"Please to meet you," said Jones, raising his glass.

"Who is one of the ministers at Grantville's Methodist church. And this is my curate, Father Augustus Heinzerling. I believe you've already met."

Heinzerling nodded a greeting, and Luzzatto gave another half-bow in return.

"Forgive me," Luzzatto said, "for I may not understand the Christian religion perfectly, but I understood that your Methodist church was Protestant, Reverend Jones?"

"It is, yes," said Jones, clearly anticipating the question. "If you're wondering whether that means Father Mazzare and I should be enemies, the answer is no, not in the twentieth century. Our churches never settled their differences of doctrine, but outside of a few troubled places and a few small minorities of troublemakers on both sides, Catholic and Protestant never do more than chide each other for their lapses in doctrine. As to our being friends, that is a happy accident of our having shared interests outside our respective religions."

"Indeed," said Mazzare, "a happy accident." He smiled. Jones had learned Italian fairly well in the months they had had before leaving Grantville, but he hadn't quite relaxed into the language. It was bizarre to hear the plain-spoken minister suddenly start talking in that grammatically perfect and excruciatingly pronounced way, in slow and measured sentences, after hearing him in voluble and homey eloquence all these years.

It was a question of practice, of course. Mazzare had grown up with Italian from his parents, refreshed it with a two-year stint in Rome, and was both fluent and colloquial in the language. The twentieth-century version of it, at least. He had had no difficulty with the Venetian dialect once he had attuned his ear to it, but Jones was still having trouble. Indeed, very few people hereabouts could understand his twentieth-century formal Italian, since it was a language hardly anyone in this time actually spoke.

"That is-interesting," said Luzzatto, looking introspective for a moment. Mazzare had an idea that he understood the Jewish lawyer's surprise. Luzzatto had lived most of his life in a place where there were hardly any non-Catholic Christians and non-Christians were formally and punctiliously discriminated against.

Mazzare realized he was being remiss in his duties as host. "Can someone get Maestro Luzzatto a drink? And one for me, as well." He pointed to one of the bottles on the sideboard. "That one-we have some others, too-was sent to you personally from Don Francisco. He asked me to assure you that it was prepared according to the laws of kosher-ah, kashrut."

Heinzerling moved to the sideboard, but Luzzatto intercepted him quickly and smoothly.

"Please," the lawyer said, smiling at the burly Jesuit, "allow me." Luzzatto opened the bottle and poured himself a glass, murmuring something as he did so. Mazzare didn't catch the words but assumed it was a religious blessing. Heinzerling seemed a bit surprised at the notion of a guest serving himself, but made no objection. He simply poured a glass for Mazzare and brought it over.

Mazzare noted with approval that Gus did not take the opportunity to refresh his own glass. But, mostly, he was chiding himself. He'd forgotten that Nasi had explained to him that maintaining kashrut required that the wine not be handled by anyone except observant Jews from the time the grapes were put into the bin to be pressed to the time it was poured into the glass.

He sighed inwardly. This was just one of the many ways in which one Larry Mazzare, small-town American priest, felt inadequate to his new assignment. Grantville's only Jewish family, the Roths, had been Reform Jews and late-twentieth-century variety at that. Dealing with seventeenth-century Jews was another matter altogether. No matter how sophisticated, cosmopolitan and well educated they were, the traditions and customs of Judaism were so deeply ingrained in their attitudes that it was easy to blunder into a minefield without realizing it.

That was even true, in many ways, with nonobservant Jews like Mike Stearn's wife Rebecca and her father, Balthazar Abrabanel. To Mazzare's way of thinking, it was odd. But he was Catholic, not Jewish. He knew that where Christians tended to see theological doctrine as the defining issue of their faith, Jews placed far more emphasis on matters of ritual, tradition and customs. Rebecca had been willing to marry a gentile, and her father had not objected. But Mike had told the priest that, very early on, he had learned to respect and accept the fact that Rebecca kept a kosher house and continued to observe Shabbat and the Jewish holidays. Not as strictly as the rabbis of Amsterdam would require, but to what Rebecca and her father regarded as a reasonable level.

He'd told that to Mazzare one evening in the Thuringen Gardens, as he munched on a ham sandwich. "Only time I ever get to eat pork any more is when I do it on the sly outside the house." But he'd said it cheerfully enough. "What the hell. If Paris was worth a mass to Henry the Fourth, keeping my wife happy is sure as hell worth a few changes in my diet and habits."

