It was the right thing to say. Or, at the very least, it wasn’t a totally wrong thing to say. Sarah had stopped her litany of complaint and her mouth was hanging open. Then it snapped shut. “I can’t!”
Never one to lose an advantage, Karl shot back, “Why not? It’s not like you actually need the job at the Fed.” Then, seeing her expression, he backpedaled fast. “I’m sure we can come up with a good reason for you to go. Certainly good enough so they won’t fire you for it. You can go to study economic trends in Bohemia. They have a market basket, too, and they probably have even less of a clue what goes in it than you do here.”
Sarah’s expression had gone thoughtful and Karl heaved a very well-hidden sigh of relief. A mine field had been crossed, and he hadn’t even known it was there.
“I’ll think about it,” she said as their order arrived. “In the meantime, why does King Al want you to sign on the dotted line now?” Sarah asked, then dipped a cottage fry into something that claimed to be ketchup, but wasn’t. They had discussed the very polite and vague letters that Karl and the king of Bohemia had exchanged before.
Karl’s relations with King Al, as Judy the Younger had christened him, had been by mail. Before Wallenstein had become King Albrecht, Karl had made a whirlwind trip to take the oaths of his people. That gave Karl quite a lot of legitimacy and made it difficult for King Al to go all Capone on him unless Karl did something serious.
In spite of the fact that several people thought he had bent the knee, Karl hadn’t quite done so. He paid his taxes on time, while his uncles were paying the same taxes to Ferdinand II. “I don’t know. It may be that the railroad makes him nervous.”
“Why?”
“Your American Civil War probably,” Karl told her. “They were used quite extensively to move troops and supplies.”
Sarah nodded. She wasn’t, Karl knew, all that conversant in military history.
“Well, the railroad will help your lands a lot,” Sarah said. “How bad is it going to be?”
“I don’t know.” Karl shook his head. “I know that the up-timers, and the USE in general, don’t have any great affection for the Holy Roman Empire, but it’s Christianity’s shield against Islam and has been for centuries. It’s my country. My father and my uncles fought and bled for it and I expected to do the same when my time came. Now it’s disappearing before my eyes. There is no way that Prince Ferdinand will get the votes to become emperor, and less chance that someone else would get those votes.”
“I know,” Sarah said. “I wonder how I would feel if I had to watch the up-time United States slowly disintegrating before my eyes.”
Karl looked at her, and felt himself starting to smile. As he’d said, Sarah Wendell wasn’t overly fond of the HRE. Nor did she have a lot of reason to be. But it was very. . encouraging. . the way she was trying to see things from his point of view. Even if the situations weren’t quite parallel.
His smile died as he thought about the reality of the situation. The HRE had indeed been the shield of Christianity for over eight hundred years. Protecting Christian ideals from Islam while Europe grew strong and wealthy. . was that enough to justify the Edict of Restitution? Well, maybe, at least in that other time-line. But the shield was coming apart, whatever he thought about it, and there was nothing-nothing at all-that he could do to prevent it.
Besides, Karl wanted that railroad. It was necessary to the improvement of his lands. That had to be his first priority.
“So how long is it going to take?” Sarah asked.
“A small troop with good horses, but bad roads,” Karl thought aloud. “Avoiding Saxony. I don’t want to be John George’s ransom to bring the HRE in on his side. Figure twenty-five miles a day on average. A week to Prague. And while I’m at it, I should visit Aunt Beth. So that’s another week. Plus whatever time. .” Karl paused not at all sure whether to say “I spend” or “we spend” and settled on “. . it takes to negotiate with King Al and my aunt. So at least a month, probably a month and a half.”
Now Sarah was looking distressed. “I’ll have to talk to my boss. That’s a long time to be gone.”
Wendell House, Magdeburg
“Are you nuts!” Fletcher Wendell didn’t quite bellow. Not quite. “Karl, you at least, ought to know better. Two hundred plus miles over rough country, with either one of you a bandit’s dream come true. What’s your ransom value, Karl? Half of Silesia? And you, Sarah? Half a million shares of OPM? You would have to take a flipping army with you just to fight off the bandits.”
“I’m not insensitive to the situation, and the newspapers make it much harder to get where you’re going before the bandits know about the trip,” Karl agreed. “On the other hand, King Albrecht is insistent that I go.”
“And my daughter? Is King Albrecht insisting that Sarah go with you?”
“No. But I’d rather tell King Albrecht no than tell Sarah that. If you don’t want her to go, then you get to try to convince her she can’t.” Karl couldn’t keep just a touch of smugness out of his voice as he said that and it clearly didn’t please Herr Wendell.
CHAPTER 7
September 1634
Prague
As it happened, Karl’s wait for the king’s pleasure wasn’t long at all. In fact, the king’s call came as soon as they arrived at the palace. Karl was escorted to a small throne room, not the big one, more of an office really. And before he could even finish his bow, Wallenstein asked him, “Was your father a thief?”
“I don’t think so, Your Majesty,” Karl answered carefully. “Though I am aware that others hold a different view. I prefer to think he was simply a practical man.”
“Not exactly a ringing endorsement from a son.” Wallenstein snorted. “I take it you don’t think I’m a thief, either.”
“No, Your Majesty.”
“Then you would accept paper money issued by the crown of Bohemia. That is, by me!”
Karl had apparently landed in the middle of a rather heated debate. He noted the presence of Morris Roth, Uriel Abrabanel, and a few other people that he suspected were counselors to the king or money lenders. Bankers, as the up-timers would have it. He began to get an inkling of what was going on. King Albrecht was setting up his national bank. The timing seemed about right. And the king had just been told that there were problems.
Karl had a decision to make and he had to make it fast. Telling truth to power wasn’t a safe thing to do, but if what the family said about Wallenstein was true, lying about this could be incredibly costly. He hesitated, saw the expression on King Albrecht’s face, and blurted out, “Not if I could safely avoid it, Your Majesty.”
“You acknowledge that I’m not a thief, but wouldn’t accept my money?” King Al gave Karl a hard look. “Which time were you lying?”
“Neither, Your Majesty. But just because I trust your money’s value, doesn’t mean I can spend it. That would require that the person I’m buying from trust it. Sarah Wendell is the person you should be talking to about this.”
“Who is Sarah Wendell?” King Albrecht looked around the room as though she might be hiding in a corner.
“She’s the daughter of the USE Treasury Secretary,” Morris Roth explained.
“She’s his girlfriend.” Pappenheim jerked a thumb at Karl. “I read it in the National Inquisitor.”
“She was the chief financial officer for OPM before she resigned to take a post with the USE Federal Reserve,” explained Uriel Abrabanel.
“She’s just outside,” Karl said, all of them speaking pretty much simultaneously.