The Lens and the Looker (Book #1 of The Verona Trilogy)

  "I want my Mama," Lincoln cried.

  He looked around. Everyone had gone silent and was staring.

  "I don't think this one will last very long," he heard the Master whisper to Ugilino.

  "Master Lincoln, please," Pan whispered, "please find the strength to control yourself. Your self- pity will do no good here." Lincoln sat up and shook himself.

  "You gonna be all right, man?" Hansum asked.

  Lincoln didn't answer, but looked around the table again. Everyone was still staring, expressionless, except for Ugilino. He had a bit of a smile on his face. Lincoln glared at the oaf. He wanted to scream and argue, but held his tongue. He had seen the damage this Master della Cappa had done to Ugilino's scalp.

  "The day, she gets dark," the Master finally said. "Everybody eat up."

  Lincoln's stomach was telling him to eat, so he tried, but there was no joy in the food. He nibbled away, avoiding putting any pressure on his hurt tooth. Finally, he got his share of the food down. And while the mood of the Master's family and Ugilino appeared to lighten, Lincoln's mood, along with Shamira's and Hansum's, got heavier.

  "Thank you, Holy Father," the Master said as he crossed himself at the end of the meal. "So, now we go to sleep with the angels. Ugilino, show the boys where to bed. Guilietta, show Carmella her cot in the corner. She must make sure the fire is going in the morning."

  "Oh no, Papa," Guilietta said. "It is too filthy down here still. Carmella, you sleep with me tonight. This way we will be warm. Tomorrow we all clean the house together and you will have your own nice bed after that."

  "I am good at warming beds," Ugilino said.

  The Master's cup flew through the air and hit Ugilino on the cheek. "You are good for warming barns!" Ugilino laughed until the Master said, "Now get out of here and take the boys with you!"

  Chapter 27

  "Si, Master," Ugilino said.

  Hansum felt the filthy Ugilino pull at his tunic to signal him to get up and follow. Then he slapped Lincoln on the head to get him moving. When they stepped from the hovel into the dark, unlit streets of Verona, Ugilino's attitude turned as chilly as the night.

  "Come on, orphans. I show you your beds," he said forcefully.

  "Well, at least we have beds," Lincoln hissed.

  "Idioto," Ugilino muttered.

  "Where do we sleep then?" Hansum asked.

  Ugilino just grunted and walked up the laneway. They came back to the barn with the tethered cow. It mooed nervously at their presence and stomped about in the mud. Ugilino pointed to the top of the barn.

  "Another barn loft?" Hansum said.

  "You were expecting the Podesta's palace?"

  "Okay, now I'm getting pissed!" Lincoln said.

  Lincoln felt Hansum clasp his arm. "Don't sweat it, man. Remember what we agreed. Be cool and play along."

  "Play along? Play?" Lincoln said loudly. "This isn't play anymore. I'm hungry, I'm cold. I've got a friggin' broken tooth and now we have to sleep in a barn?"

  Ugilino laughed. "Hey, he thinks he's a prince."

  "And you shut up, man. I'm already sick of you!" Lincoln growled.

  Lincoln barely saw it coming. Suddenly he felt the sharp crack of Ugilino's callused hand meet his cheekbone, hard. He felt himself tumble uncontrollably backwards, bouncing off the cow and then collapsing onto the muddy ground. Through blurred vision he saw the hooves of the cow almost stomp him.

  "Hey!" Hansum shouted, coming to Lincoln's defense.

  But Ugilino didn't look angry, he just held up his hands. "Calma, Romero. Calma. That was just to make the little one relax. He is too excited."

  "You hit him on the head, Ugilino! How does that relax someone?"

  "Well, look at him. He is quiet now. Hey, if I a counted how many times the Master quiets me like that, well, I couldn't count that high."

  "Are you all right, man?" Hansum said, bending down to help Lincoln. "Can you stand?"

  "I guess so." He stumbled to his feet with Hansum's help.

  "Come on. Into the loft," Ugilino ordered. "It's almost too dark to see. Come." When the two didn't move, he repeated sternly, "Come!"

  Hansum thought how in the twenty-fourth century there was always light when needed. But not here. As the boys entered the barn, their feet bumped into things on the floor. Some were hard, some were mushy. They came to the ladder and Ugilino was already half the way up it.

