Best New Horror #26, page 15
“Terribilità,” Summers intoned to himself Mortensa’s own favourite word for the architectural effect he sought to create. “Terribilità in spades!”
Turning to the nearest bookshelf, he took down a volume at random. The complete works of Angelo Ambrogini Poliziano, tutor to the son of Lorenzo de Medici, the first edition in its original binding! Again a book at random; a treasure from the Press of Aldus Manutius, a Greek bible of 1518. More, a copy of the Aldine Editio Princeps of Aristotle’s works; and a 1495–96 Idylls of Theocritus. Many bore the mark of the Florence Academy.
A beam of sunlight broke through the storm clouds and penetrated the chamber, turning the dancing motes of dust to gold. Summers smiled contentedly to himself.
“Ca’ Maledetto! Accursed, damned! If so, then let me be accursed and damned forever!”
In the days that followed, Summers settled into a pleasing routine. A bracing walk from his lodgings to Via Serpente, where he entered the palazzetto by the much less salubrious landward entrance. Bramanti had been as good as his word, for he found an adequate if unsafe looking heater in the library. Two large keys, joined with string, lay on the desk; one quite plain, the other beautifully ornate, with a gorgon head embossed upon it. Summers assumed that the more ornate one would wind the clock, but it was the plain one that worked. The hours struck with a mellow sound, like distantly heard church bells, and the automata moved.
On examination, Summers concluded that the scene was the flaying of Marsyas. On the left-hand side stood Apollo playing his lyre; on the right the L’arrotino or knife-sharpener crouched to whet his blade. Between them Marsyas hung by his wrists in preparation for his bloody punishment. At every hour Apollo plucked his lyre, the crouching figure sharpened his little knife, and Marsyas opened his mouth in a silent scream, turning his head stiffly from side to side. The clock was charming, and the sound pleasant, but Summers was aware at every chiming that a gathered silence of many years was being disturbed.
Every morning he researched among the Mortensa books and papers, had lunch at a local trattoria recommended by Bramanti, wandered back through the convolutions of Via Serpente, spent the early afternoon browsing over some interesting volume, then worked again until early evening. On Sunday he went to Mass in a local church, but not Mortensa’s, a visit to which he was saving as a special treat.
Rain swept in waves over the roofs and cupolas of Venice, but lost in his work, Summers hardly noticed. On days of particularly foul weather he took to bringing his lunch with him and not leaving the palazzetto at all.
The library was a delight. Once he approached a door alongside the great clock and only realised as he reached out to open it that it was a staggering piece of trompe l’œil. The bibliophilic joys, too, were unending. One afternoon he wasted hours, lost in a 1499 Hypnerotomachia Poliphili, the vellum binding and heavy, hand-made paper of which were just as ravishingly sensuous as the adventures conveyed by the text and illustrations. With a pang of envy, he came upon a long shelf of books on anatomy by the likes of Guido Guidi, Realdo Columbo and Gabrielle Fallopio, though surprisingly (and for Summers disappointingly) not a sign of an Andreas Vesalius De humani corporis fabrica, the one book on the subject he would have bet on finding.
Perhaps the explanation for this last mystery lay in an annotation in one of the other works:
Arteries are long and hollow with a double skin to convey the vital spirits; to discern which the better, they say that Vesalius the anatomist was wont to cut men up alive.
Had that rumour offended the devout Mortensa’s Christian spirit so much that he would not allow a copy in his library?
Every day something memorable occurred. Once he took down a set of matching “volumes” with no labels and found they were false books full of mounted cameos and intaglios, each set enriched at the centre with a gold Tiberius. Most exciting of all, when he examined the section of the shelves devoted to architecture, he found that the copies of Vitruvius, Alberti, Palladio and the anonymous Sepulchres of Etruria, were all annotated by Mortensa himself!
At least they were in part so annotated. Summers found two similar but distinguishable hands, and realised with a flutter of excitement, that here before him was the first record of a relationship mentioned by Vasari.
