1635 The Papal Stakes: Chapter Sixteen

    “There’s the Laguna Veneta.”

    Klaus nodded at his copilot’s announcement. He measured the Jupiter Two’s sideways drift again, then began the long, lazy bank that would bring the four-engined aircraft 180 degrees about. When the turn was completed, they would be set up at the head of a landing run that would end near the litter of small islands that sheltered Mestre’s far western warren of docks and warehouses.

    As they started over the lagoon, well to east of Venice itself, Klaus called for a wind check. Arne was a little slower in making his reports than most junior copilots, but he was never wrong; he would have been typecast as the tortoise in any staged rendition of Aesop’s fable of that creature’s race with the rabbit. “Two knots from the southeast. Very steady.”

    “Good.” And it was. Landing the Jupiter in Venice was, in some ways, very easy: the lagoon was a large, calm body of water which made it particularly friendly to the immense plane’s unusual air-cushion landing gear. But if the winds were running in off the Adriatic as they often did, and were strong, then it was safer touching down from the north approach; a nose wind increased lift and was a little more forgiving with the air-cushion landing gear.

    And Klaus Kohlbacher was happy for any little advantage. Having started his aviation career flying on smaller craft with conventional, wheeled landing gear, he had never taken to the ACLG. Of course, he had always kept his misgivings to himself; there weren’t a lot of jobs for pilots, to put it lightly. And being a pilot had become his dream the first time he saw one of the up-timers’ wondrous aircraft: to make his living among the clouds as a “knight of the air,” as his enthusiastic young nephew put it. So Klaus had resolved never to voice any reservations that might reduce the confidence his employers placed in his abilities.

    But sometimes, it had been hard to contain his misgivings about the Jupiter — or more particularly, its landing gear. Flying the aircraft was, admittedly, the aerial equivalent of piloting a river barge; it was ponderous and did not respond well to frequent or abrupt course changes. But the Jupiter was strong and steady and surprisingly reliable for such an ambitious multiengine design. So what if she wasn’t a high-spirited and agile Arabian mare? She was a sturdy and strong Percheron.

    “Surface conditions?” Klaus asked as their turn brought them around to the south of the island of Venice itself, where galleys and noas and carracks and billow-sailed sloops jockeyed for berthing positions in what, at this altitude, appeared to be a graceful but very slow dance.

    “Water surface is smooth,” answered Arne. “Nothing more than wind ripples.”

    Which meant all signs were good for the southern landing approach, which would put them just a few hundred yards away from the shallow ramp leading up to the new hangar and shop facilities. “Excellent. We will be landing from the south. Test the blower motor.”

    Arne nodded. “Testing blower motor.” He checked that subsystem’s dials, and threw the starter switch with the choke set wide open.

    A faint, thin vibration added itself to the customary thrums, growls, and jiggles of the immense aircraft.

    “Blower motor tests as ready; shutting off.”

    The blower motor, which had started its up-time existence spinning the blades of a lawn mower, slept again; the faint vibration disappeared.

    “Confirm bearing for final approach.”

    “Confirmed.”

    Klaus nodded and brought the plane out of its long banking turn, nose pointed north toward the low, rambling wharves of Mestre. As soon as the level indicators settled, he checked the slight leftward drift and started easing the four-engined biplane down toward the blue-green water scudding past below.

 

---

 

    Although Tom was the one who had asked for the meeting, he arrived twenty minutes late. Miro rose to greet him.

    “Hey, Estuban; you’re here early. Or am I late?”

    “I don’t really know,” Miro lied.

    “Oh, damn. So I am late. Sorry. Seems I’m always running behind now.” Tom looked out over the Laguna Veneta, which seemed to gather itself to the foot of the belvedere-crested villa upon which they stood. His eyes got dreamy, the way Miro noticed they did when he hovered on the edge of an up-time reminiscence.

