On the other hand, Billy had finally gotten his apple.

"Hey, shithead," he said. The Frenchman looked his way. Billy beaned him.

A little high. Out of the strike zone. The apple had struck the man on the slope of his forehead instead of right between the eyes. Most of the impact had been deflected with the apple.

Still, that had been one hell of a fastball. Somewhere between ninety-five and a hundred miles an hour, at a guess. The apple itself was now just a fruit stain across the far wall. Ducos' agent was reeling, barely able to stand. And he'd dropped his sword.

Billy started to reach down for another apple but changed his mind. "I never liked that damn designated-hitter rule anyway," he muttered.

He stalked over and picked up the leg of the table Sanchez had shattered. Then, proceeded to start beating the Frenchman into a pulp.

Sharon stopped him, unfortunately, before he could really get into a good rhythm.

"Hey, don't kill him! We want him to talk." He could just barely make out the words through the ringing in his ears.

Billy took a deep breath. She was probably right.

"Okay. But. Still. This is why pitchers never bat too well, y'know. Nobody lets us get enough practice."

Chapter 38.

After Mike Stearns had finished reading the latest report from Venice, he raised his eyes-his head still lowered-and looked at Francisco Nasi.

"Did you expect this? Any idea at all?"

Nasi chuckled. "Would you believe me if I claimed that I did?"

Mike smiled and slid the file onto the desk. "I'd call you five ways a liar. I sure as hell didn't. Never in my wildest dreams. Larry Mazzare summoned by the pope to Rome to defend Galileo. Lord in Heaven, you want to talk about an opening."

He rose from his chair and went over to the window he favored at moments like this. Francisco suspected that looking out the window helped Mike take his mind off his wife, his sister, and his friends who were trapped in cities far away, and about whom the prime minister could do very little, just then. But what Mike found to look at out there, in the still-ugly raw newness that was the city of Magdeburg being reborn, Francisco had never been able to determine. Most likely the Elbe rather than the city itself. Nasi knew that Mike Stearns found looking at moving water something of an emotional comfort and an aid to concentration. That might be part of the reason he had insisted on having the new building which housed the USE's executive branch built along the riverbank.

A small part, though, if any. The main reason was that the building fronted along Hans Richter Square and was named-also at Mike's insistence-the Richterhof. If there was any trick of propaganda and public relations that Mike Stearns would shy away from, Nasi had never encountered it. Magdeburg was the political capital of the new United States of Europe as well as-so far, at least-its major industrial center. Over time, the two aspects of the city would most likely reinforce each other. There was no way to tell, as yet, and wouldn't be for many years. But Nasi thought that Mike's estimate that Magdeburg would eventually come to provide the same center of gravity for Germany that London and Paris provided for England and France was probably correct.

If so, Mike Stearns would take the time and effort now to stamp the city in his own political mold as best he could. Using the memory of Hans Richter as the stamp, every chance he got. Richterhof, Richterplatz, Richterstrasse-there were at least three of those in the city-Richter Park; for all Francisco knew, a Richter lamppost somewhere and no doubt a profusion of Richter Alleys.

Stearns was utterly shameless. Francisco glanced at a nearby wall of Mike's office, which was covered with enlarged portraits. A few of them were photographs; most were paintings. Mike agreed fully with Mary Simpson that drawing artists to Magdeburg was yet another way to ensure that Germany's most radical city also became its most important. As Paris goes, so goes France; the same for London-and if Stearns had any say in the matter, the same would be true of Magdeburg as well.

Most of the portraits were what you'd expect in the office of the new nation's prime minister:

A large portrait of the emperor, Gustavus Adolphus.

A not quite so large-perhaps by half an inch-portrait of Mike Stearns and Gustavus Adolphus and Axel Oxenstierna solemnly discussing political affairs. The emperor seated, his two principal advisers standing. Francisco was particularly taken by those poses: Oxenstierna with his hand atop a globe of the world-well, that was reasonable enough-and Mike Stearns with a sword belted to his waist and one leg turned out in the finest courtier style. Given that Mike Stearns did not own a sword, had no idea how to use one, and had never been seen by man nor beast in any stance that was not either relaxed or what you'd expect of an ex-pugilist . . .

Those type of portraits.

Ah, Magdeburg. Nasi loved the city, despite its multitude of flaws. It was the only city in the world other than great Istanbul that he found truly exciting.

