Free The Kingdom of Light by Giulio Leoni Page A

burden?’
    ‘What man does not bear one so heavy, especially if, like myself, he has reached a great old age? A long life is a life of many sins.’
    Afternoon, outside Santa Croce
    I F WHAT he had learned at the inn was true, Bernardo Rinuccio must have been spending almost all his time in the library of the Franciscans. Dante waited outside the door of the scriptorium for the monks to come out once their work was over. Finally Bernardo’s bloodless, hollow face appeared on the threshold.
    Dante saw him coming, carrying a bundle of parchments and his writing case. Bernardo looked ill and tired, and his step was slow and difficult. And yet he did not seem to be suffering from the heat. From time to time he stopped, leaning his foot on a stone, and took his wax tablets from his bag, writing something on them with a piece of pointed metal.
    At a public fountain he avidly approached the bronze pipe, and drank in great gulps. He seemed prey to an insatiable thirst. Dante drew up beside him, greeting him politely. Bernardo returned the greeting, wiping the sweat from his brow with his sleeve.
    ‘I have been wanting to speak to you for some time,’ the poet said.
    ‘I know your task, Messer Durante. And I know your voice as a poet. I imagine you want to know the facts related to the horrible death of the painter, Brunetto. But I cannot help you. I only met him at the inn and glimpsed him a few times during meals. My research often takes me outside in search for information. Or closed away in my cubicle, setting down on paper what I have learned,’ he added, nodding towards the parchments.
    Dante, his curiosity aroused, came closer to him. ‘What is the nature of your research?’
    ‘I am attempting to finish the third part of a piece of writing, the
Res gestae Svevorum
. The history of those great Swabian emperors. And particularly of the greatest of them, Frederick. The facts of his life and his death.’
    ‘And what have you found that was useful here in Florence? My city never received the Emperor, to my knowledge.’
    ‘It never welcomed him in his lifetime because he was often hostile to the city, in spite of the presence of many loyal Ghibellines within its walls. But also because the Emperor feared the Scot’s prophecy: You will die
sub flore
. But perhaps something of him came here after his death.’
    ‘After his death? What do you mean?’
    The historian shrugged and clamped his lips tight shut as if he was afraid of having said too much. ‘I found something in the pages of Mainardino’s
Chronicles
, and it was that that brought me here.’
    ‘Mainardino da Imola? The bishop loyal to the Emperor, who is said to have spent his last years writing a life of Frederick? But his work is lost, as far as anyone knows. Or perhaps it was never written!’
    The other man half-closed his eyelids, glancing cryptically at the poet. Then he looked quickly around, as though to check that no one was listening.
    Dante instinctively did the same, but saw no one paying them any attention. Meanwhile Bernardo had pulled a long twig from a bush, and was busy tracing signs in the dust in the road.
    ‘So if that text exists,’ the poet pressed, ‘and you have been able to read it, what have you learned from it that brings you here? And what if the Emperor came here after his death?’
    Bernardo did not reply immediately, trying to find the right words. ‘Mainardino wrote something about a treasure belonging to the Emperor. This is how my master put it: ‘
Thesaurus Federici in Florentia ex oblivione resurget
,’ ‘Frederick’s treasure will emerge from oblivion in Florence.’
    ‘And that’s what you’re looking for?’
    Bernardo firmly shook his head. ‘It isn’t wealth that I desire. On the margins of life, gold is the most useless of materials. However, I would like my humble work to respond to the question to which even my master could not give a reply. But I want to ask Arrigo da Jesi. I learned that he too is