The monks worked from before dawn straight through to the dark of night, but still, the job would be a week in the doing, and always I feared that Duke Henryk would arrive and take the whole thing into hand himself.
I took myself to Wawel Castle and spent the day there talking to any that I could meet about the seym that was soon to be held in Sandomierz. All that I met, the old and the infirm, were enthusiastic for Conrad's enlargement, yet there were very few of the nobility there. All too many were gone or dead.
The city council came to me with the plea that Count Conrad should be their duke and protector, and we talked long as to how this could be accomplished. They then sent representatives to every incorporated city in eastern Poland to plead for our cause, and they did this at their own expense, as well! Not that I was in lack of funds, but when those tightfisted burghers had their own money involved, you can be sure that they would give it their best effort!
While I was thus employed, Sir Wladyclaw was also busy. The weather was now fair and the radios were at last working properly, so his men were no longer needed as messengers. Keeping only one at his side, he sent the others about the countryside in search for Mongols and, when time permitted, to tell the gentry of the victory won by Count Conrad and of the seym to be held at Sandomierz. They found no large groups of the enemy, and we were growing daily more certain that victory was truly ours, but more than once scouts brought back heads barbered in the strange Mongol fashion as proof of their prowess!
I sent occasional messages to my husband, telling him that I was well and that I was helping to organize a meeting of the seyms of eastern Poland, since because of my association with the old duke, I knew so many of the people in this area. I never exactly told him that the feeling here was that he should be duke of all three duchies, for fear that he would decline the offer before it was even made to him. Bishop Ignacy was entirely too accurate in his estimation of my husband! When the time came, I wanted him to think that the nomination was entirely spontaneous and that it was his duty to accept it.
Until the time was right, I wanted him to stay in Three Walls, doing his little engineering things!
He should come to Sandomierz, I told him in the messages I sent, for he did have lands that he had purchased along the Vistula, and thus he was obligated to come, but to be there a little late would cause no harm, I said. My intent was that when he got there, the matter would be already settled. Once he was duke, he would find reasons of his own for remaining duke. I knew it as I knew him.
When the print run was almost done, a scout brought back from the army camp west of Sandomierz a list of the Polish nobility that had survived the battle there. To publish a list of those who had died would have taken a book three times longer than our entire magazine, though we promised that such a magazine would be published in the future. For now, all that we could do was add eight pages with the names of the living. So few!
At last the printing was done, and all the monks fell to the task of combining the pages and binding them together. I was able to get many of the town's folk to help with this task, and as soon as a stack of finished magazines was ready, one of Sir Wladyclaw's scouts was there to take them to all the towns and hamlets of eastern Poland. Of course, we were careful that none were sent to the west for fear that Duke Henryk would hear of it.
The riverboats helped distribute the magazines as well, for Baron Tadaos now had three at his command. Two of them had been found up a small creek, intact but devoid of their crews. There was evidence of a fight, but what exactly had happened there was something that we would probably never know. The baron had found men to operate them and ammunition for their guns, but what he was happiest about had nothing to do with men or arms. His many wives and their children had been found, and all were alive! Indeed, they were helping him operate his boat.
Sir Gregor sent me a message that said that our radio operators at the duke's camp at Legnica told of sickness there and that the duke was taken ill with it. He was not likely to die, yet he would not be fit to travel for at least a week. The message ended with a request that we should pray for the duke's recovery, and indeed I did pray for his health, but that it be returned to him later. Much later!
Once, in our long fireside conversations at my manor before we were married, Conrad had told me of a land in which once he had lived where all the leaders were chosen every few years by all the people. He talked of candidates for office shamelessly putting up great pictures of themselves and hanging many posters with slogans on them as though they were so many cattle to be sold at auction! At the time I laughed at the thought of the old duke thus pandering himself, but as I later thought on it, I could see the necessity of it all.
It took far less time to print the covers, which were done on a separate machine, than to print all the pages of the magazine. Since the facilities and supplies were available, I persuaded Friar Roman to make some posters as Conrad had once described. Some were just the front cover of the magazine, with my love's portrait. Others boldly said, "I want Conrad for my duke! " Many thousands of these were made, though at a price for the friar's services. I promised that after I had my child, I would pose for him in any manner that he wished while he painted me. Well, perhaps it would be fun.
I wanted to get to Sandomierz well ahead of the crowd, to set the stage, as it were. Soon we were on the road again, my maids crowded out of the carriage by stacks of posters and magazines and riding apillion with two of Sir Wladyclaw's Scouts. None of those involved seemed to mind the arrangement in the least.
The captain felt that an escort of five would be safe enough, but I persuaded him to bring all his men to make a better appearance as we rode into Sandomierz.
The city of Sandomierz had been under siege, but it had not been taken. The city council had long looked to the strength of its walls, which were well built and defended. These people were among the few burghers that had purchased sufficient guns and armor from Conrad's factories. Further, they had heeded his thoughts and the suggestions that he often wrote in the magazine and had been ready when the Mongol hordes had come against them. Thus, while the suburbs had been devastated, all that was within their walls was safe. Also, those who had been on the walls had been treated with a view of the major battle of the war, at least in terms of the number of enemy killed. It was here that the riverboats had made their greatest slaughter, and dead Mongols had been heaped up on the bank opposite until they were twenty bodies deep! Even as we arrived, battalions of my husband's men were still stripping and burying the dead, for Conrad was afraid of the pestilence and disease that follow battle. The heads were all up on pikes, a huge monument to Polish arms. Also, the Mongols had looted widely in the Russias, and he wished to see this wealth back in Christian hands.
On arriving, I went directly to the inn. It had been doing very good business, but for months the innkeeper had not been able to deliver its profits to Conrad. I drew on these funds at need, in part to rent most of the rooms at the inn itself. Thus, when an important person could not find lodging in the town, I could offer it to him as a favor from Conrad. And surely no decent man could speak publicly against his host!