“WE’RE LOOKING FOR VENICE,” Gertie said in a deep voice, “and it’s pretty urgent.”
The woman studied the young Keeper from the top of her horse. Gertie knew she was looking at the birthmark that covered one side of her face.
“What fine clothes for a child . . .” she said. “Detachable sleeves with designer slashing? Very nice.”
Gertie looked down at the clothes she had picked out.
“And what an unusual, well-trained animal soldier you travel with. Though I’ve never seen a rabbit with a mustache before. You must be important people from kingdoms far off.”
“Very, very far off,” Kolt said. “And yes, our rabbit is well trained—just don’t ask him to get you a plate of chocolate chip cookies.”
The woman looked around. “Where is your escort?”
“Our escort?” Gertie said, wondering what such a thing was.
“We lost it,” Kolt interrupted, “it was terribly bad luck.”
“You lost it!” said the woman. “How unfortunate.”
Gertie looked at the ground. “It must have fallen out of my pocket.”
The woman smiled and patted her horse. “No, really, c’mon,” she said, “where are the private soldiers all wealthy merchants travel with?”
Kolt took a step forward. “The truth is, our escort was involved in a tragic accident involving . . .”
“A dollop of mashed potato.”
“It was very bad . . .” Gertie said, trying to salvage the conversation, “their horses slipped on . . .”
“Strawberry mush.”
The woman on the horse was now just looking at them with a blank expression.
“I know what you are,” she said. “You can’t fool me with your humble traveler story—I know the truth about you, there’s no point denying it.”
“Well, you’re wrong,” Kolt told her nervously. “We’re not an ancient order of time-traveling heroes, battling an evil sect of neophobic losers for control of human destiny using a time machine in the glove box of a British racing car.”
“You’re clowns! From the commedia dell’arte,” the woman said.
“Look, the absolute truth,” interrupted Gertie, “is that we need to see a very important doctor in Venice, and would be very grateful if you would help us find him or her.”
“Very well, I will escort you into the city of Venice where my family is on the Counsel, close with the Doge himself—he’ll get the truth out of you . . . or more merriment perhaps?”
“What’s she talking about?” Gertie asked Kolt. “Merriment?”
“She thinks we’re Italian clowns from an early tradition of comedy, so just try and be funny until we get to Venice.”
THE CITY WAS SEVERAL muddy miles away, and the track widened as they walked behind the woman’s horse.
“If the Renaissance wasn’t such a dangerous time,” Gertie said, enjoying the chatter of birdsong from the woods, “then Italy in the 1400s would have been a fun place to hunt for lost Keepers.”
Kolt pointed out that the Renaissance in Italy was actually one of the safer times in human history.
“But it’s so dangerous with robbers on the road!”
“It was better than what came before,” he told her.
“What about all the diseases? Like leprosy.”
“You simply couldn’t avoid them,” Kolt said. “But the real problem was that no one questioned anything. People just did as they were told. The lord who owned the land also owned the people who lived and worked on it.”
“People weren’t free to go anywhere they wanted?”
“Absolutely not.”
“But at least they could think whatever they liked, right?” Gertie said, trying to be optimistic.
“I’m afraid they couldn’t do that either,” Kolt said sympathetically. “Your body belonged to the landlord, and your soul belonged to the priest who served another kind of lord. People thought that if they disobeyed the rules, they would burn at the stake, or burn in hell, or both, but everything will change dramatically about two hundred years from now, with a new fashion called science and people called humanists who want everyone to be educated and free.”
“They sound like Keepers!”
Kolt nodded. “Yes, I’ve always wondered if they knew about us; one chap in particular called Rousseau, he had all the hallmarks of a Keeper who found a way back. . . .”
“Once we’ve completed the mission, Kolt, let’s sniff around a few dungeons and see what we turn up? We’ll know if there’s anyone down there, because the key in my pocket will probably do something.”
A look of concern crept over Kolt’s face as they neared the entrance to Venice. “You want to explore the dungeons?”
“Oh, stop worrying!”
When Gertie noticed long-haired children her age playing in the street, she waved and smiled. They beckoned for her to come and join their game, but the woman on the horse was walking too quickly, and Gertie knew she had to keep up.
As they passed an open barn, where people were blowing glass, Gertie heard rushing water. Then they turned a corner where the main street was a brown canal. Kolt explained that Venice was a river city where the main roads literally gushed with brown water, and bobbed with the traffic of small, thin boats called gondolas.
