It hadn’t taken the king long to make clear that he had no objection. Obviously, Wallenstein understood that the main reason Mike and his Third Division had been sent to Bohemia was to get him out of the USE for political reasons, not to satisfy Wallenstein’s request for military support.
“Meaning no offense, Michael,” the king had rasped, “but I don’t need foot soldiers—nor did I ask for them. What I could use, and did ask for, was air support so I could keep an eye on Austrian troop movements.”
He shifted uncomfortably in his bed. “Which I didn’t get, even though I’ve built two of the best airfields in Europe—one right here in Prague, the other in České Budějovice. And now I don’t have the use of the Jew’s plane either, since his idiot pilot crashed the thing in Dresden. Your man Nasi tells me it’ll be months before the plane is repaired and able to fly again.”
Mike saw no point in arguing the matter of whether or not Francisco Nasi was “his man.” In some ways, that description was still accurate, he supposed. His former spymaster was now operating his own independent business as what amounted to a contract espionage agency, but he’d made clear to Mike that he would be glad to provide him whatever assistance he could. Given that Francisco was now residing in Prague himself, Mike had every intention of taking him up on the offer. He’d already met with him twice, in fact, since he arrived the week before.
“I may be able to assist you there,” he said. “I’m having an airfield built in Děčín”—he used the Czech pronunciation for Tetschen—“to provide air support for Colonel Higgins and his regiment, in the event Holk launches a surprise attack.”
Both he and Wallenstein maintained completely straight faces. Perhaps Mike rushed the next sentence just a little bit.
“But I see no reason that whatever plane Colonel Wood can free up from the air force to come down here can’t also overfly the Austrian lines.”
Wallenstein had been satisfied with that, and no further mention was made of Mike’s convoluted logistics. The king had wrung the little bell next to his bed and Edith had practically rushed back into the room. She’d become quite devoted to the man, by all accounts—which included gunning down the assassins who’d tried to murder Wallenstein shortly before he seized power, in addition to tending to his medical needs.
“Edith thinks he’s dying, Mike,” said Judith. “Wallenstein just won’t listen to her medical advice.”
“God-damned astrologers were bad enough,” Morris growled. “Now he’s got these new Kirlian aura screwballs whispering in his ear.”
Mike cocked his head quizzically. “Which screwballs? I can’t keep track of all these seventeenth century superstitions.”
“I’m afraid this one’s our doing, Mike,” said Judith. “It’s based on Kirlian photography, which was developed up-time. Nobody in Grantville ever took seriously the idea that Kirlian images showed a person’s life force—the ‘aura,’ to use the lingo. Unfortunately, Doctor Gribbleflotz stumbled across some references to it in one of the Grantville libraries and…”
“The rest was a foregone conclusion,” said Morris.
Herr Doctor Phillip Theophrastus Gribbleflotz—a great-grandson of Paracelsus, as he never tired of reminding people—was an alchemist who had an uncanny knack for reinterpreting up-time science in a down-time framework, and making a bundle of money in the process. He’d made his first fortune with baking soda, which he renamed Sal Aer Fixus. A little later he’d made aspirin, which he dyed blue on the grounds that blue was the color of serenity. Much to Tom Stone’s disgust, Doctor Gribbleflotz’s brand had outsold the straight-forward stuff produced by Stone’s pharmaceutical works. Eventually, when his father got distracted by something else, Ron Stone quietly ordered the chemists to start dying their own aspirin blue as well. Sales picked up right away.
“Don’t tell me,” Mike chuckled.
“Yep,” said Morris. “Before you could say ‘hogwash,’ Gribbleflotz had half the nobility in the Germanies and Bohemia hooked on the notion, seems like. He charges a small fortune to show someone his so-called ‘aura,’ and then…well…”
He drifted into an uncomfortable silence. His wife gave him a glance and smiled. “What Morris isn’t telling you is that we’re making quite a bit of money from the side-effects.”
“How so?”
Morris made a face. “Somehow or other—I didn’t do it, I swear I didn’t, and neither did Tom Stone—people got the idea that once someone knew their Kirlian aura they needed to complement it with the proper costume and jewelry. So all of a sudden there’s a booming demand for exotic dyes and exotic gem-cuts. Tom’s dye works supplies most of the former and my jewelry makers provide most of the latter.”