‘Um …’ replied Luther, frowning monstrously. Slovo saw that he oh-so wanted to embrace this radical revision of developed natural law but stubborn honesty was bringing him back, time and again, to the flaws within it. Pretty soon, worrying away at the edges, he’d be able to drive a coach-and-four through one of the resulting gaps. The Admiral therefore prepared some propositions to meet the monk if and when he emerged. Slovo was determined that the weary hours spent coaching Droz to carry out his very first abstract argument should not go to waste.
Fortunately, at that exact moment, when all was in the balance, the powdered mushrooms that had been covertly introduced to Luther’s wine took effect. Slovo merely wished to make him more liberal and welcoming than hitherto, and it had been simplicity itself, for someone who’d spent two decades in the company of the Borgias, to doctor Luther’s drink. The monk’s attention had been seized by a passing Puttane with endless legs in gold hose; in a trice the deed was done – and the world thereby changed.
Luther looked at Slovo and Droz anew, a fresh vivacious light in his slit eyes. ‘I see what you mean,’ he said slowly. ‘Hadn’t ever thought of it that way before. So you could say it’s the intention that counts, not the deed, couldn’t you?’
‘Absolutely,’ replied the Admiral, not really listening any more, confident his job was done.
‘I mean,’ Luther sprinted on, ‘if ever a monk got to Heaven by monkery, it ought to be me. I’ve done my bit, ruined my knees in prayer and gone without beer and sausage for days on end to save my soul.’
‘And a lifetime without the flushed-pink diversions over there,’ smirked Droz. ‘No wonder you’re so worked up!’
‘You’re right, agreed the monk. ‘I reckon God should be more forgiving than man is, and men forgive almost anything. So, as long as you believe—’
‘The Just shall live by faith,’ mused Admiral Slovo, and – catching the monk’s chemically affected mind at just the right moment – inadvertently supplied the cornerstone of a whole new theology. Unknown to Slovo, the idea that would split Europe in two and put the Grim Reaper on to overtime had just been born.
‘Right!’ shouted Luther, standing up in his excitement. ‘Justification by faith alone – Ooo-wee!’ He punched the air and gyrated his bovine hips in a masterful, four centuries premature, impersonation of James Brown, ‘godfather of Soul’.
‘I feeeeeeeeeeel goooooooooooooooood!’ he sang, and the nearby ladies stared at him.
‘Over to you, I think,’ said Slovo to Droz. Things had gone terribly well – now for phase two of the plan.
‘I have some business to conduct elsewhere,’ Slovo explained to the dancing German. ‘However, Father Droz here will be with you for the rest of this little outing. He will take good care of you.’
‘S’right,’ rumbled the Swiss, pleased that things were now moving into his specialist sphere. ‘Don’t worry, I’ve brought a spare sword …’
Unwilling to actually witness the spiritual squalor of what Numa Droz called a good night out, Admiral Slovo went home and occupied himself with the sort of things he did when people weren’t watching. He was awaiting the inevitable.
It came at dawn in the form of a Burgundian Officer of the Watch. ‘Would the honoured Admiral be so good,’ he’d asked, puzzled but pleased to find Slovo dressed and waiting, ‘to attend the Castel Sant’Angelo and vouch for two malefactors who dare to claim acquaintance?’
Admiral Slovo followed on at his leisure, having advanced in the world beyond blind obedience to the summons of some mercenary. In the Palazzo del Senatore, he waited until the coast was clear and then gave the contents of his moneyscrip to an old beggar-lady who was crouching in a doorway. Then he hurried off before anyone spotted the shameful deed. It would not do for his painfully acquired image to be compromised by public knowledge of pointless kindness. One of his many enemies might conclude he was getting soft and make a move against him.
Even so, he’d felt impelled to make the gesture. Doubtless he would be richly rewarded, as usual, by the Vehme; land and money, and access to people and pleasure seemed to be theirs in infinite supply. There remained, though, some guilt about his compliance with their demands. Only a little, however …
Then, mentally braced against the tedium of active life, he entered the Sant’Angelo – and found Numa Droz and Martin Luther holding court.
The Watchmen, who were only hireling shepherds after all, were wary of Droz and had not attempted to disarm him. He was, Slovo straightaway realized, in that most unpredictable of phases where the waves of euphoria are set to crash against the cliffs of hangover. The Admiral accordingly kept communication to the minimum. The Swiss looked back red-eyed and noted the acknowledgement of a job well done. He felt pleased, but these things were tricky to judge.
Luther, by contrast, was making noise enough for three, reliving the night’s exploits under the amused eyes of the Watch. He plainly had no idea how to hang or handle a sword, was boastful drunk and didn’t know or care that he’d split his monk’s habit from neck to arse.
‘Hello, Admiral,’ he shouted, weaving about unsteadily. ‘What a time we’ve had!’
‘We finally caught up with them making a fighting retreat from the Bordelletto,’ said the Burgundian, smiling wryly. ‘There’s probably two dead and a lot more who’ll need patching, no one of any importance though. You obviously know them and your word’s good with me. What’s it to be, sir, the informal garrotte, a proper hanging or shall I let them go?’
Admiral Slovo paused for a few seconds before replying – just out of sadism really. Martin Luther sobered considerably in the interval.
‘The last option, I think,’ the Admiral said eventually.
‘If you’re sure,’ replied the Burgundian, signalling to his men to clear the way. ‘But if they’re either priest or monk, then I’m a Frenchman!’
‘No,’ admitted Slovo, to the man’s evident relief. ‘You’re not a Frenchman.’
Outside in the comparative cool of the morning, Luther started to come off the boil. Slovo had chosen the ‘Thousand Star’ mushroom because of the reportedly gentle and benign return to earth it gave. Never again would the monk feel as good or live so fully as he had done these last few hours, but the warm memory would linger on, like the fading perfume in a lost loved-one’s clothes. It would keep him going for a while – long enough for it to be too late to turn back.
‘Ah – Admiral,’ Luther rhapsodized as they walked along. ‘I don’t know what to say …’
‘Good,’ said Slovo, but to no avail.
‘I’ve had the best night of my miserable life, I have. Mind you, I’m scandalized that a priest of Rome should know what Father Droz knows!’
‘Please,’ said Admiral Slovo, raising his black-gloved hand, ‘no details, I beg of you.’
‘We had opportunity for thought as well, you know, amidst all the … doing,’ said Luther, pouting and offended. ‘It was strange, my perception of time seemed to go funny; the hours stretched on and on.’
‘They did when you started talking!’ complained Numa Droz, raising his eyes to Heaven.
‘Father Droz is like a soldier in many respects,’ the monk went on regardless. ‘He has their fatalistic attitudes, most unlike a normal priest.’
‘All I said,’ protested Droz, ‘was that if a pike-head’s got your name on it, it’s got your name on it and there’s nothing you can do.’
‘It’s just so in accord with my new insight,’ said Luther, ignoring him. ‘We live by faith alone. If you’re justified by faith you’re saved, if you’re not, you’re not – and there’s nothing you can do about it! See?’