“Don’t try to hold me up.” Lamormaini’s voice was laced with distrust, but there was a hint of desperation there, too.
“I’m not, Father. The simple truth is that the area around the Ring of Fire, and especially inside it, is the most expensive place to live and work in Europe. Rents are outrageous, food expensive, and the cost of labor is insane. A housemaid in Grantville earns what a master smith makes in the Viennese countryside.”
“Their famous library is free.”
“Yes and no, Father.” Friedrich would have continued but Lamormaini waved him to silence. The old crook had enough money that he shouldn’t have been arguing in the first place. Not that Lamormaini would ever admit that any of the money was for him. It was all for the church.
Lamormaini had used his position as confessor to Ferdinand II to acquire quite a bit of wealth. All for the church. Friedrich suppressed a laugh. Lamormaini hadn’t taken bribes; he had accepted donations. “What is it you want me to find, Father?”
“It will be in their records somewhere. Probably hidden in plain sight. Find references to the devil!”
Friedrich felt his face, twitch. But he didn’t say anything as Lamormaini explained his theory about the true origin of the Ring of Fire.
Babbel left a few days later. He would find or create what the priest wanted.
Sanderlin House, Race Track City
“I would be happy to provide you with concrete for the race track, Herr Sanderlin,” Baron Johannes Hass said. “Unfortunately, we are lacking in the equipment. When the crown granted me the patent on concrete, it wasn’t yet known how difficult it would be to produce the stuff. I have had experts go to your libraries and it turns out that they need massive rotating kilns to make the Portland cement efficiently.”
Ron was confused. Even after the Ring of Fire he hadn’t been much interested in how concrete was made. Well, how Portland cement was made. He had poured a patio back in 1998 before the Ring of Fire, and he knew how to mix quicklime and aggregate in a wheelbarrow. The way you got the Portland cement was by going to Clarksburg and buying it at the Home Depot. He knew that after the Ring of Fire there had been a program to make concrete. It had worked, too. Portland cement was available in Grantville and Magdeburg. Expensive compared to up-time, but available. He hadn’t learned how it was done but he knew they could do it. “Well, they make it in the USE. What about shipping in the Portland cement from there?”
“That would be very expensive. Also illegal, because the old emperor granted me the sole patent.”
They talked some more but didn’t get anywhere. Even though they were both speaking German, it seemed like they were talking a different language.
After his unsuccessful attempt to get concrete from Baron Hass, Ron looked into the possibility of blacktop. Asphalt, it turned out, was a petroleum byproduct. But Ron knew that they could use coal tar and there had to be coal around here somewhere. Didn’t there?
Yes, there was coal, Ron discovered. But it was as yet mostly not found. The one bit of good news was the Danube. Shipping cost would be much less over a pretty long stretch, because of the Danube. The bad news was the patents that Ferdinand II had been issuing to anyone with the money to purchase one. Patents had been sold on most inventions and industrial processes brought back by the Ring of Fire. At least, on the ones that Austrians had found out about.
The Liechtenstein family owned a bunch of them, and so did lots of other wealthy nobles. Including the Abrabanels. Often enough, it wasn’t even because they wanted them. More a case of the emperor saying, “Yes, I know that I owe you a fortune, but take this patent on helicopters and we’ll call it even.”
It was apparently pretty hard to say no to an emperor.
* * *
“It’s almost tempting to buy some of these patents.” Hayley nibbled on one of Frau Mayr’s honey nut rolls. The woman was doing her best to make Hayley fat. “A bunch of people are offering to sell patents at a loss, and no one knows what they are worth.”
“Are they worth anything?” Ron Sanderlin asked.
“Not in Grantville or the USE. But here? Maybe.” Then Hayley shook her head. “No. At some point they are going to have to make peace and regularize the patent laws, and then almost all of these patents are going to be worthless. In the meantime, though, there are a bunch of relatively powerful people trying to get their money back on patents that they were forced to buy. It’s going to make it hard to do much.”
“What concerns me,” Dana Fortney said, “is that any business we start is going to run into one of these patents. I wonder who owns the patent on casein and when we are going to get sued.”
“That’s a good point, Mom,” Hayley said. “I think we need to have a talk with Jack. And maybe a talk with the emperor about his race track. Meanwhile, Mom, can you get an appointment with Moses Abrabanel? I am probably going to have to get some sort of money transfer from Grantville.”
Abrabanel House, outside Vienna
Dana Fortney managed to get an appointment with Moses Abrabanel, but it took a week. She was simply the wife of the second assistant mechanic of the emperor’s car. Sonny was out of town at the moment, working with a team of down-time surveyors to get started on the route for the railroad.
“Have a seat, Frau Fortney. What can I do for you?” Moses was a young man. About thirty, Dana guessed. Down-time thirty, which looked older to up-time eyes. He looked about her age. He wasn’t balding, but his hairline was definitely in retreat. He wasn’t fat, but was developing a bit of a paunch. He was well-dressed and bearded. The dress included the special feature that Jews were required to wear, but was of very good quality. The room was small like most down-time offices but there were file cabinets along one wall. They were wood, probably oak, she thought, and inlayed with a lighter wood, but definitely file cabinets. He also had an up-time style desk and chairs.
“Well, we’re going to have to send home for some money,” Dana said. “I understand that you have contacts with the Grantville national bank.”
“Yes, I do. But I must admit to some surprise,” Moses told her. “I am involved in the court payroll, and as per contract your family has been paid every month, as have the Sanderlins?”
Dana could hear the implied question. Not that it was any of his business. On the other hand, she knew perfectly well that a lot of people in Vienna resented the fact that the Sanderlins and Sonny were getting paid every month. She had learned after they got here that actually being paid by the crown was unusual. Also he might be able to help. “It’s the patents. We have been putting people to work and a few days ago, on the emperor’s instructions, Ron Sanderlin started looking into the possibility of getting concrete to pave the race track. It was then that we learned that the Holy Roman Empire had issued patents on the devices and techniques brought back in the Ring of Fire.” Dana could hear her own resentment and tried to modify her tone. “There are no such restrictions in the USE and we were, until then, unaware of the restrictions here.”
The youngish man winced a little. “It was necessary,” he explained. “The tax base of the empire has been badly stressed by the military reverses we have suffered in the last few years, and yet the demands on the royal purse have only increased.”
“In any case, it is an unexpected expense and we don’t know how much it’s going to cost.”
“Perhaps I can help with that. I know a clerk in the office of patents who can probably tell who, if anyone, holds the patent on a specific product or process. And then I should be able to point you in the direction of the patent holder.”