  "One at a time," he warned. "It could break." A few seconds later, he called from the top, "Okay, come."

  Hansum saw there was good reason for Ugilino's warning. The ladder's rungs were tied to the uprights with hemp twine, and most of the knots had become loose. Hansum went up, gingerly stepping on each rung, his natural physicality showing. Lincoln barely made it up. Each of his unsure steps caused the ladder to wobble more.

  "Careful. Slowly," Hansum cautioned, then grabbed Lincoln's arm when he got to the top and guided him into the loft. Outside, the clouds parted and moonlight shone through the open haymow door. The loft was nothing more than the old thatched roof on boards over the barn. It was cramped. Piles of straw were everywhere. As Hansum's eyes accustomed themselves to the light, he thought he saw a black blur zip in the opening. There was a fluttering around his head and in his ears. Then it was gone.

  "We sleep here," Ugilino announced.

  "Here?" Lincoln asked incredulously. "There's no beds."

  "I told you . . ."

  "I know, this isn't the Podesta's palace," he said, glowering.

  "Hey, he learns fast."

  "Are there blankets?" Hansum asked.

  "Wha?" Ugilino's face crinkled up into a questioning mass of wrinkles.

  "You know, a cover to put over you when you sleep."

  The ugly apprentice's face then broke out into a devilish smile. "Oh yes, Prince. I think we have one over here." He reached into the shadows and pulled out an old horse blanket. It was stiff and encrusted with the dried horse sweat, bird droppings, rain and mold. "This will keep you nice and snug. Eh, you two can share it."

  "Where's the poe?" Lincoln asked. Ugilino's face wrinkled into another question mark. "The bathroom." Of course, there was no phrase for bathroom in the fourteenth century. That was about five hundred years away.

  "Where do we take a, you know, a pee?" Lincoln said. Ugilino gave him a look that said he still didn't know what he meant. "Poop?" Lincoln said. More lines of confusion on Ugilino's face. Finally Lincoln did something that translated perfectly. He crouched down, screwed up his face and made a raspberry farting sound with his lips. Ugilino began to laugh.

  "Oh, merda, merda! Merda and piss. Of course, my Princes. I shall get your royal commode." Ugilino went to the open haymow door and bent down. When he stood, he was holding an old ceramic chamber pot without a lid. He made a grand march of walking it back to the boys. "Here, your royal orphaned highnesses, your royal bowl. Do you wish me to wipe your delicate behinds for you too?" He held it directly under their noses. It was full.

  "What the . . ." Lincoln cried as the odoriferous fumes entered his nostrils.

  "Oh, a thousand apologies, magnificent spawn of nobody-knows-who. The pot at this time does not have noble merda in it, only that of a peasant."

  "Whose?" Lincoln asked, his eyes burning.

  "Me. It is mine from last night and this morning. Oh, it was a magnificent evacuation."

  "Don't you ever empty it?" Hansum asked, gagging.

  "Of course." And with that, Ugilino went to the haymow door and threw the contents into the night. They heard a splash, followed by a long and miserable bovine cry.

  The tension in the loft was high. Hansum could see Lincoln shaking with rage. He was about to explode. To keep the younger boy under control, Hansum took hold of his arm and squeezed tightly again.

  "Ugilino," Hansum said to the ugly apprentice, "if we are to live together, it would be best we get along."

  "To get along is easy. Just do what the Master and I say. And stay away from Guilietta. I saw the w
ay you looked at her."

  "It seems everyone did," Hansum said.

  "Who?" Ugilino asked suspiciously. "The Master? You watch it! She's to be mine!"

  "Well, that cut on your head says you're not first choice for a son-in-law either."

  "The Master will come around. The Signora told me the story how her father did not like him at first. But after he saw what a good lensmaker he was and how he could be a good provider, he changed his mind."

  "So you are a lensmaker?" Hansum asked.

  "Not yet. But because I stole back one of the Master's lathes from the Jews who repossessed it, the Master promised he would teach me. So you see, I have a plan. And as my priest back in Florence said, a man without a plan will soon be with Satan. So I must get going."

  "How's that?" Hansum enquired.

  "To go out and get things."

  "But it's night. The market's closed."

  "Oh, my market is open all the time."

  Hansum and Lincoln stared at each other, trying to think what Ugilino was referring to.