Luzzatto came back over to Mazzare's side and held up the glass. "Please pass along my thanks for the wine to my cousin Don Francisco, Monsignor Mazzare." He had a slightly impish half-smile on his face. "The Nasis are quite famous for it, you know."

"Oh?"

"Yes. The Nasis are even famous for it in the City." The words the City contained a freight of meaning. As if there was and could be no other city in the word comparable to Istanbul. "Until quite recently they were sole suppliers of wine to Topkapi palace. The business is still substantial, despite Emperor Murad's recent prohibitions."

"I'd think that would be a bit risky."

Luzzatto shrugged. "Simply living in the City has its risks. But it was the great shelter for the Sephardim after the Spanish drove us out of Iberia. Truth be told, the risks are small provided one does not wave the matter under the nose of Murad the Mad. Like most Ottoman emperors, he really does not care much what Jews or Christians do in his capital, as long as they do it quietly."

Mazzare took a sip of his own wine, which had also come from Nasi. Francisco had ordered several barrels sent to the embassy at his own expense. They'd already been here when the mission arrived.

The wine was good; full-bodied and with a sweet undertone that wasn't sickly like so much of the wine they got in Germany. "Delicious," he pronounced. "I must remember to thank Francisco when I send my first message home. Speaking of which-"

He broke off, remembering the need for security. Smoothly, understanding his quandary, Sharon Nichols stepped forward and engaged Luzzatto's attention. Mazzare took the opportunity to move away a few steps and speak softly into Heinzerling's ear. "Gus, how are the radio people doing?"

Heinzerling put his glass down. "I can find out," he said. "I left them untangling wires in the attic."

He spoke as softly as Mazzare. No one really knew if all the capabilities of Americans with radio were still a secret from Europe's princes. But so long as there remained the possibility that the USE's enemies still thought that enormous towers were needed for the devices, they would do their best to keep the knowledge limited. Although Melissa Mailey and her party were imprisoned in the Tower of London, they still had the means to communicate with home. If Charles I-the Earl of Strafford, more likely-ever got wind of the full capability of American radio . . .

He would surely have their quarters in the Tower subjected to a rigorous search-something he had avoided doing so far.

"Please," said Mazzare. "Tell them there's no pressure, I should simply like to know if I can send a message in tonight's transmission window or whether it should wait."

Heinzerling left, padding with that silent gait that went so oddly with his burly physique.

Mazzare moved back to Luzzatto's side. "Speaking of negotiations, do we yet have a program of discussions with Messer il Doge?"

"Ah." Luzzatto set down his glass and pulled his briefcase from under his arm. "It was for this reason I came to visit." He took out papers and began sorting through them.

"Perhaps we should take a moment to read through . . ." Mazzare broke off, when he saw the amount of paper involved.

"No, Monsignor. These are simply notes, of my own. I find I grow absentminded as I age."

Luzzatto gave a dry little chuckle. Mazzare hoped he was joking. As well as being small and narrow, the lawyer was remarkably baby-faced, giving the impression that he was in his twenties. The life story Nasi had given Mazzare, though, put Luzzatto somewhere nearer to forty.

"Ah," Luzzatto went on. "I am absentminded again. There are some matters for you to attest as plenipotentiary for the United States, the rental of this palazzo and so forth"-he set aside a bundle of documents-"and I shall leave these for you to examine at your leisure. There is no rush before the beginning of Lent, which is some time away yet. Then it will be needful to have your contracts signed."

Mazzare nodded, although he did not relish the thought of reading that pile of legalese in what was rapidly becoming his fourth language after English, German and Latin. Perhaps better to get onto a more immediate subject. "I understand that the diplomacy begins this evening with a reception at the palazzo ducale?"

"This is at once true, and not true, Monsignor. The reception will be to allow the members of the Consiglio to take a look at you and for each to pass some moments, perhaps, in conversation. Nothing can be done or will be done without a vote, and they dislike to act on any vote that does not have a majority of seventy or so."

"Seventy?" Jones had his eyebrows raised. "We have to convince seventy people of everything? I thought it was the doge and a few councillors-ten, wasn't it?"

