1634- the Galileo Affair

by Eric Flint

  Sharon smiled grimly. "I guess that sounds idiotic, doesn't it? Yeah, gee, no kidding, there's something wrong about a murder. Especially one this brutal. But that's not what I meant. There's something wrong about the murder."

  * * *

  Coming around the corner, the first thing Frank Stone and his brothers spotted was Billy Trumble. The young Marine was leaning against the wall next to the entrance in front of Joe Buckley's building. Even from a distance, he looked . . .

  "He's practically green," hissed Ron. "It must be true. Shit!"

  Gerry was scowling in the exaggerated manner that only teenagers can manage. " 'Shit,' is right. Joe was a good guy."

  Frank didn't really share his youngest brother's attitude toward Buckley. Hadn't shared, he reminded himself bleakly. Frank had always found the reporter a bit two-faced. Not a bad guy, no, but way too self-absorbed for Frank to like him all that much. Still, he'd hardly wanted anything like this to happen to him.

  "Let's go see what Billy can tell us," he said. He began marching over, his brothers trailing in his wake.

  When they came up, Billy gave them a weak little nod. "Hey, guys. You heard about Joe, huh? Yeah, it's true." He paused for a moment, clearly controlling his gorge. "Jesus, you oughta see him! No—don't."

  Billy glanced at the door. "Don't do up there, guys. Just take my word for it. Lieutenant Taggart probably wouldn't let you in, anyway."

  Frank swallowed. So did Ron and Gerry.

  "Bad?" asked Gerry, half-whispering the words.

  Billy wiped his face with the back of his uniform sleeve. "You wouldn't believe it. They tortured him first. Then . . . oh . . ."

  He turned away and doubled up. Vomit splattered the side of the building and the garbage-strewn ground in front of it.

  "Jesus," hissed Ron. He looked like he might puke himself.

  Frank thought he probably looked about the same. His stomach sure didn't feel good. He was definitely feeling light-headed. Not even so much at the horror of what had happened to Buckley, but at the greater horror of what might happen in the future. To Giovanna.

  But he managed to control himself. More than anything, Frank needed to figure out what to do. Now.

  He waited impatiently—some part of his mind feeling guilty at the impatience—until Billy was done. As soon as Billy drew in a deep breath and managed to half-lift himself, hands now placed firmly on his knees, Frank stepped up and patted him on the back.

  "You okay?"

  Billy nodded.

  "Look, Billy, I'm sorry but I've gotta know. You say they tortured him? I mean, Joe wasn't just murdered?"

  Billy shook his head. When he spoke, his voice was thin but firm. "No. Christ, Frank, there are pieces of him spread around. His fingers—belly—" He broke off, giving his head a shake so violent it was more like a dumb beast trying to rid itself of a swarm of insects. "Just take my word for it, will you?"

  Frank nodded and gave Billy another pat on the shoulder. "Okay, man, no sweat. I just . . . needed to be sure." He glanced at his brothers meaningfully. "I guess we'd better . . . uh, be off, now."

  Billy finally managed to raise himself erect. He took another deep breath and then gave Frank something that might in really bad light have been able to pass for a smile.

  "Probably a good idea." Billy glanced unhappily at the doorway. "I need to get back up there anyway." He took an uncertain step toward it.

  But Frank and his brothers were already around the corner before Billy made it to the door. As soon as they were out of sight, they started running.

  * * *

  When Ruy Sanchez came through the door after a young officer nodded him past, the first thing he saw was Sharon Nichols. The sight of the woman, as it had for weeks now, arrested him for a moment. Had Sanchez known that Mazzare had, not long before, been puzzling over the matter of Sharon's relationship with him, the Catalan would have been mightily amused. Since he himself was only—finally!—beginning to sort it out.

  It was not so much that the woman herself was confusing, though there were many times that Sanchez found her so. It was more a matter, he'd finally realized, that Ruy Sanchez de Casador y Ortiz—as he'd called himself for several decades now; to his amazement, with complete success—had managed, not for the first time in his life, to place himself in a quandary.

  Sharon still hadn't noticed him, standing in the doorway. Neither had the priest standing beside her. So, Sanchez took the moment to examine her.

