Grantville Gazette 37 gg-37 Page 5

  "How does sending some of the girls shopping reassure anybody?" Lori demanded.

  "Women gossip," Lips said, before hastily leaving the room.

  Next day

  Lips made sure he had a prime spot when Frau Bombast, as expected, stormed in on the family without knocking. Fortunately, her heavy-footed stride gave them some warning.

  "What is this I hear?" Maria Elisabeth Bombast demanded in her most strident voice.

  Phillip appeared calm as he finished chewing the food in his mouth, took a sip of herbal tea, and finally smiled at his mama as he lowered his cup. "What is it you've heard, Mama Dearest?"

  "I wish you wouldn't call me that, Theophrastus. You know I don't like it."

  "Of course, Mama Dearest. Now, what is it that brings you visiting at such an early hour?"

  But Maria Elisabeth had been distracted. She pointed an accusing finger at Dina. "Why is she suckling that child? The wife of a king's advisor should have a wet nurse."

  "I haven't signed the contract yet."

  Maria Elisabeth turned, aghast. "Not signed it yet? You can't be thinking of refusing to enter a king's service? You wouldn't do that to your poor mama. How will I be able to hold up my head when I return home?"

  Success, she was going home. "I'm sure Phillip has every intention of signing, Frau Bombast. However, it is only sensible to have a lawyer check the contract first," Lips said.

  A few days later

  Lips stared at the money being counted out in front of him. "What is that for?" he asked.

  "It is your pay for handling Dr. Gribbleflotz' correspondence," Frau Mittelhausen said.

  He licked his lips and carefully counted the USE bank bills to reassure himself just how much there was there. In his mind's eye he could see a shop in Grantville, with blue jeans, t-shirt, and a leather jacket.

  "Don't spend it all at once, Lips. That has to last you until next month," Frau Mittelhausen warned.

  That did surprise Lips. He hadn't expected to get paid for doing Phillip's correspondence, and now that Phillip was no longer distracted by Dina's pregnancy, surely he wouldn't continue to do it. "I won't."

  "But I bet he knows what he wants to spend some of it on," Lori said.

  A smile twitched at Lips' lips. "I want some blue jeans, and a leather jacket, and . . ." memory failed him. He couldn't remember everything his screen hero had worn in that movie.

  "If you want to buy jeans, I might be able to help."

  "I don't want girl's jeans," Lips protested.

  "Don't worry. I wasn't going to offer you any of mine, but there's bound to be someone in my family about your size who could use the money. Do you have any particular style in mind?"

  Lips hadn't realized jeans came in different styles. He shrugged.

  "Well, you must have an idea. Where did you see the ones you like?"

  "It was in a movie," Lips admitted.

  Lori shook her head. "It's like pulling teeth. What movie?"

  "Rebel without a Cause."

  "Ahhhh! You see yourself as James Dean." Lori nodded. "You'll need a haircut. I don't suppose anybody is making hair cream, are they?"

  "Hair cream?"

  April, Prague

  Phillip burst into the kitchen still in dishabille, brandishing a collar. "I can't wear this. I'm supposed to be meeting the king."

  "What is wrong with the collar, Doctor?" Frau Mittelhausen asked.

  "The starch is showing." Phillip showed where white particles of starch showed up against the brilliant lime-green fabric. "I can't wear that to see the king. Why hasn't the laundry been using dyed starch?"

  "Let me see what I can do." Frau Mittelhausen grabbed the collar and disappeared.

  Lips studied Phillip. His brother-in-law was resplendent in a doublet and knee breeches, with silk stockings and short boots. That was basically the standard garb for meeting important people, however, Phillip had gone to town in his choice of colors. The doublet was an interesting shade of red, with an under-shirt in lime green visible through the slashed sleeves. The stockings were a pale pink, and the boots, well, there was no single dominant color. Lori Drahuta would have broken down laughing at the sight, but Lips was already aware that the colors, if not Phillip's combinations, were starting to be seen around Prague.

  Frau Mittelhausen arrived back with the repaired collar and fitted it around Phillip's neck. Seconds later they were left in peace.

