Of Love and Evil (6 page)

“This one young man, Vitale de Leone, prays urgently and faithfully, and so passionately do others pray for him that they are storming Heaven’s gates.”

Down we were moving, closer and closer to the rooftop gardens, closer to the domes and steeples, until finally we could see the maze of crooked stairways and alleyways that made up the streets of Rome.

“You yourself in this world are a Jew, named Toby, and you are a lutenist as you will soon discover, and let that be a key to you as to how much of your varied talent will be needed to see this venture through. Now you are known as one who is imperturbable and can bring consolation to the troubled through his music, so you will be welcomed when you arrive.

“Be brave, and be loving, and be open to all those who need you—especially to our frantic and much discouraged Vitale, who is a trusting man by nature, and who so valiantly prays for assistance. I count upon your cleverness as always, your nerve, and your cunning. But just as much I count upon your generous and educated heart.”

A
S
I
EMERGED ONTO A SMALL PIAZZA BEFORE A HUGE
stone palazzo a crowd broke as if it had been waiting for me.

It was not the mob I’d encountered in England on my last escapade for Malchiah, but clearly there were goings-on here and I was being plunged into their very midst.

The crowd were Jews, almost all of them, or so it seemed because so many wore a round yellow circle attached to their clothes, and others wore blue tassels on the ends of their long velvet tunics. These were rich men, men of influence, and their bearing told me this as well as their dress.

As for me, I was dressed in a fine tunic of rolled velvet, with slashed sleeves with silver linings, leggings that were clearly costly and brightly dyed green and tall leather boots. I wore a pair of fine fur-trimmed leather gloves. On my back I carried by its thin leather strap a lute! I wore the round yellow patch as well. And when I realized this, I felt a certain vulnerability I’d never known before.

My hair was shoulder length and blond and curly, and I was more stunned by recognizing myself in this garb than by anything that the crowd before me might do.

They were one and all stepping aside for me and gesturing
to the gate of the house through which I could just see the light of the courtyard inside.

I knew this was my destination. No doubt of it. But before I could reach for a bell rope, or call out a name, one of the elders of the crowd stepped up as if to bar my way.

“You enter that house at your own peril,” he said. “It’s in the possession of a dybbuk. We have called the elders together three times to exorcise this demon, but we have failed.

“Yet the headstrong young man who owns the house won’t leave. And now the world, which once trusted him and respected him, has begun to regard him with fear and contempt.”

“Nevertheless,” I said, “I’m here to see him.”

“This is not good for any of us,” said another one of the men present. “And your playing a lute for his patient is not going to change what is happening under this roof.”

“What then would you say I should do?” I asked.

An uneasy laughter went through the group. “Stay clear of this house and stay clear of Vitale ben Leone until he determines to leave it and the owner decides to have it pulled down.”

The house looked immense with four stories of round arched windows, and the action described seemed desperate.

“I tell you something evil has taken up its habitation here,” said one of the other men. “Can you hear it? Can you hear the noises inside?”

I could in fact hear the noises inside. It sounded as if things were being thrown about. And it seemed that something made of glass was shattered.

I banged on the gate. Then I saw the rope for the bell and pulled hard on it. If the bell rang, it was deep within the interior of the house.

The men around me backed away as the gate finally opened,
and a young gentleman, about my age, stood squarely on the threshold. He had thick black shoulder-length curly hair and deep-set dark eyes. He was as finely dressed as I was in a padded tunic and leggings and he wore Moroccan leather slippers on his feet.

“Ah, good, you’ve come,” he said to me, and without so much as a word to the others, he pulled me inside the courtyard of the house.

“Vitale, leave this place before you’re ruined,” said one of the men to him.

“I refuse to run,” Vitale answered. “I will not be driven out. And besides, Signore Antonio owns this house and he is my patron and I do as he says. Niccolò is his son, is he not?”

The gate was shut and the heavy wooden door closed and bolted.

An old servant stood there holding a candle which he shielded with his skeletal fingers.

But the sharp light came from the high roof into the courtyard, and only when we started up the broad stone steps did we find ourselves plunged into shadow and in need of the little flame to guide our way.

