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ther side. The splintered areas were about the size of her hands, but they didn't look like they'd been caused by hands.
They looked like they'd been caused by claws.
"Good morning, my dear," the Doctor said from the doorway. "Did you sleep well?"
"Doctor!" She turned, smiling at the familiar elderly face. "I had a wonderful night!"
The Doctor beamed at her. He looked no different from the last time she had seen him: just as distinguished and just as sprightly. "Good, my child. This place seems to agree with us all. I spent a very instructive night in the Doge's library, and Steven seems to have "hit the town", as Chetter -Chesterton used to say."
"Doctor, come and look at this." Vicki gestured him over to the window. "I had the oddest dream last night. I dreamed that there was something sitting on the windowsill, talking to me. It wasn't human, and when I woke up this morning, I found these marks."
The Doctor examined them closely. "Hmm. Are you sure that they weren't there last night?"
"Well... " She thought for a moment. "I don't remember them."
"No, and more to the point, neither do I." He ran a hand across his chin. "I cannot explain it, not yet, but when added to the mysterious invitation, it begins to fit a pattern of sorts, doesn't it, hmm?"
"Does it?" Vicki frowned.
"However, my dear, we have a far more pressing problem on our hands."
"Do we?"
He nodded. "Apparently the Doge wishes to see us this morning. Now, I don't know whether he has ever met Cardinal Bellarmine or not. If he hasn't, then I have to try and pretend to be a confidant of the Pope. If he has, then I'm afraid all of our geese are cooked."
Vicki was about to say something when the door opened again and a haggard, unshaven figure entered. "Steven!" she cried. He looked terrible, and he was wearing different clothes to the ones he had left in - velvet trousers and a brown velvet jacket, embroidered with a maze-like pattern and with a laced shirt beneat
