The Empire of Glass - Andy Lane [81]
Braxiatel sighed. "Please, Doctor, not in front of the locals."
"These aren't just any locals," the Doctor snapped. "This is Galileo Galilei -" he indicated the Italian "- and this is William Shakespeare."
Galileo just nodded curtly, so Shakespeare executed a courtly bow. "I am honoured, if puzzled, to meet you," he said in a voice that shook less than he had expected. "My lord and master, King James of England, commends me to convey his best wishes to you, and bids me -"
Braxiatel dismissed him with a glance. "Did you have to bring them with you, Doctor?" he said as Shakespeare subsided. "I have been trying to keep this thing quiet."
The Doctor raised an eyebrow at Braxiatel. "If you had told me that you were behind all this," he said waspishly, "then I wouldn't have had to involve anybody local at all."
Braxiatel sighed. "I did tell you, Doctor," he replied with the air of a man who has rehearsed the matter in his mind for some time, "but our people wiped your memory. You were on a mission for them."
"I was?" The Doctor appeared surprised. "How strange. Tell me more about this mission."
Braxiatel raised a placating hand. "There are rules about this sort of discussion, Doctor, and we are infringing them merely by meeting like this. Suffice it to say that our people gave their blessing to my asking you to chair an arms limitation conference of galactic races here on Earth, and that you agreed. Unfortunately, your memory was wiped and I've ended up with another chairman."
"The invitation, of course," the Doctor mused. "It was programmed to bring me here." He shook his head. "This is all academic. My companion - Vicki - you have her in safe keeping?"
"I did, but she's been kidnapped again by one of our envoys."
Envoys. Shakespeare held on to that word. There was a meeting going on. Representations were being made, and he had to make his contribution. He hadn"t travelled all the way around Europe to be dismissed by someone who had the lean and hungry look of a man who thought too much.
"That envoy would be Albrellian?" the Doctor asked.
Braxiatel nodded. "Well done, Doctor, you're picking the situation up nicely."
"And the boats headed towards this island? What of them?"
"I wouldn't worry." Braxiatel glanced at one of the stick-men, who nodded. "If they are carrying weapons, our security precautions will prevent them from landing. If not, the Jamarians can frighten them off."
The Doctor raised his head and gazed down his nose at Braxiatel.
"You always were over-confident, Braxiatel, even as a child. The people on those boats are all suffering from some sort of radiation sickness. Given that people of this time cannot refine radioactive materials, has it occured to you they might have been supplied with fragments of some material that is inert normally, but when brought together in large quantities becomes radioactive and, when the quantity is large enough, will explode? And has it occurred to you that such a device would circumvent your security procedures, because the weapon would not actually exist until the people all arrived in the same place at the same time?"
Braxiatel, Shakespeare thought, was beginning to look a little pasty.
"No," the Doctor continued grimly, "I don't suppose it has."
"Surely we can't hold a duel in a church!" Steven said, pacing across the room that the Doctor had been given by the Doge. He passed a hand across his forehead, hidden beneath the holographic image of Galileo's forehead, and wasn't surprised when it came away moist with sweat. His first instinct when Tomasso Nicolotti challenged him had been to steal a boat and head straight for the TARDIS, but caution had prevailed, and he had sought out Marlowe for advice. Not that Marlowe was looking too concerned now, as he lounged against the window frame, paring his fingernails with a slender knife.
"We can and we must," Marlowe replied. "The Church of San Trovaso lies at the boundary of the territories controlled by the Nicolottis and the Castellanis. It's the only neutral