“What? Why?”

  “Because of him.” He pointed at Don Vincente. “And him,” he added, pointing at Matija, who groaned up the narrow stairs, pulled and pushed along by two of the Wild Geese. “God damn it, that’s a lot more weight than we counted on.”

  Asher bristled. “I will not stand for your blasphemy, Captain Lefferts.”

  “Okay, Doctor, maybe I shouldn’t take the name of the lord in vain. But maybe you should be putting the name of the lord to good use.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I mean you ought to start praying.”

  “Praying? What for?”

  “A miracle. We don’t have enough lift to get everyone off this tower.”

  As the balloon came down out of the clouds, Miro was surprised to see that they were only forty feet above the roof of the lazarette.

  The very crowded roof of the lazarette.

  “Holy Mary and Christ on a crutch,” breathed Sean Connal, “are all those people our passengers or a welcoming committee?”

  Miro didn’t respond; he was too busy counting the upraised faces that were drawing closer every second. Frank, Giovanna, Harry, Turlough Eubanks, one of the Hibernians, Asher, a prisoner, Matija-wounded, it looked like-and another face that seemed strangely familiar, dressed as one of Asher’s assistants “Meir Tarongi!” Miro shouted, the headcount suddenly wiped from his mind.

  “That’s me,” Meir shouted back up. “Just came to say goodbye and see what this fool contraption looked like. It certainly does suit you, high ears! Now, I’m off.”

  “Meir-”

  “No time for goodbyes; we said those already. Besides, you might not have enough room as it is.” Miro’s friend started down the staircase “Meir- shalom! ”

  Meir turned. “Next year in Jerusalem, Ezekiel-wherever that might happen to be.” He gave a crooked smile and was gone.

  “They’ve seen the bloody balloon!” called Anthony Grogan from an embrasure overlooking the ravelin.

  “Then let’s show them some muzzle flashes,” answered Thomas North. “All rifles to the embrasures overlooking the ravelin and the barbican. Your targets are men with long muskets. Fire at will!”

  A musket ball zipped past the airship’s gondola-which was fortunate, because the leather-and-wicker compartment would not offer much protection against bullets. “Drop the netting,” ordered Miro.

  Sean Connal complied; he pulled two slip-knots free and cast the triple-weighted net fringes outward.

  As the bottom of the gondola came down to the level of the lazarette’s battlements, a double-layered fishing net spilled out beneath it, suspended by two lines per side and one on each corner. Belaying lines led down into it from over the edge of the gondola.

  “We’re supposed to get into that?” asked Frank.

  “Impossible,” huffed Asher.

  “Not at all, Doc,” muttered Harry, who grabbed the old man around the waist, and in two long steps, went leaping out between the merlons of the battlement and into the net, which swayed a bit. Asher, after making sure he was alive and was going to stay that way, began berating Harry mercilessly.

  Frank looked at Giovanna. Her eyes were wide, and he saw a look on her face that he did not recognize at first, but then did: fear. His fearless Giovanna was every bit as terrified as he was to jump off a hundred-foot-tall tower into a fishnet. So there was only one thing to do: he reached out a hand toward her.

  She looked at it, then grasped it fiercely. Her eyes rose and locked on his.

  Frank smiled. “Ready to go? In one, two, three-”

  They jumped.

  “The Spanish are moving again, damn it,” cursed Owen.

  “They might be, but you shouldn’t,” replied North. “You should be hobbling back down the tunnel already, so you don’t hold us up.”

  The Irishman smiled. “You can’t order me about, fellow-Colonel Sassenach.”

  “Actually, I can. Colonel or not, I am in the direct employ of the USE. You, sir, are merely some baggage we picked up along the way. Meaning that I can indeed give you orders, and here is the one I’m giving you now: that you allow Mr. Jeffrey here to help you down the stairs into the tunnels and that you both start back to Cala Pedrera immediately. It’s a long walk with a leg wound, and we have to be there fifteen minutes ago.”

  “Jeffrey’s wounded too,” objected O’Neill.

