The Empire of Glass - Andy Lane [15]
"Poor dear," the Doctor said. "It's been a long day for her. She deserves her sleep." He turned his face back to Steven. "Now, where was I? Oh yes - Cardinal Roberto Francesco Romolo Bellarmine, general of the Jesuit Order, Consultor of the Holy Office and Master of Controversial Questions at the Vatican. I assume that is who I have been mistaken for. Although many believe him to have been behind Guy Fawkes's attempt to blow up the English Parliament, he will be made a Saint in, oh let me see, some three hundred years time." The Doctor frowned. "Hmm, I must admit to a slight worry. Being mistaken for an emissary of the Pope in Venice in 1609 is, perhaps, not the safest thing that could have happened."
"Why not?" Steven asked.
The Doctor shook his head. "Religion is never an easy thing to explain. Where do I start. Let me see... " He furrowed his brow, thinking, then raised a finger aloft. "Yes, I do believe that it began three years ago when two priests visiting Venice were charged with various things, including murder, by the Venetian authorities.
They were locked up in the dungeons in this very building -"
"Dungeons?" Steven asked, but the Doctor kept talking.
"- and the Doge of Venice threatened to have them put on trial in a secular court, rather than an ecclesiastical one. Tried by the people, not by the Church, if you like."
"And what happened?" Steven asked, more because he knew the Doctor wanted him to than because he wanted to know the answer.
"What happened? Why, the Vatican couldn't let its ecclesiastical authority go unchallenged, could it?"
"Couldn't it?" Steven couldn't see why not, but he assumed that the Doctor knew what he was talking about.
"Why no, of course not. The Pope had to have the final say on everything. So he excommunicated Venice: lock, stock and barrel."
The Doctor rubbed his hands together. "Caused quite a furore, I believe. No baptisms or burials could be carried out, no masses could be held, all marriages were dissolved and all children were declared illegitimate."
"And what happened then?" Steven was becoming interested in the story, despite himself.
"For a few months it looked as if war might break out. Spain allied itself with the Vatican and France allied itself with Venice. England, which had split away from the Catholic Church some seventy years before, made advances to Venice as well. The whole poisonous boil seemed about to erupt, but thanks to a little fancy diplomatic footwork, the two sides came to a face-saving arrangement. Honour was satisfied on both sides, and Venice was brought back into the fold."
"Oh," said Steven, disappointed. He'd been hoping for a good scrap.
"But that is why Papal emissaries are not necessarily the most welcome visitors, even now," the Doctor continued. "Still, there are worse people to have been mistaken for. Cardinal Bellarmine is no religious fanatic, but a deeply philosophical thinker. He has a formidable mind, sharp as a pin, and he is an astronomer to boot.
I'm not surprised that he's interested in Galileo's spyglass. It's right up his street, hmm?"
"And who's this Galileo that you're supposed to have come to see?" Steven said. He was getting a little lost amongst all the names and the history. "And what's a spyglass?"
"Your education has been woefully neglected, my boy. We're fortunate to have arrived at such a time in your history." The Doctor frowned for a moment and patted the pocket in which he had placed the mysterious invitation. "Or perhaps luck had nothing to do with it," he added.
Irving Braxiatel stood in the centre of the room and gazed around with some pleasure at the books that lined the walls, their spines facing inward as was the custom. The collection was complete. In this room he had every single book that was on the Index of the Catholic Church. They were banned knowledge, books considered too dangerous to read, but such books were, in the end, the most precious. Censorship illuminated perfectly the directions in which any civilization would advance.