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“Tell me.”
“I prayed for fame,” he said in a small voice. “I prayed for riches. I prayed for recognition. I prayed that, somehow, I’d become a great physician in Rome, and that I would be an outstanding scholar for Signore Antonio, perhaps translating texts for him that no one had yet discovered or made available.”
“That sounds like a very human prayer to me,” I said, “and given your gifts, it sounds quite understandable.”
He looked at me so gratefully that it was heartbreaking. “You see, I have many gifts,” he said humbly. “I have a gift for writing and reading that could keep me busy all my days. But then I have a gift as a physician as well, an ability to touch a man’s hand and know what is wrong with him.”
“Was it wrong then to pray that these gifts would flower?”
He smiled and shook his head. “You may have come to play the lute for my friend,” he said, “but right now you give me more comfort than music ever could. The point is, that very night the ghost began his rumblings, his stampings, his casting things to the floor. It was right after my prayer, and always after he’d torn this study to pieces, and believe me, he can make the inkwells fly, he would retreat to the cellar. He would retreat and bang his fists against the casks of the cellar.”
“My friend, this ghost may have had nothing to do with your prayer. Now go on. What happened with Niccolò?”
“Well, at this time Niccolò suffered a fall from a horse. It was nothing of any consequence and the wound healed instantly. Niccolò is stronger than I am. But ever since, he’s been failing. He’s grown pale. He shudders and I tell you every day he’s worse and it’s eating at his mind, this illness, this idleness, this lying in bed and watching his own hands tremble.”
“The wound’s clean? You’re sure of it?”
“Certain. He has no fever from the wound. He has no fever at all. And the rumors, the rumors are spreading now as they always do, that I, his Jewish physician, am poisoning him! Oh, thank Heaven that Signore Antonio believes in me.”
“This is a terrible danger, this being accused of poisoning,” I said. I knew this well enough from history. No one had to tell me.
“Oh, understand, I have my indemnity from Signore Antonio, all properly signed, to treat the patient and that I’ll be paid whether he lives or dies, and no accusation can formally be brought against me. That’s the usual thing in Rome, and I have my dispensation from the Pope to treat Christians. I’ve had that for years. I’m dispensed from wearing the yellow patch. All that’s in order. My concern is not what will become of me. My concern is this ghost and why he’s here. And my concern is what will happen to Niccolò. I love Niccolò! If it weren’t for the ghost I wouldn’t be accused. And my other patients wouldn’t have fled. But I could do without them. I could do without it all. If only Niccolò were well. If only Niccolò were restored. But I must discover why this ghost plagues me and why I cannot cure Niccolò there where he lies not one hundred feet from here in his own house growing ever weaker.”
“We should go to Niccolò. We can talk of the ghost later.”
“Oh, but one thing first. I prayed with pride that first night. I know that I did.”
“We all do, my friend. It’s pride, is it not, to ask God for anything? And yet He tells us to ask. He tells us to ask as Solomon asked for wisdom.”
He drew back and that seemed to calm him. “As Solomon asked,” he whispered. “Yes. I did that. I told him I wanted to have all these many gifts, gifts of the spirit and the mind and the heart. But did I have the right to do it?”
“Come now,” I said. “Let’s go to your friend Niccolò.”
He paused as though listening for some distant sound. And we both realized the house was quiet, and had been for some time.
“Do you imagine the dybbuk has been listening?” he asked.
“Perhaps,” I said. “If he can make a sound, then he can hear a sound, isn’t that likely?”
“Oh, may the Lord bless you, I am so glad you came to me,” he said. “Let’s be going.”
He clutched my hand with both of his. He was a passionate man, a volatile man, and I realized how very different in spirit he was from those I’d visited on my last adventure, who for all their passion had not had his hot southern Mediterranean blood.
“You realize I don’t know your name?” he asked.
“Toby,” I said. “Now let’s go to see your patient. While I play the lute, I can listen and I can watch and I can see if in fact this man is being poisoned.”
“Oh, but that’s not possible.”
“I don’t mean by you, Vitale, I mean by someone else.”
“But I tell you, Toby, there is no one that does not love him, no one that could bear to lose him. Therein lies the dreadful mystery.”
We found the same crowd in the street, but this time the Jews had been joined by some onlookers and some of the rougher sort and I didn’t like the look of it.
We pushed through without speaking a word, and as we made our way through the thick press of the alleyway, Vitale was whispering to me.
“Things are good here now for the Jews,” he said. “The Pope has a Jewish physician and he’s my friend, and there are Jewish scholars in demand everywhere. I think that every cardinal must have a Hebrew scholar on his staff. But that could change in an instant. If Niccolò dies, the Lord have mercy on me. With this dybbuk I will be accused not only of poison but of witchcraft.”
I nodded to this, but was mainly trying to make my way through the press of passersby, peddlers and beggars. The cookshops and taverns added their scents and swell to the narrow street.
But within minutes, we had arrived at the house of Signore Antonio, and were admitted at once through its huge iron gates.
CHAPTER SIX
IMMEDIATELY WE ENTERED A HUGE COURTYARD, FILLED with potted trees, arranged at random around a glittering fountain.
The bent and withered old man who opened the gate for us was shaking his head and very forlorn.
“He’s worse today, young Master,” he said, “and I fear for him, and his father has come downstairs, and will not leave the bedside. He waits for you now.”
“That’s good, Master Antonio is out of bed, that’s very good,” said Vitale immediately. He confided to me, “When Niccolò suffers, Antonio suffers. The man lives for his sons. He has his books, his papers, his work for me all the time, but without his sons, there’s nothing really for him.”
