* * *
Over the next weeks, the girls of the Barbie Consortium did what they did best. They shopped. They bought cloth, they bought jewels, they bought bread and cake and buttons and bows. They bought flour by the ton and coal and bronze. Every purchase was recorded and went into Sarah’s database, and a picture of what the Austro-Hungarian reichsthaler was worth began to emerge. People like to think that one currency translates into another in terms of a simple exchange rate, but it’s not really true, any more than one language translates perfectly into another. An exchange rate is an average and that average will be accurate enough for some products, but way off the mark for others. Like the German word Weltanschauung can be translated as “world view,” but that translation is not completely accurate. In terms of money, it depends on where you are and what you want to buy. What Sarah developed wasn’t so much an exchange rate for the reichsthaler versus the American dollar, but a picture of what the reichsthaler was good for.
It wasn’t a pretty picture.
Abrabanel Offices outside Vienna
“Hello, Moses.” Karl Eusebius von Liechtenstein smiled as he was ushered into Moses Abrabanel’s tiny office. Then the smile died as he saw the yellow circle on Moses’ doublet. Jews in Grantville were not required to wear special signs on their clothing, and with Morris Roth as a major noble of Bohemia, they weren’t required to wear them in Bohemia either, though many still did. But here in Austria-Hungary, it was still a legal requirement. Quite to his own surprise, Karl suddenly realized that he was offended by it. The news out of the USE was full of the CoC and Operation Kristallnacht. Much as he knew and understood the political motivation, he remembered Henry Dreeson’s body, and was for the most part in sympathy with the CoC and Mike Stearns on this.
At the moment, he could see concern blooming on Moses’ face and wondered what his looked like. “I’m sorry, Moses. I have been living in Grantville these last years, and, well, sometimes I forget that the rest of the world has not changed as much as we would hope. It was the yellow circle. No one wears such things in Grantville unless they choose to. And not every one that wears one is Jewish. They are all the rage among a certain faction of the CoCs recently.”
Moses didn’t look especially reassured by Karl’s comments. “I’ve been concerned that there might be a reaction to the CoC operations here.”
“You think that likely?” Karl asked. “It’s not Jews stringing up the anti-Semites in the USE.”
“That’s a distinction not commonly made in the midst of a pogrom.” Then the Jewish banker shook his head. “Never mind, Your Serene Highness. What can I do for you?”
“You have been loaning the Sanderlin-Fortney Investment Company money for the past several months, I understand?”
“Your Serene Highness, with all respect, our dealings with the SFIC are a private matter and it would be inappropriate for me to discuss them with you. You wouldn’t want us bandying about any dealings we might have with your family, would you?”
“No, and that’s fine. I got the information, including the numbers, from Hayley Fortney. I’m here with her knowledge and consent to buy the debt.”
“Why?” Moses blurted, then blushed all the way to his receding hairline.
“Because Hayley is approaching her credit limit, and her fellow Barbies are coming to the rescue. I’m the Ken Doll, I’ll have you know. And the Ken Doll is supposed to stand around looking good and giving the Barbies money. Judy says it’s a rule.”
Moses Abrabanel blinked and his mouth fell open. Karl found himself laughing out loud. “The Barbies are backing the SFIC, and the Liechtenstein family is backing the Barbies. SFIC’s credit may now be considered as good as any in the Austro-Hungarian Empire, and better than most.”
Now Moses was giving Karl a very sharp look. “Why?” he said again. This time it wasn’t shock, but calculation.
“Because it’s a good investment,” Karl explained. “Yes, they are carrying people, but most of those people are hard-working and if some of them will fail to pay the SFIC back in full, most will. The SFIC can afford the loss of the occasional default or forgiven loan better than the loss of business.”
Moses nodded, slowly at first, but then with more vigor. “I see, and if I could I would extend them more credit. But with the loss of Bohemia and the rest, the empire has been leaning on its other sources of income with more force than might be entirely wise. To put it bluntly, Your Serene Highness, the Abrabanel family in Austria-Hungary is teetering on the edge.”