  "Wait a moment," Hansum finally said incredulously. "You're going to steal things?" For twenty-fourth-century people, stealing was unknown, something only mentally ill people did. And there were very few of those.

  "Of course," Ugilino laughed. "Since we only moved in I'll just roam the streets, learning what's where and whose it is. My only purchase will be if someone leaves me an easy bargain that can't be denied. Come with me, Romero. It will be fun." Ugilino smiled, his broken teeth glowing in the moonlight.

  "No. No, I better stay here with Lin . . . with Maruccio. He doesn't look so good."

  Ugilino's smile disappeared. "This one?" Ugilino said, jabbing his finger close to Lincoln's eye. "I agree with the Master. I don't think this one will last very long."

  "I'm going to stay here," Hansum repeated.

  Ugilino didn't look happy. He spit. "I will be back before morning." And with that, he was gone.

  Chapter 28

  Hansum and Lincoln looked around the loft. The haymow's opening used to have two working doors, but now one was lying on the floor and the other was hanging by a single leather hinge. Open to the elements, the temperature was dropping and the clouds began to cover the moon again. Another black flash passed the boys, leaving a flapping echo in their ears.

  "History Camp is starting to sound pretty good," Lincoln said, shuddering.

  The loft lit up from an artificial source. It was Pan, popping his head out of Hansum's shoulder. "Greetings, Young Masters," the head said. The image turned into a small whirlwind and a full-bodied, meter-high version of Pan landed, feet first, on the floor.

  "So," Lincoln said, "at least we can see now."

  "We better be careful," Hansum warned. "Your light could attract attention."

  "Quite right, Young Master. Let's retire to yon corner where I spy a largish mound of straw. You both can ensconce yourselves within it and thus be somewhat insulated from the intemperate night air." Pan opened his eyes wide, turning them into flashlights. The boys sat in the straw and scooped it around them. Pan lounged back into the straw. "It's so nice to just kick back and relax with friends," the hologram said.

  "Let's get serious here," Hansum said. "Do you really think Arimus has abandoned us here in the fourteenth century? That we're here by ourselves for a month?"

  "It would appear so," Pan said.

  "But why would they?" Hansum wondered. "The History Camp people, I mean."

  "Impossible to really know," Pan answered. "But it's obviously a hard lesson they've planned."

  "They planned to let us get beat up and broken?" Lincoln asked, feeling his broken tooth.

  "I don't know, Young Master, but as you've experienced, these truly are not enactors who will restrain their actions. I think we have no choice but to continue fitting in and observing."

  As if on cue, a blast of cold wind blew in through the open haymow door. Straw and straw dust blew into the boys' faces. They shivered and pulled their hats down over their ears. Then they huddled close for warmth. Pan lowered his personal light emanations and they listened in silence as rain beat down on the thatched roof.

  "It's going to be a long night," Lincoln said, finally closing his eyes.

  "I wonder what Charlene is doing right now..."

  Chapter 29

  Lincoln laughed out loud when he heard the unmistakable sound of a raspberry. He knew he was dreaming, and thought he was reliving last night's miming of going poe while crouching. Then the sound became more real. He opened his eyes and the dream disappeared. It was replaced by the sight of Ugilino relieving himself in a chamber pot about six feet from Lincoln's face.

  "Buon giorno, my sleeping princes," Ugilino rasped cheerfully. "Oh, little Maruccio, such a sweet smile you had on your face." Lincoln's smile turned instantly to a frown. He tried to get up fast, but was stiff from sleeping in the cold. Hansum was in a similar state. Straw had gotten under their clothing and both scratched at themselves. Ugilino took a handful of straw and gave a perfunctory wipe at his nether regions. He then flicked it out the haymow door and pulled up his chausses. "Come on, orphans. Come eat before the Signora steals all your food."

  Lincoln was trying to scratch in places he couldn't reach.

  "I'm itching like there's no tomorrow!" he cried. The modern saying, translated into old Italian, sounded quite novel to Ugilino.

  "You are very funny, Maruccio. I hope you don't die quick," he said going down the ladder. Hansum was ready to go, but Lincoln wasn't.

  "Ugly might be able to poe in front of people, but I can't," Lincoln told Hansum. "You go ahead."

