Chapter 12 Before the Gates Close #2
"The rear of this warehouse flooded badly when my grandfather was a child. The old stone room is below the present floor level, against the water side. Part was filled and rebuilt. One chamber remains because its roof supports the quay stair. We use it for broken scales and iron fittings."
Orsino was already closing the account book.
"Does it have a door?"
"Yes."
"Old?"
"Older than you."
"Then it deserves respect."
Giuliano looked toward Lucetta. "You believe your coffer may still be there."
"I believe someone moved a sealed sea chest to a rear stone room because of damp. I believe the account remained open because the warrant was never produced. I believe that is enough to inspect the room if you permit it."
"And if there is a chest?"
"We stop. We identify. We do not open."
Giuliano hesitated.
A shout rose from below. The young clerk burst into the room.
"Master, the water door latch has been cut."
Bertran moved before the sentence finished.
"When?"
"I do not know. The lower man says it was sound at dawn. The chain is still there, but one staple has been sawn almost through."
Giuliano went pale with anger.
Bertran said, "Close the street door. Put two men where they can see the water landing. Do not stand directly in front of the door. If someone already entered, shouting will tell him we know."
Giuliano stared at him. "This is my house."
"Then command your men yourself. Command them to do the same thing."
For one heartbeat Lucetta thought Giuliano would throw them all out. Instead he swore, sent the clerk downstairs, and said, "Show me."
They descended through the warehouse proper.
The building opened behind the counting room into a high timbered space stacked with bales, amphorae, barrels, crates, and sacks.
Light fell through upper shutters in bright bars thick with dust. The rear descended by three steps toward the water side, where the floor changed from timber to old stone.
The cut staple was exactly where the clerk had said. The chain still appeared secured, but one iron eye had been weakened until a hard pull might tear it loose.
Orsino crouched.
"Fresh."
"How fresh?" Bertran asked.
"The filings are not rusted. That means little indoors. The cut is bright. Today, perhaps yesterday. Not months."
Giuliano's anger became fear.
"Who would cut it and leave?"
Naldo answered from behind them. He had persuaded the warehouse boys to bring the cart down again.
"Someone who expects to come back quickly. Or someone who entered another way and prepared his escape."
Bertran looked at him. "You are becoming irritatingly useful."
"I warned you."
The rear stone room lay beyond a low arch half hidden by stacked broken equipment. Giuliano produced an old key from the warehouse ring. It entered the lock but would not turn.
Orsino held out his hand.
Giuliano did not give him the key immediately.
"You said you would not open locks."
"I said I would not open the coffer without permission. You are now standing before your own warehouse door asking why your key does not turn while someone has cut your water latch. If you prefer philosophy, keep the key."
Giuliano handed it over.
Orsino examined the bit, cleaned the lock opening with a thin piece of wire, worked the key twice, then stopped.
"Something inside resists. Not broken. Another key may be in the other side, or someone has wedged the bolt."
Bertran drew his sword.
Lucetta's mouth went dry.
Giuliano whispered, "There is another entrance?"
"There was once a stair from the water level," he said. "Filled years ago."
Naldo said, "Filled with stone, or filled in the way merchants fill anything they hope never to discuss again?"
No one answered.
Bertran placed himself to one side of the door. "Orsino, can you withdraw our key?"
"Yes."
"Do it."
He did.
Bertran knocked once with the hilt of his dagger.
"If anyone is inside, hear me. We are not town watch. We will not force the door if you answer. If you stay silent and come through it armed, I will assume you mean harm."
Nothing.
He waited.
A faint scrape sounded beyond the stone.
Brother Paolo crossed himself.
Naldo murmured, "Not adventurous."
Bertran raised one finger for silence.
Another scrape. Then a dull impact somewhere lower than the door.
"Water side," Naldo said.
Bertran pointed. "Giuliano, where does the old stair meet the quay?"
"Behind the fish landing, perhaps. The wall was rebuilt."
"Naldo, you stay."
"No."
"That was not—"
"I know the water doors. Your feet know roads. Mine knows docks, even when one of them is useless. Send the warehouse boys with the cart if you must, but if there is an old landing behind that wall I will see where it opens before you do."
Bertran's jaw tightened.
Lucetta said quietly, "He is right."
"I know. I dislike it."
"Those are different matters."
Bertran looked at Naldo. "You do not get out of the cart unless the building is on fire."
"What if the cart is on fire?"
"Then I leave you to your judgment."
Naldo grinned despite himself.
