SEXT

In which the succession of librarians is reconstructed, and there is further information about the mysterious book.

William decided to go back up to the scriptorium, from which he had just come. He asked Benno’s leave to consult the catalogue, and he leafed through it rapidly. “It must be around here,” he said, “I saw it just an hour ago….” He stopped at one page. “Here,” he said, “read this title.”

As a single entry there was a group of four titles, indicating that one volume contained several texts. I read:

“What is it?” I asked.

“It is our book,” William whispered to me. “This is why your, dream reminded me of something. Now I am sure this is it. And in fact”—he glanced quickly at the pages immediately preceding and following—”in fact, here are the books I was thinking about, all together. But this isn’t what I wanted to check. See here. Do you have your tablet? Good. We must make a calculation, and try to remember clearly what Alinardo told us the other day as well as what we heard this morning from Nicholas. Now, Nicholas told us he arrived here about thirty years ago, and Abo had already been named abbot. The abbot before him was Paul of Rimini. Is that right? Let’s say this succession took place around 1290, more or less, it doesn’t matter. Nicholas also told us that, when he arrived, Robert of Bobbio was already librarian. Correct? Then Robert died, and the post was given to Malachi, let’s say at the beginning of this century. Write this down. There is a period, however, before Nicholas came, when Paul of Rimini was librarian. How long was he in that post? We weren’t told. We could examine the abbey ledgers, but I imagine the abbot has them, and for the moment I would prefer not to ask him for them. Let’s suppose Paul was appointed librarian sixty years ago. Write that. Why does Alinardo complain of the fact that, about fifty years ago, he should have been given the post of librarian and instead it went to another? Was he referring to Paul of Rimini?”

“Or to Robert of Bobbio!” I said.

“So it would seem. But now look at this catalogue. As you know, the titles are recorded in the order of acquisition. And who writes them in this ledger? The librarian. Therefore, by the changes of handwriting in these pages we can establish the succession of librarians. Now we will look at the catalogue from the end; the last handwriting is Malachi’s, you see. And it fills only a few pages. The abbey has not acquired many books in these last thirty years. Then, as we work backward, a series of pages begins in a shaky hand. I clearly read the presence of Robert of Bobbio, who was ill. Robert probably did not occupy the position long. And then what do we find? Pages and pages in another hand, straight and confident, a whole series of acquisitions (including the group of books I was examining a moment ago), truly impressive. Paul of Rimini must have worked hard! Too hard, if you recall that Nicholas told us he became abbot while still a young man. But let’s assume that in a few years this voracious reader enriched the abbey with so many books. Weren’t we told he was called Abbas agraphicus because of that strange defect, or illness, which made him unable to write? Then who wrote these pages? His assistant librarian, I would say. But if by chance this assistant librarian were then named librarian, he would then have continued writing, and we would have figured out why there are so many pages here in the same hand. So, then, between Paul and Robert we would have another librarian, chosen about fifty years ago, who was the mysterious rival of Alinardo, who was hoping, as an older man, to succeed Paul. Then this man died, and somehow, contrary to Alinardo’s expectations and the expectations of others, Robert was named in his place.”

“But why are you so sure this is the right scansion? Even granting that this handwriting is the nameless librarian’s, why couldn’t Paul also have written the titles of the still earlier pages?”

“Because among the acquisitions they recorded all bulls and decretals, and these are precisely dated. I mean, if you find here, as you do, the Firma cautela of Boniface the Seventh, dated 1296, you know that text did not arrive before that year, and you can assume it didn’t arrive much later. I have these milestones, so to speak, placed along the years, so if I grant that Paul of Rimini became librarian in 1265 and abbot in 1275, and I find that his hand, or the hand of someone else who is not Robert of Bobbio, lasts from 1265 to 1285, then I discover a discrepancy of ten years.”

My master was truly very sharp. “But what conclusions do you draw from this discrepancy?” I asked.

“None,” he answered. “Only some premises.”

Then he got up and went to talk with Benno, who was staunchly at his post, but with a very unsure air. He was still behind his old desk and had not dared take over Malachi’s, by the catalogue. William addressed him with some coolness. We had not forgotten the unpleasant scene of the previous evening.