It was like many an Italian house, showing only drab windowed walls to the streets, but its interior was worthy of the word “palazzo,” and I was enthralled by the sheer size and solidity of it as we made our way through vast and polished rooms. I glimsed beautifully frescoed walls, floors of rich marble tile, and a wealth of dark tapestries.

A loud crashing noise sounded somewhere and this brought our little party to a halt.

The old servant uttered some prayers in Latin, and crossed himself, which surprised me, but the young man with me appeared fearless and defiant.

“I won’t be driven out by it,” he said. “I will find out what it is that it wants. And as for Niccolò, I will find a way to cure him. I am not cursed and I am no poisoner.”

“That’s what they’re accusing you of? Of poisoning your patient?”

“It’s because of the ghost. If it weren’t for the ghost, I would be under no suspicion whatsoever. And because of the ghost I can’t attend to Niccolò, which is what I should be doing now. I put the word out for you to play the lute for Niccolò.”

“Then let’s go to him, and I’ll play the lute just as you’ve asked me.”

He stared at me, indecisive, and then rattled again by a fierce crash that came from what might have been the cellar.

“Do you believe this is a dybbuk here?” he asked.

“I don’t know.”

“Come into my study.” he said. “Let’s talk just for a few minutes together before we go to Niccolò.”

There were sounds now coming from everywhere, creaking doorways, and the sound of someone on a lower floor stomping his feet.

At last we opened the double doors of the study, and the servant quickly lighted several more candles for us as the shutters were drawn. The place was stacked with books and papers, and I could see glass cabinets of peeling leather volumes. It was plain some of these books were printed, and some were not. On the various small tables there were handwritten codices open, and on others papers filled with what looked like scribbling, and in the center of the room was the man’s desk.

He gestured for me to take the Roman chair beside it. And then he flopped down, put his elbows on the desk and buried his face in his hands.

“I didn’t think you would come,” he said. “I didn’t know who in Rome would play a lute for my patient now that I am in
such disgrace. Only the father of my patient, my good friend Signore Antonio, believes that any measure I take might be helpful.”

“I’ll do whatever it is you need for me to do,” I said. “I wonder if a lute might calm this troublesome spirit.”

“Oh, what an interesting thought,” he conceded, “but in this day and age of the Holy Inquisition, do you think one of us can dare to try to charm a demon? We’d be branded witches or sorcerers if we did this. Besides I need you badly at the bedside of my patient.”

“Think of me as the answer to your prayers. I’ll play for your patient and do whatever it is I can possibly do to help you with this spirit, also.”

He looked at me for a long thoughtful moment, and then he said, “I can trust you. I know that I can.”

“Good. Let me be of service to you.”

“First listen to my story. It’s brief and we have to be on our way, but let me tell you how it unfolded.”

“Yes, tell me everything.”

“Signore Antonio brought me here from Padua, along with his son Niccolò, who has become the closest friend I’ve ever had in the world, though I’m a Jew and these men are Gentiles. I was trained as a physician at Montpellier and that’s where I first met father and son, and immediately began copying medical texts from Hebrew into Latin for Signore Antonio, who has a library five times the size of this which means everything to him. Niccolò and I were drinking companions as well as fellow students, and we went on, all of us, to Padua together and then finally home to Rome, where Signore Antonio set me up in this house to prepare it for Niccolò. It’s for Niccolò and his bride, this house, but then the ghost appeared the very first night I knelt down and said my prayers here.”

There came another loud crash from above and the distinct
sound of someone walking, though it seemed to me, in a house like this, one could not have heard the sound of an ordinary person walking.

The servant was still with us, crouched by the door, holding his candle. His head was bald and pink in the light with only a few wisps of dark hair, and he stared uneasily at the pair of us.

“Go on, Pico, get out of here,” said Vitale. “Run to Signore Antonio and tell him I’m coming directly.” Gratefully the man ran out. Vitale looked at me. “I’d offer you food and drink, but there’s nothing here. The servants have run away. Everyone but Pico has run away. Pico would die for me. Perhaps he thinks that’s what’s about to happen.”

“The ghost,” I reminded him. “You said that he came the night you prayed. This meant something to you.”

