Free Fools' Gold by Philippa Gregory Page B

turned to Luca. ‘Don’t you remember Giorgio in the monastery? Came from the Po Valley? Very proud of their history. Told us about Gorgonzola cheese. Said they’d been making it for five hundred years. Good thing too. Probably more use than rainbows.’ He served himself with two great slices of ham and sat down and buttered some bread.
    ‘You are a source of endless surprises,’ Luca told him.
    ‘Glad to help,’ Freize said smugly. ‘And I have more. You’ll be interested in this.’ Freize put down the bread, wiped his fingers on his breeches and brought the gold half noble coin out of his pocket. ‘I exchanged some of my smaller coins for this. A gold half noble from England. Isn’t this one of the coins that Milord wanted you to investigate?’
    Luca held out his hand and looked at the bright coin. ‘Yes – an English half noble. It’s perfect,’ he said. ‘Not a mark on it.’
    He passed it to Brother Peter who studied it and then handed it on to Isolde. ‘Why is Milord so interested in these coins?’ she asked.
    Ishraq and Freize exchanged a hidden look as Isolde named the very question that was troubling them.
    ‘He believes that someone may have opened a gold mine and is minting them in secret,’ Brother Peter said. ‘Such a man would be avoiding tax, and avoiding the fines he should pay to the Church. Milord would want to see that the Church reclaimed those taxes. It would amount to a fortune. Or some criminal may be forging them.’
    ‘So do you think the coins are forged? Made to look like English nobles but made from lesser metal?’ Luca asked.
    ‘The money changer said they were from the English mint in Calais,’ Freize explained. ‘But he was very stern with us when I asked him about them – he warned me not to ask questions. He didn’t want anyone saying anything which might spoil the value of the coins.’
    ‘Is the value good?’
    ‘They might be overvalued, if anything,’ Freize volunteered. ‘They were rising in price as we stood there. He said he would put up his exchange rate tomorrow. Apparently everyone wants to trade in them – there were men queuing behind us. Everyone says they are solid gold, without any alloy. That’s very unusual. Most coins are a mixture of precious metal and something lighter. Or good ones are shaved and clipped. But these seem to be perfect.’
    ‘There’s only one way to be sure. We’ll have to test them to see how much real gold is in each coin,’ said Luca.
    ‘How shall we test it?’ Isolde asked. ‘We can’t ask the goldsmiths – as Freize said, they won’t welcome questions about the quality of their coins.’
    Brother Peter looked slightly uncomfortable. He put his hand to the inner pocket of his jacket.
    ‘You’ve got orders!’ Freize said accusingly, eyeing the small scroll.
    ‘Milord honoured me . . . ’
    ‘More secret orders!’ Freize exclaimed. ‘Where do we have to go now? Just when we are settled and have discovered fegato alla veneziana ? When Luca is studying at the university, and is going to see Father Pietro? Just when he might find his father? Don’t say we have to leave! We haven’t completed our mission, we’ve not even started! The girls haven’t even bought their carnival clothes!’
    ‘Peace! Peace! We don’t have to move yet,’ Brother Peter said. ‘And if it was an order from Milord, then the fact that you have discovered a Venetian culinary speciality of liver and onions, and that the girls want new dresses, would not prevent us. This is vanity, Freize. And greed. No, Milord simply gave me instructions for our time in Venice. How we are to go to the Rialto when our ship comes in and claim our share of the cargo. How we are to sell it at a profit, a manifest of the cargo it is carrying. And here, a list of the tests we were to make on the gold coins, when we had them.’
    He looked at Ishraq. ‘The instructions are in Arabic,’ he said awkwardly. ‘This is infidel learning. I thought you