For surely the second hand must belong to Antonio Borsini, Mortensa’s protégé, who had been groomed to take over the master’s mantle, and had so spectacularly betrayed him by disappearing with their work on San Bartolomeo scarcely begun, escaping just before anonymous denunciation for heretical and blasphemous activities.
On first reading Vasari’s account, Summers had been humbled by Mortensa’s Christian forbearance. Such a blow might have justified a bitter denunciation from the great architect, but this was a man who habitually dressed in skull-cap and cassock, and donated many holy relics to the churches he built. All that he had allowed himself was a gentle statement of disappointment and a heartfelt offer of forgiveness and support, if only the young man would return.
The two hands were similar, but Summers thought he could discern which was which by the tone of the annotations. This surely was Mortensa, writing of The Knowledge of perfect proportions, the harmony which produces beauty, and beside an exquisite little sketch of the human form within a church ground plan, the words The interior of the body is a divine secret. The character of Borsini, on the other hand, was readily identified in such passages as Some divide demons into nine degrees, standing contrary to the nine orders of angels. The first of these are called false gods, who would be worshipped as gods and would demand sacrifices and Adorations. Another example, on sculptural decoration, recorded, The rams heads refer to the power of destruction as the ram is the acknowledged symbol of Pluto, Lord of the Dead. And perhaps worst of all: Even as our brother in the divine Counsels of Night, Morto da Feltre, descended into the subterranean fastnesses of Rome’s ruins, there to draw the grotesques, and from such inspiration invented sgraffito, whereby a design in white is only delineated by the presence of its black ground, so do we seek the ancient wisdom that we may build in marble that which depends, for its true meaning, upon the Four Strengths of Shadow.
Perhaps Mortensa had been too kindly and naïve to recognise the dangerous drift of such comments.
Summers came upon another troubling example of Borsini’s influence on the Mortensa Library during these first days, a huge canvas-bound folio among the architectural volumes. As he turned the pages he found a fabulous scrapbook of carefully tipped-in drawings, on carta bombasina, of mythological scenes. The style and the medium—bistre, Chinese ink and chalks—were so reminiscent of Tiepolo that a less academic mind might have become excited. Summers had seen enough of such works in researching his books to know that drawings in the style of great Venetian artists had been a speciality of many highly talented contemporary fakers. Still, even if these works were to be categorised as “After Tiepolo”, they were still very fine.
What did shock Summers slightly was the subject matter. There must have been twenty or more studies of the Centaur Nessus raping the nymph Dejanira, and a very large number depicting what he could only describe as families of satyrs eating, dancing, making sacrifice to their gods and even making love.
Now this would not be surprising in the library of almost any other architect of that era—all of whom were in some way products of the classical tradition—but Mortensa had been such a devout man, all but saintly in his embodiment of the Christian virtues.
The clue lay in the annotations that accompanied certain drawings, quotations from Pomponius Mela on the subject of satyrs, and extensive references to the Diversorum veterum poetarum in Priapum Lusus, an Aldine edition published in Venice in 1517. All were in the same hand as the previous annotations on demons. Summers recognised here, quite literally, the hand of Borsini.
A single bell began to toll mournfully from the tower of San Bartholomeo. The clouds had parted and the sun was beating on the rooftops of Venice. He would get some fresh air, and perhaps visit Mortensa’s church at last, before a bite of lunch.
Crossing the canal by the nearest bridge, Summers navigated a tangle of calli and cortes to the church. Before entering, he could not resist a look back at the windows of Ca’ Mortensa, thinking how strange it was that he had been inside that beautiful building only minutes before. A shadow passed across the library windows. It was so fleeting that he could not tell its shape. The source must be some passing bird, but it troubled him enough to pause and satisfy himself that there was no recurrence before entering the church.
