The Grantville Gazette - Volume 7 Part 12

"Well, Mister Onofrio, what can I say? It seemed like a good idea at the time."

"Chief, you just sent the biggest jerk in the whole town to represent us to the greatest intellectual mind that Germany is likely to produce this century."

"Never heard of him," Chief Richards replied.

"He probably didn't live long enough to make it into our history books. Beyond doubt, he will be in the ones we're writing now. His published work on philosophy guarantees that, even if he never writes another word. We can't have him thinking that jacka.s.s, Jimmy d.i.c.k, represents Grantville. You've got tostop it." Chief Richards knew Emmanuel must be a very fl.u.s.tered academic. He wasn't just speaking forcefully, he was nearly shouting.

"I don't see what I can do about it. Having dinner isn't a crime. If you feel that strongly about it, go talk to Jimmy d.i.c.k. Now, is there anything else I can help you with before I get back to work?" Chief Richards was getting a bit annoyed. He wasn't used to being yelled at in his own office.

Emmanuel put his kickstand down outside of Club 250 within a few minutes of leaving the police station. As he read the sign, 'No Dogs And No germans Allowed', his mind corrected the missed capital letter. Then he realized it had been done that way on purpose. He took a deep breath, squared his shoulders and entered the den to bait the lions.

Ken looked up as Emmanuel walked in. Emmanuel could see that Ken didn't immediately recognize him. Then he apparently decided that Emmanuel was obviously an up-timer, probably okay. The old man approached the bar and Ken asked, "What can I get ya'?"

"I'm looking for Jimmy d.i.c.k," Emmanuel said.

"He ain't here," Ken answered.

"You're Ken Beasley, right?" Emmanuel asked.

"Yeah," Ken answered.

"I'm Emmanuel Onofrio," Emmanuel said.

"Ralph's uncle?" Ken asked.

"Or his brother, depending on which Ralph you're referring to. Perhaps you can help me. I need to convince Jimmy d.i.c.k to not keep that dinner date tonight."

"Why?"

"Mister Beasley," Emmanuel started to explain but was interrupted.

"Call me Ken," Ken said. "The only people who call me Mister Beasley in here are cops here on official business."

"Ken, Jimmy d.i.c.k is the b.u.t.t of a horrible joke. A joke that's in very bad taste, I might add, perpetrated by the police department."

"Manny, we knew that when we sent the note accepting the invitation," Ken said.

Emmanuel ignored being called Manny. The old man detested that nickname, but was dealing with a shock of his own at the moment. "You knew?"

"Sure," Ken said.

"Then why did he accept?"

"Well, Grantville is going to be laughing about this for years to come. We decided we'd rather have them laughing at some d.a.m.ned Kraut stuffed shirt than at one of our own," Ken explained.

"But, Mister Beasley, Ken, that Kraut stuffed shirt is Wilhelm Krieger. He's here to research our philosophy before he writes about it for all of Europe to read." When it came to Herr Krieger's purpose Emmanuel was guessing. Correctly, as it turned out, but still just guessing.

"Really?"

"Do you actually want all of Europe to judge us by Herr Krieger's impression of Jimmy d.i.c.k?"

Emmanuel asked.

Ken looked taken aback for a moment. The stakes were a lot higher than he had realized, apparently. Still, he asked, "Do you really want Jimmy to spend the rest of his life being laughed at over this?"

Emmanuel started to speak and paused with his mouth open. He hadn't thought of that. He was angrywith himself. In an argument you take the time that your opponent is speaking to plan your next point. In a discussion you listen to the other party and think about what was said before responding. He hated arguing and was annoyed with himself for having slipped into one. Still, he had to try. "Mister Beasley, this is important. Way too important to leave in the hands of Jimmy d.i.c.k Shaver."

"Well, the cops should've thought of that before they set him up to take a pratfall. Shouldn't they have?"

"I can't agree with you more. Their behavior is reprehensible. But what can you do, report them to the police?" Emmanuel asked.

Ken actually laughed. The hostility that had been building was, provisionally, set aside, though it was ready to hand and could be easily put back in play.

"Where is Jimmy d.i.c.k? Perhaps I can reason with him," Emmanuel said.

"I doubt it." Ken smiled. "His mind is pretty well made up. Have a seat and a beer on the house.

Jimmy will be back shortly. He's gone out to nail down his interpreter for tonight."

That caught Emmanuel's curiosity. "Who is he getting?"

"He wants Old Joe Jenkins."

"That old hillbilly?"

"Yep." Ken nodded. "Jimmy said he heard him translatin' sermons, German to English and English to German right down to the emotional slant of the preacher and was never more than one word behind. He also said that Old Joe Jenkins was the smartest man he had ever met."

Emmanuel was shocked to find that he was angry or jealous and chided himself for it. Why should he care about the opinion of the biggest jacka.s.s in a town half full of petty, close minded people? Besides he had never really met Jimmy d.i.c.k, so the poor man didn't really know what a smart man was. Then he chided himself for being overly proud and again for being uncharitable to the village he grew up in and had chosen to retire to.

