Chapter 12
Friedrich von Logau sat in Walcha’s Coffee House, doodling in his pocket notebook while his friends argued. Gathered around the table was a group of poets and writers from all over Germany, there to seek patrons and to partake of the capital city’s élan.
“Lovecraft was the greater writer,” intoned Karl Seelbach, Friedrich’s fellow Silesian. Karl then proceeded to slurp his coffee, which evoked winces all around the table.
Friedrich drew loops around his latest attempt at an epigram.
In danger and great need,
Irresolution brings destruction.
It was rough, and he wasn’t satisfied with it yet. So he listened to his friends while his mind worked under the level of the conversation.
“You’ve drunk so much coffee your head is addled,” Johann Gronow retorted. “Anyone with a wit can clearly tell that Poe’s skills were far superior to Lovecraft’s, although he didn’t write as much. Isn’t that right, Friedrich?”
Gronow’s Hamburg accent grated on Friedrich’s Silesian ear just a bit, but he ignored it. “Don’t be dragging me into your interminable verbal duels over which up-time author of old grandmother tales is superior.”
Friedrich spoke with a smile, as he was the one who had put Gronow on the trail of both authors, with the end result being the creation of Der schwartzer Kater—Eine Zeitschrift. Or Black Tomcat Magazine, as the up-timers more succinctly called it. Gronow was the publisher/editor of the two issues it had done so far, and his oft-spoken mission was to further the development of the art of macabre story-telling in German. Friedrich had it on good authority that Johann had written all of the first issue and most of the second issue except for the translations of two Poe stories.
His mind raised a thought at that moment, and he crossed out “Irresolution” and replaced it with “Compromise.” He surveyed the result. Better, but still not quite right, somehow.
A sudden silence at the table caused Friedrich to look up. His friends were all looking behind him. “I wonder what she wants?” Johannes Plavius said. Friedrich turned in his chair and draped an arm across its back.
He knew who the woman was that approached with her husband shadowing her as he usually did. No one could move in the middle or upper circles of Magdeburg and not know—or at least know of—Marla Linder. Depending on one’s beliefs about music, she was either famous or notorious, but she was never ignored. All agreed that her voice was spectacular.
Walcha’s Coffee House was not one of her usual haunts. Friedrich watched her walk toward their table. Tall, with long black hair pulled back into a “pony-tail,” as up-timers called that odd hairstyle, she walked with assurance, as if she was so certain of herself and her place that she had no doubt of what she was doing. Which she probably didn’t, he thought before he echoed Plavius’ thoughts. “I wonder what she wants with us?”
“I believe we are about to find out,” Plavius muttered.
Frau Linder came to a halt just beyond Friedrich’s reach. “Good afternoon, meine Herren.” Her Amideutsch had the unmistakable flavor of the Grantville up-timers, for all that her pronunciation was impeccable. Something about the tonal quality of the voice, he mused.
Greetings rumbled from most of the circle at the table. Friedrich contented himself with a nod of the head.
“I’m looking for Friedrich von Logau.”
Although Friedrich did not react, he felt the gazes of his friends fix on him, and one of them must have pointed, for Frau Linder’s eyes settled on him. A feeling not unlike staring at the muzzle of a loaded gun entered his mind.
“Herr Logau, I am Marla Linder, and this is my husband, Franz Sylwester.” Herr Sylwester nodded his head in turn.
“I know who you are, Frau Linder. How could I not?” He felt the corner of his mouth quirk upward.
That seemed to fluster her for a moment, but she clasped her hands around the tube of paper she carried and settled. “I—we—have need of a poet. You have been highly recommended to us. Herr Adalbert, the editor at the Times-Journal, told us we might find you here.”
“You have need of a poet.” Friedrich made it a statement, not a question, and his voice was very dry.
“Yes. I have a song lyric written in up-time English that I need translated into German.”
“A…song.” Friedrich had trouble believing what he was hearing. He frowned. “You want me to translate?”
