Chapter 13 The Shipmasters Strongbox #3
The account book was not a full ledger. It seemed to be a shipmaster's private copy or working abstract, with quantities entered beside abbreviated names: grain, salted meat, lamp oil, rope, quarrels, iron fittings, timber, cloth, wine.
Some entries carried ports. Others carried names of factors or guarantors. Several lines were crossed through.
Adelasia touched one page without laying her finger on the ink.
"Here."
Lucetta read.
A shipment designated for eastern provisioning had been divided. One portion went as expected. Another was redirected under a chain of endorsements. The names were abbreviated, but the route moved westward through intermediaries she recognized from earlier Brotherhood accounts.
One notation in the margin used a Proven?al form.
Not a confession. Not proof of theft. Not even proof that the diversion had been unlawful. But it was a road in ink.
"We inventory first," Lucetta said, though every part of her wanted to read ahead.
Adelasia nodded. "We inventory first."
That decision saved them.
A crash sounded above, followed by a shout cut short.
Bertran's sword came free.
Ysoria was already moving toward the stair when one of Giuliano's men stumbled into the lower room clutching his shoulder.
"Men at the quay door. Three—four—more behind. They say the watch ordered inspection. They have no watch badges."
Giuliano swore.
Bertran pointed. "Bar the upper stair. Nobody carries the coffer. Niccolò, wrap the key and put the acknowledgment with it. Lucetta chooses what papers matter if we must abandon the rest. Adelasia, help her. Orsino, can the locks be closed again?"
"Yes."
"Do it after we remove what cannot be lost. Naldo—"
Naldo was already on his feet, face white from pain.
"Sit down," Bertran snapped.
"If men are at the quay door, sitting is a poor defense."
"You cannot run."
"Then give me a place from which running is unnecessary."
Bertran looked at him once, judged, and pointed to the inner angle by the stair. "There. Staff, not knife. You stop one man from passing. You do not chase anyone."
Naldo grinned without humor. "At last, work suitable to an invalid."
Beatrice had not moved from the coffer. "My papers."
"Take your authenticated copy," Lucetta said. "Leave anything duplicated."
"And the coffer contents?"
"We cannot carry twenty disputed things through a street fight. The key and the Saint Aurelia records come because their custody has a purpose. Personal property stays sealed unless immediate destruction threatens."
Giuliano stared at her. "You mean to leave the rest here?"
"Under your custody, witnessed and relocked. Yes."
He looked relieved and insulted at once.
The upper stair shook under a blow.
Bertran said, "Decide faster."
Lucetta's world became selection.
She hated selection.
Documents were dangerous precisely because significance did not always announce itself.
A dull receipt could later destroy a grand claim.
A marginal note could prove a route. A name that meant nothing today could become the hinge of tomorrow.
Yet she could not carry an archive while men broke through a warehouse.
She chose the cracked shipping abstract, the waxed pouch containing Saint Aurelia correspondence, and one packet whose outer endorsement named the confraternity directly.
Adelasia chose a second packet containing freight acknowledgments.
Odelin selected a small folded instrument referring to charitable stores.
Everything else remained where found, its position recorded.
Niccolò wrapped the Shipmaster's Key in clean cloth, wrote a custody acknowledgment with astonishing speed, sanded it, and read aloud while the pounding above grew louder.
"One iron key, provisionally identified by Master Orsino Malvezzi as consistent with the key belonging to the office of Shipmaster of the Confraternity of Saint Aurelia, removed under emergency from the Varesi sea coffer for the purpose of preserving it together with the other known keys and pursuing the location of the confraternity's principal chest; custody delivered to Mistress Lucetta Verani and her company without prejudice to the claims of Lady Beatrice d'Orsenna, the creditors represented by Messer Corrado Salviati, Master Giuliano Trevisan as present custodian of the coffer, or any other lawful claimant hereafter proved. "
Beatrice said, "Add the hospital witness."
Niccolò added it.
Brother Paolo signed as witness in the manner available to him. Giuliano named his mark and clerk. Beatrice added her acknowledgment. Lucetta added hers last.
Orsino gave the wrapped key to Lucetta.
She did not put it in the same satchel as the papers.
"Bertran."
He turned.
"You carry the Notary's Key already."
"Yes."
"Then not you."
She looked at Ysoria.
Ysoria understood. "Inside my courier belt."
Lucetta handed it over.
