1634- the Galileo Affair

by Eric Flint

  He stamped his own feet again. He'd heard Italian summers could be scorching. For him, this was about the only time of day with a civilized temperature and it was only spring. Aye, weel . . .

  "Get Messer Cavriani up, will you? I'll see the lads are getting ready for the road. We'll either pass the boys on the way or be waiting for them there. We happen might have Messer Cavriani's people hire a few local lads there to help watch, eh?"

  "Turning spymaster, Herr Kapitan Lennox?" Heinzerling grinned through two days' worth of stubble.

  Would it kill him to bloody well shave? "Hiring local scouts, ye daft gobshite," Lennox retorted. Spymaster, indeed. It was not as though he had any low opinion of the good Don Francisco, mind. It just wasn't honest work for a soldier. "An' no' another word, ye bugger, o' spyin' or the like. And while we're aboot changes o' career, do ye think to make a cavalryman? For today's ride'll see that fat German arse broken."

  Heinzerling's sneer was magnificent; Lennox had to allow him that. It was just possible to admit a sneaking regard for the drunken tub of guts. He might sit a horse like a side of fat bacon, but at least he stayed on the thing and, more or less, kept up. He seemed to be able to look after his beast as well, although he'd passed the word for the troopers to keep an eye on him. Any horse bearing Heinzerling's weight was bound to see more wear and tear than a mere Romish priest could remedy. Lennox himself was no small man, but at least he wasn't carrying a half-hundredweight of butter with it.

  The sniff that followed the sneer was another masterwork. "We shall see, Herr Kapitan, which arse is broken, this day. I have the better padding, I think you will agree. Am I not the fat papist?"

  Och, the bugger's a smart one. Took ma ain line off me and turned it around. And there was a sting in it, too. Lennox wasn't the young man who could once have ridden days and nights on end and not noticed it, and truth be told he was considerably bonier about the behind than Heinzerling. "Aye, ye've y'ain cushion, right enough. It'll be threadbare by dusk, mind. Now run and get Messer Cavriani up and about."

  "You called?" Cavriani stood in the inn doorway, a buff-coat wrapped tightly about him. "Curse these cold mornings."

  The worst of it, the man was not joking. Lennox sighed. "The day'll warm up. And I was just saying we'll ride on for—" he paused to get the sound of the placename right "—Firenze straight away. Mind, we'll stop as little as we can, press the pace good and hard."

  Cavriani groaned. "Christ, have mercy!" he exclaimed. "My ass is already about broken."

  Lennox and Heinzerling looked at each other.

  "What?" said Cavriani.

  * * *

  Florence seemed like a neat and pretty enough town, although Lennox would be the first to admit he was no great admirer of architecture and buildings and what-not.

  The ride had been just as bloody painful as advertised, for the horses as well as his own backside. They'd pressed hard for the best part of two and a half days to get to Florence, and gotten away without any serious problems. That the embassy had enough funds to see them right for two remounts apiece had been their salvation, of course, even if it did make them look like a gaggle of tinker horse-copers.

  Heinzerling, rot him, had coped admirably. Lennox supposed, all other things being equal, that the fat priest wasn't such a bad fellow, if he could endure a ride like that without complaint. He had to be hurting just as badly as Lennox was.

  Cavriani was a sight to inspire pity. Suffering though Lennox was for not having been in a saddle for weeks before this wild goose chase, Cavriani had last sat a horse years before. And he was by no means the youngest man in their party, either. The lads—none of whom seemed to be feeling a damned thing, God rot their callow souls—had ribbed him with a good nature and seen to him without orders. They all, no doubt, remembered their own first days in the saddle.

  They'd left Lieutenant Trumble in charge of keeping a watch on the road while the horses were cared for and rested at a livery on the edge of town that had been positively ecstatic to see so much business in one fell swoop. Cavriani had ambled about—conspicuously bow-legged; Lennox would have to see about getting the man some goose-grease for his sores—asking after the Marcoli party.

