But how would they afford passage on a ship? Frank wasn't even sure how much it would cost, and they'd spent better than half what Michel said he'd stolen along with all the money the Marcolis had started with . . .

He was awakened-damn, how long had he been asleep?-by the creaking of the door. He muttered and rolled over, pretending to still be asleep, but he wanted to see the door. There was no light in the corridor outside, so all he had were dim chinks of moonlight to see by. A dark figure, sidling around the door . . .

Was it just imagination that filled in a dark hood, a mask?

Slowly, Frank slid his hand up to where he had his pistol under the-

Oh, hell! Every night of this journey he'd put a pistol under the pillow, loaded and wanting only to be cocked. Where was the damned thing? By his bed? In his bag? Where? Surely the assassin could hear his heart pounding, knew he wasn't asleep-

Another stealthy step, the door pushed softly closed behind, a quiet rustle. Frank began to think desperately. Shout the alarm and then make a break? Throw a blanket and then shout? What? Would anyone wake up? Was he the last one left alive, everyone else murdered in a drunken stupor? He resolved to throw his blanket over the assassin, scream a warning and get the hell out into the corridor. Keep moving, make as much noise as possible, see what could be done with speed and surprise. He tensed himself to spring. One more step, you son of a bitch, just one more step . . .

"Frank?" the voice was a soft whisper.

A soft, feminine, whisper. One he recognized perfectly because it had been whispering in his ear for weeks now.

"Giovanna?" he breathed.

"Yes. You are awake?"

"Uh, yeah?" He began to tremble. "Jesus, Giovanna, you scared the life out of me!" He clapped a hand over his mouth, realizing he'd spoken aloud. "Oops," he murmured.

She giggled. "I hope I didn't scare all the life out of you," she whispered. "So tragic, a widow before I even marry." She took two more steps, quickly now, and with one motion flipped up the blankets and squirmed under.

Fireworks and cheering started going off in Frank's head. And, he realized, other parts of his anatomy.

And then, hard on their heels, that vision of the queue of Marcolis, lining up with knives and murder in their hearts . . .

"Giovanna, you can't be here, if your brothers-"

"They're all drunk asleep, Frank. A volcano couldn't wake them up. It's cool." She said the last two words in English. Another phrase that was definitely catching on in these parts. Although not in the parts of Frank that were currently getting his urgent attention, where things were growing very warm indeed.

"How, I mean, uh-"

Whatever the linkage was between Frank's brain and his mouth, it stopped working just then. Come right to it, his brain was shut down completely.

And his mouth for that matter, as Giovanna found it and comprehensively shut him up in the best way known to man. She'd kissed him before, but never like this. The fact that the girl was figuring out how to do it as she went along just made it all the more exciting.

Time passed. Something was happening to Frank's sense of time. It was either seconds, or hours. He breathed in, deeply, savoring the scent of her. God, they were both good and ripe. To his surprise, he found it good. That sneaking little voice came again. If you're caught, Romeo . . .

"How?" he asked.

"Gerry and Ron, they helped. We plotted, them and me. Them and I? Whatever. They made sure everyone got good and drunk. Except you. I drank almost nothing, too, I just pretended." Her voice now sounded just that little bit cross. "But forget them. Thank them in the morning. Tonight, you concentrate on me. How can you do a proper job of taking my virginity-you fiend!"-a little giggle there-"if you're worrying about anything else? And I warn you!" She lifted herself up on an elbow, grinning like an imp, and wagged a finger under his nose. "I want it taken lots of times!"

"Uh, I don't think you can do that."

"Yes, you can! If you only concentrate!"

Frank didn't really feel like arguing the point. To put it mildly. As erect as he was now, who knew what was possible?

The problem was that same ferocious erection-they'd all been sleeping in their clothes and seventeenth-century styles didn't go in for handy zippers and whatnot-he was fumbling with the fasteners like an idiot-

"How do I, uh-

"Like this." Her nimble fingers worked quickly. "Here."

Suddenly, gloriously, he was free. A veritable statue of liberty. Giovanna's hand moved from the fasteners to close around him.

"Oh," she said softly, wonderingly. "I never thought it would be so big. Even though I thought about it a lot."

Then, choking down a laugh of pure glee: "Oh! Ten times at least!"

Part VI:

June, 1634

Nay, we'll go

Together down, sir. Notice Neptune, though,

Taming a sea-horse, thought a rarity,

Which Claus of Innsbruck cast in bronze for me!

Chapter 46.

Frank wondered what the hell he was doing calling himself a leader any more. Michel had made the plans that got them into Rome. Michel had done the scouting when they'd laid up in the grotty tenement house that-yes-Michel had found. Michel had sketched out their route into the church where the trial was being held; their way back out again. Michel had found the coaches and the trustworthy drivers who'd get them down to the boat on the Tiber which would take them and Galileo to freedom. Just like he'd found a reliable captain and crew. The coach drivers and boat crew were all members of Rome's Committee of Correspondence, he explained. That had come as a surprise to the Marcoli youngsters as much as it had to Frank and his brothers. None of them had even known there was a Committee in Rome.

Sure, the others had contributed, too. They'd all done a turn casing the Villa Medici, where Galileo was being held. That hadn't gone anywhere, though. All of them agreed that there was no way they could fight their way in past a small horde of Medici retainers, find out which room the old guy was being held in, and get him out.

So, they'd have to spring Galileo from the trial itself. They couldn't even be sure of their moment to do it, but they reckoned it would go best if they waited until the last minute. After all, then would be the best moment. Right after he'd been convicted and they could wring the maximum amount of propaganda out of the forces of reaction. There was no sense not giving them enough rope to hang themselves with, Ron had said-an image that Frank felt he might have chosen a little more carefully.

Still, Michel had planned most of this. He'd really been the one running the show since they'd finally arrived in Rome. Frank was finding his dislike for the man growing all the time, but he was too honest with himself not to admit that Ducos seemed a veritable wizard at this sort of thing, all of his modest protestations notwithstanding.

And, truth be told, the closer they got to the actual deed, the more Frank felt as if he'd entered some kind of weird virtual universe where he didn't trust his own judgment. Too many things just . . . didn't make sense to him, even though he could never figure out exactly why they didn't.

Take the location of the trial itself. The whole thing was freaky, to Frank. The Inquisition held its trials in an ordinary church, it turned out, not a dungeon. A church that happened to have some extra side rooms, but a church nonetheless. Made sense, Frank supposed, when you tried to look at the thing with the sort of bizarre logic that put a man on trial for saying the Earth went around the sun, but Frank still couldn't get his head around it.

The days of leaving church buildings locked were a long way in the future, so everyone had taken a turn over the last couple of days to go in, kneel down, and case the place. That, at least, was easy to do. It wasn't like there weren't whole bunches of other people in there at the same time. It had come as a surprise to Frank to discover that the church was used as something of a social center when it wasn't being used as a house of worship. People met there, and talked, and sat around to shoot the breeze. Frank had actually never set foot inside a church before, which was maybe a little freaky when he thought about it, but it was true. The only idea he'd had about how you ought to behave in a church came from television: hushed tones; respectful whispers; slow-moving priests with hands folded before them, coming to offer wise counsel to troubled souls.

Come right to it, that was mostly where he'd gotten his impression of Father Mazzare from, since he barely knew the man.

And there was something else for Frank to worry about. Despite the best efforts of Michel Ducos, they'd been unable to learn anything about where Mazzare was being held or when his trial was scheduled.