Grantville Gazette, Volume 71

by Bjorn Hasseler

  "They'll have to at some point, Pat. Flintlocks are obsolete now that percussion caps are coming available in commercial volumes. I know the USE Army is buying the majority of the percussion caps but there will soon be more caps available for the public. It's inevitable that change is coming."

  "True, and the timing is right for us if we can meet our business plan."

  They stood as Archie returned. "I think we have discussed all that we needed to for the moment, Archie. You've helped us a lot. May we borrow your manuals at some time?" Gary asked.

  "Sure, Gary, just take care of them. There aren't any more that I know of."

  III

  September, 1634

  Grantville

  Gary Reardon and Osker Geyer arrived in Grantville in the rain. It wasn't a light rain; it was a downpour. They had hired a coach for their trip from Suhl and, when the rain started, it began to leak. Rain entered through the windows, around the leather shutters they had rolled down the windows and dripped from the coach roof where the rain had soaked through. They were wet, cold, and completely uncomfortable. "This is where I grew up, Osker," Gary said when the coach rolled up before the two-story house. "Dad is in Magdeburg, but Mom is home. We'll stay here while we're in Grantville." Gary had noticed Geyer looking at everything in Grantville. This was his first visit to the up-time town—city, now, and he appeared to be amazed at everything—the streets, the lights, the buildings, everything.

  Gary and Geyer paid the coach driver and hauled their luggage up to the Reardon extended front porch out of the rain. Gary's mother, Nancy, an elderly white-haired lady, was waiting in the doorway.

  "Gary! How good to see you . . . and you've put on some weight, I see. Come inside and take off those wet coats." The two men entered the house, and she waited while they hung their coats on hooks near the door. "Come back to the kitchen, and I'll fix you something hot," she said after giving Gary a strong maternal hug.

  They followed her to the kitchen in the rear of the house. Osker Geyer was looking at everything—the linoleum-covered floor, the porcelain sink and chromed faucets, and, although he didn't understand their purpose at first, the stove and refrigerator. Nancy Reardon continued her conversation with Gary as he and Osker sat at the kitchen table.

  "Gaylynn is a great cook, Mom. She has to try every new recipe on me as soon as she finds one. Greta Issler is teaching her baking, and Gaylynn has discovered the joys of honey rolls."

  While they talked, she filled a kettle with water from the sink and put it on the stove to heat.

  "Mom," Gary said, "let me introduce Osker Geyer. He's a business associate of mine in Suhl. We're here to consult the library."

  "Guten Tag, Frau Reardon. I'm most happy to make your acquaintance," Geyer said.

  "Glad to meet you, too, Herr Geyer. You are very welcome."

  She turned to Gary, "I've your old room available and Dewey's room, too. He's gone with your father to Magdeburg."

  The kettle began to boil. She placed some loose tea in a metal ball and put that ball in the teapot. She turned a knob on the stove, picked up the kettle, and poured water into the teapot. "Will you two be staying long?" she asked. "There's no rush, I don't expect your Dad and Dewey to be back for a couple of weeks."

  "I don't know, Mom," Gary replied. "It will depend on what we find in the library."

  ****

  The two men rose early the next morning and, after a quick breakfast at Nancy Reardon's insistence, headed for the high school. Gary signed for the two of them in the registry just inside the library, walked past the guard and asked the librarian where to find books on steel making and chemistry. She directed them to the next available researcher, who consulted an existing bibliography on each subject and headed for the science section of the library. She brought Geyer several volumes on the production of steel and the Bessemer process. Geyer took two volumes and seated himself at a table in the corner. He had brought his secretary with him, a small leather case containing paper, several pencils—he had been warned that pens and ink were forbidden in the library—note cards, and other paraphernalia. Absorbed, he proceeded to read and make notes.

  Gary wasn't as fortunate. He hadn't known that there were two kinds of chemistry, organic and non-organic. The researcher brought a stack of books from each category. Finally, in frustration, Gary went back to the researcher and asked her if she knew of any books on primers, specifically lead styphnate and DDNP. The researcher hadn't heard of DDNP but a large number of 'manufacturers' had been interested in lead styphnate, and she brought him those volumes.