  There had been no sign, yet. So Lennox and Heinzerling had rented a couple of nags—nothing much to look at, just not half-blown from nearly three days' hard ride across mountains—to take a look in town. Walking would have been agony, and a carriage was no way to see a town. They weren't expecting to see anything, it was just that Lennox liked to get a feel for a new place as quickly as he could. They'd wait here for a few days, he thought, keeping a watch, and if Messer Cavriani could—

  Heinzerling reached over and tugged his sleeve. "Herr Kapitan? If I might disturb your rest?"

  Lennox realized that he had, in fact, been nodding a little in the saddle as they rode along a cobbled streets and into a large, open square. "Aye?" he said, daring Heinzerling to comment further.

  "Father Mazzare." He pointed.

  Lennox stared. "Aye, so it is." The American priest was standing on the other side of the square with, it looked like, the Reverend Jones, studying the front of some building or other. A Romish church, from the looks of it. Even the outside of the thing looked idolatrous. "I'd thought myself he'd be nearer Rome by now. We should report."

  "Ja," agreed Heinzerling, and they rode across the square.

  Mazzare and Jones both did double takes when they turned at the sound of approaching hooves and saw Lennox and Heinzerling. It turned out that they'd reached Florence two days before, and were proposing to depart in the morning.

  "You nearly missed us here," the priest-turned-ambassador said. "I'd finished writing up my notes from the things we discussed in the coach, and we were just sightseeing before getting a good night's sleep and moving on. You must have just missed us at Ferrara, if I'm keeping any track of the time we've spent on the road."

  "Seems like," said Lennox. "And you didn't pass anyone you recognized on the road?"

  "Should we have?" Mazzare frowned.

  "Aye, weel," said Lennox, sighing deeply. "It's like this, y'see . . ."

  The report took a few minutes. The Reverend Jones simply let his face drop open. As well he might.

  Father Mazzare's face grew progressively blanker as Lennox progressed with his report.

  "Well," he said, when Lennox had finished.

  "Aye," Lennox responded. "It's a muckle great stew of a thing, right enough."

  "And Ducos is with them," Heinzerling added.

  "Aye," Lennox added. "We were wondering about that, as it happens. Yon Marcoli fellow's none of your great schemers, it seems, and the French want to see him succeed and embarrass us all."

  "That'd work," Jones said. "What were the boys thinking?"

  Mazzare's face was growing eerily still. "I can guess what Frank was thinking," he said, in a voice with almost no tone to it at all.

  Lennox saw that Heinzerling was growing even redder in the face than he normally was, and shifting from foot to foot.

  "Father Mazzare," the big German said, "Vielleicht we can be charitable toward the boys, ja? They think to do good, by their lights, ja?"

  "Good?" Mazzare's tone was still mild. Lennox realized, with more than a little discomfort, that Mazzare was one of those dangerous men who got more controlled and calm the angrier they became. The man was positively icy, now. Lennox realized that he really, really did not want to be the Stone boys when Mazzare next saw them. Come to that, he didn't want to be himself if he didn't stop the Stone boys before they did whatever it was they were planning.

  "Yeah, steady there, Larry," Jones said. "You said yourself lots of folks have some, ah, slightly wild ideas about what's going on with the Inquisition and Galileo and all."

  Mazzare took a deep breath, murmured something quietly to himself—probably a prayer, Lennox realized—and: "Okay. Getting angry isn't going to help. Captain Lennox, you say you've not passed them on the road?"

  "Ay
e, Your Excellency," Lennox said. Out of reflex, he was calling on all his reserves of sergeantliness.

  "And you're certain they headed for Padua first?"

  "Aye, Your Excellency."

  "Such was the news Messer Cavriani got for us from the watermen, Father." said Heinzerling, "The Marcolis were poor at keeping secrets, it seems."

  "Except from us, apparently," Mazzare snapped. "Sorry, Gus, it wasn't your fault. Will they have met Tom at Padua? Maybe he got them to turn back, and you've chased down here for nothing."

  "Schade, no," said Heinzerling. "Herr Doktor Stone returned from Padua without meeting his sons. He is very worried, mein' ich."

