The Secrets of Casanova by Greg Michaels Page B

behaviors.
    “You can understand why it was wholly inconceivable when this evenhanded man came to my room to explain the Inquisitori’s methods and to feverishly pronounce the warning to me: Leave Venice this minute.
    “I chose not to listen. The very next morning, my lodgings were invaded by three dozen Venetian policemen. Looking back, I suppose it pleased my pride—that the Secretary of the Three deemed me dangerous. Or so I thought.”
    In the telling, Jacques’ voice was soft and simple. He thought he saw in Dominique’s eyes a question: Do you seek to lead me astray? He laughed at his notion and let the spring air warm his lungs.
    Dominique bade him continue his story.
    “On the first day of my sentence, I remained in good spirits while entering the Doge’s palace and the prison within it: I Piombi, the Leads. Spirited was I—even while I passed the garroting machine, the torture instruments used for tearing out teeth and tongues, and the tool for skull crushing.
    “But …,” he paused. “I hadn’t been informed of charges nor been told the length of my sentence. I crouched in that cell—lower than my full height—feeling utter confusion.” Jacques bent his head forward. “All was dark except for one corner of the room that had an undersized window that offered some dingy light. Rotting in a cell, you don’t tire of living, you tire of slowly dying. Deeply frightening, I assure you. It speaks to my fear that I didn’t have a bowel movement for half a month.
    “‘Why am I in prison?’ I asked myself again and again. ‘I’m blameless. Guiltless.’ Soon I did not so much wonder why I was there but how I would escape the place.” His eyes glistened.
    “How … how did you escape?” Dominique’s lips were parted in astonishment, her eyes unblinking.
    WHOMP! Jacques’ hands clapped shut.
    Dominique immediately took up a defensive posture, her expression vulnerable but not helpless.
    “The slamming of that cell door scared me as badly as I scared you!” exclaimed Jacques.
    The pair exchanged a silly laugh.
    “Here—in brief—is my escape story: I donned a hat and walked out the front door of the Leads.”
    Dominique showed a glimmer of glee that ended with a smile. “Tell me all, or you’ll get no dinner tonight.”
    “For your pleasure, madame,” he said, straightening out his legs. “In the beginning, I was put in solitary confinement. Little did I know I would stay there ninety-seven days. In unremitting hell. Keeping company only with what thoughts I had. I, who thrive on the pleasures of social discourse, on the sweet joys of food and drink, on the … reduced to a dark, dank cell with rats as big as rabbits.
    “By late autumn, I was given cellmates from time to time. The head jailer, Lorenzo, began to feed me decently and soon granted me an armchair. For reading material, I was given The Mystical City of God .” Jacques’ face screwed up into a graceless expression. “Interminably long and catastrophically boring.”
    Dominique laughed.
    “I knew these privileges of mine were granted only because of the entreaties of my benefactor, Senator Bragadin.” Jacques frowned. “But most everything, it seemed, added to my severe melancholia. Fortunately, better things were to come: eventually I was granted walks—for exercise—in the prison attic. It was there I discovered a piece of polished black marble and an iron spike the length of my forearm. Although at the time I’d no idea what good this might do, I secreted the spike and marble in my armchair. Then one dream-filled night, a plan came to me.
    “Quite soon, I began to complain of chest pains and bronchia to Lorenzo. I persuaded the prison doctor that my cell must not be cleaned because the dust might kill me. I kept this up for some time, during which my difficult work started: In those periods when I was absent cellmates, I’d sharpen my iron spike by honing it on the marble, using spit for lubrication. Stiff arms, a