  "What is dyed starch?" Frau Mittelhausen asked.

  "It's from the Autochrome experiments. Phillip has been trying to rediscover how the up-timers made color photographs using dyed starch particles scattered randomly over a photographic plate." Suddenly Lips' thought process kicked him. "Frau Mittelhausen, is white starch on collars much of a problem?"

  "Only on colored collars. Oh!"

  Lips nodded. Frau Mittelhausen had reached the same conclusion he had. White starch on white collars wouldn't be a problem, but with people copying Phillip and buying colored collars, surely they too were having problems with the white starch ruining the desired effect. He rose from his chair. "If you need me, I'll be in the laboratory doing some research."

  "I'll get you some old collars to experiment with."

  May, Prague

  Lips sat watching Phillip pacing around his laboratory in the Mihulka Tower. He'd been acting strangely since he returned from his latest meeting with the king.

  "What's bothering you, Phillip?" he asked.

  "Dr Stone agrees that the king's color is blue," Phillip muttered.

  "But that's impossible, isn't it?"

  "I thought so. I thought that Kurt Beta's Kirlian image interpretation ideas were impossible, but if Dr. Stone says the king's aura is blue, just like the color Kirlian image suggests, then that means Kirlian image interpretation is a valid science." He paused to correct himself. "More correctly, it is a poor cousin to the real science of Chakras."

  "What are Chakras?"

  Phillip sent Lips a wry grin. "I'm not overly sure myself. It seems to be some technique that only Dr. Stone and his assistant, Guptah Rai Singh, are familiar with."

  "Are you going to ask him to speak about the Chakras at one of your seminars?"

  "In the fullness of time, when I have had a chance to learn more about them. But meanwhile, I have a problem. If aural investigating is valid science, then I may have given up on invigorating the Quinta Essentia of the Human Humors too soon."

  "I wonder what Dr. Stone knows about pyramid power?" Lips asked.

  "I can't ask the Great Stoner about pyramid power. No, I'll just have to recommence my research based on the new information."

  Lips left Phillip to his ruminating and retired to the library, where he dug out the latest copy of the Grantville Genealogy Club's Who's Who of Grantville Up-timers,and spent a fruitless couple of hours looking for someone named Guptah Rai Singh.

  A few days later

  Lips was in the laboratory furthering his experiments with dyed starch and starched collars when Phillip walked in.

  "What's that you've got there?"

  "Dyed starch for collars, Phillip. Nobody in Prague has been doing any research on dyed starch, so I thought I'd try it."

  "And does it work?"

  "Oh, yes." Lips held up a dyed collar. "This is just experimenting in different shades. Thomas has a production line going, and we're already selling it in the Dr. Gribbleflotz Emporium of Natural Wonders."

  "I don't think the store was a good idea," Phillip muttered.

  "But why not? It's doing amazing business."

  "Because the king saw one of Paxton's posters."

  "I hope he wasn't offended?"

  "No, much worse," Phillip said. "The king would like me to develop color photography."

  "Ouch, did you tell him about the problems we are having with Autochrome?"

  "One does not tell one's patron more than he needs to know. Besides, a patron is never interested in problems; a patron is only ever interested in results."


  Lips brushed Phillip's patronizing hand from the top of his head. "So we get back to work on Autochrome?"

  "No, we have left Hans working hard on that problem back in Jena. If he, with the resources at his command, hasn't discovered the solution yet, then the two of us working together won't succeed. No, we need to think outside the box."

  "What is it the king wants?"

  "The king wants to be able to take a photograph of his son and hang it across from his bed."

  "What about doing what Schmucker and Schwentzel do and just make printing plates?"

  Phillip reached out a patronizing hand again, but Lips managed to avoid it. "Okay, what did I say wrong this time?" he asked.

  "One pleases one's patron not by replicating what has already been done, but by creating new and different things that he can show off. The printing process Schmucker and Schwentzel use is well known, and so not sufficiently impressive. What we need is something completely different."

  "But there are only so many ways to lay colors onto a surface to produce a color image."

  "The king doesn't know that. We only have to have something sufficiently different from everything else that it has the appearance of being unique."