"Who's his other second?" Emmanuel asked.

"Huh?" Ken looked confused.

"Jimmy has been challenged to a duel of wits. He's taking two seconds. One is Joe Jenkins. Who is the other one?"

"I don't think that's been settled yet," Ken said. He knew for a fact that Jimmy was a.s.suming he would be the third member of the party. He wasn't thrilled with the idea. Fresh organic fertilizer had a way of splattering anyone close by when it hit the fan and he didn't want to deal with it. A thought grew in his mind and a smile grew on his face. "But I think it should be you."

Fritz Shuler was ecstatic. On a week night his struggling restaurant, Grantville Fine Foods was booked to capacity. He hadn't had a night like this since the opening rush. The crowd was almost all up-timers, for a change. There was one reservation from a down-timer. Then the calls started trickling in.

The trickle steadily increased until he was turning people away.

Fritz was frantically putting the final touches on the new policy that he hoped would be the salvation of his investment. He had researched up-time dining before he opened. He found a paper maker who would make paper plates and napkins. His niece bought plastic flatware and cups at school from anyone who would sell them.

He had set out to provide an authentic West Virginia dining experience. He featured catfish, Kentucky style chicken cooked in a very expensive "pressure cooker," and beef grilled to order, on top of a full menu. The down-timers found it charming but up-timers didn't come back.

Someone finally explained the difference between fast food and fine food. After tonight when diners arrived they would be asked, "Paper or cloth napkins?" But tonight, except for the one table, everyone would have real linen, silver flatware, fine china and gla.s.s. He hadn't planned to start that until next weekbut when the river floods, it's time to float the logs.

After a hard day of frantic preparations the night was not going well. People who arrived at six were lingering over coffee and wine, as if waiting for something. People who had a seven o'clock reservation were arriving early, as if they were afraid they would miss something. Customers were piling up in the waiting area. There were no open tables except for the one set for six with paper and plastic. Fritz was not going to put an up-time patron there. He gritted his teeth and started pa.s.sing out free wine.

The down-timers arrived a bit early. Oddly, no one in the waiting area objected to being pa.s.sed over. Fritz showed them to the table where they immediately examined the place settings in detail as was typical of a first time down-timer diner. Fritz was shocked when the rest of the party arrived and were up-timers. Well, it was too late to change things now.

Fritz showed the new arrivals to the table. Before they could seat themselves one of the down-timers stood up. Fritz was startled and just a bit worried.

In pa.s.sable English the standing man said, "Herr Krieger suspects that he is being played for a fool."

From the look on his face the interpreter was completely convinced of it and was more than a little pleased about it for some reason.

Emmanuel's heart dropped. He had hoped he could take the conversation into Latin, the language of scholarship, and control the night. Now the game was lost before it started. All he could think to do was apologize profusely. Before he could start Joe Jenkins spoke up.

"Why does he suspect that?" Joe asked.

It was a fair question, Emmanuel thought, but something about the way Joe said it was . . . Latin! It was Latin; accented but understandable Latin. Where did a dumb hillbilly learn Latin?

The interpreter looked perplexed. Emmanuel guessed that he didn't know Latin, just his native dialect of German and the pa.s.sable English he had picked up somewhere. Herr Krieger, on the other hand, was suddenly focused completely on Joseph. He motioned for the interpreter to sit down.

"My man here claimed to have overheard a conversation leading him to believe d.i.c.k Head is not a name but an insult," he said in crisp Latin. His voice was quite tainted with suspicion and hostility.

"Well, he is right about it being no one's proper name." Joseph continued speaking in Latin, to Emmanuel's ongoing amazement. "I am Joseph Loudoun Jenkins, now commonly known as Old Joe.

When I was young I was known was Low Down Jenkins. Over there is Emmanuel Onofrio, known to his students as Oman Frio, meaning Old man 'Frio. Don't look sour, Emmanuel. You know it's so.

Emmanuel is otherwise known as Ralph's brother or Ralph's uncle, depending upon the age of the speaker. Your third guest is James Richard Shaver, commonly known as Jimmy d.i.c.k, sometimes called d.i.c.k Head."

"Why?" Wilhelm asked.

Joe began to answer. "Well, sir." Hearing the West Virginia accent and word choice coming out of Joseph's mouth while speaking Latin was amazing to Emmanuel. Still, somehow, it felt like Joseph was yet going to pull it out of the soup. "We came from a very busy time. Anything we could do to get things done faster we did it. Even our language was rushed. We didn't have time to say 'The United States of America,' so we said 'the U.S.A.' When I was a young man we had a 'President,' a leader named Eisenhower. He was very highly esteemed. Everyone referred to him as Ike. Later two presidents in a row were known by initials, J.F.K. and then L.B.J." Joseph answered the question while completely ignoring what was asked.