    “Y’know,” Stone drawled, turning his whole body toward the water, almost as if he were addressing it, “I used to hate wearing watches. Seemed that everywhere you looked, up-time, there was a clock. Telling you how many minutes you have left before you have to do this, or do that, or wake up, or go to sleep. No freedom, man; slaves to the clock. But when we got here –”

    He raised his wrist; the up-time watch upon it looked like a strange bracelet with a cheap inset stone of grayed onyx. “This thing used to tell the time, do simple math like a computer, record notes: everything. Funny. I hated it, only wore it occasionally. Mostly to please my boys, since they were the ones who gave it to me. But when I got here — it was like a treasure.” He looked at the face of the watch, which Miro knew was made of the unusual up-timer material known as plastic. “But now it’s dead. No batteries for it. Never will be, either. And still I wear it. Like a gift from the ancient astronauts; like I’m a cargo-cultist of my own making.” He realized even before seeing the carefully blank and patient expression on Miro’s face, that he had lost the down-timer in the dense verbal thicket of his own esoteric references. “Sorry. But look, here’s lunch” — cheese, loaves, and sausages were arrayed on the table — “and we’ve got the best seat in the house.” He pointed out over the lagoon. “Have you ever seen one of these Monsters land?”

    “No.”

    “Quite a sight, even from this distance. There it is now.” Tom pointed to the south, where a cruciform speck was easing from a long sweeping turn into level flight.

    They were both silent for a time. Tom looked at his shorter companion and smiled, a bit crookedly. “Aren’t you going to ask me?”

    “About what?”

    “About the balloon project we were talking about.”

    Miro shrugged. “I presumed that if you wished to discuss the matter, you would bring it up. There is no reason to rush.”

    “See, Estuban, that’s what I like about you. One of the things I like, anyway. You’re not like other businessmen. Here in Venice business is all very cordial, all very careful, and always in play. You never talk about anything without talking about business, too. ‘And your family, are they well?’ sounds like someone just being friendly and concerned, but it’s also a way of finding out if you’re distracted, if your focus on some upcoming deals is wavering, if you’re contemplating pulling back from commerce for a while. But with you, it’s different.”

    Miro shrugged. “I am not Venetian. And I am not here as a businessman. Except opportunistically, peripherally.”

    “See, they don’t have any ‘peripheral’ business, here. In Venice, you may not even be in business — but you still are. You’re a soldier, a judge, a scribe, a navigator? Fine, but that’s not just your profession; that’s also your basis of barter. Everybody is looking for a little fee if you want access to what or who they know. Seems to be the Venetian way.”

    Miro smiled. “It does indeed.”

    “Guess you’ve dealt with it a lot over the years, huh?”

    “Some,” Miro understated mightily.

    “So about the balloons…”

 

---

 

    Klaus watched the airspeed indicator fall slowly, felt the slight increase in leftward drift even before Arne reported: “Wind rising a little; now at three knots. And coming about. More from due south.”

    Of course. Intermittent sciroccos and the Adriatic’s own peculiar weather and currents were adding to the fun. Nothing stayed very steady very long over the springtime waters of Venice.

    The drift diminished, but the right-rear tailwind was now starting to boost the Monster’s airspeed, even as her leftward drift decreased. Just what you want during a landing: shifting winds.

    He throttled back the engines a tiny bit, brought the nose up a degree — a little earlier than he’d intended, but he had to counteract the accelerating effects of the tailwind.…

 

---

 

    Miro watched the speck wobble a little as it seemed to settle itself into a straight run, growing slowly larger as it drew closer to the surface of the water.

    “First I had to find out which people might be interested in balloons here in Venice. Turns out there are a lot of them, and all with different reasons for wanting to get involved. It also seems there have been foreign agents here, nosing around.”

    Miro nodded. “There’s a great deal of foreign interest in balloons. Hardly surprising since nations without up-time engines can start a blimp-building program and still hope for a reasonable chance of success.”

    Tom nodded. “From what I hear, you even helped the authorities in Grantville nab an informant. An industrial spy, as we used to call them.”

    Miro raised an eyebrow. “And where did you hear that?”

    “Oh, the Venetians are pretty well informed. And there were some follow-up inquiries made down here. The authorities thought it was pretty strange that although the spy you found in Grantville was Venetian, and was returning here, he was not working for any local factors. That worries them.”

    “As it should. If either the Mughals or Ottomans were seeking access to balloon technology, they would move it through the Mediterranean. Given the disruption in the rest of Italy, Venice is the most likely conduit. Particularly given its unofficial, arm’s-length trade relations with Istanbul.”

