by Eric Flint
"We will. We have plenty of timber about. The newcomers will build their own barracks. It won't be a proper residence but it will do. It is probably what we should have done from the beginning, instead of trying for brick."
"Most of them will desert come spring."
"Probably, but we will still have the buildings they constructed when they leave and think of the good this charity will do your soul. Which is badly in need of it, let me tell you. I believe the up-timers call it good karma."
"Karma? Where the hell did that come from?"
"India, I believe."
* * *
"North and Donovan have been together several years now," said Harry Lefferts. "They met originally in Amsterdam, when the Dutch sent out the call for any mercenaries in defense of their independence from Spain."
Piazza grunted. "That would have been after the truce between 1609 and 1621 broke down, I assume? They must be old-timers."
"No, they're both in their late twenties. Once the truce was over and Spain attacked again—just another part of the mess we call the 'Thirty Years War'—the Dutch needed as many mercenaries as they could get. As young as they were, both were intelligent and rose pretty quickly within their mercenary company. And somewhere in the course of it, they got to be good friends."
"An Englishman and an Irishman?" asked Quentin skeptically.
Harry shrugged. "For being from different countries, fighting a war to defend yet another, they had a lot in common. Liam had been tossed out of the College of the Holy and Undivided Trinity of Queen Elizabeth near Dublin when it was found out his family was Catholic. The authorities were so pissed off by his false application that he had to get out of Ireland altogether. He landed on the Continent with an extensive knowledge of languages, the classics and histories, but with barely a penny to his name."
"And North?" asked Mike.
"North left England for less, ah, austere reasons. He's nobility of a sort, being the third son and seventh child of the minor baron of Kirtling. The first son inherited the title and lands. The second son was expected to enter either the army or navy, to defend the glory of England. The third son, if a lord was so fortunate, was usually sent off to the clergy."
Something in Harry's expression caused a little chuckle to ripple around the cabinet room. Harry smiled. "Yeah, that's about right. The Anglican Church doesn't expect chastity. They allow clergy to marry, after all. But they still weren't willing to elevate somebody like Tom North to the holy orders. I guess he had quite a reputation. If he'd been the son of a duke or a more powerful lord, special arrangements might have been made, but... he wasn't. And while he was a bit better funded than Donovan, I guess his father made it clear to him not to return home for a good long time. So, Thomas North was alone in a foreign land before finding Liam."
Harry shifted in his seat, trying to marshal his words. "Normally, you'd think, an Irish Catholic intellectual and an English Anglican nobleman would not have much to do with each other. But after discovering each other in a Dutch gaming parlor they found out they did share one fundamental characteristic that surpassed all borders and religions.
They like money, and plenty of it, and between the two of them they're pretty good at figuring out how to get it. Since then, their noble quest took them here and there, to whoever was the best paymaster at the time. Eventually they wound up in the Clancy mercenary company loosely connected with Tilly's army back when it was rampaging across Germany. By then, Thomas had risen to command one of the detachments of fifty men used to scout about the flanks of the army." Harry cleared his throat. "This fortunate assignment enabled them to make their unofficial transfer an easy business."
The President of the United States rolled his eyes to the ceiling. "Don't tell me."
"Yup," said Harry, now grinning. "After they heard reports of the newcomer Americans and our effectiveness in the field—not to mention the usual fabulous tales of our wealth—the two of them packed their bags, decamped in the middle of the night, and set out for the, ah, promised land."
Still staring at the ceiling, Mike closed his eyes. "Promised land," he murmured. "Out of idle curiosity, when did we decide to pave the streets of Grantville with gold? And how come I haven't noticed any special abundance of milk and honey around here lately?"
Judging that the question was rhetorical, Harry pressed on. "So, the two of them headed directly toward what most in their situation were taking their distance from. Look, Mike, whatever else, these two guys aren't stupid."
Mike opened his eyes again, still keeping them on the ceiling. "No, apparently not. And, of course, once they got here they wouldn't have had any trouble getting work. In fact, if they're as literate and multilingual as it sounds, they probably did pretty well."
"They loved the place," said Harry. "Believe it or not, what really charmed them the most was our libraries. They both love to read. And, in North's case, I think he loves movies even more."
Quentin Underwood grunted. "They still sound like scoundrels to me."
Harry made a little wiggling gesture with his hands. "Yes and no. I sure wouldn't nominate either of them for the Mr. Morality contest, but they're really not that bad, Quentin. Sure as hell not compared to most long-time mercenary soldiers. The Croat raid last year even instilled in them a mild sort of patriotism, I guess you could call it. Mind you, I think they were mostly determined to keep the libraries intact."
Again, he shifted in his seat. "After the attack, they also decided to go back to the mercenary business. That was because—"
Mike brought his eyes down from the ceiling. "Yeah, I understand. After the Croat raid we relaxed our earlier restrictions on letting mercenary companies operate in our area, as long as they had our seal of approval. Did they ever consider just joining the regular army?"
Harry glanced over at Jackson. "Mike, joining the army was never really an option. And it's just as well, frankly. Either one of them, much less both together, would have sent even Frank into orbit."