  “Yes, which is why you both need to start moving-and helping each other along. Now don’t make me send a healthy man to make sure the cripples do what they’re told.”

  “ Sassenach bastard,” Owen grumbled.

  “Yes, fine, I’m a bastard-just get moving.”

  Which the two hobbling Irishmen did.

  North turned, looked up at the balloon, a black blotch against the almost black clouds overhead, and gave what he hoped would be his last orders on this operation: “Keep the Spanish musketeers under fire, men. Mr. Ohde, let’s start lighting the longer fuses.”

  Miro scanned the remaining passengers. “You,” he said, pointing to the tall hidalgo prisoner, “strip as far as decency allows.”

  “What? I am-”

  “You are staying here if you do not do as I say; you are the extra weight we must carry.” Miro thought again. “Turlough, you see that large leather case next to you?”

  “Aye. What is it?”

  “Something we are not going to bring after all. Toss it down the stairs.”

  “My instruments!” howled Asher.

  “Doctor,” said Miro in the most soothing tone he could manage, “where you are going, you will have the tools you’ve always dreamed of-and complained of not having.”

  “But those are my-”

  “They are gone. I am sorry. And Turlough, leave your cuirass and sword.”

  “Maybe I should be getting a quick haircut, as well?”

  “If I thought it would make a difference, I’d handle the scissors myself. Now, Virgilio, how many casks of oil can we dump overboard and still make it to Dragonera?”

  “What? Dump fuel? That is not-”

  “Virgilio, no arguments, not now. How many can we lose and keep a reasonable margin for error?”

  “Two. Three at most.”

  “Virgilio…”

  “All right. Four. But no more than that, really.”

  Miro nodded to Sean. “Four barrels overboard, then-and have them hit down inside the Castell. Let’s give Palma a fireworks show it won’t soon forget.”

  North lit the master fuse on the roof, stood hands on hips and surveyed the beautiful architecture one last time, reflecting that he might be the last human ever to see it in all its delicate, pristine beauty. A shame really, he thought, and then darted for the stairs.

  As the last of the passengers on the lazarette’s roof-the Hibernian and Turlough Eubanks-leaped over into the netting, Lefferts had finally finished hauling Asher up into the gondola, where he hung on the end of his belaying line like some limp, improbably bony fish. Frank and Giovanna were on their way up, and the net showed no sign of excess stress; Miro and Virgilio had tested it often enough, after all.

  To the north, the bells of Santa Catharina began to chime. It was an alarum, of course, to warn the city that one of its defenses was under attack, but from here, it sounded like a celebration. Then, as if to remind Miro that they were not out of danger yet, a musket ball zipped through the floor of the gondola and carried on up to put a hole in the bottom of the envelope.

  “Don Estuban,” Virgilio gasped, “please; we must go.”

  Miro looked over the side, saw muzzle flashes aiming up at him, saw sharper brighter ones winking out the arrow slits along the northern and eastern faces of the Castell, saw several of the Spanish musketeers fall. He looked at the remaining men in the net. “We need to move,” he apologized. “We’ll have to pull you up as we travel.”

  “Fine,” panted Turlough. “Just get us off this bloody shooting range!”

  “Virgilio,” shouted Miro over the revving engines, “take us home.”

  Thomas North counted the men as they went past. Many were wounded; Paul Maczka of the Wrecking crew was dead, along with two of the Hibernians, and one of the Wild Geese-little Dillon. Their gear had been carried out, but their bodies would be buried here, beneath the rubble of the storeroom that North now closed behind him.

  He locked the storeroom door-mostly to intensify the effects of the impending internal blast-and checked the fuse on the two kegs of powder he had placed beside the trapdoor into the tunnel. It would burn down in four minutes, give or take.

  North lit the fuse, blew out the match, dropped down into the secret passage, and closed the trapdoor behind him.

  Virgilio had just completed a sweeping turn to the west, which would put them among the southernmost hills of the Tramuntana mountain range, thereby screening them from eyes in Palma. But as they slipped behind the crest of the Serra de Portopi, the passengers and crew of the dirigible heard a long, dull roar behind them.

