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A dim thought seeped into Simpson's mind. Dim… and unpleasant. So he pushed it aside almost instantly. But, for just a moment, he found himself contemplating the possibility that maybe-just maybe-that coal miner roughneck knew what he was doing. Better, even-maybe-than the CEO had.

Bah. He was just lucky.

Chapter 37

Mary Simpson chattered gaily all the way home, not even complaining once about the wretched conditions of the half-cobblestoned streets and the way their vehicle was lurching about. They were riding in what amounted to a palanquin suspended fore-and-aft between two horses, with a rider on the lead horse. That was a far more practical conveyance for a city with such rough streets as Magdeburg's still were than an actual carriage would have been. Still, the ride was very far from a smooth one.

Simpson was glad to hear the undertone of happiness in his wife's voice, but paid little attention to her actual words. Her monologue was mostly meaningless to him, anyway, involving Mary's detailed-even exhaustive-assessment of the various personalities she'd encountered at Hesse-Kassel's soiree. As opaque as his own shop talk would have been to her.

It was a practiced and polite sort of ignoring, on his part. He'd had plenty of experience, in the long years before the Ring of Fire, accompanying Mary to a multitude of social occasions. He'd always tried to get out of as many as he could, except during his stint at the Pentagon, but Mary ran a tight ship and didn't let him slip too often. She'd even forced him to attend more operas than he could remember, a form of entertainment he found positively excruciating.

But… he'd never complained, either. Simpson was honest enough to admit, even to himself, that his impressive career in the Navy had been helped along considerably by Mary's talents and discipline. She'd been the perfect 'Navy wife,' just as, in later years, she'd given him more influence in the social circles that mattered than he'd ever have been able to get simply from his status as the head of a sizeable industrial firm. Without Mary, John Chandler Simpson would have been a powerful and respected man, of course. But no newspaper or magazine would ever have bestowed upon him-as one of them once had-the title of 'Mr. Pittsburgh.' The title had been given out in a gingerly manner, to be sure. There would always be too much of the ruthless corporate shark about John Simpson to make people completely comfortable around him, even those as wealthy and powerful as he had been.

There'd been no such reservations, on the other hand, about the title which many magazines and newspapers had bestowed upon Mary. 'The Dame of the Three Rivers' was a phrase you could have found, on any given day of the week, in the society columns of western Pennsylvania's periodicals. She'd been on the board of directors or otherwise highly connected with practically all of the Carnegie establishments in Pittsburgh, ranging from museums to Carnegie-Mellon University; and the same for at least half of the city's major artistic and musical foundations. Whenever someone wanted to tap into philanthropical circles in Pittsburgh, they eventually wound up knocking on the door of Mrs. John Chandler Simpson-and those of them already in the know started there in the first place. With a quick phone call, followed by lunch at any one of Mary's favorite restaurants.

Her enthusiasms had cost him money, to be sure, and now and then he'd grumbled about it. But not too loud, and not too often. Partly, because money hadn't been everything to John Simpson, despite what people assumed. Mostly, though, because he was more than sophisticated enough to understand that what goes around, comes around. He was certain that at least one big contract he'd landed-balanced on a knife edge between him and a competitor-had come his way because the prospective customer, on a visit, turned out to share Mary's enthusiasm for Benjamin Britten's opera Peter Grimes. The customer's wife-no accounting for taste-had even shared Mary's fondness for Renaissance music.

By an odd coincidence, no sooner had they entered the house which he'd rented next to the shipyard and lit the lamps than his drifting thoughts intersected Mary's full-bore monologue.

'-still alive. God, John, think of it! Monteverdi himself. Of course, he's getting on in years-must be somewhere in his sixties by now-but if I remember right he lived to a ripe old age. Even down there in Italy, where they always have such terrible epidemics. And the landgravine of Hesse-Kassel-that's Amalie-was telling me that she heard from her cousin Luise that although Monteverdi took holy orders after that horrible sack of Mantua and he moved to Venice-'

The name 'Monteverdi' finally rang a bell. An alarm bell. Mary caught the slight wince on his face and laughed.

'Oh, please! I am not going to apologize for forcing you to sit through-once only, for pity's sake-a performance of the entire Vespers of the Virgin Mary.' Firmly: 'No person who claims to be civilized should go through life without hearing it. I will admit, I'm personally more partial to his operas.'

She broke off her monologue as she went to the side table and rang a little bell. Almost instantly, a young German girl appeared in the doorway. Their house servant, having heard them enter, had obviously been waiting for a summons.

'We'll have some tea, please, Hilde.' She spoke in English, not her still very-poor German. Hilde had been hired in part because she was fluent in English.

The girl nodded and left for the kitchen. 'That's one good thing about this century,' said Mary, lowering herself onto a divan. 'The service is not only cheap, it's good. And I'll say this, too-'

She patted the divan she was sitting on. 'Furniture like this would have cost us a fortune back then. Even if we do have to spray it with DDT before taking it into the house.'

