Summary

Taddeo is spending his tenth week at the abbey when a messenger brings news that Laredo has demanded that Texarkana remove its troops. The King was poisoned the night he made that demand, and Laredo and Texarkana went to war. Hannegan II, the ruler of Texarkana, has won the war. Additionally, he had Apollo tortured and killed, and the Church responded by putting Texarkana under interdict, a condition in which Texarkana citizens could not receive communion. Taddeo converses about this with Dom Paulo but warns that New Rome should not idly threaten Hannegan II. A chill settles over relations between Taddeo’s party and the abbey.

The abbey’s neighbor village, Sandy Bowitts, asks the abbey if the village can take refuge there if an attack comes. Dom Paulo decides that this will be allowed but that the village men who can bear arms will need to defend the abbey. A stream of people coming out of the Plains brings the abbey stories of the cattle plague, a mutiny in Laredo, an assault by Mad Bear’s warriors on the Laredans, and Mad Bear’s resistance to joining Hannegan II’s cause.

Meanwhile, Taddeo notices that Poet has mysteriously left the abbey, without telling anyone of his plans. Taddeo mentions that he still has Poet’s glass eye, and Dom Paulo explains that Poet believed the eye aided his sight. He goes on to say that Poet put in his eye when he needed to think, and the abbey referred to it as his “conscience.” Taddeo concludes that he will keep it, and says that soon his party will leave the abbey. Taddeo discloses to Dom Paulo that he disagrees with Hannegan II, but publicly supports him because Hannegan II’s prosperity is linked with the prosperity of the collegium. When Dom Paulo objects to this approach, Taddeo charges him with idealistically wanting to detach science from politics, and their conversation ends on this disputed note.

On a Thursday, Taddeo’s party prepares to leave the abbey. Taddeo briefly discusses optics with Kornhoer. He remarks that Kornhoer’s practical mind would fit well with his own theoretical mind and invites Kornhoer to join him at the collegium for a time. Kornhoer resists this invitation, as he believes it is opposed to his religious vocation. Dom Paulo walks down the stairs into the basement, briefly talks to Taddeo, then climbs the stairs to the courtyard and talks with Gault. Apollo’s secretary, Brother Claret, has journeyed to the abbey after being tortured by the Texarkana empire. He confesses that he betrayed Apollo, and Dom Paulo finds a document Claret has carried with him. It is a decree from Hannegan II against New Rome. The decree declares that in response to the interdict, Hannegan II is declaring the interdict void, and orders the Church’s Texarkana clergy to be licensed by the empire and vow their allegiance to Hannegan II.

The scene shifts to Taddeo and the others in the basement. Gault has joined them, and Taddeo mentions to him a “pre-Diluvian fragment” that seems to say that mankind was created just before the nuclear war by “a preceding race which became extinct during the Diluvium Ignis.” Gault rejects this notion as opposing common sense, but Taddeo argues that this notion would explain why the Simplification occurred. Dom Paulo enters and decries Taddeo’s theory. Taddeo shows Dom Paulo his notes on the fragment, and Dom Paulo dismisses the fragment as a piece of fictional literature. He begins reading out loud the Genesis story of the temptation of Adam and Eve as Taddeo remarks that he was merely speculating. Dom Paulo questions why...