1636: The Devil's Opera

by Eric Flint

  Simon walked beside his friend, trying to absorb everything that had just been said. “But…but he seems so nice and friendly.”

  “Does he? Think about what he told me before the fight. Think it over carefully.”

  Simon recalled the words the merchant had spoken. One phrase in particular stood out in his memory, I shall only be disappointed if you lose, Hans. He thought of the expression on the merchant’s face, of the tone of his voice. A realization dawned in his mind.

  “He ordered you to win.”

  Hans spat. “Yah. Ordered, and threatened.”

  Simon shuddered. “Threatened?”

  “Oh, I know the words seem mild. But there was a warehouseman who did something to ‘disappoint’ the good master some time back. One day he didn’t come to work, nor the next day. The day after that he was found floating face-down in the river.”

  “You think…”

  Hans was silent for a moment. “Not that it would have done much good, the words of such as us against the word of one of the richest men in Magdeburg.”

  Simon was very confused. What was Hans talking about? And if Master Schardius was such a bad man…“So why do you work for him?”

  Hans was silent for a long time. Then he said: “I was never able to read or write. The school master would write the letters down, but when I tried to read them they twisted around. So I ended up working for Schardius. I don’t like him, but…” He shrugged. “He pays his warehouse men better than anyone else for that kind of work, and in turn we do some other work for him now and then.”

  “Other work?”

  “Never mind. You don’t need to know right now. It’s just…I needed the money,” Hans muttered. “I still do. It’s the same reason I fight. I need the money to take care of Uschi.”

  “But you make enough money to take care of her from your job, don’t you? And she makes money with her embroidery.” Simon was confused.

  “It’s not enough,” Hans said. “If something happens to me, she needs money set back, money to keep her. I failed her once; I’m not going to fail her again; never. That’s why I fight.”

  Simon had trouble understanding. “What could happen to you?”

  “I may have seen something I shouldn’t have seen.”

  Hans stopped suddenly and placed both hands on Simon’s shoulder. “I’m not going to tell you to forget what I just told you. I know you won’t. But for the sake of your safety, and for Ursula’s, keep it behind your eyes. Don’t open the gate of your mouth and let it out.” He dropped his hands and started to turn, paused as if a thought had struck him, then turned back. “Unless something happens to me.”

  “Nothing will happen to you,” Simon protested.

  “Maybe it won’t. But if it does, you go to the policemen, Chieske and Hoch. Especially Chieske. No one else. They’re the only ones who look to be honest, and that up-timer Chieske is a hard man himself. Nobody will turn him. You tell them what I said. But no one else. Understand?”

  Simon nodded.

  “Promise?”

  Another nod.

  “Good. Now, I need something to get a bad taste out of my mouth.”

  It was not many more minutes before they were at the Chain. Hans walked up to the counter and slapped coins down in front of Veit. “Genever.” Veit produced another of the blue bottles from the table behind him. Hans grabbed it and headed toward a table. Veit turned a spigot and pulled a mug of small beer from its cask and handed it to Simon.

  “Fight not go well?” Veit nodded towards Hans where he was sitting alone at a table.

  “He won in seven rounds. He’s happy with the fight. It’s something else that’s chewing on his insides.” Simon was faithful to his promise and left it at that.

  “Right. If it gets worse, give me the high sign. A moody Hans is not good for the establishment.” Veit winked.

  Simon went over and took a seat on the bench next to where Hans was cradling the blue bottle between his palms.

  It was some time later that they wandered back to their rooms. Ursula was happy to see them home in one piece. She was not, however, happy about the black eye Hans had received. She let him know in very clear and concise language the extent of her unhappiness, with the aid of a finger pointing in his face. Simon was somewhat surprised to see his friend just stand with a smile on his face and let his sister upbraid him, but he was beginning to understand that Hans would give Ursula anything and everything he could, including being her target if that was what she needed.