  ***

  "Ah, finally my youngest apprentice arrives." Agistino della Cappa truly felt in a good mood this morning. Hope, that elusive impulse of late, seemed to be burning brightly in him. "Soon we shall have figs and olives for repast, and all will be well again," he said.

  He looked at Lincoln, staring at the young man's head. Lincoln quickly pulled his liripipe off. Dust flew up and hair popped out in every direction. The table broke into gales of laughter.

  "I saved this for you," Shamira giggled, putting their shared bowl in front of him. There was the same bread and pork as the night before, and a glass of warm water.

  "We had wine in the morning at the last place," Lincoln said, still whistling whenever he said an s.

  "He still thinks he is at the Podesta's palace," Ugilino joked.

  "We do not have wine in this house," Guilietta whispered.

  Lincoln thought for a second and looked at the Master.

  "Oh, right."

  "I want wine," the Signora squawked.

  "Drink your tea, woman," the Master said without looking at her. "You too, Maruccio. Eat, eat." The youngest apprentice nibbled cautiously at the meat and especially the bread. Agistino smiled. "There's cleaning and preparation to get to when you're done." Then the Master said thoughtfully, "Verona may be just the place for us. We must get to know it and its people well. For nobody in this city makes discs for the eyes. They all come from Florence."

  "I went for a walk last night and met people," Ugilino offered.

  "You weren't out stealing again, were you?"Agistino said, glaring at the ugly apprentice. "I don't want this house to be known for that."

  "Oh no, Master. In fact, I met a priest and helped him."

  "What?"

  "In the street. A Father Lurenzano. He was going to give the last rites to a little girl near the Arena. I went with him and helped."

  "How could you help with last rites?"

  "I carried the body back to his church, San Francesco al Corso. It was a long way outside the old city walls. That little girl got awful heavy. He even gave me something to eat before I came home."

  It hadn't looked like the Signora was listening, but she piped up, "He's already eaten today. Give me his porco."

  "Carrying the bambina was hard work," Ugilino insisted.

  "Drink your tea, Mama," Guilietta urged.

&
nbsp; "Did you see him reading his bible?" the Master asked. "Could he read easily?"

  "Oh, he had a hard time, Master. Squinting and moving his head around." Ugilino held his palms out in front of him, and bobbed his head, as if he were trying to focus.

  "Good, good. Maybe we can sell him some discs for the eyes."

  "Oh, I get it, Master. That's very good," Ugilino said.

  "We must get to know all the priests and all the merchants who can read and keep ledgers. That is how I became famous in Florence. So," the Master said, standing up and clapping his hands, "today we start our journey back to solvency. Girls, clean and put away the utensils. Ugilino, fix that shelf on the wall so the girls can put the kitchenware on it. New apprentices, gather up all the old straw and remove it from the house. Put it in a pile out front for now. Carmella, as the boys take away the straw, you sweep the floor. Then, boys, bring fresh straw from the barn. We will have a clean home today, for cleanliness is next to godliness."

  Not long after that, the air was heavy with dust.

  "Master, couldn't we open the shutters?" Shamira asked, coughing.

  "Si, Father, it will be much cheerier that way," Guilietta said. "The sun is coming out and it looks like it will be a warm day."

  The Master looked at his radiant daughter and a smile came to his lips.

  "Perhaps we've been living in a dark place in our minds as well as our home. Si, let's open the shutters!"

  Guilietta's mother awakened from her stupor. "No, don't let the sun in. Michael likes it dark. His halo and wings show up better."

  "Quiet, woman," the Master said.

  "The sun will make you feel better, Mistress," Hansum said, smiling.

  The Signora seemed taken aback by this servant's audacity. She grabbed Guilietta's arm.

  "Take me to my bed," she pleaded.

  While Guilietta tended to her mother upstairs, work proceeded on the main floor.

  "The landlord nailed the windows shut when the building became vacant," the Master said.

  "I'll fix it," Ugilino said, grabbing the fireplace poker and banging the shutters with it. "This'll get the windows open quick."

  "Idioto, stop!" the Master cursed. "You're breaking the frame!" He sent Ugilino upstairs to get an iron pry bar and hammer from the stash of precious tools hidden under his bed. Agistino methodically pulled the nails out one by one, extracting each carefully, and putting them in a neat pile for reuse later.