Glarentza, April 1430
The Santa Lucia waited half the morning for a berth. Lorenzo counted the masts inside the mole while they swung at anchor: eleven, five of them flying the Lion. In the autumn he had tied up at an empty quay, and the harbor master had walked down to meet him.
A boatman put them ashore, through water that smelled of tar and fish guts. Last time he had come, the same man had taken a small coin and been glad of it. Now he named double, and was not ashamed to.
"You'll wait two days for a berth," he said, resting on the oars while a lighter crossed ahead of them. "The Genoese there has waited three. The old men say it was like this under the princes, when the fairs ran. Before my day." He crossed himself in the Greek manner. "God keep the Despot."
It was a fair price with the harbor this full. Lorenzo paid it, and minded it more than the coin was worth.
On the quay, porters were carrying flat crates down to a Genoese galley, and Lorenzo knew those crates; he had packed his hold with them in the autumn. A line of carts stood above the water stairs, and a saw was working somewhere behind the warehouses.
The autumn cargo had come back handsomely, and he had spent the winter being asked about it at every supper on the Rialto. He had smiled and said little. It had not mattered. Half the men he had dined with were somewhere in this harbor now.
He left his mate to see to the unloading and went up into the town. He had not gone far when a hand closed on his elbow, and it was Marco Contarini, in shore clothes, wearing the grin he brought to card tables.
"Lorenzo. You made my winter very dull."
"Marco."
"'A small venture in the Morea,' you told Morosini's table. My factor watched your crates come off on the Riva in October. A great many of them." Marco fell into step beside him. "We all did our sums by Lent."
"And here you are."
"Here is everyone, my friend. I came in Thursday and I have already been to the shop. I placed an order for thirty."
"What shop?"
The grin widened. "They sell from a shop now. Stone-built, new, guards on the door, the prices posted up for any man to read. You buy Scripture there the way you buy salt. Come, it is worth the walk."
The shop stood on the paved way that ran up from the port, stone below and new timber above, the mortar still pale. Above the door a phoenix was painted in gold, wings spread, and beneath it MOREA PUBLISHING in Greek and in Latin both. Two men-at-arms in the Despot's livery flanked the entrance. Lorenzo priced their wages out of habit.
"They have certainly invested in presentation," Lorenzo said.
"Wait until you see inside," Marco said, and nodded at the door.
As they stepped closer, Lorenzo saw the bills pasted to the wall, the same phoenix at the head of each: "Latin Bibles, Forty Gold Ducats the Copy. Ten Copies or More, Thirty-five the Copy."
Below these, notices of works to come. They were printed, not painted, pasted paper left out for the weather to ruin. Lorenzo looked at that longer than he looked at the prices.
Inside, light came down from high windows onto a long counter, and behind it five young men in matching tunics of deep blue. Each wore a small parchment tag on his breast with his name written fair upon it. Lorenzo read the names without meaning to, and then wondered why he had.
Benches ran along one wall, and men were sitting on them. Genoese, by their talk. Sitting, waiting to be called in their turn, and no one pushing to the counter. At a table in the middle of the room a Bible lay open on a stand, chained through the binding like a church book, and three merchants stood around it turning pages with the tips of their fingers.
The shelves behind the counter were nearly bare. Lorenzo counted ten volumes.
Marco had lowered his voice without seeming to notice it. Lorenzo caught himself doing the same.
"They wait to be called," Marco said quietly. "No man crowds another's place."
"I have not seen that in a shop before," Lorenzo said. "A church, perhaps."
One of the blue tunics came from behind the counter and bowed. "Noble sirs. Be welcome to Morea Publishing. How may I serve you?"
"Latin Bibles," Lorenzo said. "In quantity, if you have them."
"It would be our honor. I must tell you our present stock is much diminished; a fresh supply is expected within the month. We hold ten copies today. Beyond that, we can enter a reservation against the new stock, at the posted price."
"The ten, then. And enter me for fifty more."
"Very good, my lord." The clerk drew a ledger from beneath the counter and opened it flat. "Your name and your house, if it please you, and when delivery is to be made."
The page was not ruled by hand. The columns were printed on it, black lines and headings both, and the page beneath it was the same, and the page beneath that. Someone had made a whole book of them ready before any customer walked in. The clerk only wrote in the parts that changed: the name, the count, the price, the port. Lorenzo had seen ledgers as neat kept by the great houses, but a man with a straight-edge had ruled each of those fresh. He had never seen the form itself printed, so that every page was the twin of the last before a word was written on it. Somewhere on a page like this was Marco's thirty. He gave his name and watched the boy write it into its row.
Down the counter, another of the blue tunics was speaking to a Genoese. Our present stock is much diminished, he was saying. A fresh supply is expected within the month. The same words, in the same order, to the syllable.
Outside, the sentries' eyes went over them once and returned to the street.
"There is some machine behind it, a press of a kind," Lorenzo said. "I heard as much. But no one will say how it works, and that is the thing worth knowing."
"And how do you mean to learn it?" Marco said. "They have been careful."