Frau Linder started to nod, then shook her head, which made for a very odd motion.
“Not just translate. I don’t want a word for word literal translation. I need a German’s poet’s translations of the…the thoughts behind the English words. I need you to make the German lyrics sing like the English ones do.”
“Ah.” That was different. That, he could understand.
Friedrich had done some translating in his time. Most poets and men of letters did at one time or another in their careers. Translating words was usually easy. Translating the thought was always the challenge.
He held out his hand. “Let me see it.”
Frau Linder placed the paper cylinder in his hand. He unrolled it, and started scanning the text. Midway through, he stopped, went back to the beginning, and read through again slowly, letting each word register in his mind.
He looked up at the woman. “I will not insult you by asking if you know what you are asking. But do you realize the kind of storm this could raise? Especially now?”
Frau Linder returned a grin that reminded him of nothing more than a feral cat showing its fangs. “Oh, I intend for it to do that,” she breathed. “Exactly that.” Her tone was not loud, but every man at the table heard it, and Friedrich felt the hair on his neck rise.
Friedrich looked at the short length of lines on the page. He read through them again, then folded the paper and put it in his inside coat pocket.
“Where can I reach you?”
“Messages can reach me at the Duchess Elisabeth Sofie Secondary School for Girls, at the Royal Academy of Music, or at our home.” Herr Sylwester handed his wife a card, which she in turn handed to Friedrich. He looked at the address, then tucked that card into the same pocket.
“Give me a week.”
“Sooner would be better, but if it takes a week, and it’s good, so be it.”
Herr Sylwester leaned forward and whispered in Frau Linder’s ear. She nodded in response, then returned her focus to Friedrich. “How much?”
Friedrich was tempted to play word games with the woman, but in the end decided not to. “Nothing. I will do this just for the pleasure of being a part of it.”
He was surprised when Frau Linder didn’t remonstrate with him. She simply took him at his word, and nodded. “Within the week, then. Good day to you, Herr Logau, meine Herren.”
Herr Sylwester nodded, having never said a word to the gathered writers, then turned and followed his wife. Friedrich felt his mouth quirk again. With Frau Linder for a wife, why would the man need to say anything? And from what Friedrich had heard, although he followed in his wife’s wake often, Sylwester was no rudderless ship sucked along in an undertow. One could be quiet, and still be a rock of strength.
Friedrich turned back to his friends.
“Well?” Plavius demanded.
“Well what?”
“Aren’t you going to show us the English lyrics?”
Friedrich made a pretense of considering this suggestion, before letting his face settle into a grin. “No,” he said as he beamed at them. “You will hear them like everyone else, when she is ready to salvo them at the world.”
“Salvo?” Gronow caught at that word. “You infer that it will be a momentous occasion.”
“My friends, you have no idea. But you will remember that day, I doubt not.”
As those around him erupted in expostulations, Friedrich looked back down to his notebook, and crossed out “destruction.” He wrote in a simple word, so that the last line of the epigram now read “Compromise brings death.” He read the line again, nodded, and put the notebook back in the breast pocket of his coat.
* * *
Bam!
Gotthilf walked up to the counter just as Byron fired his last shot. The action in the .45 locked back; Byron ejected the empty magazine and laid it and the empty pistol on the counter.
“Clear!” he called out to the range officer as he slid the ear protectors down to hang around his neck.
The range officer blew his whistle. Even though Byron was the only shooter in the range at the moment, the officer still yelled out, “Range is cold.” After a moment, a young man ran out to grab the target off the hook, then ran back to the side and around the range perimeter to bring it to the lieutenant.
Gotthilf looked around his partner’s arm to see the grouping. “Not bad, Byron.”
Byron laid his hand on the spread. Nothing showed outside his palm. “Yeah, eight shots in a five inch diameter at thirty feet. Not world class, maybe, but good enough for the guy’s heart and lower left lung lobe to be hamburger.” He put the target on the counter, then bent over and picked up his cartridge casings. “I almost forgot these. I’ve got almost a box worth that I need to get reloaded.”