  Then, very softly, sighed. Two weeks earlier, after as serious and determined a campaign of seduction as Ruy Sanchez had ever launched—and he was quite good at it—he'd come to accept the fact that he'd met his match. Not for the first time, to be sure; but it was still a rare enough experience to cause him to sulk for several days. The cardinal had been quite sarcastic about it, too. Not that Bedmar knew any of the details, of course, because Ruy Sanchez never discussed his amatory affairs with anyone. But he and the cardinal had been together now for many years, and the old bastard was hard to fool.

  That left only two options: abandon the campaign with a gracious salute to the victor; or . . .

  Sanchez had spent a week mulling over the "or." And, by the end, decided he much preferred it to the alternative.

  As he'd feared he would, alas. Whatever else he was, the Catalan was no fool. His pretense at nobility had gone unchallenged, true enough, but that was mostly a result of his connection with the cardinal and the fact that few men who knew Sanchez would challenge him lightly. Few, indeed, would challenge him at all; even now, as he approached his sixtieth year of life. In his own way, he was somewhat famous in the insular world of hidalgo Spain and its territories. Well known, at least; and if not esteemed, he was certainly given wary respect.

  None of which, he well knew, would make—to use the American expression he'd picked up from Sharon—a "spit's worth of difference" to her. He might as well advance an offer of marriage to a Spanish infanta. Granted, Sharon Nichols would be gracious in her refusal, where an infanta—or her father, more likely—would have Sanchez clapped into a dungeon. Refuse him she would, nonetheless—if anything, even more decisively than a Spanish princess. The Catalan had only a dim sense of the way in which Americans gauged these things, because they viewed the world so differently than other people he'd known. But he understood enough—thought he did, at least—to know that he would be considered an utterly unsuitable spouse for such as Sharon Nichols. By she herself, leaving aside her father or anyone else.

  It was all . . . very confusing, and left Sanchez feeling uncertain of himself and what he should do. There was nothing in the world that Ruy Sanchez de Casador y Ortiz detested more than being confused and uncertain.

  That detestation made him clear his throat more noisily than he meant to. Sharon and the American priest looked over, startled.

  "You sent for me, dona?" Stubbornly, as a sop to himself, Sanchez used the Catalan term instead of the Spanish señora or the Italian signora. He knew it was silly, but not even Ruy Sanchez could bring himself to call Sharon Nichols by the girlish diminutives. Not in any language. Unmarried or not, she was simply impossible to address other than with the fullest respect.

  "Thank you for coming, Ruy," said Sharon. She gestured at the corpse whose feet were the only thing Sanchez could see from where he stood. "You were told what happened?"

  He nodded. "The soldier who brought your summons informed me."

  "It was hardly a 'summons,' Ruy," Sharon murmured, smiling. It was a little smile, and a sad one. He wondered about that sadness. Most of it, to be sure, was due to the death in the room. But some, perhaps . . .

  Old habit swept his hat from his head in a gallant flourish. "From you, dona, any request sent to Ruy Sanchez is considered a summons. I would no more think to disobey than—"

  Sharon barked a little laugh. "Oh, Ruy—give it a rest!" She shook her head, smiling more widely. "I will say you can always cheer me up. Even here, even now. But, still, put a cork in the test
osterone, would you? Just for a few minutes—I know it's a lot to ask."

  Sanchez smiled back. He understood the term "testosterone" now. Sharon had explained it to him. Twice. The second time, laughing, after he'd strutted for minutes when she explained it the first time. Ha! The truth! Confirmed even by Americans, with their dazzling science!

  She motioned him over. "Come here, please. I want you to look at this. I think—no, I'd rather hear what you think, before I say anything."

  * * *

  It took Sanchez no more than three minutes to draw his conclusions. It was not difficult. Certainly it was not upsetting. Sanchez had seen far worse, as a young man, in the course of the endless border wars in New Spain with the savage indigenes of the mountains and deserts. Not all of which barbarisms, by any means, had been the work of the indigenes themselves. By the time he was twenty, he'd understood that savagery was the common property of mankind. The same skin, whatever its color.

  He might have despaired then, had he not discovered in the arms of his first wife that other properties were shared and common also. Those he chose to treasure. For the rest, there was always his sword.

