“Not the real trial,” Vitelleschi said.
“Then what is? Your Holiness?”
“That I do not know. I pray for guidance, Antonio. Your elder brother believes there is much to be gained by proceeding down this path, word-for-word and as fast as possible. He is more of an enthusiast than you for the new learning in every sphere of life. San Onofrio, my brother and your uncle, believes that we should place this material from Grantville in some musty corner of his library at the Lateran. Then, admit of its existence to only a few of our more trusted theologians and let the ideas out slowly and with great caution, if at all, and beginning only when we have seen the new politics established for perhaps a century, so as to be certain this has in some sense God’s blessing upon it.”
Barberini could barely keep himself from laughing aloud at that last. “He thinks that God has ordained a trial by combat in the Germanies?”
“Not really.” Urban’s smile was a little wistful. “He and I are less than an hour apart in age, but very different in some ways. He has always been the more studious of us, and I think he fears these things for which there is not ancient authority. May God bless him, he has not been well of late, and some of the things he has to say on these subjects are not entirely lucid.”
“He grows unwell?” Barberini crossed himself, offered a silent prayer for his other uncle.
“Not so bad that he cannot get about. He grows . . . testy.” Urban sighed. “I would that I could grow so testy as well. I prayed God to spare me this, such turmoil. And yet I see no way out of engaging with this new learning. This—basta!”
Both Barberini and Vitelleschi moved closer to the pope, whose face was now drawn and lined. “Are you unwell, uncle?” Barberini asked.
Vitelleschi’s mask had cracked, for a moment, and was then back in place. “Shall I have a physician attend Your Holiness?”
“No, no,” Urban said. “I am well enough, in body. It is in the spirit I ache, in the spirit. At once an opportunity and a challenge. I am reminded of that English saint, Thomas à Becket.”
Neither of the other two priests spoke. Barberini, for his own part, could not place the Saint Thomas that his uncle was referring to.
Urban went on. “He was commanded by his king to overlook some matter of the church’s interest, and refused. I misdoubt that that king’s penitence after the fact made the swords of his knights hurt any the less.”
“I can assure Your Holiness that there is no sign of any current plot—” Vitelleschi began, almost hotly. Whatever the efficiencies of the Holy Office in Rome, the Society of Jesus had its own fearsomely effective apparatus of informers and spies, and had indeed been first on the trail of the last, albeit comical, plot to murder the pope.
Urban waved him aside. “No, no, I do not doubt you or your eyes, Muzio. I know for a fact that there will be such a plot, however.”
“Your Holiness has decided—?” Vitelleschi’s voice had a note of doubt in it.
“Not in any formal sense, no.” The pope’s face had turned brooding. “But in my heart I see that there is a way to step ahead of the errors and missteps of the next centuries. I pray every hour for the courage to take that way. For, more importantly, the wisdom to see the path that leads on that way.”
“Ah,” said Vitelleschi, and fell silent.
“I do not understand,” said Barberini after a moment trying to follow. “What way?”
Urban smiled. “My dear, dearly beloved nephew, have you read those papers that the American priest sent?”
“Some of them, yes, but . . .”
“But you are no theologian, or at least no more than you need to be a priest on those occasions when you discharge that small part of your office?”
Barberini felt himself blush. Holiness and piety were no great part of his character and in the august presence of his uncle there was no way to hide that fact. He said nothing.