When Mary looked at him, her smile was a bit sly. 'But, to get back to what I was saying, Monteverdi himself, of course, is probably immovable. But the Landgravine tells me that her cousin Luise tells her that Monteverdi's student Cavalli is very frustrated with the situation in Venice. Frightened too, of course. The epidemic there two years ago took off a third of the city's populace, you know.'

Knowing the decision Mike Stearns had made to send all of the chloramphenicol to Luebeck and Amsterdam, Simpson winced again-and no slight wince, this time.

Mary shook her head. 'Horrible, isn't it? But let's look on the bright side. Cavalli's not the genius that Monteverdi is, to be sure-I saw his opera Giasone once, and while it wasn't bad at all it certainly didn't match up to Orfeo or L'incoronazione de Poppea-but he's the other great composer of the day in Italy. Will be pretty soon, anyway. He's still a young man. And Cavalli's apparently just as upset about the state of musical affairs in Venice as he is about the danger of plague. He wants to build a theater especially for opera-opera houses don't exist yet, as amazing as that seems-and with the city's desperate situation he's having a hard time getting the financial backing-what's so funny?'

'You are,' said Simpson, shaking his head. 'Mary, I hate to break the news to you, but you are no longer 'the Dame of the Three Rivers.' And-' He shrugged. 'While I'm reasonably well-off by today's standards, with my salary as admiral, I am no longer 'Mr. Moneybags.' '

He lowered himself on the divan next to her. 'I'm sorry, Mary, but we have to face it. We lost everything.'

Her face was pale, and even stiffer than his own. 'No, John. That's not quite right. We didn't lose everything. What we lost was our money. What we threw away was our life-starting with our son.'

Simpson felt the wooden mask clamp down.

'Oh, God help us,' she whispered. 'Here it comes again. John Chandler Simpson, the man who can never be wrong about anything.' She turned her face away from him, her eyes starting to water. 'I hate that man. Now, more than I ever have.'

'Mary-'

'Shut up. Just shut up.' She rose to her feet, hands pressed to her thighs, and stared at the far wall. There was nothing on the wall. No painting, no tapestry, nothing. Simpson's salary had been enough to cover the house and the furniture and the servant. There had been nothing left over for Mary's beloved art works.

She seemed to be reading his mind. Not surprising, perhaps, for as long as they'd been married. 'I don't blame you for that. I don't blame you for not having the money you used to have. The Ring of Fire was not your fault. I don't even blame you for Tom. That was probably my fault more than it was yours, to be honest. I think I was even nastier to his fiancйe than you were.'

Simpson's jaws were clenched. He was filled with the anger of a man who, always sure of himself, wanted desperately to drive home the lesson again. Probably? Are you kidding? I was just stiff and cold to the girl. Okay, even rude, I suppose. But you were the one, the first time Tom brought her up to Pittsburgh to meet us, who reduced her to tears at the dinner table by ridiculing her tastes in music. You were the one who wouldn't let her slide out easily when you pressed her on her knowledge of the world's 'great lit'rat'chure.' You were the one, you snotty-

Barely, thankfully, he managed to hold it in check. Even through the anger, Simpson retained enough clarity of thought to realize that his marriage was at the breaking point. And realized also, in something of a crashing wave of recognition, how desperately he did not want that to happen. On a personal level, his wife was all he had left in the world. They'd gotten married the day after he graduated from Annapolis. He couldn't imagine his life without her.

'Mary, please-'

'John, be quiet. For once-just once-listen instead of talking.' She turned around to face him. The anger was still there on her face. But he was relieved to see, lurking somewhere behind the tears, the affection of a lifetime shared.

'You are not good-to put it mildly-at ever admitting you were wrong about anything.' She swallowed. 'I suppose I'm not much good at it either, for that matter. I know I can be even pettier than you are, lots of times. But I'm not in your league when it comes to unyielding self-righteousness. Not even close. I don't think I know anybody who is.'

Hilde came into the room then, carrying a tray with a teapot and two cups. There was neither milk nor sugar on the tray. Milk was too much of a headache for casual use, needing to be boiled first; and sugar was far too expensive. Willy-nilly, Mary Simpson had learned to take her tea plain. She'd even stopped complaining about it, months before.

The servant froze, after taking two steps in the room, as servants will when they suddenly realize they've walked into the middle of a quarrel between the master and lady of the house.

When she wanted to be, Mary Simpson could be graciousness personified. For a moment, the anger and hurt and sorrow on her face vanished, replaced by the serene dame. 'Thank you so much, Hilde. That will be all for the night.'

The servant nodded nervously, set the tray down on a sidetable, and hurried from the room.

The break in the tension came as a relief for Simpson. All the more so, when he saw that Mary's 'dame persona' had settled her down. The expression on her face was now stern, but no longer had any trace of hysteria.

'Tonight, John Chandler Simpson, I am going to tell you the truth. Two years ago, when the Ring of Fire turned our universe inside out, Mike Stearns was right and you-we-were wrong. Just as he was right-not us-during the political campaign.'

She waved her hand impatiently. 'Oh, stop looking like a boy being forced to swallow a pill. I didn't say he was right about everything, for