    “Yeah, I think that’s what they were fretting over. That, and having too much competition in building the balloons. Although a lot of the locals aren’t envisioning airships for transportation, but for coast-watching and mapping.”

    Miro nodded. “Logical.”

    “So you saw this coming?”

    “It was a distinct possibility. And those activities don’t require large, or even powered, dirigibles. Just a stationary one-man rig, tethered to the ground.”

    “Yeah, that’s what they were saying. Given the piracy problems all along the Adriatic, they’ve already got potential interest and permissions from Ravenna, Rimini, and Ancona and are talking with communities on the Dalmatian coast. I suspect they’d send some out to their island possessions in the Aegean, as well.”

    Miro nodded. “And I’m glad to see that someone obviously read the letter I wrote them about mapping.”

    “You wrote?”

    Miro smiled. “I just sent along some observations. Specifically, that given the low cost of its operation, and its stationary position, a balloon is vastly superior to a plane when serving as a cartographic platform. This is not the case when one has much ground to cover, of course. And given your photography, perhaps this was not so true in your up-time world. However, here, and in terms of constructing a detailed map of a limited region, a man in a balloon will be far more accurate and can easily recheck his measurements.”

    Tom rubbed his chin. “You know, I was talking to some of my advisers –”

    – Which, Miro knew, probably meant his very business-savvy down-time wife, Magda –

    “– and they say there could be a lot of money in this cartography business. A very lot of money.”

    Miro nodded. “Naturally. The Venetians I corresponded with already understood the military advantages of having precise maps with topographic renderings. And it only took a little extrapolation for them to foresee the balloon’s wider benefits in regard to surveying, prospecting, land and water management, road development, and engineering. And the uses to which they put the balloons will not only prove their utility, but whet the similar appetites of other nations.”

    Stone watched the Monster growing larger. “Yeah, before long, everyone is going to want high-quality maps. Of course, the big countries will only buy a few balloons each, with one held back as a prototype for copying. But by then, we’ll have sold dozens.”

    “We?”

    “Sure, ‘we.’ You don’t think I’m going to sit on the sidelines, do you? My wife — er, advisor — speculates that we might make even more money by offering tutoring on aerial mapping methods.”

    “Strange.” Miro rubbed his chin. “I was under the impression that you were not overly concerned with making money, Tom.”

    “I’m not, but how else are we going to fund the first airborne ambulances and antiepidemic airships?” He smiled. “The Venetians like that idea, too.”

    “I was not aware the Council of Ten had adopted such humanitarian attitudes.”

    “Oh, they haven’t. But they realize that after the first few models are flying, almost every country is going to want at least one of their own. Probably a lot more, over time. And then I showed them your map of how to link the major cities of Europe together with flight legs of less than one hundred miles. Man, their greedy little eyes lit up like sparklers on the Fourth of July. They’re pretty eager to have a business meeting. But I put that off. I hope you don’t mind.”

    Miro nodded, understanding. “Of course. First things first. And getting your son and daughter-in-law back is the first thing.”

    Tom nodded and looked out over the water, clearly working at keeping the worry out of his voice and his eyes. “Yeah. And now that the Monster is here, we should be one giant step closer to achieving that.”

 

---

 

    The tailwind was holding steady, at least: no significant changes in speed or direction. Klaus made a last inspection of the stretch of water leading to Mestre: cleared of traffic, as arranged earlier, and no sign of large debris, new obstructions, or choppy cross-currents. Perfect.

    “Arne,” he said, watching the rpms of the four tachometers, “inflate the bag.”

    Arne flipped the switch to the blower motor.

 

---

 

    In the belly of the Monster, the blower’s old lawnmower engine growled into life. But the blades it spun now were those of a big attic fan, designed to move air, not cut grass.

    The sudden rush of air pushed the leather “bag” out from the small, front-lipped recess in the Monster’s fuselage. Spared the constant wear of flapping in the air-stream by this small windbreak, the tough, heavily-stitched and reinforced leather now extruded from the Monster’s belly, and in doing so, revealed that it was not so much a bag as it was a skirt. But, rather than rustling like the fabric of a skirt, it creaked and clunked: the typical sounds of its deployment, heard only faintly in the cockpit.

