The Cannon Law—ARC(29)

They didn't call it the Freedom Arches, though. It was just "Frank's Place" for the time being. Frank had decided right off, even before they got to Rome, that they'd do the political stuff quietly and without fuss. Concentrate on substance, not form, to put it another way. He thought waving red banners and engaging in firebrand street oratory in the same city as—in fact, no more than a couple of hundred yards from—World Inquisition HQ was just plain stupid. Not to mention being a good way to get tossed into a cell. He'd had all of three nights in prison in his entire life and didn't want any more of that than he could possibly avoid, thank you very much.



Besides, it seemed to fit the Roman style. Frank had the impression even before moving to Rome—which had since been pretty well confirmed—that the Church and city authorities, at least with the current pope in power, were inclined to look the other way as long as you didn't insist on rubbing their noses in your activities.



There were only a few flies in the ointment, the main one being the lefferti. Naturally, Benito had mentioned that the place was run by Americans, and that had attracted the guys Harry Lefferts had hung around with during his time in the city, along with people with an actual interest in political issues. At least, they claimed Harry had hung around with them.



Harry had been more or less okay for a jock, as far as Frank could remember. He hadn't even been a real "jock" in the first place, in the sense of those mindless high school athletes who honestly thought that winning a football game was something you needed to pray to God for, because God actually gave a flying damn whether the guys in blue and white or the guys in red and gold got a ball across an arbitrary line more often that the other ones did. Harry had been one of the tough kids who were often enough in trouble. No high school letters for him, no sirree. He'd just been a "jock" in the operative sense that the real jocks stayed away from him because he'd beat the crap out of them if they tried to pick on him they way they did on Frank and his brothers. But really not a bad guy, in Frank's experience, as long as you didn't mess with him.



Some of these lefferti, though, were mean. Well-dressed mean, like the kind of guys who, when you saw them in a Western, you just knew were going to turn out to be called "Doc" or something similar.



Oh, sure, polite and friendly enough, and they all wanted to practice their English. A couple of them were looking Giovanna over, too, although there wasn't much Frank could do or say about that unless one of them stepped over the line. Not much he could do after, either, unless he was willing to shoot them. All of them had some sort of weapon on their belts. None of them had guns, but there were certainly swords and a couple of bowie knives. They were consciously trying to ape Harry Lefferts, and Frank hoped like hell they'd picked up on Harry's good nature.



On the positive side, at least some of the lefferti were reading the literature that could always be found in "Frank's Place."



Frank was taken from his reverie by a customer waving for service.



And one of the kind Frank was less than happy about, to be honest. One of the lefferti. "Signor?" Frank asked, going over with pencil and notepad.



"Signor?" the fellow said, swinging his boots off the table, which Frank noted with a small degree of satisfaction had a stack of pamphlets on it from the literature table. "Please, I am Piero."



Frank heaved a mental sigh of relief. This was one of the amiable ones, it seemed. "What can I get you, Piero? I'm Frank, by the way."



Piero touched a finger to the brim of his hat—a wide-brimmed number, naturally. "A pleasure to meet you, Frank. I should like a jug of wine and a pizza, if you please."



"Certainly," he said. "Be maybe half an hour before we have another batch of pizzas out the oven, though."



Piero nodded. "In the meantime, the wine. And when, pray, does the revolution begin?" Piero garnished that one with a big smile.



"Revolution? Not on the menu here, Piero." Frank's instincts started to murmur a gentle warning. He'd knew the term agent provocateur, after all—having been made a fool of by one only the year before. He'd damned near gotten killed because of it.



Piero shrugged. "Harry said something about revolution, I think." He'd dropped into English. Pretty good English, at that.



"Sounds like Harry. You knew him, while he was in Rome?"



"Who didn't? Harry was popular. Some nights, it was hard to get the attention of any girl in Rome, truly it was, but it was hard to resent him for it."



Frank smiled. "Harry, to the life." He found himself warming to Piero. "Say, mind if I join you in that jug of wine? Sounds very much like we have a friend in common, hey?"