The streets stank of rotting food, dirty water, pee, and animal droppings. Robot Rabbit Boy was able to step over most steaming piles of animal waste, but some of the streets were very narrow, forcing them to squeeze past local Venetians, who smelled of incense, perfume, burnt wood, and sweat. One woman hurried by with a goose pulled to her chest, while a boy in red tights steered his greyhound on a leash through the crowd. Gertie felt a tingle of excitement at the idea of nodding and saying hello to the boy and his dog, but before she could get close enough to talk, their path was blocked by a line of donkeys with hay loaded onto their backs.
All the windows at street level had iron bars over them, and in the walls, Gertie saw carved lion faces with thin slots for mouths. She asked Kolt what they were for, but he didn’t know. When Gertie touched one, and Robot Rabbit Boy put his whole paw into one, the people all around her stopped what they were doing and stared in horror.
The woman on the horse turned to see what had happened.
“Don’t they have those where you come from?”
“No.” Gertie said, touching the carved lion face. “What are they?”
“People write the names of those who break the rules of the city, then drop the paper in there. If a person is found guilty—”
“They’re quartered?” Gertie asked with a gulp.
“No! Nothing usually so brutal as that,” the woman said. “They’re just strangled in a dungeon.”
Gertie backed away from the deadly lion’s mouth, but it was clear Robot Rabbit Boy’s paw was stuck.
“Butter,” he said, his fake mustache twitching. Everyone in the street burst out laughing. “A dollop of mashed potato,” he cried, his eyes glowing neon white, as he pulled and pulled on his trapped paw.
Kolt sighed and shook his head. “This is not what I meant by blending in!”
Eventually Robot Rabbit Boy wriggled free and they continued their journey.
“Did you hear what she said, Kolt? Dungeons!”
“I suppose you want me to get directions for you?”
“Or we could just write our own names on some paper and drop them in the lion’s-mouth box.”
“Get ourselves arrested, you mean?”
“You brought the time machine from the glove box of the Time Cat, didn’t you? We can just put the key in and fizzle home if things get too hairy. It would be worth it to look for lost Keepers.”
“Hmm, I’ll think about it, but if we can get to the dungeon after we’ve completed our task, let’s try and visit as guests of Venice and not prisoners, eh?”
In the center of town, the brown buildings got taller and grander.
When they walked through a large town square, it echoed with the deep, haunting tones of church bells. Gertie found it strange that in the countryside there were people in worn-out cloaks, with missing limbs from leprosy, while the city had tall stone buildings, and enormous, beautifully detailed churches. It amazed her that such magnificent structures could have been made without the technology that would come later.
The smell near the Grand Canal was less rotting food and more decaying fish—with the occasional blast of wind that felt good on their cheeks and in their noses.
There were wooden stalls with many different things for sale, from paintings of the city, to tall cups of colored glass, to sleeves of lace that could be stitched onto clothes or pillowcases.
“Are you impressed with our city?” the woman asked. She had slowed her horse and was now walking alongside the three Keepers.
“Our Venetian craftsmen and craftswomen practice their art only here, in our fair city.”
“Yes, there are many nice things,” Gertie said politely, but there was nothing she wanted to buy personally, and Kolt only liked doughnuts.
“The people who make all these fine things must really like it here in Venice,” he told the woman, “despite the aroma.”
“Oh, the artisans who work here have no choice; if they practice their craft anywhere else, we send private soldiers to kill them.”
“I see,” Kolt said, making a face at Gertie. “That’s one way to limit competition.”
As they neared the woman’s home, a brick building with balconies overlooking the canal, she stared down at Gertie.
“I have a young brother, about your age. He’s extremely strange, but perhaps you’ll like one another. He’s twelve and not married.”
Gertie shot Kolt a panicked look.
“Calm down,” he whispered, “don’t panic, no one’s getting married.”
“I’d rather get snatched!” Gertie hissed quietly. “Ten times in a row!”
Robot Rabbit Boy’s eyes turned raspberry. “Dollops. Mush. Fly.”
“Relax. Both of you, calm down. We’re going to return the medicine and then get out of here.”
“Good!” Gertie huffed. “The sooner the better.”
It was starting to get dark, and they could smell the smoke from people’s evening fires.
“And here we are,” the woman announced, as they reached the grand villa with iron gates and guards who were also wearing pieces of armor with rabbits painted on them.
“First thing we should do,” Kolt said, “is try and get some leads as to where the doctor this powder belongs to lives.”
Gertie agreed.
The guards saluted the woman on the horse and pulled open the heavy wrought-iron gates. “Are you travelers hungry?”
“Funny you’d ask,” laughed Kolt, “because I’m actually starving.”
“Food?” Gertie said, nudging him. “I thought we were in a hurry!”
“Well, you gave all our money away! We’ll just nibble a few things, then go, I promise. . . .”