  The two spent the morning reading and taking notes. Geyer issued a constant stream of muttered comments and hired a local researcher to help translate books from up-time English to colloquial German.

  "Finding what you were looking for, Osker?" Gary asked. The hour was approaching noon, and Geyer appeared to have been successful in his search.

  "Yes and no. The Bessemer process is more complicated than I thought. I have found that my initial understanding—blow air through the molten iron—is not as simple as I thought. I want to make specialty steel. I thought using the Bessemer process was the answer, but I think I was wrong . . . at least to start. I use what the books here call the puddling process. It's easier to alter the alloys with my current method. I do need a hammer forge and a rolling and stamping mill, but I think I need to build what you up-timers call a prototype plant. I can add a Bessemer furnace later."

  "You'll still be able to make tool steel and tungsten carbide steel for us, right? We need that to make the dies and other tools."

  "Yes, as long as I can get the proper ores. If you can get zinc to make brass, I can get tungsten from the same place. I think my next step is to place our orders with Schmidt Steam. Have you found what you need?"

  Gary wagged his head from side to side and finally sighed. "Like you, yes and no. It's harder than I thought. I think I need an alchemist."

  The trip to Grantville wasn't a total loss, not for Geyer at least. Gary, unfortunately, had to search elsewhere. He had found some information—enough to know he couldn't make primer compound, any kind, by himself. He just didn't have the background, the experience, or the knowledge.

  IV

  September, 1634

  Essen

  Nicki Jo Prickett sat in her office in the Essen Chemical works nursing a cooling mug of tea and staring out the window. October was approaching, and the weather had cooled earlier than expected. She should have been doing something, but . . . it just wasn't the same since last year when Tobias Ridley and Solomon des Caux had blown themselves up. She watched the wind blow through the trees that had been planted in front of the building. Some were turning already, and autumn wouldn't officially arrive for another week.

  She knew the explosion that had killed two of her researchers wasn't her fault. Katherine kept reminding her of that fact. She was . . . just depressed. She wasn't motivated to do anything, just coasting. In one part of her mind, she was disgusted. She wasn't used to being idle. The rest of her mind, however, kept returning the scene from the previous year, the scene of bodies being retrieved from the rubble after the explosion.

  Katherine Boyle, the fifth daughter of Richard Boyle, the Earl of Cork, could be heard in the outer office. Katherine and Nicki Jo were . . . what up-timers would call a couple. They had been together for almost two years; meeting after Katherine had fled to Brussels, away from her abusive husband, the late and unlamented Arthur, Viscount Ranelagh. Ranelagh had hounded Katherine all the way from England to Brussels where he apparently drowned in a canal while drunk.

  Tobias Ridley and Solomon des Caux had caused their own deaths and that of others by ignoring her instructions, trying to short-cut a process they believed could move faster by ignoring some steps. They were wrong. The steps, required to further refine and purify some of the ingredients, were important. Tobias and Solomon thought otherwise. The result was an explosion that destroyed the lab and killed Ridley, des Caux, and
some other nearby experimenters.

  GIGO, she thought. For Tobias, that was Contaminants in, BOOM out. She giggled and the sudden giggles startled her. The giggle was so . . . inappropriate. She sighed. I should be in the lab, she thought. At least I'm not cutting myself. Nicki Jo had a habit of . . . punishing herself. Katherine had found her cutting lines into her arm a week after the explosion. She pulled back her sleeve and glanced at the white lines of scars. The freshest scar was now more than six months old. That line of thought took her down one circuitous path after another. Her thoughts were interrupted by Katherine calling from the outer office. "Nicki Jo, you have a visitor."

  "Who is it?"

  "Hi, Nicki Jo," Gary Reardon called as he entered her office. "It's been awhile." Gary Reardon was twice Nicki Jo Prickett's age. He knew her because he was a friend of her father. He walked over to Nicki Jo and sat down across from her desk.

  Gary's preemptive entrance startled her. "Gary Reardon! Why are you here?"