  When she at length ran out of words and emotional steam, Ursula threw her hands up in the air and exclaimed, “You great lunk, you don’t even care that you got hurt, do you?”

  Hans shook his head, still grinning.

  Ursula started laughing. “Oh, Hans, what am I going to do with you?” He held his arms out, and she stepped into his embrace. “I love you, you know.”

  “I know,” Hans said, his face gone serious.

  “It just bothers me that you fight so much.”

  “I know,” Hans repeated. “But we need the money.”

  “Do we really?” Ursula pushed back from him. “Or is that just your excuse to fight?”

  Hans took the money Tobias had given him from his pocket and placed it in her cupped palms. Then he drew himself up. “I’m good at it, Uschi. I like it. And I’m going to keep doing it, to provide for you.” He spread his hands, shrugged, and turned to his room.

  Ursula looked after him and took a step, then stopped. Her shoulders drooped. After a moment, she put the money in her own pocket, then reached over to the table, picked up her cane, and made her way to her own room. “Blow out the candle, please, Simon,” she said over her shoulder in a dull voice.

  Simon waited for her door to close. His blanket lay folded on his stool. He sat long enough to take off his boots, then picked up the blanket. Blowing out the candle, he moved to his space in front of the fireplace. A moment later he was rolled up in the blanket, and moments after that his eyes drifted closed.

  Chapter 24

  Ciclope actually saw what he believed was the first puff of smoke. He had glanced at the wood yard from a distance as he walked by carrying some tools to the brick yard. He glanced around quickly. No one else had that particular angle of vision on the wood. He almost sagged in relief, but steeled himself to keep trotting with the tools and not look around.

  After some discussion, he and Pietro had agreed to try to set a fire. The wood was costly, so any amount of destruction would work toward their ordered goal. But even though it was costly, it was mostly left unattended. That played into their hands nicely.

  Pietro had convinced Ciclope that he could get in and out of the wood yard without being noticed. Ciclope knew his rail-thin companion was adept at getting into and out of places without being noticed. He had been a thief, after all, and from all accounts he had been a successful one. Unsuccessful thieves didn’t last very long in Venice. If the doge’s guards or the city watch didn’t grab them in the act, the other thieves would rat them out to the guards. It reduced competition among the thieves and gave the guard something to brag about, which meant they’d be a bit less vigilant for the next little while.

  But Ciclope had still had his doubts as to whether or not Pietro could get into the wood yard, at least without being noticed by someone. Apparently he could.

  So Pietro still remembered how to move like a thief, Ciclope mused to himself as he neared the brick yard. He’d buy the little runt a mug of ale. Now, had he remembered how to set a fire so that it would catch fast and burn hot?

  A shout sounded from behind him. He looked around to see flames spreading along the top of the wood piles. From the smoke that was rising, it looked as if the fire was well and truly set.

  Looked like Ciclope owed Pietro two mugs of ale.

  * * *

  “Look out below!”

  Ciclope jumped back with the rest of the gang he was with just a moment before a barrel’s worth of water splash
ed over the flaming timber stack they were attempting to pull apart.

  “Now!” shouted Leonhart Kolman as the steam crane swung the barrel back toward the Big Ditch to refill it for the next dump. The gang leaped in with their tools and poles as the flames momentarily died down and tipped the top of the pile over to the ground on the other side where the charred timbers and boards sizzled in the pools of water and mud. They spent a couple of minutes making sure that the fire in that stack, if not totally quenched, wouldn’t at least return to a conflagration for some time. Then Kolman looked around, pointed to another stack, and yelled, “Come on!”

  Ciclope cursed to himself as he allowed most of the others to get ahead of him. He had to show willingness in this emergency, but at the same time he didn’t want the efforts to be too successful. The crew boss was entirely too good at his job.

  “Get out of the way!” someone yelled from behind Ciclope. He jumped to one side just as a stream of water shot past him to splash against the stack the gang had been headed toward. His internal cursing redoubled as he realized that the fire company had finally managed to get their balky steam engine running well enough to start their pump sucking water out of the moat to feed their erstwhile limp hoses.