  He rose. "This is fakery. The man fought. Not well, I think, but fight he did. Those teeth broke; they were not broken. The rest—"

  He made a contemptuous gesture. "All done after he died. The garrote is what killed him. Not a good death—what is?—but better than most. It would have been quick, at least, as deeply as that cord is driven into his neck."

  The priest was frowning. "All . . . that? But—why?"

  Sanchez shrugged. "Much of it, I think, was done from sheer fury. The murderer probably did not expect his victim to strike back, and flew into a rage when he did." He pointed to the intestines spilling onto the floor. "Why else inflict such a wound? No torturer would, for a surety. And most of this was done to make it seem that the man was tortured."

  The priest was still frowning. Whether that was because he was puzzled or simply because a frown was his way of maintaining composure in the midst of barbarity, Sanchez could not determine.

  "I still don't understand why."

  Neither did Sanchez—and the matter was beginning to intrigue him. Given Buckley's past activities, of course, there were a multitude of possible suspects. One of them being . . . well, Sanchez himself.

  He decided it would be best to depart now, before that thought occured to the Americans also. Besides, Cardinal Bedmar needed to learn of this matter at once. So, with a flourish, he made his farewells and came as close to scampering out the door as Ruy Sanchez de Casador y Ortiz ever came to scampering.

  * * *

  Which was not very close at all. After he was gone, Sharon Nichols shook her head and said: "I swear, that man will swagger into his own grave." But she was smiling when she said it. The first genuine smile on her face since she'd entered that horrible room.

  Chapter 33

  The funeral that took place the next day was wholly lacking in Venetian pomp, but drew a ceremonial all of its own. The arrangements had been simple enough; Gus had dealt with it. It had turned out to be easy to persuade the nearest church to let them hold the service, and a grave was to be had for ready money. Given the state of the corpse, no one even proposed employing the services of a mortician. The Marines, sharing Gus' own grim attitude, had taken care of wrapping the body. The casket, of course, was closed.

  Mazzare had not even the beginnings of a notion what religion Buckley had had, if any, and Sharon hadn't known either despite their being at college together. So it was a requiem mass, by default, since there would have been complications at the very least had Jones, as the only Protestant minister in town, done the service in his own native liturgy.

  He had expected a quiet affair, with just the staff and the ambassadorial party turning out.

  Not a bit of it. Mazzare had stepped out of the sacristy, accompanied by a small squadron of Venetian altar boys, to see a church packed wall to wall. In the front pews, the embassy party minus the corporal's guard they'd left behind. Behind them, Mazzare recognized several Venetian dignitaries. None of them of the first rank, and the highest of them would need to puff himself out to make the second rank, but nothing happened by accident in this town. Someone—likely several someones, some number between one and Ten—was sending a message of support.

  Mazzare was not really surprised. Outside, he'd been told by Gus, a small mob from the Arsenal had gathered for the funeral also. Joe Buckley's articles had been passed around the Arsenal too, in special editions printed by the Venetian Committee of Correspondence. For whatever reason—always hard to know with that mysterious body—the Council of Ten had chosen to turn a blind eye both to Buckley's activities as well as the propaganda work of the city's small and oft-derided Committee.

  Heinzerling himself thought it was because the Council of Ten saw Buckley and his popularity in the Arsenal as an asset to Venice. True, the Venetian elite itself had often been the target of Buckley's muckraking. Buckley had had the touch, however unpolished he might have been, and the Venetian masses had especially enjoyed one article he'd written on the Council of Ten, which he or some wit of an editor had entitled "A Conspiracy of Harlots."

  But Venice had not survived for so many centuries in Europe—a republic among monarchies for a thousand years—because its upper crust was given to fits of pique. The real danger they faced was not rebellion on the part of the city's masses, it was foreign intervention. More than once, Venice's powers had used the Arsenalotti to drive out an alien presence which, for one reason or another, the Council of Ten had not wanted to confront directly.

  Mazzare wondered if such a maneuver was being undertaken again. And who would be the target?

  The Spanish? Maybe . . .

  But, if so, Sanchez seemed determined to be the joker in the deck. He'd turned out for the funeral also, and in full hidalgo formal attire. A message from his master, or just here because of Sharon?