"Are we just goin' t' stand here or what?" Jimmy d.i.c.k spoke up.

Herr Krieger's interpreter translated the question into German. Wilhelm nodded slightly and motioned to the chairs with a slight hand movement. Emmanuel realized that James was a loose cannon who was getting irate about not knowing what was going on. He started translating the Latin into English for him.

"So you shorten names for convenience. That is nothing that we do not do. But he is d.i.c.k Head. Isthat not an insult?" Wilhelm asked.

"Have you studied Hebrew, Herr Krieger?" Joseph asked.

"Briefly." Wilhelm said. "There were works I wanted to read, but in the end it proved more workable to have them translated."

"I know what you mean. I tried to learn Hebrew and Greek but it was more time than I could spare back then. Knowing French helped when I decided to learn Latin six months ago," Joseph said.

"You have only been working on Latin for six months? Incredible," Wilhelm said. Emmanuel agreed.

"We Americans do things in a hurry. I thought I might need it for dealing with the Catholics, so I was motivated. As I was saying about Hebrew, you know that the word 'Rosh' can translate as 'first' or 'top'

or 'head.' d.i.c.k can be used in English to mean 'p.e.n.i.s.' But it also can mean 'any man' for obvious reasons. Like the words," he shifted to English for two words "lumberjack and steeplejack. So, yes, it can be an insult. But then, to misquote scripture, 'a philosopher is not without honor except in his own home.'"

Wilhelm smiled and started to call for wine by picking up his gla.s.s and holding it in the air. But he stopped with the red plastic cup only inches off the table. "Why are we the only ones who have these?"

he asked.

"s.h.i.t," Jimmy d.i.c.k said. "They came from up-time with us and when they're gone they're gone.

You're being honored." He swallowed the words, 'ya dumb Kraut', because Emmanuel had impressed on him how important the dinner was. "Honored with a piece of the future. Everybody else here tonight has to make do with the here and now."

Emmanuel started translating what was said into Latin before Herr Krieger's man could give an uncensored version. People at the nearby tables seemed to be taken with sudden fits of coughing.

"Waiter, wine for my guests," Wilhelm Krieger called out. When he did it seemed as if there was a pause in conversation while he spoke. The noise level in the room unquestionably went back up when he set his gla.s.s down. "This," he waved his hand to include everything on the table, is truly amazing, so light, yet strong." He picked up a fork and looked at it skeptically. "Can you truly eat with this? It seems like it would break."

Emmanuel was busy translating German to English for Jimmy d.i.c.k, who was amongst the minority in Grantville who refused to learn German. So the conversation fell to Joseph, who responded in German.

"They can break if you try cutting meat with them, so you use the knife. They were made to be thrown away after one use."

"Truly?" Wilhelm asked with raised eyebrows. "What of the expense?"

"You could buy a box of one hundred for less than you earned in an hour," Joseph replied. "They were not highly esteemed but it saved the time of washing up. Our thought was 'anything to save time.'

We were a very busy people."

Herr Krieger's eyebrows went up again. Emmanuel could almost see him thinking that there was a fortune to be made here.

"Unfortunately, we can't make any more. Even if we had the equipment, the materials are not available. These are the last for at least ten years," Joseph said.

"Unfortunate, indeed. Do you teach at the local academy also?" Krieger asked.

"No. I don't have the credentials it takes to do that," Joseph said.

"But with your Latin . . . and you are a philosopher, surely?"

"Neither Latin nor philosophy are much regarded." Turning to Emmanuel, Joseph said, "Why don't you tell Herr Krieger about the school system."

Emmanuel set about giving a detailed account of Grantville's schools. As far as he was concerned, he was justifiably proud of them, even if they were on the low side of average up-time. Joseph translated forJimmy this time. Ordering food interrupted the flow of Emmanuel's lecture, but he eventually concluded with, "I would put our high school graduates up against Jena's University students when it comes to general knowledge. When it comes to specialized knowledge, I would match Jena graduates with ours in the same field. Of course, we have areas of study that they do not." He was thinking drivers' ed, and then others.

The food arrived. Diners began to leave while others arrived and took seats. It didn't look like the hoped for fireworks were going to happen. No one had the Latin to follow the conversation, so why stay?

"Your colleague says Latin and philosophy are not esteemed?" Wilhelm asked.

"We offer Latin as an elective. Philosophy is covered as part of English literature," Emmanuel answered.

Herr Krieger cautiously cut at his steak with the plastic knife and was visibly surprised that it worked.

The silent bodyguard tried cutting his with the fork. It broke in his hand. A staff member immediately turned up with a set of silver utensils for him, and took the knife and spoon away. Emmanuel had the chicken. It was quite good. It had been so long since he last had Kentucky chicken that he couldn't tell the difference. The slaw, mashed potatoes and gravy were superlative.

After his first bite Wilhelm Krieger reverted to Latin. "Herr Head, is war mankind's greatest glory or it's greatest shame?"