He fixed me seriously for a moment. “You know, I feel I’ve known you all my life,” he said. “I feel I can tell you my most spiritual secrets.”

“You can,” I said. “But if we should see Niccolò soon, you’ll have to speak quickly.”

He sat still gazing at me, and his dark eyes had a low fire in them that I found rather fascinating. His face was filled with animation, as if he couldn’t disguise any emotion, even if he wanted to, and he seemed at any moment about to burst into some wild exclamation but instead he grew quiet and began to talk in a low running voice.

“The ghost was always here, that’s my fear. He was here and he will be here after we’re forced out. The house has been shut up for twenty years. Signore Antonio told me that long ago he had let it to one of his earlier Hebrew scholars. He will say nothing else about the man except that he once lived here. Now, he wants the house for Niccolò and Niccolò’s bride, and I’m to stay on, to be Niccolò’s secretary, and physician when
needed, and possibly the tutor to his sons when they’re born. It was all such a happy scheme, this.”

“And Niccolò was not ill yet.”

“Oh, no, far from it. Niccolò was fine. Niccolò was looking forward to his wedding to Leticia. Niccolò and Lodovico his brother were making all kinds of plans. No, nothing bad had happened to Niccolò.”

“And then you prayed that first night and the ghost began to trouble you.”

“Yes. You see, I found the room upstairs which had been the synagogue. I found the Ark and in it the old scrolls of the Torah. These had belonged to that scholar whom long ago Antonio had let live here. I knelt down and I prayed, and I fear I prayed for things I had no right to pray for.”

“Tell me.”

“I prayed for fame,” he said in a small voice. “I prayed for riches. I prayed for recognition. I prayed that, somehow, I’d become a great physician in Rome, and that I would be an outstanding scholar for Signore Antonio, perhaps translating texts for him that no one had yet discovered or made available.”

“That sounds like a very human prayer to me,” I said, “and given your gifts, it sounds quite understandable.”

He looked at me so gratefully that it was heartbreaking. “You see, I have many gifts,” he said humbly. “I have a gift for writing and reading that could keep me busy all my days. But then I have a gift as a physician as well, an ability to touch a man’s hand and know what is wrong with him.”

“Was it wrong then to pray that these gifts would flower?”

He smiled and shook his head. “You may have come to play the lute for my friend,” he said, “but right now you give me more comfort than music ever could. The point is, that very night the ghost began his rumblings, his stampings, his casting
things to the floor. It was right after my prayer, and always after he’d torn this study to pieces, and believe me, he can make the inkwells fly, he would retreat to the cellar. He would retreat and bang his fists against the casks of the cellar.”

“My friend, this ghost may have had nothing to do with your prayer. Now go on. What happened with Niccolò?”

“Well, at this time Niccolò suffered a fall from a horse. It was nothing of any consequence and the wound healed instantly. Niccolò is stronger than I am. But ever since, he’s been failing. He’s grown pale. He shudders and I tell you every day he’s worse and it’s eating at his mind, this illness, this idleness, this lying in bed and watching his own hands tremble.”

“The wound’s clean? You’re sure of it?”

“Certain. He has no fever from the wound. He has no fever at all. And the rumors, the rumors are spreading now as they always do, that I, his Jewish physician, am poisoning him! Oh, thank Heaven that Signore Antonio believes in me.”

“This is a terrible danger, this being accused of poisoning,” I said. I knew this well enough from history. No one had to tell me.

“Oh, understand, I have my indemnity from Signore Antonio, all properly signed, to treat the patient and that I’ll be paid whether he lives or dies, and no accusation can formally be brought against me. That’s the usual thing in Rome, and I have my dispensation from the Pope to treat Christians. I’ve had that for years. I’m dispensed from wearing the yellow patch. All that’s in order. My concern is not what will become of me. My concern is this ghost and why he’s here. And my concern is what will happen to Niccolò. I love Niccolò! If it weren’t for the ghost I wouldn’t be accused. And my other patients wouldn’t have fled. But I could do without them. I could do without it all. If only Niccolò were well. If only Niccolò were restored. But I must discover why this ghost plagues me and why I cannot
cure Niccolò there where he lies not one hundred feet from here in his own house growing ever weaker.”