He spread his hands. "Your father, you understand."
Ulrik had to suppress a sudden spike of near-hysterical laughter.
"Yes, I understand. My father."
The up-time texts and records didn't really have very much concerning the history of Denmark, taken as a whole. It had been a small and unimportant country in their time, and not close to their own. But there was a fair amount in the libraries in Grantville—the woman with the huge and eccentric personal library had had even more, which she'd been kind enough to let Ulrik examine—concerning King Christian IV himself. A very flamboyant and long-lived monarch he'd been, it seemed, who'd been quite popular with his people despite his seemingly endless excesses. Ulrik's father had made such an impression on his land that he would be one of the few monarchs of the era still vividly remembered centuries in the future.
Remembered for many things. One of them being the fact that he'd produced over two dozen children, a goodly number of them illegitimate.
Such was Ulrik's father, for good or ill. You could hardly expect such a man to satisfy himself with one or two special projects for his navy—when he could conceive a dozen.
"You're certain?"
"Yes, Your Highness. I did the calculations. If we'd started earlier, things would be different. Starting now . . ."
Norddahl's eyes went to the prototype. "Even now, if you could persuade your father to drop everything else, I think I could get enough made and put in place to close the Øresund. That would protect Copenhagen, at least. But there's no chance any longer that we could make and place enough to close off even the Little Belt, much less the Great Belt."
"Either of which would allow Admiral Simpson access to the Baltic—and our fleet blockading Luebeck."
"Yes, Your Highness."
"Let's assume—for the moment—that I could keep the king pried off your back enough to allow you to devote . . . oh, let's say one-half of your efforts to the mines."
Norddahl's eyes narrowed and grew a bit unfocused, while he did his calculations.
"I couldn't close off the Øresund. But I could certainly make and put in place enough mines to make it dangerous for the enemy's ships."
"And you're certain that one of these mines would be enough to sink an American ironclad? I've seen them, Baldur. At something of a distance, of course. They were friendly enough, when I passed through Magdeburg, very respectful of my diplomatic status, but they obviously weren't going to let me into the shipyards. But even under construction, seen from afar, they are formidable looking things."
Norddahl chuckled again. "Oh, yes, Your Highness. I've never been able to get my hands on a copy of the actual plans, but there's really no great mystery about the ironclads. Give me the wherewithal and enough time—"
He waved at one of the projects looming darkly in a corner. "—and I could build one myself. Though even the king agrees that would take far too long, so I've never done much but fiddle with it. But one thing is known for sure. However much armor the ironclads may carry above the water, the hulls themselves are just wooden hulls. These mines are powerful enough they'd probably even hole an iron hull. They'll certainly shatter a wooden one."
Ulrik nodded, and then looked back toward the area where the spar torpedo project was underway.
"And how many of those could you have ready by May? Assuming—for the moment—that I could give you enough breathing space to devote . . . oh, half the time that's left, after the mines. I'm afraid there's no way around the fact that you'll have to keep at least a quarter of your effort devoted to these other ridiculous schemes. I can keep my father at a distance, to a point. But I'd have as much chance of fending off a great bear with my hands as I would keeping my illustrious sire from meddling at all."
He was a bit startled to realize how far he'd allowed himself to discard circumlocutions in the presence of a man who was, technically, nothing but a servant. His instincts had led him there, though, and Ulrik trusted his instincts about people. He'd come to have a great deal of confidence in Baldur Norddahl, and needed to make sure the reverse was true as well. This was going to be a desperate enough business, under the best of circumstances. If anything was to work at all, it would require a close bond between a prince of Denmark and a Norwegian adventurer, rascally as he might be.
Baldur had been pondering the question. "It's not quite as simple as that, Your Highness. I could have a number of boats built and ready with spar torpedoes, by May. But I have a bad feeling they won't do much good."