  Lips chewed over what Phillip was saying. He fingered the T-shirt he was wearing, and suddenly had an idea. "Phillip, are you familiar with staining slides so that cells are more visible under a microscope?"

  "I've read about it, but never done it."

  "Well I have, in some classes in Grantville I sneaked into. You use dyes to stain the cells and various parts hold more or less dye so that you can see everything a lot better. Could I try something?"

  "Of course."

  Lips made up some gelatin and poured a little into several watch-glasses. Then he added a different dye to each watch glass. Finally, he painted a design on several blank glass photographic plates, using one color per plate. When they dried he stacked them and held them up against the light.

  "Very nice, now how do you paint a photographic image onto the plates?" Phillip asked.

  "We don't. We photo-transfer the images. Lori showed me how to do it when she taught me how to silk-screen print. What images do we have in three-color?"

  "Just the spectral lines, but I'm sure Dina would be happy to have a photograph of her and the twins."

  A few days later

  Lips shivered as he paced around the room. Phillip had been gone for hours. Surely it didn't take this long to show the king the new Gribblechrome, as they'd decided to call their new process. He pulled his leather jacket closer round his body.

  "You wouldn't be so cold if you changed into something more suitable."

  He glared at his sister. Yes, his blue jeans, t-shirt, and leather jacket weren't really warm enough in this room-why they couldn't have central heating like they had in Jena he didn't know-but what price comfort when he could look like James Dean? He ran a hand through his closely cropped locks. "Phillip should have been back ages ago."

  "He's dealing with a king, Lips. Kings work to their own schedule. He might not even have seen Phillip yet."

  "Frau Kastenmayerin," Frau Mittelhausen called as she burst into the room, "the Doctor, they've just carried him home on a stretcher."

  Dina erupted from her chair and ran off. Lips followed.

  ****

  "Can you tell me what has happened?" Lips asked the man who'd accompanied the royal guardsmen who'd brought Phillip home.

  "I'm not really sure myself, Herr Kastenmayer. You have to understand, I wasn't there when it happened. However, it seems Dr. Gribbleflotz has been putting his health at considerable risk caring for the king. Dr. Stone's assistant saved Dr. Gribbleflotz by performing emergency surgery to remove a Mishawaka."

  Lips wanted to ask what a Mishawaka was, but there were more important questions to ask. "Is the doctor going to be all right?"

  "Oh, yes, Dr. Stone was most definite. The emergency surgery has removed the problem, although Dr. Gribbleflotz should be allowed to rest for several days."

  "How long will it be before the anesthesia wears off, do you know?" Lips asked, wondering what sort of pain Philip was likely to be suffering.

  "There was no anesthesia. Actually, although there was a lot of blood, there appears to be no wound. A most amazing piece of surgery."

  Lips barely noticed when Christoph Seidel left. He was deep in thought, and his thoughts weren't pretty. Something was wrong here. He needed the opinion of an up-timer he knew and trusted. That meant writing Lori a letter.

  ****

  A week later and Lips had a reply, and it reinforced his disquiet over what had happened in the king's chamber. Phillip hadn't been able to tell him much. He'd just shown the king the Gribblechrome of Dina and the babies when Dr. Stone and his assistant-the assistant who wasn't listed in the list of up-timers-had burst in saying something about his chakras fluctuating so dangerously the effect could be felt in the antechambers. Then there had been the surgery. Phillip had been adamant that Guptah Rai Singh had pulled something out of his body, even though there was no wound, or even a magically quickly healed scar.

  Lori had called it "psychic surgery," and Lips had been left in no doubt she didn't approve. Corrupt fakery was amongst the more polite terms she had used to describe it. Which raised the question of why would Dr. Stone fake not only an illness-if fake surgery could cure a problem, surely the problem had to be fake-but also a cure?

  Frau Mittelhausen appeared at the door to the office Lips was occupying. "A gentleman to see you."

  Lips shot to his feet. He wasn't used to greeting anyone Frau Mittelhausen would class as a gentleman. The man who was guided in was a shock. Lips instantly recognized him as the king's private secretary-although he'd heard that Heinrich Niemann was the king's secretary the same as Frau Mittelhausen had been Phillip's housekeeper. The title didn't adequately describe just how much responsibility either of them had.