"They have a good reputation, professionally speaking," said General Jackson. "I agree with Harry that I wouldn't have wanted to touch them in the regular army. But we've used them for a few courier runs and, mostly, for providing protection for supply trains when our own people were stretched too thin. They always did the job, no complaints or problems, and at reasonable rates. I also hear they do guard duty on local properties and run protection for a few merchant caravans in and out of CPE territory as well. They haven't lost a single one far as I know, and we have a few less highwaymen and bandits to deal with thanks to them." He grimaced slightly. "Of course, they're one step removed from bandits themselves, but all experience shows them to be loyal—as long as they get paid."
"All right," said Stearns, massaging his head. "Harry, do you think they can hack it?"
"Well, Mike, they've been fighting wars since they were in their teens and have more practical experience than everyone in this room combined. In their own way, they're pretty good." He hesitated a moment. "Maybe a bit rambunctious."
"Damn good card players, if nothing else," said Frank.
Mike looked him, surprised. "When did you start playing cards?"
Jackson shrugged. "I don't. But Henry Dreeson says they're damn good. He's played cards with them several times at the Gardens."
"Where?" asked Underwood, coming alert. "In the main rooms or—"
Jackson grinned. "Quentin, when does Henry ever play cards in the front rooms?"
There was a moment of silence. To everyone's surprise, once Grantville eventually bowed to reality after the Ring of Fire and the enormous influx of immigrants and lifted its up-time restrictions on gambling, the town's elderly mayor had been revealed as a card shark. He'd become something of a legend in the area's gambling circles. If North and Donovan were able to keep up with him in the back rooms of the Gardens devoted to serious card-playing...
Stearns came to a decision. "All right, Harry, bring 'em in. If I remember right, Donovan handles most
of the business side of things, so I'll talk to him about the contract. In the meantime, I want you to take our guest out to their place and see if he approves. And I want you to personally oversee as much as you can."
Harry nodded, got up and left. "Now," said Mike, "let's move on to the next item on the agenda."
* * *
The cabinet meeting eventually broke up. Mike stayed at his chair, frowning a little.
"Becky's situation bothering you again, Mike?" asked Ed Piazza, when they were alone in the room. He knew Stearns was worried about his wife, trapped in the siege of Amsterdam.
Mike shrugged. "Yeah, sure, it always does these days. At the moment, though, that's not what I'm fretting about. It's what Harry said, at the end there."
"What? His recommendation of North and Donovan?"
"Not that so much. I agree they're probably the best fit we have for this peculiar problem, much as I hate to admit it. But it's how he described them at the end. 'Maybe a bit rambunctious.'"
Piazza smiled ruefully. "Coming from Harry, that's a little rich."
"Still that's not what's eating at me. It's that he hesitated before he said it."
Piazza's smile went away. "Oh, Christ."
* * *
The Friday night game was perennially held at nine P.M. every Friday in a backroom of the Thuringen Gardens. The game could very well go on all weekend, with small fortunes being won and lost. Of course the same players wouldn't necessarily keep at it all weekend. Busting out or cashing out, they would quickly be replaced by another eager sheep waiting to be fleeced.
"One card," said North as he discarded onto the felt. "And I still say he was and will be a lunatic."
"Two cards," said Donovan when the deal came to him. "He is one of the finest Irish writers that ever lived or will live."
The other players received their cards, sharing knowing looks with their fellows on what was to commence, almost as much a tradition as the game itself.
"James Augustine Aloysius Joyce," said North, annunciating the first syllables like he was giving orders on the battlefield. "The only reason you like him is because you share a name."
"That is not true."
"At age twenty-four he renounced his Roman Catholicism and left Ireland forever. Yet 'history' considers him a champion of those two groups. Bet twenty dollars."
"Call," said Henry Sims, tossing a few chips into the center. "I have to agree with Mr. North here. I had to read Ulysses in college, a terrible experience."
"See? Our shire's senior dentist and a man of learning agrees."
"Call," said Donovan, biting his tongue.
"And his punctuation was atrocious," continued North. "Raise twenty."
"Fold," said Sims.
"Fold, said Henry Dreeson.
"He was an artist," said Donovan.
North sniffed. "He was a lazy little git who could not be bothered to learn the English language, raise fifteen."
"I know what you are trying to do." Donovan tossed more chips into the center. "Call."
"Do you now?"
"You are trying to anger me, to involve emotion in the game, to get me to bet heavily so that you can 'clean me out.'"
"When I read Finnegan's Wake, I wanted to put a bullet in my brain and have one of my own. 'Finn, again! Take. Bussoftlhee, mememormee! Till thousendsthee. Lps. The keys to. Given! A way a lone a last a loved a long the'—with no period at the end of the novel, I might add."
"He was making a point."
"No, the point is, he did not make a point. Raise twenty."
"That is a fine way to end a masterpiece, and if you did not have the intellect of a flea you would understand. Call. It will not work this time because I know you're bluffing."
"Am I now?" asked North condescendingly.
"Yes." Donovan smirked. "You are shuffling your cards back and forth. It is your tell. Call and raise twenty. We have reached the table limit, I believe."
