Read Online The Alchemist's Apprentice by Dave Duncan - Free Book Online

doge had given me three, but I was allowing one for travel. I opened a drawer and selected a quill and a sheet of our best rag paper. “The attorney, Imer, is the man to start with. He must be quaking in his dancing pumps.”
    Maestro Nostradamus said, “Faugh! You still don’t know how bad this is. Take a cheaper sheet.”
    I changed the paper.
    â€œThere were about thirty guests in all,” he said, “but not all are suspect. Only the procurator was affected, so the poison was not in the bottle. It must have been put in his glass. It acts quickly but not instantaneously—I know that but the Ten do not. So the only persons who matter are those who came in to look at the manuscripts.”
    He leaned back wearing an expression of extreme smugness like a suit of plate mail. I plodded through his logic and decided it would have to do for now. I could not possibly question thirty people in two or three days.
    â€œClear crystal glasses, or colored?”
    â€œMurano ruby glass. You could not tell what anyone else was drinking, and if the poison made the wine cloudy, that would not show either.”
    â€œAnd what sort of wine?”
    â€œWe were offered a choice of three: refosco, malmsey, or retsina. I had the refosco. It was a good jar.”
    He fancies himself as a connoisseur of wines. I plan to study them when I am rich.
    â€œRefosco is red, malmsey a sweet white. The other one is Greek, yes?”
    He made a steeple of his fingers again for a sermon. “Yes. Retsina is most vile, flavored with resin. Served in honor of the Greek merchant, I suppose. It is pungent enough to hide the taste of lye or vitriol, but few Venetians would touch it. Malmsey is so sickly it might suffice. Refosco would not. Let us review the suspects. I proclaim my innocence, and in any case I was seated behind the table. I could not have put poison in anyone’s glass without standing up and stretching across, which would have been a very conspicuous action. Write my name in the first row.
    â€œThe Greek was in the room all the time. Our host came and went. As organizers of the affair, they must be suspect. Imer and Karagounis in the second row.”
    He closed his eyes to think. “I was early, as I told you. Imer and his wife greeted the guests as they arrived and saw that they were given wine. Most went to the salotto , only the book collectors came into the dining room. The first buyer to enter was Senator Tirali. He wished me well and at once walked the length of the table, on the far side from me, inspecting the goods. I felt like a shopkeeper!”
    â€œI believe you, master.” I knew of another Tirali, the senator’s son. Neither was a patient of the Maestro’s.
    â€œClose behind him came Procurator Orseolo, leaning on a cane. He and Tirali greeted each other coolly. They were old rivals as collectors.”
    â€œPut Tirali in the second row?”
    â€œI suppose so, but I doubt if their rivalry ran to murder. Orseolo had a woman attending him. I didn’t hear her name and she stayed close to him. Next came a foreign couple, who did not introduce themselves to me. They spoke in French with barbarous accents, questioning me about the books. They knew nothing about books. All they were interested in was price.”
    I added them to the second row: two foreigners.
    â€œTwo footmen poured the wine. We should include them in the second row, if the Three have not gotten to them first.” The Maestro opened his eyes. “Then sier Pasqual Tirali, Giovanni’s son. With your friend.”
    I wrote Violetta’s name in the first row and started a third for Pasqual Tirali, vowing to send him to the torturers for prolonged interrogation. I get twinges of jealousy sometimes, when I think of her evenings.
    â€œThey were the last to arrive. There was one other before them, Pietro Moro. First row.”
    I stood my quill in the inkwell, laid my forearms flat on the