The Botticelli Secret - By Marina Fiorato Page 0,89

unimpressed; he was clearly parroting knowledge that he had learned not one hour ago, in order to impress his court, and my lip curled a little in contempt.

“Indeed,” rejoined Brother Guido enthusiastically. “The Pantheon still exemplifies the Roman aim for perfection in structural integrity and philosophical harmony.” His statement, unstudied and unrehearsed (and to me incomprehensible), made me as proud of his learning as if he were my eldest son, but Don Ferrente’s countenance soured.

“To be sure.”

Brother Guido did not heed the king’s tone but continued to marvel, turning this way and that as if calculating the volume of the space above his head. “So, the hemisphere of roof actually becomes a full sphere in the space between roof and marble floor! It is miraculous.”

Don Ferrente was forced to agree or betray his ignorance. He nodded sagely. “The sacred geometry of the cosmos.”

This was a little too pagan for Brother Guido’s palate. “Created by God.”

The king let this pass. “And note, too, my lord, the pavimentum.” Don Ferrente used a phrase that had clearly never passed his lips before tonight.

But he was outclassed. “Ah, yes, the pavimentum—in the opus sectile style, I see.”

Here Brother Guido flummoxed both myself and the king.

“Circles within squares,” he instructed, “as in the geography of Ptolemy. The Romans have succeeded in squaring the circle!” He laughed and I saw the king laugh along and then mentally retain the phrase, while at the same time shooting a look of ice at the ever-present Santiago. I knew then who had been sent to garner the knowledge to brief the king for his tour, and that the majordomo would be held responsible for the yawning gaps in His Majesty’s knowledge. I could not feel sorry for him.

Don Ferrente was soon to gain the ascendancy, with a mind-numbingly dull inventory of every type of marble the blasted Romans had used for the floor. A slab resembling a slice of salami was named as purple imperial porphyry from Egypt. Pavings as pink as porco grasso pâté were called docimian pavonazzetto from Asia Minor, and the flagstones so yellow it seemed as if someone had vomited on the floor were described by the king as giallo numidiana marble from Carthage. Granito grigio pavings that resembled nothing so much as dirty snow were pronounced to come from the northwest, Gaul or the Alps. I stopped listening at about this point but I knew that Brother Guido would respond fittingly.

“Incredible,” he said. “A statement of imperium writ in marble.”

My proud smile slipped a little as Brother Guido’s pronouncements began to annoy me. I wished he could speak plain Tuscan. I saved the king the shame of asking for a translation. “What?”

“I meant only that the Romans have here built a pavement that exemplifies, sorry, shows every part of their empire set into one floor from edge to edge. From all four corners of the Roman Mediterranean they have brought these marble spoils expressing conquest of Egypt, Asia, Carthage, and Gaul. It is a political statement—propaganda in porphyry.”

Jesu.

Don’t get me wrong, I was well pleased with this intellectual pissing contest, and thought it clever of him to have instigated it back in Naples, but I wished Brother Guido would use his game of bones to produce more about the plot of the Seven. I drew him aside and whispered some of this, as if I were prettily leaning in for a caress.

Brother Guido drew back, surprised. “But it is all about that. Every word was significant, every syllable relevant to our quest.”

“Even all that cant about the marble?” I hissed.

“Especially that.” His breath tickled my ear. “Were you not listening closely?”

He had me there. “Just try and find out something, anything, actually related to this pickle of ours.” I mouthed into his neck, “Please.”

Brother Guido pushed me gently away and turned to our host with the utmost courtesy. “And what do we do here, Majesty? Are we to celebrate an evening mass?”

The king smiled. “After a fashion—not of God but of nature. The old gods hold sway tonight. Look. It begins. Watch the moon carefully through the oculus, for truly there is no better place in Rome to see such a spectacle.” His courtiers gathered around us, and his servants began to extinguish the torches. We were clearly at the appointed hour for whatever we had come to see.

I looked up, and the moon, bright and perfectly full, sat serenely in the heavens as it always did. It looked perfectly ordinary, except—wait. “The moon