1635_ Cannon Law - Eric Flint [6]
"Maybe we shouldn't wait for the German Committee."
Frank frowned. "What do you mean?"
"I think maybe we should start working on Massimo's plan to spread the Committee elsewhere in Italy, no?"
Frank noticed she was chewing the inside of her lip, the way she did when she was thinking hard and deep about something. That made him feel good about the way the conversation was going for two reasons:
First, because Giovanna was probably the smartest of the Marcolis, if only because she had the same brains her dad did without the hairy-eyed temperament that went with it. And, second, because it was cute as all hell.
Frank cleared his throat. "Okay, lay it out for me—how are we going to do that with your dad dragging his heels all the way?"
"We should go back to Rome," she said. "I think."
It was all Frank could do not to sigh. There were also some disadvantages to having a smart wife.
There was no point lying to her, either. Giovanna had an ability to detect Frank telling lies that bordered on the supernatural.
"Well, yes," he admitted. "Venice is just too . . . different, I guess, from the rest of Italy. It's ultimately a side show, here. Politically speaking."
She seemed to be only half-listening to him. "Naples, maybe? Instead of Rome, I mean."
Frank was paralyzed, for just an instant. It had suddenly dawned on him that, from the standpoint of the danger involved to Giovanna, Rome was almost infinitely better than Naples.
Slowly, he sat down at the kitchen table, while he thought about it.
True enough, they'd have to be careful in Rome, what with the Papal Inquisition right there on their figurative doorstep. But with some experience, Frank had come to realize that the "Inquisition"—the papal variety of it, anyway, if not the Spanish—wasn't actually the pack of slavering torturers he'd vaguely remembered from his up-time history reading. They could be awfully scary, at times, to be sure. Still, they tended to respect certain limits—and, whatever else, they weren't usually given to precipitous action.
Naples, on the other hand . . .
Naples was a political powderkeg. To make things worse—much worse—Naples had the Spanish army sitting on top of it. And the Spanish authorities, at times, were given to precipitous actions.
It wasn't simply an issue of their personal safety, either. As much as he tried to protect Giovanna, Frank understood perfectly well that engaging in revolutionary activity was inherently a risky proposition—and there was no way to keep Giovanna out of it, even if he was so inclined.
But Naples was a political mess, as well as a powderkeg. A city with a long-standing revolutionary tradition of its own, with a multitude of political tendencies and unofficial parties. From the standpoint of a fledgling Committee of Correspondence, just getting off the ground in Italy, it would be an inhospitable environment. They'd probably wind up spending more time quarreling with other revolutionists than they would getting anything productive accomplished.
"No," he said firmly. "Let's go to Rome."
Giovanna nodded. "I will speak to my father about it."
Maybe he'll decide to stay behind in Venice. But Frank knew it was a hopeless wish.
Rome
There was nothing unusual about an atmosphere of tension in the halls of the curia. If anything, Cardinal Antonio Barberini the Younger reflected, it would be a sign something was badly amiss if at least a few of the cardinals, monsignors and what-not present were not pointedly ignoring each other, barbing their comments or outright yelling insults. For a body that in theory was moved and guided by the Holy Spirit, it was usually infernally bad tempered.
And, of course, the last few years had been . . . more strained than usual. And the cardinal presently rising to speak had been the source of much of it. Or, at least, more of it than any of the other purple-clad mischief-makers Rome was home to.
Cardinal Gaspar Borja y Velasco. Like every other Spanish prelate, part of the government of His Most Catholic Majesty