If Mortensa had been aiming for terribilità with his exterior, the intention inside must have been very different. Summers had never seen a more pious, contemplative church interior in his life. Austere enough indeed to justify the claim once made that Mortensa was the Savanarola of architecture! The green, yellow and black marble created a soothing, submerged atmosphere that suited the rippling greenish light from outside. Summers wandered around in quiet delight, wondering why this architect had never been numbered among the great. Perhaps it was the obvious piety and Christian virtue of the man that was out of step with the tenor of these cynical times. There were no concessions to irreligious sensibilities.
There was a particularly gruesome martyrdom of Saint Bartholomew after Tiepolo (a good deal further “after” than the drawings in the library), and Summers’ eye was also caught by an oblong of murky light that turned out to be a case full of sacred relics. These included some implements of torture, a few leathery rags of skin stretched over ornate frames, and some shrivelled, unidentifiable body parts including a delicately beautiful human head, all mummified by time.
Kneeling there, he tried to see them devoutly as holy objects, but found that he could not banish from his mind the guilty idea of condemned meat in some nightmarish butcher’s window.
There was a danger that this would spoil his lunch. In any case, a cleric in a cassock was approaching, no doubt with some prepared lecture he did not want; he left swiftly.
On his way to the trattoria, Summers thought the cleric had followed him as far as the bridge, but the dazzle of the low sun was playing tricks, for the shivery reflection in the waters below showed a bridge but no figure.
A good meal and a half carafe of red wine later, Summers made his way happily back to the palazzetto. The late Contessa’s devotee was leaving as he let himself in by the landward door, and she tried to engage him in conversation. He could understand little of her quickly-spoken Venetian dialect, and merely nodded politely as he pushed by. Clearly, Bramanti had failed to pass on the message that he was not out to pillage the relics of her devotion. In her distressed state, the oddly pronounced slang was all but impenetrable, but he caught enough words to feel offended. She seemed to be calling him an uninvited intruder, and used words such as monstrous and horrible. The pleasant mood created by his lunch was quite ruined.
In the murky light within, the Venetian mirrors distorted shapes, so that a bronze Antinous or Furietti centaur of red marble glimpsed in their mottled depths seemed to shift and gesture as he passed. In the library he was troubled to find that his books and papers on the desk had been disturbed. At once the idea came to him that the mad acolyte had been snooping, and had acted out her show of welcome merely to throw him off the scent. If so he was at a loss to know what the faintly reddish mess was that dappled the papers and books. Could it be henna, rouge or lipstick? A volume of classical verse lay open, and a smudgy stain lay like a clumsy underlining on the page.
The dappled worm is the murderer
within the eye of blooming vines
A veiled threat? Or was she mad enough to see anyone who threatened her shrine as a murderer? He would make sure he locked the door from now on.
And so he did. The papers and books were undisturbed next day. Pleased with himself for having thwarted her, he worked well all morning, lunched contentedly and returned to the library rubbing his hands in anticipation. While all of Venice lay under a spell of sleep, he would select some choice volume and browse away an hour or two. Almost he was tempted to take down the folio of mythological drawings, but after a few drinks the subject matter might turn his thoughts in unwonted directions, so instead he chose a treasure of Venetian printing that was hardly conducive to lascivious thoughts: The Feast of the Sensa, being an account of the ceremony of the Doge’s ritual espousal of the Sea on Corpus Christi day.
Summers had heard of this charming ritual enacted yearly, when a wedding ring was cast by the Doge into the waters to ensure the favours of the ocean, so necessary for a sea-faring empire. That indeed was how the account began, but when the Doge set off in the ceremonial splendour of his bucintoro for the open sea, a second Doge similarly clad was described leaving in a covered gondola through the canals to a certain house, named Phytonteo, where he descended by secret ways to a chamber deep below the level of the waters, a dark and noisome place, hung with weapons of torture. There, at an altar raised to other, older gods, he performed a very different rite.