Bertran took one warehouse man and Naldo's cart toward the water landing. Ysoria returned at that moment, breathless but controlled.
"Western gate closed. Eastern gate still open for outbound foot traffic but the watch says it may close. Harbor entrance remains open, though patrols are doubling. There is a body of armed men outside the western wall. I could not learn whose without choosing which liar I preferred."
Lucetta pointed toward Bertran. "Go with him. Old landing. Possible intruder."
Ysoria did not ask for the rest. She followed.
Giuliano looked at Lucetta as if she had personally brought every armed man in the city to his warehouse.
"You promised documents."
"I did not promise they would be quiet."
Adelasia said, "Master Giuliano, anger later. First we keep whatever is behind that door from leaving."
Giuliano swore again and sent servants to the quay.
Lucetta remained by the stone room with Orsino, Odelin, Niccolò, Brother Paolo, and Adelasia. She could hear movement outside, then nothing. The door stood mute before them.
Orsino touched the lock plate.
"This was replaced."
"Recently?" Lucetta asked.
"No. Not today. Different iron from the hinges. Maybe twenty years, maybe forty. The original door is older."
Adelasia said, "Could the replacement relate to the coffer?"
"Everything relates to the coffer if we want badly enough. That is why wanting is useless."
A crash came from beyond the wall.
Someone shouted.
Bertran's voice answered, too distant to distinguish words.
Then came the unmistakable slap of water and Naldo yelling, "Left! Left, you ox!"
Lucetta moved toward the quay.
Orsino caught her sleeve.
"You hired a soldier. Let him earn the insult."
"He was not hired."
Orsino looked at her.
She realized what she had said and pulled her sleeve free.
"That is not the point."
"No," he said mildly. "It is apparently another point."
She would have answered, but Bertran appeared at the end of the warehouse lane with Ysoria behind him.
Between them they pushed a thin young man in a soaked tunic whose hands were empty but whose face was bleeding at the mouth.
Naldo's cart followed, propelled by one warehouse boy.
Naldo held a coil of wet rope like a trophy.
Giuliano strode forward. "Who is he?"
"Ask him," Bertran said. "He came out through a broken drain opening behind the old stair. Tried to reach a skiff. Naldo's rope reached him first."
Naldo said, "It was a very fine throw."
"You nearly pulled yourself out of the cart."
"The cart lacked discipline."
The young man said nothing.
Bertran wiped water from his forearm. "He had this."
He handed Lucetta a small wooden tally tag marked with two letters and a cut notch.
Niccolò's face changed.
Lucetta saw it.
"You know the mark."
He did not answer at once.
Adelasia stepped closer. "Niccolò."
"It resembles a freight mark used by one of the houses that sometimes contracts with Salviati partners. Resembles. It is not Corrado's house mark."
The young man spat blood onto the floor.
Bertran said, "Who paid you?"
Silence.
"What were you doing in the stone room?"
Silence.
Giuliano said, "I can have the watch pull his answers from him."
Odelin's expression hardened. "Pain produces speech more reliably than truth."
"He cut my door."
"Then charge him for the door."
Lucetta crouched enough to meet the prisoner's eyes without touching him.
"You were not carrying a coffer. You were not carrying papers.
So either you entered and found nothing, or you have hidden what you found, or your work was to prepare entry for someone else.
If you tell us which, you may prevent men far more powerful than you from deciding you know too much. "
The young man's eyes flicked toward Niccolò.
That was the first real answer.
Niccolò went pale with anger. "Do not look at me as if I sent you."
The man laughed once through his split lip.
"You all wear another man's coat."
Bertran said, "Name yours."
The man shook his head.
A horn sounded outside. This time three short notes followed by one long.
Ysoria turned toward the quay. "That is closure."
Giuliano said, "Which gate?"
"Likely more than one."
A warehouse servant ran in. "Master! The eastern gate is closing. The watch says no armed men in or out. They are calling militia to the wall."
Bertran looked at Lucetta. "We have less time than we had."
She looked at the stone door.
"And someone has already been inside."
Giuliano took a decision with visible pain. "Open it."
Orsino said, "The key is blocked from the other side."
"Then open it another way. You are a locksmith."
"At last, a sensible instruction."
He knelt with his tools. The work took longer than Lucetta wanted and less time than she feared. He removed one hinge pin after driving out corrosion, then loosened the second enough that Bertran and a warehouse man could pull the door inward crookedly without destroying the lock entirely.
Cold damp air breathed from the room.