“So,” said Gerry when introductions had gone around. “When is everyone else getting here?”
“Everyone is here,” said Marcoli sternly, “now that you have arrived.”
Frank’s heart sank. Venice’s Committee of Correspondence consisted of nine people, seven of whom were all part of the same extended family, one of whom worked for them as a handyman, and the last being a visitor from a Committee in another country altogether. Not to mention that, of the nine, five were teenagers or just barely past it.
And they propose to free Galileo from durance vile? How?
Alarm bells started going off in his mind. This had all the earmarks of a half-baked scheme concocted by enthusiastic amateurs. Well, except Ducos, who seemed to know what he was doing. But he was a foreigner too.
“Okay, then, what’s the plan?” asked Gerry.
Frank strained, but couldn’t hear a drop of sarcasm. Damn, he’s getting good, he thought. Either that, or his youngest brother was a nitwit.
Marcoli didn’t hear any sarcasm either, and set off in a torrent of enthusiastic Italian. Once they got him to slow down, he explained to them the plan, with contributions from Massimo. Frank’s heart plunged lower and lower, into what seemed to be a bottomless abyss.
First, they would circulate propaganda, to ensure that there was popular outrage at Galileo’s treatment.
Okay, that’s feasible. If we can scrape up the money. And if the authorities don’t nab us at it. Not sure how they feel about “circulating propaganda” in Venice, but I rather doubt the First Amendment carries a lot of weight here.
Then, they would travel to Florence, where Galileo was being held under house arrest pending his trial.
Um. Travel takes money—from where? I can just see Dad’s reaction if we ask him for some spare change to mosey on over to Florence. And just how easy is it to travel across Italy these days, anyway? It’s not as if the place is a single country in the here and now.
Frank tried to remember the history lessons crammed into them before they left and on the long way here. Didn’t Florence dislike the Venetians? I think so. If I remember right, everybody in Italy dislikes the Venetians.
Then, they would “fall upon” the inquisitors guarding Galileo.
Frank tried to picture himself “falling upon” an inquisitor. The image that came to mind did not fill him with great confidence. He had a dark suspicion that the average inquisitor in the seventeenth century bore a closer resemblance to American high school jocks than old men rubbing their arthritic hands and cackling with sadistic glee. The one and only time in his life that Frank Stone had ever “fallen upon” a jock—a stupid argument in the high school gym which had gotten out of hand—the affair had gone badly. Very badly indeed. Goddam football players.
Alas, Giovanna was beaming at him. Those dimples . . .
Driven by evolutionary impulses way too powerful to be overridden by mere sanity, Frank squared his shoulders and did his best to look “manly.”
And said nothing. Made no protest at all. Such is the folly of natural selection.
Finally, Antonio Marcoli concluded enthusiastically, after freeing Galileo from captivity they would “spirit him away” to freedom in the United States.
Galileo’s . . . what, now? Just turned seventy, I think. According to what Dad told me, his health is shaky and on top of that he’s losing his eyesight. Frank remembered the rigors of their trek across the Alps to get to Venice. Great. I can just see us “spiriting him away.” In what? A coffin?
But Marcoli was plowing on, as enthusiastically as ever—and, more to the point, Giovanna was still beaming at him. So, again, Frank kept his mouth shut and just did his best to satisfy the crazed imperatives of evolution by looking as stalwart and masculine as possible. Much like a male peacock spreads his glorious tail feathers in the bright sunshine or a male frog croaks his mightiest in the gloom of night.
Predators be damned.
* * *
Marcoli spent the next few minutes explaining how their “great revolutionary exploit” would bring the downtrodden masses of Italy to their feet. It seemed that—according to Marcoli, anyway—every Italian of the exploited and oppressed lower classes spent every waking minute agonizing over the fate of the great Italian genius Galileo. His liberation would be the death knell for medievalism! The tocsin for revolution!