They ate at a tavern by the water and came back up the street toward dusk. At closing, a porter barred the shop door from within, and the five clerks came out together and went up the hill in a group. The youngest stopped at the fountain to drink and then took the lane toward the fish market alone. It was the boy who had kept the ledger.
"There's our chance," Lorenzo said.
Marco hesitated. "Are you sure about this? If they catch us prying, it will go badly for us."
"What we learn here is worth more than the cargo. But we go carefully. One misstep and we could find ourselves in a dungeon, or worse."
They followed discreetly and came up with him where the lane narrowed between two warehouse walls. Lorenzo approached with a friendly smile.
"A word, friend. You served us today. The fifty Bibles."
The boy turned and knew them at once. "My lords."
"The service does you credit, and the books more. Most remarkable."
"Your kind words are appreciated, my lord."
"Then you will forgive our curiosity. Books so fine, and in such abundance. We hoped you might enlighten us as to the making of them."
The clerk hesitated. "I beg your pardon, my lord, but I am not at liberty to speak of such matters with those from beyond our lands. The Despot's law is strict."
"Of course, we understand," Lorenzo said, his voice smooth. He produced a small pouch of coins, the weight of it evident. "But perhaps you could share a little, as a professional courtesy. Your secret would be safe with us."
The young man swallowed hard, eyeing the pouch. "If anyone learned I spoke of this, it could cost me dearly."
"We give you our word," Marco interjected softly, "not a breath of this shall escape us."
After a tense pause, the clerk accepted the pouch with trembling hands. He leaned in, his voice barely a whisper. "I ought not to speak of it, but... the books are made with a device, a press, that imprints the pages swiftly, stamping inked metal letters onto paper."
"Metal letters?" Marco echoed.
"It is so. But you must understand, the workshop is a guarded secret. It lies beyond the town, and only a chosen few may enter. I have never seen it myself. None of us in the shop have. The Despot has decreed harsh penalties for any who speak of it."
Lorenzo raised an eyebrow. "It would seem the Despot guards his secrets well."
"More than you know, my lord. I should not say more." He was already stepping back as he said it, and then he went up the lane quickly and did not look back.
They made their way back toward the harbor. Marco shook his head. "A machine that writes," he said. "If Venice could build such a device, the trade in books would be ours."
"You heard the boy. A chosen few, and the Despot's penalties over them. But there will be others who know more. Workshop men must drink and be paid somewhere. Quietly, and not this voyage."
"For now we have fifty Bibles to see paid and shipped," Marco said.
"True. But the Bibles are the small trade now. I mean to know how that thing is made."
A week later at Clermont, Michael sat at the head of the council table. The fire had burned down to a red bed, and the room smelled of woodsmoke and ink. George sat to his right, Theophilus and Petros across from him, the two senior officials at the foot.
"All the Bibles are sold," Michael said. "Every copy. And we hold orders for another nine hundred."
That moved around the table. Theophilus let out a slow breath; one of the officials said something low to the other.
Petros had his ledger open before him. "The debts are cleared, Despot, all of them, and there is a reserve besides. We have bought powder as well, enough to keep the arsenal in work through the year."
"Petros priced them at twenty conservatively in the winter," Michael said. "They went out at thirty-five the copy, wholesale, and the buyers thanked us for it." He let Petros have the look that went with that. "Which is the good news, and the end of it."
George set his hands flat on the table. "The paper. We are nearly out of it, and there is no cotton to be had to make more. The winter killed the crop in the fields, and what the presses do not eat, the Venetians are owed."
"Then we slow down," Theophilus said. "Take fewer orders, hold to the buyers we have, and wait out the shortage. Better a small trade kept sound than a large one we cannot feed."
"Slow down now and we tell all of Venice we are weak." Petros looked up from the ledger. "They will not wait politely. If we cannot fill their orders they will find another way to the thing itself."
"There is a way through it," George said.
"Go on," Michael said.
"Now the treasury is full, we can buy cotton abroad. Ragusa has it in quantity and will deal with us. I would send an expedition, and soon, before the presses stand idle."
"Not a single voyage," Theophilus said. "A standing agreement, if they will give one. I have no wish to go back to Ragusa every spring with my hat in my hand."
"A standing agreement, then, if it can be had," Michael said. "See it made ready, George. We will settle who sails and on what terms before it does."
"A shop like the Glarentza one would do well in other towns," Petros said. "Once we have the paper to fill them."
"I like it," Michael said. "Bring me the plan when the presses run again."
They worked through the rest of it, the powder stores, the road above Clermont, the men Andreas wanted for the arsenal guard. When it was done and the others rose to go, Michael caught George's eye and lifted a hand for him to stay.
When the door had shut, Michael rose and went to the window. "Sit a moment, George. The rest of it can wait."
George sat. The afternoon light lay long across the fields, and beyond them the hills stood where they had stood all winter.
"I am coming with you to Ragusa," Michael said.
George raised an eyebrow. "Are you certain, Despot? The journey is long, and your hand is wanted here."
"I can help secure the agreement, and I want to see how they trade." Michael stayed at the window a moment more. "And I have not been out of this house since February."
George nodded slowly. "Very well. Your presence will strengthen our position." He paused. "Though I will feel better about the workshop when there are fewer Venetians asking after it."