  * * *

  “I think that has it.”

  Ciclope looked up from where he was trying to clean his mud-encased shoes to see Leonhart Kolman talking to the head of the fire company. Both men drooped with weariness. But then, they were no different from anyone else in the construction site. Firemen were slowly dragging their hoses out of the way of the construction workers trying to shovel and rake the charred bits of wood together.

  Pietro looked toward Ciclope from the gang he was mustered with. He tilted his head to one side just a fraction of an inch, and a hint of a smile crossed his face; more of a smirk, actually, and it was gone almost as quickly as it appeared.

  Ciclope raised his chin by the same distance. Good job.

  Pietro looked away.

  “Stop those men! Now!”

  An up-timer by the sound of his accent. Ciclope turned his head to catch a glimpse of a clean—or at least not sooty and mud-soaked—man charging from the main gate of the site toward the leaders. An older man dressed in restrained down-timer finery followed behind, picking his way with care.

  Kolman tipped his helmet to the back of his head. Ciclope had observed the man for long enough that he knew this meant the crew boss was about to level some unsuspecting soul.

  “Who are you and what are you doing in my construction yard?” Kolman demanded.

  “I’m Bill Reilly, Captain of the Magdeburg Polizei, is who I am, and it’s not your construction yard right now, it’s the scene of a possible crime, and your men are destroying possible evidence. Now shut it down!”

  Ciclope forced himself to stand still. For all that the up-timer was practically nose-to-nose with the crew boss, Ciclope was still in his range of vision, and he wanted to do absolutely nothing that would draw himself to this man’s attention.

  “But…” Kolman tried to interject.

  “Now!” Reilly roared.

  “Do it,” the well-dressed down-timer said as he arrived at their sides.

  “But Master Gericke…” the crew boss tried again.

  “Do it.” Gericke’s words were cold and. “This is a public project, and until the fire company, the Polizei, and I are satisfied that there is nothing criminal going on, this area is under the control of the Polizei.”

  Kolman took his helmet off his head and slammed it into the mud, then turned around and began yelling and waving his arms and pulling the construction crew away from the smoldering heap of the wood yard.

  Reilly pulled a watch whistle from his pocket and blew a long blast on it. The shrill tone hadn’t ceased sounding when several of the Polizei entered the construction site carrying short poles with cruciform bases and lots of cord. As Ciclope watched, they began cordoning off the wood yard at Reilly’s directions.

  Ciclope looked to where Gericke and the fire company head were talking. So that was the famous mayor, he took note. At first glance, he seemed to be not much more than just another burgher. But Ciclope was pretty sure the mayor was a hard man, for all his polish. He eavesdropped on the conversation for a moment.

  “Hard work,” Gericke observed.

  “Aye,” the fire company head replied. “And in fairness, it would have been a lot worse if the Schiffer people had not improvised a water hoist and dump out of the Big Ditch. Master Gericke,” the man sounded like a man arguing a case before a judge, “we have got to have a better steam engine and pump. We near enough lost everything today because we couldn’t get that balky bitch of an engine to run reliably. This time it was a pile of wood. Next time it will be a house with children in it…or a church.”

  Ciclope saw Gericke wince at that last.

  The saboteur had observed in the city’s taverns that the quickest way to get a group of Magdeburgers frothing mad was to mention how Pappenheim had caused almost all their churches to be burned to blackened shells of masonry. Sad drunks, quiet drunks, jolly drunks; all would transform to narrow-eyed lunatics ready to perform a double orchidectomy on Pappenheim with a rusty broken razor and without the benefit of the new-fangled anesthetic if they only had the opportunity. A very Old Testament attitude. And that was the men. What the women proposed was beyond the Old Testament, and made even Ciclope shudder.

  Suffice it to say that the Magdeburgers were sensitive about their churches.

