The kitchen door burst open, revealing young van Donck puffing as if he were one of the new steam engines. With him were two of the cardinal's guard.
"Cardinal Mazzare says you are to come to him now!" van Donck said. "There are new messages from Rome!"
Nickel and Spee hurried to the door. There was a carriage waiting in the alley. They climbed in, followed by the guards and van Donck. As they shut the door, they were jolted back into their seats when the carriage moved.
Van Donck started to pull open the window curtain.
"Don't." Spee put out his hand in warning. "It would not be wise for Father Nickel to be seen."
Within minutes the carriage pulled up to the back entrance of the episcopal palace. The guards hustled the three Jesuits out of the carriage and up the steps into the building. Waiting for them inside the entrance was Father Heinzerling. The normally jovial Jesuit was solemn to the point of tears.
"Come quickly," he said, turning and ushering them down a long corridor.
"Come in, Father Provincial," the cardinal said.
"Your Eminence," Nickel knelt and kissed Mazzare's ring. Spee and van Donck did likewise.
"There, now that's over with," Mazzare said, brushing back his sleeves. "Please sit down."
There was a long conference table littered with maps and papers in the room. At one end, a fireplace, cold and dark in the heat of summer in the Germanies. Above the mantel, a painting of the pope, Urban VIII. At the other end of the room, as if staring the pope down, was a painting of King Gustav, the emperor of the United States of Europe.
They took chairs at one end of the table. Mazzare sat at the head.
"Why are you here, Father Nickel?" the cardinal asked.
"I have been in contact with Father General Vitelleschi, Eminence," Nickel said, "by radio."
"Aha!" The cardinal slapped the table. "I knew it. Mike Stearns owes me money. I told him the Jebbies would be able to figure out how to build radios on the q.t., given enough time. He didn't believe me, but now he will have to." He looked across the table at Nickel. "And what does the father general say?"
"Much the same as he told me when I left Rome in May. And of course, what he predicted," Nickel paused, "has sadly come to pass."
Mazzare grimaced. "And what does the Black Pope think, now that he's been on the run for two months?"
"That he believed that Borja's conclave would elect him pope very soon, and that he, Vitelleschi, and Pope Urban would have prices on their heads."
"That much we know," Mazzare said. "I've just come from a meeting with Piazza, Stearns and Nasi… the Spaniards have consolidated their hold on Rome and the Campania. We think Borja will be declared pope shortly."
"So the general believed two days ago when he radioed me," Nickel agreed. "He sent me to you with some advice for you, and instructions for me."
"Go on," Mazzare said.
"He believes that the pope may be assassinated, like many of the cardinals loyal to the house of Barberini have already been. Father General Vitelleschi told me to tell you that if the pope dies, you may want to think about holding a rival conclave here." Nickel stared at the Grantviller. "And if we find that he is also dead, I am to hold a general assembly of the order under your authority to elect a new superior general."
"Did Vitelleschi say who he recommended as his successor?"
"Me."
"Well, then we must both pray to be spared these cups, don't you think?" Mazzare smiled, a wintry smile.
"Indeed, Eminence, indeed." Nickel matched Mazzare's bitter smile.
"Shall we have an anti-pope, then?" Spee asked quietly.
"It looks like we already do, Friedrich," Mazzare said. "And his name is Borja."
"While we wait for news," Nickel said, "I must be about the tasks that the father general set me. I have his commission as his deputy while he is out of touch, and I think I should begin to draw the reins of the society in before our brothers in Spain begin to do it instead."
"Wise move," Mazzare said.
"Friedrich," Nickel said, "would you be willing to be my secretary for a while this evening? And Meester van Donck as well?"
"Of course, Father," Spee quickly agreed. Van Donck nodded his agreement as well.
"Then, with Your Eminence's permission, might we use this room as our offices for the evening?"
"Yes, of course," Mazzare said. "I will send somebody with refreshments while you work. And now, if you will forgive me, I must see the prime minister." Mazzare swept out of the room.
Friedrich marveled at how different his friend from Grantville had become. Well, not different, exactly, he mused, but the cardinal's hat sat well on him.
Nickel's cough brought him out of his reverie. "So Friedrich, we need to write to Baving, and to the other senior members of the order, and tell them that it is the father general's orders that the Society of Jesus will support the properly elected pope, and that is Pope Urban VIII. You know what to say. Van Donck, come with me, I have other writing for you to do." Nickel moved down the table a ways.
Spee pulled out a piece of paper, and got one of the new metal pens from the inkstand. As always, he began his first letter the same way.
"A. M. D. G," he wrote.
Ad Maiorem Dei Gloriam-to the greater glory of God…
"Friedrich Spee von Langenfeld, priest of the Society of Jesus, this seventh day of August, in the year of our Lord 1635…" he wrote.
Suddenly, he felt a chill. August the seventh, 1635. His mind raced back to his first morning in Grantville, over three years ago, now. He remembered standing in the kitchen of Larry Mazzare's rectory, with the Catholic Encyclopedia in his hands. Standing, trembling, almost unable to read the words on the pages open before him. After three years, he found he could recite them verbatim. "A poet, opponent of trials for witchcraft, born at Kaiserswerth on the Rhine, 25 February, 1591; died at Trier 7 August, 1635."
He could not believe he had forgotten. His pen dropped to the table.
"What is wrong, Friedrich?" Father Nickel asked, hurrying back up the table.
"Ah… nothing, really, Father," Friedrich gave a huge sigh. "Just a personal realization."
"And what was it?" Nickel pressed.
"In the original time line, before Grantville came to us," Spee said heavily, and then paused. "In the original time line, today I would have died in Trier of some plague contracted from nursing soldiers in the hospital. I had forgotten the date."
"Ah," the provincial said. "It must be a shock. To know what might have been."
"I am sure you know about yourself, too, Father," Spee said, looking Nickel in the eyes.
"Yes, and I sincerely hope that I do not become general of the society twenty years before I did, eh, before I would have… ach, there are not the right tenses to discuss this time travel!" Nickel grimaced.
"Friedrich," he said, gently, "this is why I believe that we are not inspired by the devil, no matter what Borja and Baving and del Rio would like the world to believe. Because Grantville exists, Trier has not been overrun, and one of our great hymnists can still write to the greater glory of God. And you were spared yet again, in the cathedral this morning. Now write, for we have an important task, and you have been spared by God to do it."
Friedrich Spee von Langenfeld walked back from the cathedral after the Sunday mass where he had conducted the premiere of his new music. He had noticed that there were many smiling faces, and he'd noticed that the cardinal's foot was tapping in time to the music during the performance.
Spee started whistling as he walked down the heavily graveled street to his lodgings. American music certainly was strange. He'd had the cardinal explain the lyrics of many songs to him, but he still was puzzled, especially by one song in particular. It was beginning to drive him crazy, because the melody was so hard to get out of his head. Like right now, for instance.
He found himself whistling the chorus over and over. "Singin' this'll be the day that I die."