Summers considered his Italian better than adequate, but the strange archaic mixture of Italian, Venetian dialect and Latin in which the book was written confused him. Which of the two Doges was the real one? What did Phytonteo mean? Did the rite culminate in the Doge sacrificing a victim to the waters, or was it the Doge himself who died in monstrous butchery? The tone and subject matter of the book brought to his mind some words of Lawrence on Venice with which Summers had felt no empathy until now
Abhorrent green slippery city, whose Doges were old, and had ancient eyes.
The day was beginning to fade down the long reaches of the library. He should really turn on a lamp, but his surroundings were more than usually beautiful at this time, disclosed and concealed in perfect measure, and even one lamp might spoil a light so richly insufficient. Letting the book slip into his lap, he dozed.
The chiming of the great clock awoke him. He was looking downwards at a shiny expanse of frozen swirls and eruptions of faded colour, fired to life by a strange, tawny light. Faint, reflected images hung inverted just below the smooth surface, but he knew he was not looking at liquid. He was slumped forward in his chair, looking down at the terrazzo floor of the library, now ablaze with the last, low shafts of the setting sun.
There was a sound of movement across the floor in his direction. He remained still, in the posture he had assumed in sleep. If it was the Contessa’s acolyte, she was in for a big surprise.
He could recognise the sound now, bare feet slapping wetly on the cold, marble floor in an uneven, shambling step that seemed too light for one of such rotund form. He became aware of a smell, like stagnant well water; a reflection swam over the undulating surface, into the range of his downcast eyes, and he knew with a horrible certainty that it was not her. The outline he saw was much taller, and much, much thinner, with a head hairless enough to form a bony outline, and gnarly limbs trailing ragged shreds that the figure was attempting to gather around itself with weak, ineffectual movements. It shook and shivered as it moved, and Summers heard a low moan of pain or despair. He was unable to move, or raise his eyes to look fully on what approached him in a wave of ever colder, ever more foul air. As it drew closer, he closed his eyes and clenched himself, still unable to move or breath.
Nothing happened. He risked opening his eyes.
The shape was passing to one side of his seat, towards the nearest book-shelves. By peering out of the corner of his eye, he saw the dimly reflected figure reach towards the books, touch one, and resolve itself into the veins and swirls of colour in the stone. Forcing himself to look up, he confirmed that the figure was gone.
It was just possible that he had confused sleeping and waking, and what he had just seen had not really happened. The test of that theory could hardly be avoided. Crossing to the spot where the reflection had last been, he examined the books before him and found—let him admit it at least to himself, with no real surprise—a familiar dapple of reddish dampness on one of the vellum spines.
Summers drew it out and looked at the title page. It was a volume of Herodotus published by Gregorio de Gregoriis. Returning a little shakily to his seat, he examined it.
There were no annotations or apparent insertions, but the book would not close properly, springing open at a page with no obvious significance. The cause was a piece of paper slipped into a split in the vellum at the head of the spine. It was written in a hand that Summers now recognised, but was a rough draft for a letter, and therefore difficult to decipher. The writer could no longer tolerate the blasphemous and cruel actions in which he had been forced to participate, and unless they ceased, he would have no choice but to denounce the perpetrator, destroying his high renown.
The choice of words was a little convoluted, and the writing scarcely decipherable, so perhaps his translation was faulty. What he had found must be a last attempt by Mortensa to warn Borsini of the consequences of his actions. Yes, that was surely what it must be. In any case, it was high time he got away from this place for a while. With some relief he returned to his lodgings.
That night sleep did not come easily to him. The events of the day replayed themselves in his head. Frightened as he had been by the moment of its appearance, Summers felt that the apparition had done nothing to suggest that it meant him any harm. On the contrary, the whole effort of the poor creature had been to draw his attention to the letter. Was it then Mortensa who had returned? But if so, why had he ever hidden the rough draft, and why was it so important that Summers be shown its hiding place?
