"This is Marcantonio's. I hope you like their pizza."
William watched the cook slide a giant metal spatula into a brick oven, and pull out a large round bread, covered with melted cheese and vegetables. "Is that the pizza?"
John Ugolini frowned. "Yeah. Didn't you say you were just in Italy? How come you don't know what pizza is?"
Gabrielle came to William's rescue. "John, you moron, we're in the seventeenth century, remember? The Italians haven't invented pizza yet. I thought everybody knew that."
They were seated at a large round table. Which meant that William could see all of them at one time. His rescuer, Gabrielle, had the classic Mediterranean look: brown eyes, olive skin, and coffee brown hair. Her tennis partner, Heather, had matching hair and eyes, but pale skin. Millicent, Kelsey and Vicky were blondes, and Judy was a redhead. Auburn, not coppery. Height-wise, Millicent was tiny, and Vicky taller than the two guys present, John and Derrick. Geoffrey had been offered a seat, but declined. But he was happily munching on a slice of pizza at a small table nearby.
Gabrielle nudged Heather. Heather said nothing.
"So, William, what did you think of our game of tennis?" asked Gabrielle.
"It was interesting to see how it differed from real tennis."
Vicky challenged this statement. "So what do we play, 'pretend' tennis?"
Gabrielle wasn't amused. "Oh, give him a break, Vicky."
William put his hand over his heart, turned to Vicky, and inclined his head. "Forgive my poor choice of words, mademoiselle." The girls tittered. "I suppose we can call it 'royal tennis.'
"Imagine putting half a cloister inside a high-walled building. A cloister's a garden, surrounded on all four sides by a roofed gallery.
"There is a cord strung between two poles, to separate the two teams. The players have rackets, with which they hit the ball, back and forth, across the line.
"The players make the game less predictable by serving the ball so that it bounces at least once on the penthouse to their left—"
"Wait. What penthouse?" asked Millicent.
"That's the sloped roof of the gallery."
"Monks with Penthouses, huh? What about Playboys?" said John.
"Shut up, idiot." Gabrielle looked at her friends. "Has anyone ever noticed that 'brother' is just one letter away from 'bother'?"
Heather nodded. "I always thought that the Russians were clever, because their word for 'brother' is brat." Derrick saluted her, and then converted the movement into a quick grab for her slice of pizza.
"Owww!" Heather had slapped Derrick's hand away. He held it up, bent at the wrist, and acted as if it had been maimed for life.
"Do I need to operate, Derrick?" said his other sister, Kelsey. She was in EMT training. "I recommend decapitation; then you won't notice the pain."
William grinned. His own brother, Charles, had been twelve when William left England. Such an endearing age. Decapitation, defenestration, and drowning had all appealed to William at one time or another.
"If, after the served ball comes down, it's volleyed back, or it bounces in a marked area on the receiver's side, it's a good serve. From then on, you can strike the ball so it bounces off a wall, to try to trick your opponent. You can try to hit a winning opening in the galleries. And if the ball bounces twice on the server's side, or in the receiver's forecourt, or it lands in one of the other openings, it sets up a chase."
"What's that?"
"If a second bounce is anywhere on the server's side of the net, or in the front part of the receiver's side, a chase is marked at that position. Then, before the game ends, we play off the chase. We switch sides, and the new server, to win the point, either has to cause the ball to take its second bounce closer to the far wall than the mark, or get the ball into a winning opening."
"I guess that means you want to get distance on your shots."
"That's right. Otherwise, your opponent will just let the ball bounce a second time, close to the net, and then win an easy chase."
Vicky groaned. "I've heard enough about tennis. Anyone who wants to continue to talking about it—" She mimed swinging a tennis racket, two-handed. Her imaginary ball sailed out the window of the pizza parlor "—can go outside."
They told William about the twentieth century, the Ring of Fire, and the Croat raid. William spoke about his travels. The highlights, so far as the Americans were concerned, were that he had met Galileo and walked across the Alps.
William also described his home, Chatsworth Hall. Even though he was the earl of Devonshire, his estates were actually mostly in Derbyshire. Chatsworth lay between the Derbyshire River and the moors, and it was a Tudor dwelling in the grand style: square turrets at the corners, a gateway (complete with a portcullis), a great hall worthy of the name, and an inner garden. It had already achieved some notoriety, he noted, as the elegant prison of Mary, Queen of Scots.