    So neither Klaus nor Arne had any way of discerning the slight change in the skirt’s behavior as it entered the air stream. Although frequently restitched and painstakingly watched for wear, the repeated soakings and dryings of constant salt-water landings had cost some of the pleats most of their flexibility. Like the spines of old men forced to jump up to attention, several of the most desiccated pieces of leather resisted. The sustained pressure on the stitchings, which struggled to keep the stiff pleats in trim with the flexible ones, lasted a moment too long: two of the desiccated lacings snapped. That gave the rushing wind a gap, which it exploited ruthlessly; a few more lacings weakened, and a bronze restraining rivet popped free, allowing the tearing to continue, almost up to where the skirt attached to the belly of the Monster.

    With no further resistance to the varied buffetings of the air stream, the leather plenum bag, which resembled a half-donut when inflated, now moved freely, flexibly, in the wind. But it was no longer the prim, conventional skirt it was supposed to be; a provocative slit now went from bottom to top at its back.…

 

---

 

    Arne looked up. “What was that?”

    “You mean that little tug?”

    “Yes.”

    Klaus shrugged. “Once a bag has been in use for a few months, they start doing that when you push them out into the air stream.”

    Arne nodded. “Yes. Okay. This is the leather-wear the instructors talk about?”

    Klaus nodded. “It’s been taking more and more maintenance hours to keep the bags within safety limits.” He didn’t add that he had now heard three different ground crews muttering about those limits, wondering if they were really cautious enough.

    Arne looked at the airspeed indicators again. “That bump seemed a little longer, though.”

    Klaus thought so too. “Probably nothing,” he said, reassuring himself as much as Arne. “Probably the bag was just a little stiff coming out. That cold alpine headwind on take-off could have made everything a little less flexible.”

    Arne nodded. Klaus couldn’t tell if the young junior copilot was genuinely convinced by this explanation, or was just being polite and agreeable. Like everything engineered at — or beyond — the limits of the currently available materials, the air cushion gear was quirky, finicky. Sometimes it made odd sounds; sometimes it got a little temperamental. But so what? It worked, didn’t it?

    Klaus cut the airspeed a little more, brought the nose up, watched the water come closer…

    Just as the wind indicator dropped to zero.

 

---

 

    Suddenly. Just like that. A calm cell, courtesy of the unpredictable marriage of the sirocco and the Adriatic.

    Without the tail wind, the airspeed dropped: not much, but quickly, and at the penultimate pre-landing moment. To compensate, Klaus juiced the engines, brought the nose up a little more. But he couldn’t hold that attitude for long, not with the Monster’s long tail stretching so far aft of the air cushion skirt and center of gravity.

    “There will be a real bump now,” he commented with a thin smile.

    “Yes,” agreed Arne, just before they made contact.

    Or should have. Instead of the breathy flounce of coming down on a fully inflated bag, there was a hiss, a burbling, and a lurch to the left rear. The Monster’s tail section veered closer to the water, the left horizontal stabilizer almost grazing the surface.

    “Bag failure!” snapped Klaus.

    To his credit, Arne reacted without delay, helping maintain trim as Klaus re-gunned the engines, not quite rising off the surface of the water, but not coming to rest on it, either.

    “Still dropping on the left,” observed Arne.

    “Give me a little more thrust from the outer portside engine.” Klaus cheated the stick and pedals, giving a little more lift to that side.

    Meanwhile, the burbling and complaining beneath them increased.

    “Klaus…” began Arne.

 

---

 

    “Oh, hell,” breathed Tom as the Monster landed, shuddered, pulled up, seemed like its nose was no longer in precise alignment with its direction of travel.

    “What has gone wrong?” Miro managed to swallow after he asked the question, realizing how terrible it was to watch a flying machine in such obvious peril. Particularly one as large and powerful as the Monster, which, if it truly crashed –

    “Don’t know. Wind maybe. But no, it seems calm. Probably that damned air cushion gear.”

    Miro was surprised at the vehemence with which his normally calm companion invoked the name of the landing gear. “I was not aware you had such misgivings about…”

    But Tom wasn’t listening; he was watching what might well be a disaster approaching. And if it didn’t slow down soon, the disaster might well land straight in their laps.

