It was obvious to Noelle that Cavriani often worked closely with the CoCs, in addition to being a revolutionary of some kind in his own right. So, she was still working very much in what, in a now-gone uptime world, would have been called "gray operations."
Steve Salatto wouldn't approve of what she was doing, of course. He'd be especially irate if he found out she was doing it behind his back. But his position made him oblivious to a lot of things, anyway. The real problem was Johnnie F., who wasn't oblivious to much of anything.
On the other hand . . .
Johnnie F. was also a past master at the art of looking the other way, when it suited him. Noelle was pretty sure he'd do it again here, if he found out.
Grantville, Late November, 1633
At first, the LDS church in Grantville had more or less decided that Willard Thornton ought to stay in town for the rest of the winter. It wasn't the best traveling weather. That suited his wife Emma just fine. She would even be glad—delighted, ecstatic, and enthusiastic, she told her friends—to listen to him hum "Dry Bones" just as often as it crossed his mind. Just as long as he was home and safe.
Then the letter came from Bamberg. Frau Stadtraetin Färber reported that her husband had been disabled by a stroke. She believed that it was apoplexy, brought on by the events of September. She had saved Herr Thornton's bicycle, with the many copies of the Book of Mormon in the saddlebags. She had taken the liberty of giving some of them to her friends, since she knew that Herr Thornton had been giving them away.
The Frau Stadtraetin wrote further that she wished that the missionary would return to Bamberg. She and her friends would benefit from further explanation of many passages in the book. If she might be so bold, she advised that, if possible, he should bring his wife, since a woman could go many places that a man could not—at least, that a man could not go without arousing suspicion. She made an offer, and a joke. She would gladly be a Lydia to their Paul, providing them with hospitality in her home.
Howard Carstairs read the letter to the whole congregation. Because of his army service in Germany, he had become sort of Johnny-on-the-Spot for things like this. Reading the letter aloud, he realized that Willard's reports had left the umlaut off her name, and it was not Farber. It was Färber. Dyer. Symbolic.
No one said anything. His father and Willard's father looked at one another. Those two, Levi Carstairs and Harold Thornton, were the senior men in the church. Logically, they should have been making the decisions. More and more, though, it seemed like they looked at one another and then looked at Howard.
They looked at Howard. Monroe Wilson looked at Howard. Amos Sterling looked at Howard. As did Alden Blodger and Leland Nisbet. Ted B. Warren was looking at him. Myles Halvorsen was looking at him. All the other men were out of town.
Howard said, "We should pray about this overnight." Everyone seemed to find that acceptable. He prayed; then he slept.
In the morning, he knew what they should do. That seemed to be happening more and more, too. Henceforth, the LDS missionary standard would not be pairs of young men, but pairs of mature married couples. Even if it was more expensive. The other men agreed; clearly, that was what they should do. It was obvious, now that Howard had mentioned it. The down-timers respected maturity; they would not pay much attention to boys not old enough to have finished their journeyman years.
Over warm broth at her kitchen table, Emma said, "Willard can start out now. I need to finish the semester, I really do. I'll give Victor Saluzzo my resignation Monday, though. He can find someone else for senior lit by the time second semester starts. I'll join Willard after New Year's. I think that I should stay with the kids for Christmas. The kids need to stay here for school. I won't have time to home-school them in Bamberg, if I'm being a missionary. Our two, plus the two German boys who are boarding with us." She looked at Howard expectantly.
"Arthur and Bev will take your two. Joel and Gigi will take the boys."
Howard knew that, too. He just, well, somehow, knew things these days. Not things about the business, or whether Liz wanted him to pick up pork chops for dinner. For those, he still had to calculate an estimate or pick up the phone. Things he needed to know.
Chapter 6: "I shall nonetheless do this"
Franconia, December, 1633
"Where are we?" Maydene Utt asked. Maydene, the "large one" of the three uptime auditors provided to the Franconian administration by Arnold Bellamy, always had a tendency to take charge of things.
"Somewhere northeast of a town called Gerolzhofen. That was Gerolzhofen, about a mile and a half back. The town that we had to go around. At least, according to Johnnie F.'s map, it should have been. Locked up tighter than a drum behind its walls. `See us on your way back, after we've verified your credentials.'"