"Wait and hope that General Brahe sends somebody for us."
". . . for the soul of our late brother in Christ, Ulrich, who was born a duke of Württemberg and died in the flower of his youth as a baptized and confirmed child of his savior, giving full faith to the forgiving grace of his God and acceptance of His righteousness."
"He was unconscious when he died," Merckel muttered. "He wasn't doing any believing at all."
"Hush, Lutz, the pastor isn't done."
"Man born of woman is of few days and full of trouble. He springs up like a flower and withers away; like a fleeting shadow, he does not endure (Job 14:1–2).
"As for man, his days are as grass; as a flower of the field, so he flourisheth. For the wind passeth over it, and it is gone; and the place thereof shall know it no more (Psalm 103:15–16)."
General Brahe's chaplain looked up from his prayer book. "Take comfort, however, from the promise that is associated with these words."
"For all flesh is as grass, and all the glory of man as the flower of grass. The grass withereth, and the flower thereof falleth away: but the word of the Lord endureth for ever (1 Peter 1:24–25)."
* * *
Friedrich laid his crutches down next to the stool. "I just wish," he said, "that the Lord could have seen fit to let our brother flourish and endure a little longer."
"It was a good funeral sermon." Eberhard rearranged his sling. "But, sometimes, other words seem more appropriate. Montaigne quoted some older writer as saying, 'It is no marvel that hazard has such power over us, since we live by hazard.' We die by hazard, as well, it seems."
"I like the other passage better."
"For, whatsoever some say, valor is all alike, and not one thing in the street or town, and another in the camp or field. A man should bear an illness in his bed as courageously as he does an injury in the field, and fear death no more at home in his house than abroad in an assault."
"I hope he didn't have time to be afraid at all. I hope that it all happened so fast that he didn't even see what hit him."
Mainz, May 1634
"The campaign was a great success," Botvidsson reported with satisfaction. "General Brahe was expecting a short, victorious war and that's what he got. The king—the emperor, I mean—is delighted and has extended his congratulations on behalf of the USE. According to the best intelligence we have received, the Sickingen family is headed for Bonn to take refuge with the archbishop elector of Cologne."
"I'm sure," Erik Stenbock said, "that dear Ferdinand will be delighted to have even more guests battening on his hospitality."
Buchenland, June 1634
"Who is this 'McDonnell' in the cartoon in the Mainz newspaper?" Geraldin asked. He threw it across the breakfast table in the castle of Karl von Schlitz, imperial knight of Buchenland.
"It's Dennis," Deveroux answered. "Drunk as a skunk. Some damned reporter must have heard about what happened last month. The Swedes can't tell the difference between 'Denis McDonnell' and 'Dennis MacDonald.' "
Geraldin examined his fingernails. "Neither can most Irishmen. He spells it 'McDonnell' sometimes himself."
Deveroux snorted. "We have a perfect right to misspell our own names. I'm sure I've signed mine a half-dozen different ways. Foreigners should be more considerate." He pointed across the table. "It's a pretty good likeness, don't you think, Dennis? The drool? The spittle? The vomit? The—"
"Arrrgh!"
"We miscalculated, back in March," Butler groused. "If we'd had any idea that Nils Brahe was going to take his forces haring off into the southern Palatinate and northern Alsace, we could have done a proper raid into Fulda. We wouldn't have run into any serious opposition. That Fulda Barracks Regiment is nothing but a bad joke."
"Spilt milk." Deveroux looked at von Schlitz. "You are sure, really sure, that the up-timers and Schweinsberg are wandering around this territory, with only minimal guards, trying to make the peasants happy?"
Von Schlitz had to do quite a bit of persuasion before the Irishmen were willing to believe it.
Butler shook his head. "If Taaffe and Carew were here, they would be trying to persuade me that this behavior by the up-timers is a dispensation of divine providence. It's almost enough to make me believe them."
Felix Gruyard smirked.
Fulda, June 1634
"So then they sent Duke Ulrich's body home." Derek Utt leaned against the window in the conference room, looking at the other up-timers in Fulda. "At least, they sent it as far as Belfort in Mömpelgard. That will be Montbéliard on the wall map there—that's the way the French spelled it, up-time. The family has a chapel there. It was too warm for them to try to get it across the Rhine to Stuttgart. If they want to bury it in the capital of the duchy, long-term, I guess the procedure is to wait a couple of years. Eberhard's feeling horrible about the whole thing, like it was his fault."