Gotthilf winced at Byron’s description of the effect of the shots on a body. He couldn’t disagree with it, but the thought still caused his stomach to lurch a bit. He covered for that by setting his case on the counter.
Byron started feeding stubby .45 cartridges into the empty magazine. Click. Click. Click. “Whatcha got, partner?” In a matter of moments, seven cartridges into the magazine, ram it into the handle, one cartridge into the chamber, release the action, throw the safety, and shove the pistol into the holster in the back of his belt, all the while looking with interest at Gotthilf’s case.
Gotthilf flicked a particle of dust off the top of the polished wood. “Nothing you’d be interested in.”
Byron grabbed for the case. “Anything that comes in a presentation case to a firing range interests me.”
Gotthilf slapped his partner’s hands away. “All right, all right! Don’t get greedy.” He lifted the lid of the case on its hinges, and unfolded the cloth from where it covered the contents.
“Ahh.” That lengthy satisfied sigh from Byron made Gotthilf chuckle. “What?”
“You sound like a tad in the kitchen when the cook is baking pies,” Gotthilf said.
Byron started to reach into the case, stopped, and looked to his partner. “May I?”
Gotthilf nodded. Byron completed his motion by pulling the pistol from its nest in the case. He held it in both hands at first, turning it this way and that to examine it in detail. “That’s nice,” he finally passed judgment. “Hockenjoss and Klott?”
“Of course,” Gotthilf affirmed. He was very happy with the H&K .32 he’d been carrying for almost a year, so when he decided to look for another pistol he naturally gravitated to that firm’s designs.
“Big bore,” Bryon commented as he hefted the pistol. “Bigger than your other pistol.” He held it out at arm’s length, sighting down the range. “A bit heavy, I think. Nice balance, though.”
“Forty-four caliber,” Gotthilf nodded as he took two gunpowder flasks from his coat pockets and the small box of percussion caps from its slot in the presentation case. He staggered from the slap Byron delivered to his shoulder.
“All right! It’s about time you got a man’s gun.”
“Give me that.” Gotthilf plucked the pistol from Byron’s hands, and swung out the cylinder to begin loading. “In truth, I wanted something heavier than the thirty-two, and I also wanted more shots.”
“Wait a minute,” Byron reached out and tapped the cylinder. “Seven shots? When did they come out with this one? Your thirty-two only has five.”
“Uh-huh. New design.” Gotthilf was pouring powder into the cylinder chambers, tongue sticking out from between his teeth. At that moment he envied Byron the up-time .45 cartridges more than ever. He knew H&K was making some cartridge weapons, and he lusted after one of them, but the price of the ammunition was so high he just couldn’t justify it right then. Maybe in a few years. “I was in Farkas’ gun shop a few months ago, and I talked with the master gunsmith of H and K when he dropped by, told him what I wanted. They’ve been making six-shot forty-fours for a while. I asked for more, and he came back to me with this.”
“Hmm. Seven shots.” Byron obviously mused on that for a while as Gotthilf finished loading the cylinder. “Okay. With a percussion cap system, it will take that much longer to reload, though.”
“Maybe.” Gotthilf started loading the bullets into the chambers one at a time. “Remind me to tell you what Herr Farkas suggested when I complained about that.”
Byron stepped back when Gotthilf began placing the percussion caps on the chamber nipples. “That stuff makes me nervous, even in small doses.”
“Relax. H and K switched to the French caps, the potassium…potassium chlorate. It’s not nearly as sensitive.”
Gotthilf swung the cylinder into place in the gun frame, keeping it pointing down range. He reached into his vest pocket and pulled out the flat pill case he used to carry his wax ear plugs. Moments later, he was ready to shoot, and nodded to the range officer.
“Range is hot!” the officer yelled as Byron pulled his ear protectors back up.
Gotthilf waited for the range officer to give him the nod, took a two-handed grip, focused on the target through the sights, and began squeezing the trigger.
Bam!