  Gericke took a deep breath. “The city cannot pay for it. But have your owners come talk to me. Maybe something can be worked out.”

  Ciclope faded back as that conversation ended and Gericke started looking around. He didn’t want to catch that man’s attention either.

  Not a bad day’s work, he thought to himself as he joined the throng of men heading for the gate. Not bad at all. A pity no one was seriously hurt, though.

  Chapter 25

  Magdeburg Times-Journal

  January 15, 1636

  A fire broke out yesterday at the construction site of the new surgical wing of the Magdeburg Memorial Hospital in Greater Magdeburg. It was contained and quickly put out by the local fire company, assisted by the members of the construction crew. According to Captain Bill Reilly of the Magdeburg Polizei, injuries were minor, consisting mostly of burns, although one workman was knocked out when he ran into the path of the crane hook just as it started to swing. His workmates picked him up and ran him right next door to the hospital, where he is currently still under observation.

  Johannes Kretzer, spokesman for the Schiffer Painting and Contracting firm, managers of the construction project, indicated that the fire was contained to the lumber stores. “We salvaged much of the timber,” Kretzer said. He acknowledged that this would be a setback to the project, however.

  No cause of the fire has been determined as of press time today.

  Andreas Schardius opened his eyes when Johann Westvol finished reading the article aloud. Westvol and Georg Kühlewein stared back at him; Westvol blankly, Kühlewein with a thunderous expression. Neither of them said a word. That was just as well, Schardius thought to himself. He was not in a mood for their typical idiocy. He had heard up-timers talk about Tweedledum and Tweedledee, but he hadn’t really understood that until after he had embroiled himself in the affairs of these two men. They weren’t even bright enough to say “I’m Dee.”

  Well, perhaps they were better than that—they had been effective bürgermeisters before the sack of the city, after all, in a venal sort of way—but not much.

  “You realize, of course, that this fire may have ended your tapping the revenues of this project.” Schardius knew how to deal with untoward events. He was a very successful trader, after all, with all that was implied by that label. So his voice was calm, and steady, and had just the right touch of firmness to it. “At least for a while.” He watched the reactions of his partners carefully.

  Westvol wa
s predictable. His eyes widened, for all the world like a five-year-old spoiled child who had just been informed that his greatest wish was not only not going to be granted, neither were any of the other wishes on his current “If you love me you will get me this” list.

  “But the newspaper said they put the fire out quickly and salvaged the wood…” Westvol began.

  “Shut up, Johann,” Kühlewein growled. “He’s right. It doesn’t matter what the article said, Leonhart Kolman told me they lost nearly half of the wood outright, and a lot of what’s left is only usable now to feed the steam engine in the crane. You know the price of wood these days…especially the long timbers we had to have brought all the way from the mountains.”

  Praise be to God, Schardius thought to himself with more than a touch of sarcasm. Kühlewein just took the lead to be Dee. There might be hope for the man after all if he could recognize reality when it stepped up and slapped him in the face.

  Westvol looked like he was going to cry, until his face lit with a sudden smile. Schardius had been waiting for that.

  “And no, you can’t file a claim against the accident insurance, Johann.”

  “Why not?” the bürgermeister asked with a note of petulance.

  “Do you remember when we were drawing up the project plans and you insisted on the high deductible on the insurance to hold the premium costs down?” Schardius drew his eyebrows together in a serious frown.

  “Yessss.” That was drawn out slowly by the hapless Westvol, who was bright enough to see what was coming.

  “Well, the cost of the damage is only just a bit more than the deductible.”

  “Oh. Then why did we buy the insurance, then?”

  “Because you insisted we should.”

  Westvol had no response to that, which was just as well. Schardius extended his frown to the fuming Kühlewein, who glared back but didn’t say a word.

  “So what are we going to do?” Westvol finally asked.

  “We are going to order more timber, pay the costs of the fire company, and have Kolman beat into his people that this cannot be allowed to happen again.”