  "As well he might be, Gus. Not that I'm telling you anything on that score. Lord knows I did some dumb things as a teenager, but this has to beat all." Mazzare heaved another deep sigh, pondered for a moment and then seemed to reach a decision. "Let's assume they're definitely on the way to Rome. Captain Lennox, continue your attempts to find and stop the boys on the road, but please try and make sure you're in Rome before they can possibly arrive. Don't let trying to catch them keep you out on the road while they're up to mischief in Rome. I'll be staying at the palazzo Barberini, apparently; get word to me there. I'll let you know where Galileo's being held and when and where the trial's to be, and you can mount a discreet watch. Stop them quietly but firmly, please. Gus, Captain Lennox, I don't know much about the Marcolis, but Tom's boys are three good kids at heart with all their lives in front of them. Try and keep them out of trouble, eh?"

  Lennox and Heinzerling murmured their assent.

  "And another thing," Mazzare went on, "make yourselves scarce in town until say noon tomorrow. We're traveling with Monsignor Mazarini, and I'd prefer not to have him know anything he might feel duty-bound to report."

  * * *

  As Gus and Captain Lennox rode away, Jones said "Larry, I'm not sure this is the best way to handle this."

  "Why not, Simon?" Mazzare wasn't sure himself, but it was the first improvisation that had occurred to him. Trying to explain about American traditions of teenage independence, about youthful high spirits and the sheer improbability of them doing any harm would cut no ice at a trial for what was, by anyone's standards, a plot to commit a major felony.

  "Well, if we explain and all . . . oh." Jones dried up as his thought processes caught up. "Yeah, I see what you mean. 'Cardinal, we need extra guards. The three sons of a friend of ours—one of our delegation, in fact—are plotting to spring the star attraction at this summer's biggest show-trial out of the pokey.' " He snorted. "Go down real well."

  Mazzare nodded. "Thinking aloud, here, Simon, we're dealing with a propaganda event. If things really are starting to crack open on this, if it's really like we hope it is, then we can't let anything throw grit in the gears. Although I'd throw it all up in a heartbeat if I could keep those boys from doing something that they'll regret for the rest of their lives."

  Mazzare realized, as he said it, that needn't be a very long time at all. While he wasn't familiar with any of the local penal codes, he was pretty certain what the penalty would be for trying to organize a prison-break. This was an era where people could get executed for petty theft.

  "Come on, Larry," said Jones, after a long silence. "I think I'm done sightseeing."

  Chapter 44

  "Well, Rome's better found than Venice was, I suppose." Jones was looking around the apartment that they had been given in the Palazzo Barberini for their stay. "Not as roomy, but it's clean, at least."

  "You know, Simon, for a married man you can be a real old woman at times." Mazzare chuckled.

  Jones blew a loud raspberry and sat down while a small platoon of servants scurried to sort out their baggage.

  Mazzare looked around, feeling uncomfortable sitting down where someone else was working. The Barberinis' general program of beautification of their surroundings had its upside, and staying in their palazzo was part of it. Many years before by his own time—the three-and-three-quarter-century-wide fault line notwithstanding—a much younger Father Lawrence Mazzare had come to Rome for the first time and checked off the tourist sights methodically.

  The Palazzo Barberini, by then a museum, was one of the ones he'd gone back to. The place was wall to wall with art and treasures and just plain beautiful things. It was a little sparser now than his own memory of it, but then the place had had over three hundred years to fill up by the time he'd last seen it.

  "Simon?"

  "Yes, Larry?" Jones had lain back in his chair and draped a handkerchief over his face. The trip down from Venice had been wearing, for all it had been taken in the most comfortably sprung coach they had been able to find. Jones, slightly the older of the two, had a far less ascetic disposition than Mazzare and gave vent to his discomforts and took the load off whenever he could.

  "Point of grammar. If I remember having been in this very room, but won't have been here for another three hundred and—let me think—fifty-one years, is that deja vu all over again?"

  * * *

  "It is this business about Sharon Nichols and the man Sanchez that concerns me perhaps the most, Michael." Nasi leaned back in his chair across from the prime minister's desk and somewhat cattercorner to it. "Mostly, perhaps, because we can do nothing anyway about this Galileo affair, except hope that the Stone boys refrain from sheer madness or that Lennox catches them before they don't. Whereas . . ." The sentence drifted to a halt as if it had simply run out of gas.

