1635_ Cannon Law - Eric Flint [125]
The risks to the embassy at Rome were of the more ordinary kind. Riots were chancy things, especially if the sentiment against foreigners that Miss Nichols reported was a genuine popular feeling and not simply a slogan the crowds she had heard had been paid to chant.
"—and so while I'm sure the Spanish would like to be able to commit those troops further north, pretty much anyone with eyes to see can tell they're going to have a better use for them real soon now, Mike," Ed was finishing up.
Mike looked to Francisco, "And your assessment?"
"As I say, it is the season for domestic troubles. We have been seeing something like it here. It is simply that much of it is handled at a local level if it does not go beyond street-brawling. I think you have been spoilt by life in the twentieth century, Mike. The seventeenth century is what you would call a rough neighborhood."
"All right," Mike said, "so I needn't give them a recall order, then? Because that's what it'll take to shift Sharon away from the job she's doing."
"I reckon not, Mike. Or at least, not right now," Ed said. "Although I reckon she'll git if she has to, and she'll know way before you will when that time is."
Don Francisco frowned. "You think it will come to that?" He couldn't see it, himself. Rioting was one of those things that simply happened, and the options Borja had for action that was at least within shouting distance of rationality precluded anything worse. His actions so far were of a kind to make cardinals and senior churchmen and Rome's other notables a little more nervous than they might otherwise be, and demonstrated a certain looseness of grip on the part of Urban VIII, but as a prelude to something more serious?
"Just covering my ass, Francisco," Ed said, "You know and I know that there's probably nothing deeper to this. I just get the feeling that Borja's playing with fire and even if he doesn't mean to make everything blow up in everyone's face, well . . ."
"Yeah," Mike sighed, and rubbed a hand over his face. "Life would be so much simpler if we didn't have all these assholes who played games with other peoples' lives. On the other hand, we wouldn't have as much support as we do, either. For now, then, we'll leave things as they are. I want to hear about it if things really start boiling down there, though."
Chapter 28
Rome
"Your Excellency," Ruy said, coming in to Sharon's office and dragging up a chair, in to which he flopped dramatically.
"It sounds weird when you call me that, Ruy," Sharon said. "I became an ambassador by accident, and it still feels a little unreal."
"It is a task you undertake well, and I find that remembering the correct title when we are working helps me to be clear as to the task in hand."
"And the news is?"
"There are some small changes." Ruy ran a hand through his hair. He'd been out nearly all day and Sharon could guess that getting around Rome on a warm spring day would have been more than a little wearying. "Quevedo has not been seen, or at least the men he had hired to gather his mobs have not been seen, since the night before last. There is much tension. I have heard no less than four rumors that the pope has summoned his papal regiments in order to suppress dissent in the bloodiest manner imaginable, and two other men I spoke with said they had heard, at fourth or fifth hand, that the papal troops are in a state of mutiny and refusing to muster."
"Did we get anything that sounds like it might be true?" Sharon asked. Similar