 

---

 

    “Distance to the land ramp?” Klaus did not dare take his eyes off the instruments or his senses away from the delicate balancing act he was maintaining between the pitch and yaw improvisations that kept the Monster moving forward.

    “Five hundred yards. Maybe six hundred.” Arne’s voice was taut.

    Klaus knew they weren’t going to make it; every time he backed off the engines, let the Monster settle a little more, he could feel more of the skirt shredding, felt the lift diminish from the already crippled leather-bound plenum chamber that was his landing gear. Besides, the underside of the Monster would bottom out on the ramp even if he could get that far, possibly ruining the airframe. But if he cut the speed down far enough for a stop, he’d bite the water, possibly digging in the nose — and again, ruin the aircraft.

    He glanced up to take his own bearings, saw the villa that the USE had purchased for the support of its Venetian air operations dead ahead, the smooth water that surrounded it on three points obscured on the left by the weed-choked shallows.

    The weed-choked shallows…

    “Arne, I want three, short, evenly pulsed revs from the starboard engines.”

    “But Klaus –”

    “Just do it.”

    The roar to the right increased and died as quickly as it had risen. The plane tilted to the left again, but Klaus cheated the controls, kept both the tail and left wingtip from digging in — and the craft had altered its course by five degrees or so to the left, pushed in that direction by the lopsided engine thrust that also helped them maintain altitude and extend the time they were airborne.

    Another momentary roar of the engines on the right. Then a third and longer pulse –

    “Arne, bring it back!” Klaus shouted, as he struggled to keep the Monster’s nose up, its tail out of the water, and its wings level — more or less.

    “Klaus, we’re almost into the weeds!”

    Klaus nodded tightly. “Because that’s where we’re going. Depth here is about — what?”

    “Less than three feet.”

    Klaus started easing off the engines, started to let the nose down ever so slightly.

    “Airspeed looks good,” Arne gulped out.

    – Just as the remains of the skirt made contact with the water. A high-pitched burbling rose beneath them. Klaus gauged what resistance was left in the compromised plenum chamber, let the Monster travel forward another few seconds, and peripherally watched the passing weeds begin to slow in their rearward rush, enough so that he could start to make out individual fronds and stems.

    “Two feet of water, no more,” Arne rasped.

    Klaus sighed and let the Monster settle down on what was left of her air cushion landing gear, cutting the engines.

    For a moment, the leather held — a last moment of increased pressure in the bag as the fuselage came closer to the water’s surface — and then it let go with a blast. A wash of sharp slaps and bumps announced its tattered chunks flying up against the fuselage.

    Without power, the nose came down more quickly — but at just the same moment, the tail’s horizontal stabilizers slid slowly into the water, and the lower wing kissed down as well. Arne killed the blower motor a moment before its spinning blades snarled into contact with the weed-choked swells of their landing zone.

    Klaus watched the weeds and rushes collect before his slowing craft like an impenetrable wall –

    And then realized that the Monster had come to a stop. And was sinking.

    Before stopping at a depth of fifteen inches.

 

---

 

    Tom’s mouth was still open. “Did you see that?” he murmured at last.

    As if I could have missed it? “Er…yes. This catastrophe makes our plans quite –”

    “No, no — did you see that piloting? Man, whoever that guy is deserves a medal. Hell, if Mike or Ed or someone doesn’t give him a medal, I’ll make one especially for him. That was incredible. That plane should have crashed at least three times. Maybe four.”

    Miro was perplexed. “But it did. Crash, that is.”

    Tom turned. “That was not a crash. I mean, yeah, technically, I guess it was. But it was a crash landing, and a damned good one. A real crash is — well, you’d know it if you saw it. The pilot loses control, and the plane goes in. There’s a big blast from the impact alone, even if there’s no explosion. Pieces everywhere. Usually not many survivors. If any.”

    Miro looked at the plane, sitting in the shallows, half-hidden by the weeds, which were already still again. “Very well. But unless I am much mistaken, that plane is not going to be useable any time soon.”

    Tom nodded, then looked sideways at Miro. “Eh, Estuban, about that balloon of yours –”

    Miro smiled. “I learned, while masquerading as a Christian plying the trade routes of the Mediterranean, that one should always have multiple contingency plans. I have now learned that the same is true when one is an intelligence officer overseeing a field operation.”