  Following the service, Buckley went by boat from the church to his grave, accompanied by a fleet of, not mourners exactly, but people who wanted to be seen to be mourners. It seemed a little unreal to Mazzare as he spoke the words and watched the crowd gather. He had visions of political funerals in South Africa and Northern Ireland, and stumbled over the words of committal as visions of riot crossed his mind.

  But the funeral was wholly lacking in drama as well. The gravediggers stepped forward on cue as the mourners began to file out of the graveyard. Mazzare took off his stole, and looked to the gray sky that threatened rain but had not yet delivered.

  "Larry?" Jones interrupted the reverie that Mazzare always fell into after funerals. "There's a message from Benjamin."

  The Jewish lawyer had remained at the embassy to mind the store. "What does he say?" Mazzare asked.

  "The State Inquisition is declining to investigate."

  Mazzare frowned. He had, naturally, reported the matter to the appropriate authorities as a murder. "Why?" he asked.

  "They think it's the Spanish or the French, and they can't arrest any of the diplomats."

  "What?" Sanchez had heard.

  Jones colored. "Señor Sanchez," he said, "I'm only repeating what was told to me."

  Sanchez blew through his mustaches. "Did they have the courage to make this accusation to my face, I should be much tempted to take advantage of my diplomat status." He smiled in a way that was all the more unnerving coming from a man of almost sixty.

  Mazzare decided to try conciliation. "Now, señor, I feel sure the accusation was not meant for you personally—"

  Sanchez threw back his head and laughed. "Your Excellency forgets that I was here for the conspiracy. Took part in it, in fact. The Venetians would believe anything of me."

  A cold wind was idly toying with the clothes of the few mourners who yet remained in the graveyard, but that was not all that made Mazzare shiver. The sheer Latin ferality of the man, when he chose to show it, was quite intimidating. In that moment Mazzare realized
he himself could well believe anything of the stocky Spaniard, whom Sharon had once described to him as "Don Quixote on steroids." It was easy to see him smiling in badly feigned innocence while a windmill was blown to smithereens by stealthily planted charges. Tilting he would regard as pointlessly ineffective.

  "Behave, Ruy," Sharon said.

  "Forgive me, Dona Sharon." Then, turning back to Mazzare: "And forgive my manner, Excellency. The plain fact of the matter is that our nations are in arms against one another. But neither I nor His Eminence the cardinal would resort to such as this. If nothing else, I am pricked by the suggestion that we should do something so foolish. The man Buckley was an annoyance to us, as I understand he was to you—"

  Sharon had the good grace to look a little embarrassed at having apparently released a little diplomatic communiqué of her own. Mazzare decided he would do no more than issue a word to the wise—later.

  "—but there are other means to deal with annoyances of his kind."

  "Quite," Mazzare said. He'd heard rumors of prosecutions for libel and slander, challenges to duels and so forth. It had been only a matter of time before something had descended on Buckley; it was just that the murderer got to him first.

  "Please accept my assurance and my word," Sanchez continued, speaking very formally now, "Your Excellency, that to my knowledge this matter was not conceived of at the embassy of His Most Catholic Majesty."

  "Thank you, Sanchez," Mazzare said.

  Sanchez bid them all good day, and left immediately. That made sense. If the Venetians were casting aspersions of that character, his master the cardinal Bedmar and the Spanish embassy in general needed to know so as to start protesting immediately. Loudly and in strong terms; Mazzare wondered how Bedmar kept a straight face. The old cardinal was one of the sharpest operators in Venice, for all he played the role of feeble old man in over his head.

  And, at that, he might well have to keep a straight face through all those protests. Sanchez was himself a competent operator, and had not gone so far as to pledge his word absolutely for the clean hands of the whole Spanish presence in Venice. There were, in effect, two missions from His Most Catholic Majesty in town right now, and no firm guarantee that the left hand knew what the right was doing. Mazzare had met Bedmar several times, and the other Spaniards likewise. Never in the same place, and always on neutral ground. The regular mission—the one from Madrid—was polite, reserved and distant, saying nothing and giving away less. Bedmar, on the other hand, seemed to be hinting at a second agenda, a possibility that there was more to discuss than just how little personal rancor there was arising from the fact that their mutual nations were at war. There was, however, nothing of substance in that as yet. It was, at best, frustrating.