His favorite portraits, however, were two others. One, by far the largest, covered almost the entire wall in the back-where visitors would first enter the room. The enormous painting had been only recently completed by the young Dutch artist Pieter Codde, a student of Franz Hals who had managed to escape Amsterdam just before the siege closed in. The painting was entitled Allegory of the Rebirth of Magdeburg, and it was all Francisco could do not to burst into laughter every time he entered the prime minister's office and looked at the thing.

His amusement was caused not so much by the image of Michael Stearns standing just beside Gustavus Adolphus-but carefully portrayed as barely more than half the emperor's size. Not even by the truly ludicrous spectacle of Mike Stearns as the loyal spear-carrier, wearing a Roman centurion's armor, no less!

Nor was it caused-well, perhaps a bit-by the inevitable mob of cherubs lifting the soul of slaughtered Magdeburg to Heaven, accompanied by the inescapable angels blowing upon their horns.

No, it was the centerpiece that Francisco could never look at without having to suppress the urge to riotous laughter. The babe, of course, was to be expected. Magdeburg reborn, looking much like any babe. But the young mother so tenderly cradling the infant . . . the obvious symbolism, the allegory to the birth of Christ . . .

He must have choked. Mike glanced at him. "What's so funny?"

Francisco shook his head. "Oh, nothing. I was just thinking of the mother in that grotesque new painting of yours." He hooked a thumb over his shoulder, not daring to actually look. They did have serious business to conduct, this day.

Mike glanced at the huge painting, and smiled. "I have to admit I get a kick out of it myself. I will say that Pieter did one hell of good job, having to work from memory the way he did, with the model still back in Amsterdam." He went back to staring out the window, the smile still on his face. "Spitting image of my wife. Who is, ah, no longer a virgin and has never been a Christian at any time."

He hooked his own thumb over his shoulder. "But don't lie, Francisco. I know you think that other one is even funnier."

Nasi examined the portrait to which the thumb was pointed. It was not a portrait, as such, but one of the few photographs hanging up on the walls. A classic example of that peculiar sub-genre of the visual arts known as Politics, American, Crass Beyond Belief.

"Indeed. Michael Stearns. Cheerfully eating the first Hans Richter Victory Sandwich produced by the Freedom Arches in Magdeburg. What are the ingredients, again?"

"Baltic rye bread, Danish ham and cheese, with, of course, the essential splash of French dressing. It's not bad, actually."

The prime minister turned away from the window. "All right, Francisco, enough of the drollery. I know you could bring down the house with your comedy routines. Well, anywhere except in Istanbul."

Nasi winced. "Risky business, that. Murad the Mad is prone to assuming that all jokes are at his expense."

Stearns pointed to the file. "I also know that you're just stalling because this is one of the few subjects you don't feel particularly knowledgeable about. I understand that. I don't expert a Sephardic Jew from Istanbul to be the world's expert on the inner workings of the Roman Catholic Church. Still, what's your best estimate?"

"The truth? I think we are sensing a tremor beneath our feet. The first sign of a coming political earthquake."

Mike stared down at the file, his hands now planted on the desk. "That's what I think, too. Jesus, Joseph and Mary."

Nasi shook his head. "The man will not take sides, you understand."

"Don't be silly, Francisco. He has been taking a side, whether he liked it or not-which, by all reports, he didn't much." Stearns rapped the file with a finger. "Simply the act of declaring neutrality is taking a side, when you're already on one."

"Not what I meant. Sorry. I only intended to say that I think there is no chance-no chance at all-that the pope will do or say anything overtly which could in any way be construed-formally, you understand-as an alliance of any kind with the United States of Europe."

Mike gave Nasi a very placid look. Francisco braced himself. That sleepy expression invariably signaled the coming sarcasm.

"At a rough guess, Francisco, I could get the same assessment from two out of three urchins in the streets of Magdeburg. Nineteen out of twenty, in the streets of Rome. Maffeo Barberini who was, Urban VIII who is, has been accused of a lot of things in his sixty-some-odd years. Deviousness, manipulation, cynicism-not to mention a truly breathtaking devotion to nepotism-but never once, that I can recall, being a moron. Try again."

Nasi sighed. "Michael, this is not a subject-"

"Try again."

"Tyrant!"