    Tom smiled back, relieved. “So your balloon is already back in Jena?”

    “Actually, I had it return to Grantville, where it is now being refitted and loaded. There were personnel there I thought we might have need of. As well as equipment. And now, I suspect, repair parts for the Jupiter.”

    “How soon can it be back here?”

    “That is always weather dependent, but on the average, not more than two weeks’ travel time.”

    Tom nodded. “Now let’s hope something doesn’t break on your balloon.”

    “Yes, indeed. Although, it must be said: there is far less to break on a dirigible than an airplane.”

    “No lie,” breathed Tom with a nod, and another glance at the Monster’s vertical stabilizer, sticking up from the weeds like a large, dull-colored shark’s fin. “I also hear you can burn just about any fuel in your balloons. Including fish oil.”

    “Yes, although I will not vouch for the downwind appeal of such a ride.”

    Tom’s grin was very wide. “Might as well tell you, I’m pretty much sold on the whole balloon thing. Even given the fact that someone — well, everyone, probably — is going to use it to drop bombs. I thought about that a lot, but I still think airships are going to do more good than harm.”

    “Often, that is all we can ask for in life.”

    “Oh, we can ask for more; we just don’t get it, usually. So what do these balloons cost to build? About a hundred thousand USE dollars?”

 

---

 

    “Yes, but if you’re proposing a partnership –”

    “I am.”

    “– then I would rather we do not use your money to build more of the hot-airships.”

    “No?”

    “No. In the next few years, I will make enough of those to meet the first wave of demand. Which will be brisk, but moderate; it takes people time to get used to new ideas.”

    “And then what?”

    “And then we will unveil the next generation of airship, the one which we will finance with your investment.” Miro smiled, looked into the sky, and imagined it filling with traffic and commerce in the decades to come. “Because that model will get its lift from hydrogen, not hot air. And that, Tom, that will truly change the world.”

 

---

 

    “This changes everything.” Rombaldo de Gonzaga tapped his spotless fingernail upon the worn wooden tabletop like a slow, soft metronome.

    Giulio, who was still out of breath from running to their rented house with the news, expelled words between his gasps: “How…so…Rombaldo?”

    Rombaldo de Gonzaga suppressed a sigh. It was trying, working with amateurs, but the job in Venice was a large one, needing many hands and feet and eyes. Fortunately, his master back in Rome — a displaced Cypriot named Dakis — had no shortage of scudare and reales to pass around. “With the USE’s plane damaged, they cannot remove Urban anytime soon. Nor will the aircraft be a part of any plans to rescue Stone’s son in Rome. That gives us more time. That, in turn, makes our job easier. And Cesare, be sure this news is passed along to the dovecote for immediate relay. They will want this report in Rome as soon as possible.”

    Cesare Linguanti, a small man who rarely spoke, rose and left, making the smallest of nods toward the largest man at the table.

    That man, Valentino — who denied having any other name than that—took a small sip of his wine. Valentino always had a glass of wine in hand: the one glass that he nursed all day long. “The Americans, they will repair the flying machine, if they can. And if Giulio is right, it does not sound as though the failure was catastrophic.”

    “Yes,” nodded Rombaldo. “We will need to mount a watch on the plane, as well as the embassy and the USE’s known agents. Indeed, we will need to hire many more men to watch and search. And others to wield weapons, when the target is located and the time comes.”

    “They will need to be special men,” commented Valentino. “Not many Italians are ready to kill a pope.”

    “There may not be many,” answered Rombaldo, “but when the pay is high enough, you’ll find men enough.” He leaned back with a satisfied smile. “More than enough.”

 

---

 

    Sharon found Mazzare sitting quietly with Urban. They did that a lot, these days. They didn’t seem to say a lot. It was like watching dogs or cats who are new to the same house; as if they know their lives are now entwined, they start spending time together. It was both acclimation and the growth of a new camaraderie, all rolled into one.

    They looked up as Sharon entered the trellised shade of the courtyard’s arbor. She set her shoulders squarely. “It seems like we’re going to be staying a little bit longer, after all. The Monster has crashed.”

    Mazzare looked up, startled. “Was anyone –?”

    “No. They brought it down safely. But they’re going to have to replace the landing gear.”

