The Viennese Waltz(120)
“There’s going to be trouble!” said an older dock worker. “You don’t embarrass an archduke like that.”
“They’re up-timers,” said a waitress.
“So what? Sonny Fortney is an up-timer and he’s just a regular guy. It’s not like he’s noble.”
The waitress pulled a BarbieCo stock certificate out of her pocket. It was a trudi, the best tip she had gotten that morning. She waved it at him. “Does Sonny Fortney have his own money?”
The dock worker laughed. “That’s a trudi,” he said grandly, “and she’s not an up-timer.”
“Fine. You go grab her and see what happens to your balls,” the waitress shot back.
“Not me, lass,” he said, reaching for her, but not at all suddenly, and she slipped away. “I like my women with a little maturity.”
She sniffed, but smiled a little as she headed for the next table. She was a decade older than the Barbies.
The social status of the Barbies and the up-timers became a major topic of conversation all over Race Track City. It was clear that you could be an up-timer and not a Barbie, or a Barbie and not an up-timer. It was also clear, given that the Barbies weren’t arrested, that Judy Wendell was of a rank that could, given provocation, knee the emperor’s brother in the balls and get away with it. But what gave her that rank was a matter that was entirely murky. Was it being a Barbie or being an up-timer?
St. Stephen’s Cathedral, Vienna
“I told you,” Father Lamormaini said to Gundaker von Liechtenstein. “They have no respect for the natural order of things, no sense of their proper place at all. It was intentional. I’m convinced of it. She enticed the archduke in order to embarrass the emperor and his family.”
Gundaker’s experience with Archduke Leopold didn’t indicate that he needed all that much in the way of enticement. The boy had a weakness for pretty things, though he was usually more discreet in the matter.
Still, Gundaker nodded to Father Lamormaini. The man was moving farther and farther into fanaticism and that might be useful at some point. Even so, after agreeing Gundaker added, “But we must be careful, Father. We can’t let them tempt us to rash actions.”
CHAPTER 30
Mud, Blood, and Beer
September 1635
Liechtenstein Tower Construction Site, Vienna
The scraper was down six feet below street level now and they were running into real problems.
The basement was a well.
Johann’s foot sank into the mud and the ox he was following wasn’t doing much better. The scraper was sinking into the mud. “Leonhard, we have to do something about the seepage!” Johann shouted.
He was overheard by no less a personage than Karl Eusebius von Liechtenstein, who was here observing the construction preparations for the Liechtenstein Tower, in preference to observing the towering rage of his uncles.
Gundaker was much the worst, but Maximilian wasn’t happy either. Sarah was taking the attitude that Leo got what he was asking for and if the emperor didn’t like it, they could all go home while the whole Austro-Hungarian Empire sank into its massive debt. That threat was pretty effective, more so because Gundaker really wanted Karl and Sarah’s marriage to happen. He wanted Karl’s children out of the succession, and wanted it badly. It was reassuring in a way, in spite of Gundaker’s recent association with the Spanish and Borja faction.
The whole city had been tense since Pope Urban had been forced out of Rome. There were clear fault lines over the crisis in the church, and while the royal house was tending toward the Urban faction, they had not declared for him. Judy’s knee might just move them to the Borja faction. Certainly, the Dominicans seemed to be flocking around Leo.
What possessed the girl?
No.
Karl knew exactly what had possessed her. The exact same thing that possessed all the up-timers. That up-timer sense of self-worth. It was what he expected from his fellow aristocrats, “the best bloodlines in Europe,” but it had come as quite a shock when he had first gotten to Grantville and realized that all the up-timers had it. And a whole bunch of the down-timers that associated with them were developing it.
Damn it, what possessed Leo?
No.
Karl knew what had possessed Leo too. He simply hadn’t realized what he was dealing with. What if he had done that to Gretchen Richter? She’d have used a knife, not a knee.
He would have to find a way to talk to Leo, try to explain. Karl had gotten used to up-timer attitudes over the years, and had moved the up-timers into the category of nobles in his mind, without even realizing it. That was Gundaker’s trouble with Sarah. Well, most of it anyway. That he hadn’t moved up-timers into the category of noble.