  Turning to look, Frank and Giovanna watched a column of white-yellow flame shoot up from the broad maw of the Castell de Bellver into the night sky. Large explosions pockmarked the blinding plume: those were powder kegs blown high before they, too detonated in mid air. “So long, fairy-tale prison,” whispered Frank.

  “And saluti freedom,” sighed Giovanna.

  The explosive jet settled down into a sullen orange glow; pretty at this range, it betokened an inferno trapped within the sandstone cauldron that were the walls of the Castell de Bellver.

  Then they were behind the crest of Serra de Portopi, and both the flame and the sound of the bells was gone.

  CHAPTER FIFTY-SIX

  Thomas North tapped the Hibernian beside him, who left his position at the ruined windmill and fell back toward the black-hulled llaut that had raised its black sail. Back there, North also heard the sound he had been waiting for: the cough and steady growl of the extra motor that they had brought as an emergency back-up for the dirigible, now reverted to its original function: a small outboard motor.

  A little more than half a mile to the northwest, the initially angry flames marking the Castell de Bellver had died down to occasional gutterings. From north and south, Spanish units were converging on the roads that led to the lanes that devolved into the cart tracks that wound up the slopes upon which the burning fortress was perched. What they would find when they got there was hard to estimate. On the one hand, there hadn’t been that many flammables on hand, even counting the containers of fuel jettisoned by the dirigible. But, on the other hand, the castle was sealed and the Spanish had no way to get in to fight the conflagration. Given time, the wooden floors and beams and fixtures would catch fire, too-if they hadn’t already.

  “Colonel North, we’re ready.” It was Grogan’s voice.

  “Very well, Grogan. Back aboard, now.” North followed the Irishman closely, and together they waded out to the llaut. They were hip-deep when they pushed it off the sandbar that its keel was barely kissing. As Ohde opened the throttle of the outboard slightly, North and Grogan hauled themselves over the side, receiving a hand from the waiting crowd hunkered low in the boat.

  “No oars?” wondered Jeffrey, shivering.

  “No, lad,” muttered O’Neill, his leg out straight and stiff. “It takes a trained rower not to splash like a jumping fish-and if there’s any light to be caught, you can be sure the Spanish would see it shining off the blades of the oars. And I think you’ll agree that, just now, silence is all important.”

  Jeffrey bit his lip and nodded, looking over the bows.

  The rest of them followed his eyes to the squat, blunt outlines of Fort San Carlos. Still under construction, this was a fortification in the modern style: low, sloped, thick walls, modern gun mounts-a far more ugly, and far more dangerous, structure than Castell de Bellver.

  They stared at it as they approached, passing within four hundred yards. Everything was in their favor at this point: the almost lightless night, the black of the hull and the sail, the sound of the waves drowning out the persistent low growl of the engine-a sound which, whatever else the local down-time ears might make of it, would not signify “escaping boat.” But they knew right enough that Dame Luck was a bitch goddess who refused to play favorites-because she didn’t have any. So until they had passed out from beneath the cannons of the fort…

  A musket fired into the night. They saw the flash, but could not tell, so far away, if it had been aimed at them, or just more generally out into the bay. After a few seconds, there were two other shots, one of which plippshh ’ed into the swells twenty yards astern. But after that nothing.

  Had it been a nervous new recruit firing at shadows? Had someone seen them, but not in time to bring any of the fort’s impressive cannons to bear? Had it been a trial shot-meant to excite the response of suspected amphibious infiltrators who might fear themselves discovered? Or was there some other explanation?

  They could not tell, and they would never know.

  Which was, of course, the very fiber of uncertainty that comprised the bulk of all war, and was even more characteristic of it than the death and destruction for which it was rightly infamous.

  Using the lee of mountains to cover their long, altitude-sustaining burns, Virgilio brought the balloon under the clouds once they were safe in the uninhabited uplands north of the valley lake known as the Torrent de son Boronat, where they dumped half a dozen empty fuel containers overboard. Then they wound a bit farther to the north, staying high, often in the clouds, and estimating their progress and position by maintaining close running estimates of airspeed, heading, and wind.