  "Ms. Boyle, I believe her name is, made the mistake of glancing toward your office door. You know me, Nicki Jo. I don't like waiting in outer offices—especially when it's an office of an old friend. As for the why, I would like to consult with you on a project."

  "Sometimes Katy goes too far," Nicki Jo muttered. Katy knew quite well she didn't want to see anyone.

  "I know it's been awhile since we've seen each other but, I have a project that may interest you."

  "Ha."

  "I think so, and so does Ms. Boyle."

  "Call me Katherine," Katherine Boyle interrupted from the doorway. When Gary Reardon had marched past her into Nicki Jo's office, she had followed.

  "Katherine. Thank you," he said. Focusing on Nicki Jo, again, he continued. "When I entered, I found you sitting here, giggling. I've been told why you are—have been—upset, but, Nicki Jo, it's been almost a year! It's time you got yourself working again. You can't continue punishing yourself."

  "And you think you know how to motivate me?" Nicki Jo asked peevishly. Still, she thought, what am I doing here? Nothing. Maybe I do need something to take my mind off Tobias and Solomon. I really hadn't liked them all that well, chauvinists that they were. She saw Banfi Hunyades slip into her office, watching. Clearly, Gary had gone directly to the chemical plant when he arrived in Essen and spoken with Banfi Hunyades, her senior chemist. So he would have found out that she hadn't been actively working in some time.

  "Maybe. Maybe not. Won't know until I try."

  "What do you want?"

  Gary had noticed Hunyades' entrance, too. He nodded to the older chemist in acknowledgement. "I want you to design and build a chemical plant," he told Nicki Jo. "A plant that is safe, using well-documented processes, and able to operate with limited professional supervision and oversight."

  "What kind of plant?" she asked.

  "We—

  "Who's we?"

  "Nicki Jo. Let me finish a sentence, please. The we is me, Pat Johnson, Osker Geyer from Suhl, Archie Mitchell, others in Suhl, and perhaps some more whom I'll meet in Magdeburg on the way home. The where is Suhl and the what is center-fire cartridge primers."

  "The Hart boys are already making primers," she countered.

  "Yes—using fulminate of mercury which shortens the life of cartridge brass and is highly unstable. We want to be able to reload fired cartridge brass. We want you to design a facility—from end-to-end, to make non-mercury, non-corrosive, non-toxic primers. Using DDNP if possible, lead styphnate as an alternative."

  "DDNP?" Banfi Hunyades asked, interrupting the conversation.

  "Full name, Diazodinitrophenol. It's made from picric acid. I understand you all have some experience with that."

  "More explosives," Nicki Jo said. For many reasons, and not just because of the explosion last year, she was reluctant to be involved with explosives.

  "Has to be, Nicki Jo, if the primers are going to work. We don't want our plant to blow up in our face nor do we want to ignore the risk to our employees. That's why we need a chemical engineer, one who can design the chemical processes and also design a safe plant to make the primers."

  "Do it, Nick," Katherine said from the doorway.

  "What about you, Katy?"

  "Is this a permanent position, Mr. Reardon, or—" Katherine asked.

  Gary saw Katherine's question startled Hunyades. He had seated himself in a side chair during the conversation. I can imagine some of the thoughts going around in your head, Herr Hunyades. Ambition, fear, maybe a little greed?

  "Call me Gary, Katherine, if you would."

  "Gary."

  "It could be if that is what Nicki Jo wants," he said to her. "It's an option."

  Returning to Nicki Jo, he said, "I know you have a position here and I—we, our investors—wouldn't ask you to give that up. We were thinking of a consultancy. Fixed duration, explicit goals with mutually agreed upon timeline, bonuses and options to alter or extend the contract."

  "How long?"

  "We want to be in production in a year."

  "What!"

  Gary noticed that Hunyades was nodding his head. Gary understood that Hunyades wasn't an idle member of Essen Chemical. He understood what was required to build a complete, new chemical plant. I may have an ally with Herr Hunyades. Nicki Jo obviously hadn't realized the scale of the plant that I need.

  "Yes. Full commercial production in a year producing at least a thousand primers per production line per day."