    “And that will take how long?” asked Urban.

    “I’m not exactly sure, Your Holiness. I know a lot more about fixing people than I do about fixing machines. But given the parts and getting the plane out of the water and all the rest — well, I’d be surprised if we were ready any sooner than six or eight weeks.”

    Urban leaned back and placed his palms firmly on his knees. “Well, that settles the matter.”

    “What matter?”

    “The matter of whether or not I should leave Italy just yet. In my pride, I failed to leave this matter in God’s hands. But it seems our Savior has decided to take the decision from me — perhaps to remind me I always had the option of relinquishing it into his care.”

    Sharon blinked. “Your Holiness, I don’t understand.”

    “I should not leave Italy, at least not yet. Not even if your plane was ready to fly tomorrow. Not until I know where I should go.”

    “And what will determine where you should go?”

    “Why, by learning what I am supposed to do next.”

    Sharon shook her head. “But how many choices do you really have?”

    “That,” said Urban with a sly smile, “is what I will learn in the coming weeks — and why I am so glad you came, Lawrence.” Urban smiled, rose, and headed back in the direction of the kitchen.

    Sharon looked at Larry Mazzare. “What does he mean, that this is ‘why he’s so glad you came’?”

    Mazzare shrugged. “It means — well, it means I’m just glad that Thomas North left his Hibernians behind in Venice, because we’re going to need all of them to secure the new safe house that Miro set up for us through the Cavrianis.”

    Sharon nodded, but pressed the point. “You still haven’t answered me: what can Urban do here that he can’t do back in the USE?”

    Mazzare looked at Sharon. “He can decide whether he should go there at all.”

    “What? Why?” Sharon was becoming annoyed. Not only did she still not understand what was going on, but her ignorance had her repeating herself.

    “Sharon, Urban was driven out of Rome, fled for his life. Everyone in Italy can understand why he’s no longer sitting in the Holy See. But if he leaves the country now, that will be his choice. And he’s worried — rightly — that some people may feel he’d be turning his back on both his duty and the Church.”

    “But he can’t achieve anything here except waiting around for assassins.”

    “We know that, he knows that, maybe even this whole country knows that. But knowing that a course of action is wise doesn’t necessarily make it acceptable. And a pope is both a symbol and a representative of God. Now hear me out: I’m not requiring you to believe that yourself, just to accept that many, many others do believe it. You’ve heard the expression ‘trust in God,’ right?”

    Sharon put her hands on her generous hips. “Yes. Of course I’ve heard it. As you know.”

    “Yes, I do. But you’ve never heard it the way people here, of this time, hear it. For most of them, that saying isn’t a euphemism, isn’t simply an exhortation to believe that somewhere, somehow, there might be some divine providence that will make everything all right. Here — in this time — there is nothing vague or ambiguous about trust in God. It’s presumed that there is a personal God who sees and judges all actions. And for Roman Catholics, it furthermore means that the pope is God’s divinely inspired voice and representative on Earth, and is therefore symbolic of the dignity and righteousness of that godhead.”

    “So you’re saying that if Urban runs, he’s indicating that he doesn’t have faith that ‘God will provide.’”

    “That, and he will be doing a great indignity to his holy office.”

    “Which will make Borja look strong and resolute?”

    “Well, he’ll still be seen as a monster, and mistaken in his methods, but unimpeachable in his dedication to the primacy of the Church and the dignity of the papal tiara. And in these times, that means a lot. Quite a lot, actually.”

    “So either Urban stays and gets martyred for no real purpose, since no one has the power to unseat Borja. Or Urban leaves and gets — what? Relieved of his popish duties?”

    “Something like that. But I think there’s a third choice, and I think that’s what Urban is focused on.”

    “Oh? And what is that?”

    “Knowing he has to leave eventually, I think Urban is determined to make his ultimate destination a statement of resolve that outshines the fact of his departure. Urban cannot be seen as retreating; he has to attack Borja, albeit on a different front.”

    Sharon felt her thoughts twirl helplessly. “Attack Borja? Where? How?”

    Larry Mazzare smiled his lip-crinkling smile. “That,” he said with a long exhale, “is probably exactly what Urban wants to determine before he leaves Italy.”