“That’s poking bears, Daniel.”
“That’s reason enough itself.”
“I won’t help you, not for that. You know it’s a rule that he isn’t discussed in the Master’s house.”
“I just want to know how Jacob died, that’s all. There’s nothing wrong with that, is there?”
“If you want to know, just ask.”
“I am asking.”
“Ask someone who knows!” I said. “Your mother.”
“She’d tell Brutus that I asked.”
“Ask your cousins. You have plenty.”
“It’ll all get back.” He leaned into my shadow. “There are nets laid and webs spun, and I don’t want a whisper of anything to reach those ears.”
The answer to this seemed evident. “Ask your Uncle Faulkner.” This man was the Chief Magistrate of Basel, and Mistress Dorothea’s brother. “He’s part of no one’s net.”
“But I can’t hold him to confidence, either. No, you’re the only one I can ask.”
“And I’m the only one who can’t answer. I don’t know how your uncle Jacob died.”
“But you can find the answer. I know you can, Leonhard.” He’d always been this way. Daniel had made friends in every street in Basel, as he pried open the closed doors and searched their shadows. Whoever knew him was fond of him, and whoever knew him well distrusted him, as well.
“There’s something amiss,” I said.
“There is,” he said, “and I want to know what it is.”
“Amiss with you. It’s your own uncle, and your own family, and I’m the one you’re sending into a lion’s den.”
“I can’t let the lion know what I want. It has to be you.” He laughed. “You’ve nothing to fear, old friend! Just throw a few little words, an innocent question. Then listen very close.”
Nicolaus had been silent the whole time, and he’d been listening very close. “And are you a part with this?” I asked him.
“I’m no part.”
“He’s part and parcel,” Daniel said. “It’s his plan anyway.”
“It isn’t,” Nicolaus said.
“It is, all of it. Nicolaus is the cunning one, you know. I said Uncle Jacob? and Nicolaus said Leonhard! and I said Oh, that’s our man! ” And Nicolaus said nothing.
“I know Jacob’s epitaph because I’ve seen it, and I’ve heard a few other bits. He was Chair of Mathematics here and he died twenty years ago. And you know all that.”
“I know it,” Daniel said.
“And I know his Mathematics,” I said, “because of his book that you gave to me.”
“You only know what dearest cousin Gottlieb put in the book. That’s all any of us know.”
“Except Gottlieb himself,” Nicolaus said.
“There must be more,” I said.
But that was not Daniel’s interest of the moment. “There’s only one thing I want to know,” he said, “and that’s how Jacob died.”
“That’s all?”
“Nothing more. Was it in his bed, or in the river, or in between?”
In Basel, to die in the river was an evil thing. There was a history to it, of burning and drowning, and Daniel had made a poor joke. “And why do you want to know? Why did you come back to Basel?” I asked him.
“You answer my question, Leonhard,” he said, and he shook his cup. That rattle was the only sound in that room that cut through all the other sound. He tossed the dice and put his hand over the numbers, hiding them. “And I’ll answer yours.”
Daniel had always been a mule. The more he was pulled on, the less he’d move. I’d only get more perplexity from him and I’d had enough. Besides, as we had talked there in that Underworld, its Lord arrived.
This was Old Gustavus. He was an innkeeper and a blacksmith and looked both with heavy arms from pounding and a heavy brow from scowling and a black beard like a burned forest. He was old but not aged; he’d hardened like mortar. He came in with a barrel on his shoulder and set it at the counter and then nearly extinguished the lamps with his stare. He fixed on Daniel and drew heavily near.
“Good evening, Master,” he said. “An honor for you to visit here.” He spoke cavernously, when he spoke. Most often a nod of his head and glint of his eye would get done what he wanted. “Is there anything you require?”
“A Chair at the University,” Daniel answered. He had no fear of the man. He’d bought him over many times with the money he’d spent in that room. “Mathematics would do well, though I’d take nearly any of them.” He laughed and didn’t wait for any answer. “But I’d settle for less. What do you have in the stable tonight?”