"Again, Signor Jones, this is at once true and not true. The government of Venice is a complicated thing, and different kinds of decisions require different decision makers. Messer il Doge can decide very little himself; he has influence, not power. Many other decisions require him to act with various other bodies, depending on whether it is to do with the Rialto, the city, the Terrafirma, or foreign matters. There are differences for the Empire and for foreign Christian princes. I could not possibly explain all of these conveniently now, signor, although perhaps we might spare a few days at some point?" Luzzatto looked as though he meant it. Mazzare began to speculate, briefly, how much a top-flight commercial attorney in the up-time U.S. would charge to devote his time to a client like this, and that led him to just how deep the Nasi and Abrabanel commitment to the USE actually was. They were spending money like water.

Mazzare wrenched himself back to the present. He was vaguely aware that Jones had made some polite noises about how it sounded a fascinating prospect, but perhaps he might decline to fix a date just now, and Luzzatto was speaking again.

"-and so for diplomatic matters of this character it will be several votes of the Gran Consiglio to test the waters on particular matters and then a final vote to empower il doge to enter into the treaty. They will turn out in full for that, and I should expect to see perhaps a hundred and sixty votes cast. If they believe more than a few will vote against or abstain, they hold off voting. It is safe to do very little without consensus in the most serene Republic of Venice."

Luzzatto was smiling ever so slightly, his eyes twinkling. Mazzare had the distinct feeling that the irony had been intentional and intended to convey a very real warning of weirdness ahead. It was a warning of another kind, too: that they were in a town where it paid to be oblique about politics if you were opening your mouth anywhere near money or power. That was a kind of town that had been mercifully rare by the dawn of the twenty-first century, but was all too common in the seventeenth. Even diplomatic immunity was no sure guarantee; the Spanish ambassador Bedmar who was supposed to be back in town had had to get out of Venice one step ahead of a lynch mob.

Luzzatto was shuffling his notes, apparently preparing for a more formal presentation. Mazzare decided to prompt him. "Maestro Luzzatto, what are our chances of a favorable settlement here in Venice? I trust Don Francisco sent you a briefing on what we hope to achieve?"

Luzzatto cleared his throat. "Monsignor Mazzare, I will say in summary that the chances are good, with perhaps some reservations. Don Francisco has been instructing several of us here in Venice, in the ghetto and the Rialto alike, in rumors and information to feed to various interested parties. We have, I think, been successful in making the case for a strong commercial tie with the United States of Europe as it has now become. Venice has been in a precarious situation for some years now, and came close to crisis with the Mantuan war, for there was great risk of losing the French alliance, such as it is. The designs of both Spain and France on Venice and the money it represents are obvious and long standing. Spain is perhaps not so great a threat as once it was, but France has grown powerful in recent years. And while the Habsburgs in Spain and Austria are strong enough to contain them, the Terrafirma party in Venice have been worried. The maritime party is also concerned; for all that they pretend to care little for any wealth that comes from the land and to cleave to the view that Venice will make all its wealth from the Levant trade, they know that without the landward ties they are less powerful. In this, at least, the two parties see eye to eye."

Murmurs of understanding and assent went around the room. They had all sat through briefings from Nasi.

Luzzatto went on. "I believe that this interest is well recognized to be served by trade with the United States and the commercial opportunities it represents. There is no prejudice about trading with Protestant states, after all. The Dutch and the English have for some years had significant customs concessions here and the merchant houses are grown used to dealing with such. One of the current matters of debate before the Consiglio is the admission of an Englishman to farm the customs on certain goods here, such is the presence of the English in this town. You will doubtless meet this man, Sir Henry Hider, although his interests are in dried fish and cloth and so your commercial aims will not cross with his to any great extent."

Heinzerling came back into the room and padded over to Mazzare. Politely, Luzzatto moved away and began chatting with Sharon, allowing the father and his curate a moment for a quick and private exchange.

"There is good news and bad news," Heinzerling whispered. "The good news is that the radio will soon be functional. Tonight, they say."

Mazzare nodded. Then, braced himself. Gus Heinzerling did not use the expression "bad news" lightly.

"The bad news is that Joe Buckley was just spotted, entering the building next door. With luggage."

It was all Larry Mazzare could do not to groan aloud. As if things weren't complicated enough already!