The fourth key disappeared beneath plain wool and leather.
A second blow splintered wood above.
Orsino shut the coffer, turned the right key, then worked the left lock closed with his tools. "Not elegant," he said. "But closed."
Giuliano pointed to the water passage. "If they entered from the quay, that way is lost."
Bertran said, "Then we go through the counting room to the lane."
Ysoria had already reached the upper stair and returned. "No. Two men in the counting room. They may have come through the front while the others made noise below."
Adelasia said, "They know the building."
Bertran's face hardened. "Or someone told them."
For the first time since entering the warehouse, Hugues Feraud's name occurred to Lucetta not as a possibility from distant reports but as a shape behind practical choices.
A man who understood how to use hired labor, lawful confusion, and multiple entrances would not announce himself with banners.
Whether Hugues stood outside or merely had taught someone his methods, the result was the same.
Bertran looked around the lower chamber. One door to the water passage. One stair upward. Thick walls. Small air slit too narrow for a body. No hidden tunnel because the century had provided them with architecture, not miracles.
"There is a hoist opening in the grain room," Giuliano said suddenly. "Upper floor to alley. We use it for sacks when carts cannot enter."
"Can a man pass?"
"A thin man. A woman. Perhaps not Orsino."
Orsino said, "I have survived forty-six years without being called a sack, and I shall not begin now."
Bertran ignored him. "Where?"
"Up the rear stair, across the small loft."
Ysoria said, "Counting room lies between."
Naldo leaned on his staff. "Not if you use the salt chute."
Everyone looked at him.
He shrugged. "Warehouses near water are all cousins. You showed me the upper plan when we searched for the old clerk room. The chute from the loft empties beside the rear store. If the lower shutter opens, a person can climb through the frame. It will be filthy."
Bertran said, "Can you do it with that foot?"
"Down is easier than up."
"You go last before me."
"You always give me the honorable position."
The upper door cracked.
The next minutes abandoned law for geometry.
Giuliano led them through a narrow service passage to the rear stair while his two men overturned a shelving rack across the main access.
Bertran remained behind long enough to hear the first attackers force through and then followed, not fighting because fighting was not the objective.
Lucetta carried the satchel of selected records under her cloak.
Adelasia carried another bundle. Beatrice carried only her authenticated inventory and a small purse, which told Lucetta more about her judgment than any speech could have done.
Brother Paolo held up his habit and climbed with an expression of profound ecclesiastical displeasure.
The salt chute was wider than Lucetta expected and more disgusting. Fine white residue coated the boards; old brine had blackened one edge. Naldo opened the lower shutter with a lever and peered down.
"Eight feet. Crates below. Alley beyond. No men that I see."
Ysoria went first. Then Lucetta. Bertran lowered her by the wrists for the last distance rather than let her jump.
Her shoes struck a crate, slid, and found the floor.
Adelasia came next, cursing salt under her breath.
Beatrice descended with less grace than dignity but more competence than Lucetta would have predicted.
Odelin followed. Niccolò nearly lost his writing case and saved it with a prayer that sounded suspiciously commercial.
Naldo came down badly.
His injured foot struck the edge of the crate. He made no sound until he reached the floor, then folded against the wall with his jaw clenched.
Bertran landed beside him.
"Can you walk?"
"Yes."
"That was not an answer."
Naldo drew one breath, then another. "I can put weight on the heel if I have the staff. I cannot run."
Bertran looked toward the alley, then at Ysoria. "You take him. If the pace breaks, you two turn toward the hospital house. Do not try to reach the ship through a crowd."
Naldo's face changed. "No."
"This is not a debate."
"It becomes one when you order me away from the only people in the city who know what happened in that box."
Bertran stepped close enough that his voice did not need to rise.
"You want dignity. I understand. You also want to be useful.
Then be useful by surviving an injury that has already nearly killed you once.
If you fall in a lane while men pursue us, two others stop to lift you.
If two stop, four are endangered. I will not spend four lives to preserve your pride.
Go with Ysoria if I say go. That is not dismissal. It is arithmetic."
Naldo stared at him, anger bright in his face.
Then he nodded once.
"Arithmetic," he muttered. "A miserable science."
"Yes."
They entered the alley.
Behind them, the warehouse erupted with shouting as the men who had broken in discovered the lower room empty and the coffer relocked.
Ahead, the city was closing.