  Mike Stearns laced his fingers together and leaned forward on the desk. "Explain."

  Unusually, the Sephardic banker needed time to organize his thoughts. He'd spoken somewhat impulsively, which was quite unlike him. Since Rebecca was trapped in Amsterdam and Ed Piazza had had to relinquish his duties as secretary of state in order to administer Thuringia as the new governor appointed by Gustav Adolf, Francisco had come to assume many of Rebecca and Ed Piazza's roles for Mike as well as being the head of the USE's intelligence service. There were some ways in which he was very diffident about the business. Rebecca's tasks as national security adviser he felt confident to handle, but he could hardly serve Mike as the same sort of personal confidante. And this was . . .

  Perhaps a touchy matter. On this, unlike most subjects, Americans could be quite unpredictable.

  "Well, to begin with, Michael, as a spy myself—'spook,' to use that phrase you so enjoy—I am naturally given to suspicion. I am uncomfortable with the fact that a known agent of the Spanish empire with whom we are at war has now been residing for some days in our embassy in Venice." That was the easy part. He cleared his throat. "Yes, I understand the seriousness of his medical condition—Tom Stone explained in reply to one of my queries; at far greater length, I might add, than he normally explains anything; which itself disturbs me a bit because he too seems to have become something of a partisan of this peculiar Spanish fellow—"

  "You're prattling, Francisco," Mike said mildly. "Not like you at all. And he's not really 'Spanish' anyway, he's Catalan." There seemed to be a trace of humor there. "Weren't you the one who gave me a briefing not two months ago on the significance of the distinction?"

  Francisco smiled, acknowledging the hit. "Well, yes. Still . . ."

  "Oh, just spit it out, will you? I won't bite, I promise." The prime minister unlaced his fingers and leaned back in his own chair. "What you're really wondering is why—let's be precise, here—the bed he's been recuperating in belongs to Sharon Nichols."

  Nasi must have looked a little startled. Mike smiled thinly. "I do occasionally read the entire reports, not simply your summaries. I made it a point to do so, in this case. If for no other reason, because James Nichols is one of my closest friends."

  For some obscure reason, Francisco felt compelled to play devil's advocate for a moment. "You will have noted then that there is no evidence—unless she sneaks about at night, which doesn't seem to match her profile—"

  Mike scowled, as he usually did when Nasi lapsed into jargon.<
br />
  "Well, you know what I mean."

  " 'Course I do!" Mike snorted. "So why don't you just come out and say it? Sharon Nichols and 'sneak around at night' is pure bullshit. Bull-shit. A nice, clear term that beats all that psychobabble six ways from Sunday." Mike levered himself back upright. "We're talking about a woman here who told her father straight to his face that she was going to spend the night with Hans Richter. Then did it. In his house. The way he tells the story, even instructed him to have breakfast ready the next morning—although I'm sure James made that last bit up himself. I could tell. He doesn't hardly ever brag about anything except his daughter."

  Mike was back to leaning on the desk, using laced fingers to support the weight. "So she's not screwing Sanchez. To use another excellent nonbabble term. Even if that were possible, anyway—which, if I interpreted Stoner's technical details correctly, it probably isn't. Not recuperating from that wound, not this quickly. Not even if this Sanchez guy was a man in his twenties."

  Nasi relaxed. He'd never be as comfortable as so many—though certainly not all—Americans were, in the casual way they discussed sex. His own culture was very far from prudish, but had a more circumspect way of dealing with the matter. Still, it was at least obvious that he had not inadvertently stumbled into what Americans liked to call a "mine field."

  "I am still concerned, Michael." He forced himself to be honest. "Mainly, I will admit, simply because I am puzzled. Being puzzled tends to make me very suspicious."

  Mike smiled crookedly. "There are times I think you are the only fully functional paranoid I know. 'Francisco Nasi' and 'puzzled' is a contradiction in terms; so, on the rare occasions it happens, you immediately suspect the universe of having foul designs."