So: “Next message, Giulio. We need our agents in Mestre and Vincenza to spread out along the Po. We need at least one in each of the towns on the north shore that have stables of reasonable size. They are to seek the ketch and watch for its passengers to transfer to mounts. They will do so quickly; they will not spend a night in the town.”
“Rombaldo, this will take some time to arrange. By the time the messages are sent, received, and the agents change position-”
“Yes, Giulio, I’m well aware of this. Which means, unfortunately, that our agents might arrive after the boat for which they are searching. So they cannot simply go to the villages and sit by the side of the Po, staring, hoping to see a ketch. They will need to make surreptitious inquiries about recent arrivals, mounts that were recently purchased or stabled there, strangers passing through-some of whom will certainly not be Italians. And yes, it will take time, but we are not in a hurry. Thoroughness, not hastiness, is our best ally right now.”
“It shall be as you say, Rombaldo. And if the ketch’s passengers are located, should our men ambush th-?”
“Absolutely not. They are to follow, observe, and report. That is all. These travelers are not our targets; they are our guides. We would be fools to slay them before they lead us to our ultimate objective.” He waved Giulio out. Then, as an afterthought, he added, “Also, be sure to give the fisherman three extra lire. He showed cleverness and initiative.”
Giulio stopped and cocked his head. Rombaldo almost laughed; the scrawny Paduan looked like a quizzical spaniel. He asked, “A bonus for the fisherman, Rombaldo?”
“Yes. Why? What were you expecting?”
“Well, that we’d cover our tracks like always. That we’d kill him.”
Rombaldo frowned. “Kill him? Good grief, no.” Then he shrugged, “Well, at least not yet.”
It was not at all fair, Ruy Sanchez de Casador y Ortiz decided. Not fair at all.
He looked over the ears of his horse and saw his beautiful wife reach down to give yet another child a turn riding behind her. In the time that he had known her, Sharon had become only a passably capable equestrienne. But otherwise, each passing day seemed a divine ordination upon the further growth of her other, peerless gifts. For Ruy, every moment of existence also allowed him to see more clearly how she was the very acme of charm, wit, kindness, beauty, and-and — yes. And. That. Ruy sighed. Three days upon the road and two evenings spent in the even less comfortable fields had taken their toll on Ruy’s naturally ebullient spirit. Not because of the onset of saddle sores, or the monotonous food, or the omnipresent dust that coated body, mouth, and nostrils. Being a veteran of innumerable campaigns, he no longer noticed such discomforts. No, Ruy resented the absence of a bed. And privacy. Specifically, the bed and privacy that he and his bride of less than two months had enjoyed at the farmhouse.
It had not been a wonderful bed; it was cranky and had needed a thorough dosing of DDT before it was vermin-free. And it creaked. A great deal. But that was part of what he missed. Say what one might, a creaking bed was rather like an orchestral accompaniment, and Sharon Nichols had shown, in the past weeks, that she was a virtuoso performer.
It just wasn’t fair, Ruy concluded.
“A real for your thoughts?”
Ruy looked up from his funk, smiling, simply because the sound of Sharon’s voice always made him happy. “You might not approve,” Ruy warned her.
“Try me,” she said with a smile that was more than half-leer.
Ruy glanced behind. The pope sat his horse comfortably and loose-limbed; Vitelleschi sat his like a long-necked scarecrow without joints.
“You might approve, my heart, but I sincerely doubt that the pope would.”
“Oh, I don’t know. I don’t think Urban VIII is a prude. But Vitelleschi-brrrr. I suspect he thinks holding hands is the equivalent of fornication.”
“Hmf,” moped Ruy. “Well, I certainly don’t.”
“No,” she agreed with a smile, “you certainly don’t.”
“Heart of my heart, it is more than a man should be asked to bear, this abstinence. To touch your beauty, to experience your vigor, it brands a man’s soul. It creates a hunger that knows no surfeit. It afflicts me with fantasies and daydreams of delights that are bestowed by an angel with the impulses of a demon.”
“In short, you miss the bed.”
“Ah, the bed,” Ruy sighed, shaking his head. “I remember it almost as if it were yesterday.”
“It was. Well, the day before yesterday.”
“Is it so? Then why does it already feel like a century of centuries?”
“Ruy, don’t herniate your flattery muscles, now. And besides, being on the road is a source of adventure, of new opportunities, new places-new beds. “She poked him, her lips curving slighly.
His eyes widened, then narrowed to match the salacious smile that he could feel growing on his face. “It may be true that variety is the spice of life, but I was not done savoring all the many flavors of the farmhouse. And its bed. Which lifted you just high enough, when you lay full upon it, that I was perfectly positioned to-”
“Ruy. You are not going to talk about that here.”
“Ah, so now you fear that Urban will overhear?”
“That. And I need to keep my head on my business.”
Ruy effected an epic sulk. “I am your business.”
“You most certainly are, you old goat. You are the business I want to get down to. Which is precisely why I’m going to ride ahead of you now.”
“To separate yourself from me? I am wounded, wounded unto death.”
“Really? Wounded to death? You? All of you?” Her challenging gaze drifted south of his belt for just a second; he quite literally rose to the challenge.
As she turned away, Ruy protested to the listening skies. “I am lost, utterly lost. My heart is owned by a cruel temptress who has no pity upon my desperate condition.”
Looking back, Sharon smiled. The sensuous curve of her lips seemed reprised in her shoulders, her arms, her hips, her bust. “So your condition is desperate?”
“Despite enduring a thousand battles and a hundred wounds, never have I been in more pain. I, Ruy Sanchez de Casador y Ortiz, swear that it is true.”
She raised her chin in a histrionic huff. “I’ll bet you say that to all the girls.” And with a twitch of her tail that matched her spurred mare’s, she moved farther ahead.
Smiling more broadly, Ruy spurred his own charger, keeping up with her. But he was careful not to draw abreast of, or pass, her. No, he must not pass her.
Because he liked the view from back here. Very, very much.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
The room stank of chronically unwashed bodies and the proximity of Rome’s Jewish Ghetto, from which rubbish was removed infrequently. At best.
Tom watched Juliet finish her wine. She placed the sturdy flagon down upon the table and, despite her almost parodically curvy bulk, she belched demurely. Then she stood up and whistled, once, shrilly, followed by her cry of “Benito?”
From out of the milling crowd of young men in the front room, a tall gangly adolescent with a bad facial gash and missing one ear loped over. His face was a study of dedication bordering on adoration: “Yes, Signora Sutherland?”
“Time to send all the young bucks along to their billets now, lad. Get Giovanna’s relatives to help you.”
“Her brother Fabrizio, he’s here. But her cousin Dino is upstairs, fetching-you know, ‘him.’”
Thomas North smiled tightly. Him, indeed. But it was true enough that Harry’s fame in Rome was such that the mere mention of his name and rumor of his appearance could create problems. Fortunately, this was working in their favor, now. Since they had removed Wadding weeks ago, there had been an imaginary “Harry Lefferts sighting” almost every other day. The authorities had apparently pursued these rumors vigorously at first. Now, they simply ignored them. Which was good; although the returned Wrecking Crew took meticulous care not to interact or even be seen by locals, even at night, they could not afford a slip-up. Whoever worked for Borja was looking for them; no reason to help the bastard do his job.