The Master's Apprentice - Oliver Potzsch Page 0,125

to Heidelberg and give Jodocus my regards. You will get far with the right teacher, Johann!”

“Thank you.” Feeling a little embarrassed, Johann accepted the sealed paper.

Archibaldus turned deadly serious again. “There’s something else I must tell you. It’s about your former mentor, Tonio del Moravia. I finally know where I’ve heard the name before. It sounds incredible, but—”

Archibaldus broke off when someone entered the chapel. The figure remained in the dim twilight and moved into one of the dark side aisles, where it stood in silence. The person might have been someone who’d come to pray, or the priest preparing for the next mass, or a harmless pilgrim . . .

Or someone who followed us here, thought Johann.

He shook himself. Now he was becoming as paranoid as drunken Archibaldus.

“We can’t talk here,” whispered Archibaldus. “I want to make a few last checks before I can be absolutely certain, anyhow. The truth would be . . .” He broke off as if afraid of his own words. “I want you to come to Torcello tomorrow morning,” Archibaldus whispered. “It’s a small island in the Venetian lagoon. They say the first Roman refugees settled there. Perhaps that’s why they chose the place, or perhaps they’ve always been there.”

“What do you mean, they?” asked Johann.

“On Torcello, follow the old canal to the Ponte del Diavolo, the devil’s bridge. From there, go to the old basilica. All will be explained there. I’ll be waiting for you. And now go with God.”

Archibaldus squeezed Johann’s hand, stood up, and hurried toward the entrance. The door opened with a squeak, and the old man disappeared into the dusk. A cool draft blew in from the door and swept the rose petals from the altar.

When Johann looked back to the dark side aisle, the figure from earlier had vanished.

13

MAGISTER ARCHIBALDUS DIDN’T come to the Fondaco for the evening show, nor was he at the inn when the others returned. But no one seemed particularly worried.

“He probably just had one too many again, and now he’s sleeping it off in some alleyway,” said Emilio with a shrug. “Let’s pray he didn’t fall and drown in one of the canals.”

Johann said nothing. He’d spent the last few hours contemplating what the old man had told him about Signore Barbarese and how he’d mentioned Tonio, too. Was there a connection between the two men? He thought about Barbarese’s old house, about the upside-down paintings and the many books about sorcery. Tonio would have enjoyed those books.

The knowledge Johann had drunk in at Barbarese’s library was enormous, as vast as the ocean, and behind every thought, every idea, lurked another flash of inspiration.

And another abyss.

Johann’s thoughts returned to Margarethe. She had been afraid of Tonio the magician as a child. And, he guessed, she’d be afraid of the Johann of today, too: the grim, taciturn fellow who was consumed by books and who sought his salvation in books of spells and sorcery. Suddenly, Johann saw himself through Margarethe’s eyes and realized how much he’d changed. Were the books to blame? Was Signore Barbarese actually a devil worshipper?

Johann knew he’d have to speak to Archibaldus again to find out with certainty—provided the old man wasn’t dead drunk and already regretting his remarks from earlier.

“I’m going to look for Archibaldus tomorrow,” he told the others. “He must be somewhere.”

“Stay with me for tonight at least, and don’t go running to your whore,” said Salome, running her hand through his shaggy black hair.

He slept poorly that night, dreaming repeatedly of Margarethe. She staggered toward him with outstretched arms, her face covered in blood. But when he tried to approach her, she shrank back. Her face turned into that of Salome and then that of his mother.

Go away, go away, she breathed. You . . . are . . . the . . . devil . . .

Early in the morning, Johann awoke bathed in sweat. He turned to the sleeping Salome and kissed her gently on the cheek. Then he set off for the island of Torcello, as Archibaldus had instructed him.

He asked his way to a quiet quay in the city’s east with the help of gestures and his broken Italian. Several fishing boats moored here, and apparently they also went to the smaller islands of the lagoon. For a few coins, an older fisherman with a weather-beaten face agreed to take Johann to Torcello.

While the small boat slowly sailed through the lagoon’s still waters, Johann gazed at the many islands in front of