  "Herr Niemann, how can I be of assistance?"

  "I wish to convey the king's regrets for Dr. Gribbleflotz' illness and discuss a reward suitable for the risks Dr. Gribbleflotz has taken in caring for the king's health. I do hope the good doctor is recovering?"

  "Yes, Dr. Gribbleflotz is almost fully recovered. Please, have a seat. Can I get anything for you? Tea, coffee?"

  "Could I have a Tincture of Cacao?"

  Behind Heinrich, Lips saw Frau Mittelhausen nod. "Yes, that will be possible. Could I have one too, please, Frau Mittelhausen?" Lips returned to his chair behind the desk. "Did the king like the Gribblechrome?"

  "Yes, he was most impressed. And to get a result so quickly after making the request! Most impressive."

  Lips clamped down on his tongue before he could say the first thing that entered his head. This was the client he was dealing with, not Phillip, or even one of the people who attended his seminars. Instead he smiled and shrugged. "Sometimes everything just comes together like that."

  "The king wishes to know how long it will be before Dr. Gribbleflotz will be able to create a Gribblechrome of his wife and son?"

  "If we don't ask too much of the doctor, I'm sure we could start the process any time His Majesty is ready. It will then take but three days to produce a finished Gribblechrome."

  "Then there is just the matter of a suitable reward for Dr. Gribbleflotz. Before he took ill the doctor was talking about his Society for Improving Natural Knowledge by Experimentation, and how they swapped ideas about the new sciences."

  Lips nodded. He knew all about Phillip's group of natural philosophers. They spent half their time arguing over the most insignificant detail in the methodology of experiments they demonstrated.

  "His Majesty believes that it would be beneficial to have a group of scientists keeping abreast of the latest developments in science and technology, and has decided that he will become patron of Dr. Gribbleflotz' society, awarding it a royal charter. Funds and facilities will be provided to the society to conduct scientific experiments on anything the members
wish, as long as the members are always available to advise the king on scientific matters. Do you feel Dr. Gribbleflotz would be interested in being the society's president?"

  "I believe Dr. Gribbleflotz would be most happy with such an offer."

  "Good, very good. And, of course, as Dr. Gribbleflotz would be the premier scientist in Bohemia, it would be fitting if he were awarded doctorates by the universities of Bohemia."

  "Prague, and the new university funded by Herr Roth?"

  Heinrich smiled. "Actually, I was thinking of Prague and Olmutz, but I'm sure Herr Roth would feel offended if his new university wasn't invited to similarly honor Dr. Gribbleflotz."

  After an hour of discussion, Lips escorted Herr Niemann back to his portion of the palace. He stopped at a window and stared out on the street. Revenge was going to be sweet, even if Phillip never knew he was getting revenge. He wondered how Dr. Stone would react to receiving an invitation to present a seminar on the chakras to the Royal Academy of Science in Prague, signed by the academy's president for life, Dr. Phillip Theophrastus Gribbleflotz.

  ****

  Dreams Can Come True . . .

  Terry Howard

  Grantville, Thanksgiving, 1634

  Estil Congden flicked an imaginary piece of lint off the sleeve of his white dinner jacket and looked around the room. Business was good tonight. The place was full, but still spacious. The customers were well-dressed and the women's jewelry glittered in the soft lighting. Ah. There. One of the wait staff's shoes weren't polished. Estil headed toward him . . .

  There was a loud clack of balls and a shout of, "Ou eee, Dog, you just hit hard and hope, don't you? Talk about getting lucky. Shee-it."

  "Estil, get your head out of the clouds and get me a beer."

  Oh, hell, Estil thought. Back to the real world.

  Month after month, year after year, Estil's mind listened to the murmur of the background conversation and the soft clatter of carefully controlled billiard balls.

  The fantasy, though, was a private matter. Estil never talked about it. His sincere belief was that if you talked about something you wanted to do, someone would either make fun of you, make fun of the fantasy, treat you like dirt to drag you down, or otherwise screw with your life.