I frowned. “I thought we’d already done that. We’ve been blasting TV signals to the skies since the days of Hitler.”

“Yes, but we’re getting more efficient about our use of electromagnetic radiation—tight beams, cables, optic fibers. We’re already a lot quieter, cosmically speaking, than we were a few decades ago. We can’t bring back our radio noise, but it is a thin shell of clamor, heading out from the Earth, getting weaker and weaker . . . Blink and you miss it. And besides, radio is primitive. The more advanced folk are surely listening out for more interesting signals. And there are some people out there who think we should start sending out just those kinds of signals.”

“I take it you aren’t one of these people.”

“Not anymore.” He was gazing into his hands as he said this, and his voice was unusually somber.

I remembered how he had fled to Rome, with no money, not much more than the clothes he stood up in. Suddenly I was suspicious. “Peter—what have you done?”

But he just smiled and reached for the bottle.

Chapter 42

Chapter 42

It was in the year 1527 that Clement came to Rome. He was in the service of Charles V, Emperor of Germany, who also happened to be king of Spain and Naples and ruler of the Netherlands.

A huge army of German Landsknecht, mainly Lutherans, had been raised by the king’s brother, a mighty force to wreak vengeance on the Antichrist in Rome. They battled through torrential rain and snowstorms to cross the Alps. They advanced on Lombardy and joined the Emperor’s main force of Spaniards, Italians, and others.

And then they converged on Rome.

Clement, after his travels, had seen much of the world. But Rome was extraordinary.

A great circuit of wall, it was said raised by the Caesars, was still in use today, much repaired. But within its wide boundaries there were farms, vineyards and gardens, even areas of scrub and thicket where deer and wild boar roamed. Here and there you could see broken columns and shapeless ruins poking out of the greenery, draped with ivy and eglantine and populated by pigeons and other birds. The inhabited area was small and cramped, a place of narrow streets and houses hanging over the muddy waters of the patient, enduring Tiber, with the spires of the rich looming over all.

There were many fine churches and palaces. But Rome was a city trapped in the past, Clement thought, a city that would have been humbled if set aside Milan or Venice or Trieste.

And now it was to be humbled further.

The pope offered an indemnity, which tempted the army’s leaders. But the Landsknecht wanted pillage. And so it was that an undisciplined, heterogeneous, half-starved, and ragged army finally marched on Rome, dreaming of plunder. There were more than thirty thousand of them.

The attack began before dawn.