“Even in your new and powerful position, Brother Librarian, I trust you will answer a question. That morning when Adelmo and the others were talking here about witty riddles, and Berengar made the first reference to the finis Africae, did anybody mention the Coena Cypriani?“

“Yes,” Benno said, “didn’t I tell you? Before they talked about the riddles of Symphosius, Venantius himself mentioned the Coena, and Malachi became furious, saying it was an ignoble work and reminding us that the abbot had forbidden anyone to read it….”

“The abbot?” William said. “Very interesting. Thank you, Benno.”

“Wait,” Benno said, “I want to talk with you.” He motioned us to follow him out of the scriptorium, onto the stairs going down to the kitchen, so the others could not hear him. His lips were trembling.

“I’m frightened, William,” he said. “They’ve killed Malachi. Now I am the one who knows too many things. Besides, the group of Italians hate me…. They do not want another foreign librarian…. I believe the others were murdered for this very reason…. I’ve never told you about Alinardo’s hatred for Malachi, his bitterness.”

“Who was it who took the post from him, years ago?”

“That I don’t know: he always talks about it vaguely, and anyway it’s ancient history. They must all be dead now. But the group of Italians around Alinardo speaks often … spoke often of Malachi as a straw man … put here by someone else, with the complicity of the abbot…. Not realizing it, I … I have become involved in the conflict of the two hostile factions…. I became aware of it only this morning…. Italy is a land of conspiracies: they poison popes here, so just imagine a poor boy like me…. Yesterday I hadn’t understood, I believed that book was responsible for everything, but now I’m no longer sure. That was the pretext: you’ve seen that the book was found but Malachi died all the same….I must … I want to … I would like to run away. What do you advise me to do?”

“Stay calm. Now you ask advice, do you? Yesterday evening you seemed ruler of the world. Silly youth, if you had helped me yesterday we would have prevented this last crime. You are the one who gave Malachi the book that brought him to his death. But tell me one thing at least. Did you have that book in your hands, did you touch it, read it? Then why are you not dead?”

“I don’t know. I swear I didn’t touch it; or, rather, I touched it when I took it in the laboratory but without opening it; I hid it inside my habit, then went and put it under the pallet in my cell. I knew Malachi was watching me, so I came back at once to the scriptorium. And afterward, when Malachi offered to make me his assistant, I gave him the book. That’s the whole story.”

“Don’t tell me you didn’t even open it.”

“Yes, I did open it before hiding it, to make sure it really was the one you were also looking for. It began with an Arabic manuscript, then I believe one in Syriac, then there was a Latin text, and finally one in Greek….”

I remembered the abbreviations we had seen in the catalogue. The first two titles were listed as “ar.” and “syr.” It was the book! But William persisted: “You touched it and you are not dead. So touching it does not kill. And what can you tell me about the Greek text? Did you look at it?”

“Very briefly. Just long enough to realize it had no title; it began as if a part were missing….”

“Liber acephalus…” William murmured.

“I tried to read the first page, but the truth is that my Greek is very poor. And then my curiosity was aroused by another detail, connected with those same pages in Greek. I did not leaf through all of them, because I was unable to. The pages were—how can I explain?—damp, stuck together. It was hard to separate one from the other. Because the parchment was odd … softer than other parchments, and the first page was rotten, and almost crumbling. It was … well, strange.”

“‘Strange’: the very word Severinus used,” William said.

“The parchment did not seem like parchment…. It seemed like cloth, but very fine…” Benno went on.

“Charta lintea, or linen paper,” William said. “Had you never seen it?”

“I had heard of it, but I don’t believe I ever saw it before. It is said to be very costly, and delicate. That’s why it is rarely used. The Arabs make it, don’t they?”

“They were the first. But it is also made here in Italy, at Fabriano. And also … Why, of course, naturally!” William’s eyes shone. “What a beautiful and interesting revelation! Good for you, Benno! I thank you! Yes, I imagine that here in the library charta lintea must be rare, because no very recent manuscripts have arrived. And besides, many are afraid linen paper will not survive through the centuries like parchment, and perhaps that is true. Let us imagine, if they wanted something here that was not more perennial than bronze … Charta lintea, then? Very well. Good-bye. And don’t worry. You’re in no danger.”

We went away from the scriptorium, leaving Benno calmer, if not totally reassured.

The abbot was in the refectory. William went to him and asked to speak with him. Abo, unable to temporize, agreed to meet us in a short while at his house.