The Black Opera Read Online Free PDF Page B

least!
    â€œGod is not mocked, Signore Scalese. But there: even daily miracles won’t convince an atheist of your calibre, will they? What’s your excuse for disbelieving in this?”
    Conrad wrenched his shoulders free of the friars’ grip. He shook the chain, sliding his thumb over the cold tempered metal. “You call it a miracle as if that explains it! If something is against the apparent natural laws of science and philosophy, it’s no use hiding it under the name of ‘miracle’—you need to examine it, see what really causes it!”
    â€œYou have the truth there in your hand! How much more plain could it be? I ask God to bind the wicked, and He binds you. Holy Mother! can’t you see what’s in front of you?”
    â€œI see what you see.” Conrad held the compelling black gaze. “I see the same phenomenon—I just don’t accept that it’s accounted for by superstitions and dogma.”
    Viscardo looked away and signalled. All but two of the friars left Conrad alone as if he were contagious, and commenced packing up the documents and papers strewn across the floor.
    Conrad turned the steel links in his hands, fascinated despite himself. “If I see something that appears to contradict the current explanations of science—if I see steel become plastic at such a low temperature, and without burning my skin—then I want to set up experiments to find out why this is. It demands investigation! Not blind ‘worship.’”
    â€œGod Himself comes nowhere into your blasphemous science. You make a false idol of your science: that it holds the incontestable truth—”
    â€œIncontestable! Have you read nothing that’s been published in England? Germany? France?—Davy! Berzelius! Lamarck! Darwin? —the disagreements? If a present explanation is wrong, another theory can be proposed and tested—there’s never any shame in saying ‘I don’t know.’”
    Viscardo’s eyes shone.
    Because this was a particularly stupid time to speak my mind?
    Anger won’t make him listen—but will anything?
    No one has entry to the cells under the Cardinal’s palace except the Inquisition. They answer to no law except their own. They can imprison a man for years if they choose. And they often choose.
    Conrad realised, as he stared challengingly back, why the Dominican’s gaze was so dark. His irises were a brown colour deep enough that they could barely be distinguished from the pupil.
    Like a dog’s eyes . What’s that old pun about the Dominicans? “Domini canes ”—“the Dogs of the Lord.” The Hounds of God. This one’s a mastiff: he won’t let go.
    The Canon-Regular shouldered past Conrad and gave out orders left and right. Conrad trod on the coils of steel chain, and almost fell. A bruised and dusty Tullio—on his feet now—gave Conrad a wry look.
    Conrad scooped up an armful of chains, and bundled their chill weight between his cuffed hands. “Tullio—if you get the chance, run. I don’t think I can protect you.”
    Tullio attempted a stern glare, but was interrupted.
    â€œMove!” Canon Viscardo’s order snapped out briskly enough to have the other Dominicans gathered in a moment, documentary evidence under their arms, and two men each to guard Conrad and Tullio. One man slammed a punch under the ex-soldier’s sternum that made him sway in their grip.
    â€œLet Rossi go!” Conrad scrambled for a justification of his protest. “He’s just a servant. He’s illiterate!”
    â€œChosen for his illiteracy, I expect.” Viscardo looked up from a two-year-old libretto from the Paris Opera. “Because of the blasphemy he might read here. But he still has ears and eyes—at the moment—and he can tell us what he’s seen and heard you do.”
    Hands hauled Conrad out onto the main second-floor