  After thirty minutes at twenty-two miles per hour, Miro ordered the burner be left alone and began to watch for the ground as the airship slowly lost lift. After five minutes, they came down through the lowest tier of clouds and discovered they were slightly lower than they thought, and only three miles away from the west coast of Mallorca. Which meant they were only six miles away from their ultimate destination: the oddly sloped island called Dragonera.

  As they continued to lose altitude, it became evident to the occupants of the gondola why this island was called the Dragon. Although they were approaching its relatively smooth, southern side, its northern extents soared up dramatically. Creating a combined cliff top and crest that did invoke scenes of a sinuous dragon arising from the depths.

  Virgilio conferred closely with Miro, now, whose experienced local eye guided them toward the level ground a few hundred yards north of the accessible part of Dragonera’s coast, the inlet known as Es Llado. If the nearby watchtower had seen the airship, there was no sign of it; not even Harry’s keen eyes could determine if the tower was occupied at all.

  The landing was rough, the gondola scraping along the ground before enough of the heated air could be vented and the envelope began settling. Under Miro’s and Virgilio’s supervision, and with Harry’s and Connal’s trained assistance, those passengers that could began the process of breaking down the airship. The nosecone and partial back spine were separated and removed from the envelope, which was then hastily folded. The engines were dismounted, the rest of the gear packed and distributed to individuals. Miro was constantly checking his watch; the Atropos ’s away boats were due within ninety minutes, and they had to have the entirety of the airship broken down and ready to move.

  In order to ensure that they had not, and would not, be spotted, Miro dispatched two of the group to keep an eye on the dark-windowed watchtower and the half dozen cottages of seasonal fishermen who worked the local waters. He chose Harry Lefferts for his extraordinary senses-including the sixth sense that always seemed to warn him of danger a moment before it became manifest-and, with some reservation, Don Vincente Jose-Maria de Castro y Papas, whose knowledge of Spanish military protocol was just as great as his ability to possibly deflect or at least confuse inquiries, if they were discovered by locals.

  Sitting in the scrub only seventy yards from the cottages and fifty yards inland from the rocky southern shore, Harry was wondering how to start a conversation with a recent mortal enemy when Castro y Papas solved the problem for him-but in a most unconventional and unexpected fashion.

  “I owe you an apology, Harry Lefferts.”

  “You do? I don’t even know you.”

  “No, not exactly. But you have seen me-or my handiwork-before.” When Harry remained silent, the hidalgo explained. “I refer to Rome. The courtyard of the Palazzo Giacomo di Mattei. I was in command there. I had the up-time shotgun. It was I who killed the man commanding those who attacked that part of the palace complex.” His head drooped slightly. “It was hardly an honorable way to kill an opponent. That is the nature of war, I suppose-but I have long felt that our ambush upon you there was-well, particularly cowardly.”

  Harry felt the sea air rushing in his open mouth; he shut it. “It was you? You were the guy in the window of Frank and Gia’s room?”

  “I was.”

  “And so you knew that I was-”

  “That you were in the belvedere atop the building near the Ghetto? Yes: who else but you would have been there?” He looked Harry in the eyes; there was much regret, but also much resolve in his stare. “I understand if you wish to satisfy the honor of your friend, the man I shot so many times in the courtyard, for his death was not befitting his station. I gather he was a man of some import.”

  Harry nodded slowly. “You might say that.”

  “Of course, we must wait until we are in a safe place before I may give you satisfaction.”

  “Satisfaction?”

  “I refer to a duel, Senor Lefferts.”

  Harry considered. “A duel, huh?”

  “ Si — yes; that is how affairs of honor are usually settled.”

  “Well, I have a different way. But as I understand it, if I challenge you, then you get to choose the weapons, right?”

  “That is true, but I am willing to waive that, in this case. I feel that my misdeed is such that-”

  “Lissen, I don’t need to hear any more. Here’s the challenge: whichever one of us can drink more toasts to Johnnie-eh, my friend-he has to buy all liquor we’ve swilled. Deal?”