So the guy already knew his name, too. Frank decided to make introductions anyway, and named Gerry and Ron for the Frenchman. Giovanna's father and Marius Pontigrazzi they already knew, and finally he learned the names of Giovanna's brothers: Salvatore and Fabrizio.

There were also Dino and Roberto Marcoli, twin brothers also in their teens, and another older guy in his late thirties or early forties. Frank recognized all three of them. They'd been with Antonio Marcoli in the embassy the day before, although they hadn't really been introduced. The older man turned out to be the father of the twins and one of Antonio's many cousins. He was also Antonio's brother-in-law; or had been, at least, until Giovanna's mother died in the plague.

Frank would have been surprised by that, and a little taken aback, if he hadn't already learned that the general American tendency to avoid cousin marriage was not shared in most of the world. Miz Mailey had once told him the prohibition against it in many U.S. states was a result of a combination of the influence of the eugenics movement in the 1920s and anti-immigrant attitudes. Nowhere outside of North America had it been prohibited and it was actually quite common, even in the twentieth century of the universe they'd come from. He'd found the whole thing rather amusing at the time, given the longstanding wisecracks about inbred West Virginians. In their new world, the former West Virginians were considered maniacal exogamists.

The cousin/brother-in-law was named Massimo Marcoli, and was apparently the intellectual theorist of the group. At least, he had a stack of pamphlets fresh from Germany with him.

"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!

Frank had his doubts. In fact, he was pretty damn sure he now knew what must have been going through the minds of some of John Brown's more level-headed associates when Brown explained his plans for Harper's Ferry.

He's nuts!

But . . .

Apparently, Frank's mimicry of the male-in-his-prime had served its purpose. Giovanna left off simply beaming and, in her own enthusiasm, gave him a hug. True, it was a brief hug. No matter. The feel of that nubile warm body against his was enough to paralyze Frank in the critical moment.

Critical . . . because his younger brothers-idiots!-opened the door to madness still further, before Frank could stop them.

"Why do we need the propaganda at all, then?" Gerry asked, running fingers through his hair. "Seems to me we'd be better off keeping quiet until we make our move."

Ron chimed in, after glancing at Giovanna. True, Ron seemed to have reconciled himself to letting Frank have a clear shot. But he was still a teenage boy in the presence of an exceedingly attractive teenage girl. Which is to say, a functional imbecile.

"Yeah, that's what I think too." Ron swelled his chest. "Besides, I'm more of an action sort of guy anyway."

Marcoli leaned over, his intense face more intense than ever. His dark eyes now seemed like coal. Glowing coal. "Because without the propaganda, Galileo's freedom is only the liberty of one old man, messers! The people have clutched his cause to their bosom, to be sure. But the subtleties of the matter must still be explained to them or they will not grasp the full significance of his liberation."

Frank finally saw an opening. Propaganda. Yeah. Propaganda takes time. Time to stall . . . and stall . . .

"Good idea!" he said brightly. "I'll start working on something right off. I was thinking a pamphlet-no, maybe a booklet! For that matter-this really is an important and complicated issue-maybe a full-length-"

Alas. Antonio's cousin Massimo smiled and shook his head. "No need, young messer! I have already written it!"

From somewhere on the floor he brought up a satchel, seedy-looking and frayed at the corners. From it he pulled a thick sheaf of paper, closely covered in scrawled writing, cup-rings and other, less identifiable stains. "Everything is explained here, for the people."

"I help to write it," Marius chimed in proudly.

I just bet you did, thought Frank. He'd seen enough of Marius already to realize that the Marcoli family's handyman was, in the venerable old American saying, not playing with a full deck. Frank had an awful feeling that the tract Massimo and Marius had written would be of a piece with the rest of the plan.

He had a moment's wild amusement. Maybe he could send a copy of that screed back to Joachim von Thierbach on an experimental basis. Joachim was the CoC's top propagandist in Germany and a genuine whiz at it. See if a man can really die laughing.

"Maybe you could reduce it to just the essentials," said Ron. "A single, uh, I don't know the Italian. What the Germans call a Flugblatt. Means 'flyer' in English."

Massimo and Marius frowned mightily.

"Most people don't have time to read a whole long argument, you see," said Ron. "You're trying to reach the workers and the tradespeople. They spend all day making a living and when they finish they haven't the energy to go through a whole lot. What they might do is read a sheet that convinces them of the main argument."

Massimo and Marius still looked doubtful. So did Antonio. "But we must educate the people fully!" he protested. "They must understand."

"Oh, sure, sure," said Ron, hastily. "But full understanding has to come a step at a time. Maybe we can break down your book there into ideas a page at a time, introduce the ideas one at a time, let people work up to it. They'll read a page every few days where they won't sit down with a whole book, right?"

Again, Frank saw an opening. From the look of that thick, closely scrawled manuscript, translating it into comprehensible terms on short leaflets-if it could be done at all; he had his doubts; so much the better-would surely take weeks and weeks. Maybe months.