"I leave aside that you have just proved how amateur a player you are by telling me that. There is one thing that you forgot, old friend." North pushed most of his remaining chips into the center. "I knew you recognized that tell three hands back. The one I lost for a whole five dollars. I used it this time to draw you in. The rant on James Joyce just came from the heart. Full house, ladies over threes."
"Damn!" Donovan threw his three jacks down on the table in disgust.
North laughed as he reached out to scoop up his winnings.
"Ahem!" A female voice intruded. North turned to Veronica Dreeson who had constantly, and without saying a word, kept in the game pushing forward chips to the end. North had disregarded her as a nonentity since she was very new to the game.
"I am not sure about four fives," said Veronica sweetly, "but ace is high card, yes?"
"Well..." North sat back in his chair and took out a cigar. "That's embarrassing."
"You won, honey, you can pick up the chips now," said the mayor of Grantville to his wife.
The German matron grabbed the chips just a shade too quickly for her naiveté to be anything but an act.
"Ha!" exclaimed Donovan. "The great and powerful Thomas North of Kirtling. Fleeced by a tough old German biddy!"
"Quiet," growled North, as he counted up his few remaining chips. A pile significantly shorter than when he walked in this night.
"Nobleman, warrior and son of warriors, captain of mercenaries, captain of industry. What do you have to say now?" sneered Donovan.
"Saint Patrick was an Englishman," replied North.
"Oh, burn in hell, heretic scum!" screamed Donovan in disgust at the disgustingly true statement. He jumped up from his chair and slapped the cigar out of North's mouth.
"Kiss my arse, papist dog! Those are fifty florins a box!"
North threw the first punch. Within seconds, he and Donovan were on the floor doing their best to knock each other senseless. Good friends though they were, poker was as cantankerous a subject between them as literature.
"Should we, um... try to halt the Counter-reformation?" asked Dr. Nichols, as he stepped uncertainly into the room and around the combatants to buy in for the game.
"Probably," mused Henry Dreeson. "I'm sure it's listed in my civic duties as mayor somewhere. On the other hand... Watch the elbow, Liam!"
Smack!
"That one looked like it hurt a bit," said Henry Dreeson, wincing and turning to his wife. "Dear, maybe you shouldn't be here. Ruffians."
"Why not? Is good fight," replied Veronica. "Twenty dollars on heretic scum."
"Done," said Nichols. "Liam's got fifty pounds on him."
Thud!
Smack!
"You suck!" shouted North.
"It occurs to me that we should ask them to take it outside," said Dreeson. "No need to deprive the rest of the town of this show." Like most of the up-timers in the new booming Grantville, the town's mayor had developed a blasé attitude toward tavern brawls as long as weapons weren't used.
"Very civic minded of you," commented Sims approvingly.
At this point Donovan got far enough disentangled to give his partner a good right hook. North was dazed from the blow, and Donovan, not really intending to do serious damage in what was basically a nice bar fight between friends, let him clear his head. North was going about it in a funny way, though. He was moving his tongue around inside his mouth and making all sorts of strange faces. Donovan was about to ask what was going on when North spit out a small object in the general direction of the card table. It landed next to Henry G. Sims, D.D.S.
"Is that my incisor?" North asked the dentist curiously.
"Um." Sims gave the object in question a quick, expert examination. "Yes, it is, Tom."
"Do you..." North turned ominously toward Donovan. "Have any idea what I had to go through to have that put in the last time? At the very least you should know what it cost!"
"Now, please, Tom, it was just a bit of sport. No need to get angry. Keep your temper."
"My t
emper..." North belted Donovan with a powerful uppercut, knocking the man unconscious to the floor. "Is kept right where it belongs."
"That's the one good thing about being dentists and doctors in a boomtown," said Nichols, as he handed over his lost twenty dollars.
"It's a growth industry," Sims agreed.
* * *
Driving took on an entirely different meaning when it was a horse that had to be driven instead of an automobile. A horse in many cases is smarter than a man and it required little steering to find its way back to the stable. The difficulty arose however when the passenger kept falling off the horse, seatbelts being impractical additions. North, not one to let his good mood be dampened, picked up his friend, dragged him back on top of his horse, remounted his own and began leading them both back to the farm.
"Soldier, oh soldier!" North began his song.
"A-coming from the plain
He courted a lady for honor and for fame
Her beauty shone so bright
That it never could be told
She always loved the soldier
Because he was so bold.
Fa la la la, fa la la la
"Soldier, oh soldier,
It's I would be your bride,
But I fear of my father
Some danger might betide.
Then he pulled out sword and pistol
And hung them by his side
Swore he would be married,
No matter what betide.
Fa la la la, fa la la la
"Then he took her to the parson,
And, of course, home again
There they met her father
And seven armed men.
Let us fly, said the lady,
I fear we shall be slain
Take my hand, said the soldier,
And never fear again.
Fa la la la, fa la la la
"Then he pulled out sword and pistol,
And caused them to rattle,
The lady held the horse
While the soldier fought in battle.
Hold your hand, said the old man,
Do not be so bold.
You shall have my daughter
And a thousand pounds of gold.