  "Katy?"

  "I think you should take the contract," she answered.

  "I agree, Nicki Jo," Hunyades added.

  "But—"

  "You need to do something besides sitting in your office feeling depressed and punishing yourself," Katherine said. That was exactly what Nicki Jo had been doing. Everyone who knew her also knew what she was, and wasn't, doing.

  "I'm not—"

  "Yes, you are. What about all those new scars on your arms?" she countered.

  "What would Colette say? And Fernando and Maria Anna?" Colette Modi was the owner of Essen Chemical, and the one who had hired Nicki Jo as her chief researcher. Fernando and Maria Anna were the King and Queen of the Netherlands following the separation of the Netherlands from Hapsburg Spain. Fernando and Maria Anna, by happenstance, had become close friends.

  "Tell them you're taking a sabbatical from Essen Chemical and that we're willing to license the process if it works, given some constraints and non-compete—and under our brand," Gary responded quickly.

  "Katy? What about her?" she asked Gary.

  "She's welcome, too, Nicki Jo. We'll need you to train a staff to run the production lines safely when you are finished. Katherine can help and I'm sure Herr Hunyades can manage the research here at Essen Chemical while you're gone. Correct, Herr Hunyades?"

  "Ja, Herr Reardon," He confirmed. "It wouldn't be any different from what I've been doing for the last year," Hunyades added.

  Nicki Jo knew something had to change. Katy was right. She needed something to take her mind off those two—no, she wasn't going there. Maybe a change of scenery, new faces, new . . . She could design the plant from end to end, Gary had said . . . Banfi Hunyades could be trusted to run things here and send her reports in Suhl to keep her in the loop . . . Their research lines still had a long time to go, and most of the current work was planning how to upgrade their pilot plants to production capacity.

  She drummed her fingers on her desk and exchanged looks with Katherine and Hunyades for a moment. It would be different, and she would have complete control, so Gary had said.

  "Gary?" Nicki Jo asked.

  "Yes?"

  "How many primers are the Hart brothers producing?"

  "The best we know is 1,000 per day."

  Nicki Jo muttered, "Idiot boys. They'll kill themselves yet." She looked out her window. A freight wagon was leaving the warehouse and moving towards the gate. A delivery for someone. She remained, looking out the window, listening as Gary continued.

  "We want
to have several parallel production lines in operation."

  That statement didn't surprise her. It was necessary if Gary's intent was to produce tens of thousands of primers. She turned from the window and asked, "Does the army need that many?"

  "I don't know. We don't intend to sell solely to the army. We have other plans."

  "Like what?"

  "Well . . ." He looked at the three of them, Hunyades, Katherine Boyle, and Nicki Jo. "This is all confidential, you understand."

  "Yes," Nicki Jo acknowledged. Katherine and Hunyades agreed.

  "Okay. Let me tell you about the consortium . . ."

  V

  October, 1634

  Suhl

  Archie Mitchell was alone in his office late in the afternoon reminiscing. The days were noticeably shorter, and his office was darkening. His officemate, Bailiff Kurt Wagner, was assisting Judge Fross in court. It was time to light the lamps or go home.

  Dieter Issler, Archie's senior deputy, had returned from a fugitive hunt in the 'Wald and was taking some time off. He had returned with the fugitive and a little four-year-old orphan girl, Marta. He and his wife Greta were adopting her.

  It felt strange to have a child in the house after all these years. Marta called him Großpapa. Marjorie was being very . . . grandmotherly. A sudden wave of emotion swept through him as a memory of his long-gone daughter Lena welled up. No time to be maudlin.

  Anse Hatfield had dropped by earlier in the day, and Archie took him to lunch at the Boar's Head Inn. Hatfield was in a bad way. His injuries, the loss of some fingers and part of his left hand, were minimal, but they still depressed him. He couldn't do some things that he had before, couldn't grip a tool with his left hand, he felt that he was useless. In addition, he hadn't been medically discharged from the Army, just sent home as a National Guardsman. Hatfield took the change of his status as an insult even if it did come with a promotion. Too damaged for the Army, but good enough for the National Guard.