"Grantville Gazette.Volume IX" - читать интересную книгу автора (Flint Eric)

Anna the Baptist
Terry Howard

December, 1634

Julio stacked clean glasses under the bar. "Damn it Ken! I don't know what's got you riled but I'm sick of it! Back off or I'm goin' home. I don't have t' have this job. I only took it to help you out."

Julio didn't mention his fear of losing his regular job to what he thought of as cheap foreign labor. The fear drove him to drink, something he'd done little of before the Ring of Fire. He did his drinking in the one place a man didn't have to put up with "krauts." This led to a part time job.

Julio had been sitting at the bar, contemplating the world at the bottom of his beer, when Ken yelled, "Julio!"

He looked up and said, "Yes?"

Ken Beasley calmed down immediately. "I'm sorry, Mister Mora. I'm almost out of glasses and I was yelling at my dish washer. I forgot he quit."

"You need a dish washer?" Julio tipped his beer, set the empty down on the bar and headed for the swinging door to the kitchen.

"Hey, the bathroom's that way." Ken pointed.

"I know," Julio answered.

"Where're you goin'?"

"To wash dishes."

Someone called out, "Hey, Ken, where's my beer?" First things first, Ken took care of the customer, then another one, then he cleaned up a spill. By this time there was a tray of glasses under the bar. Glasses and customers kept coming. The stack stayed topped off and all the glasses were clean. Ken quit checking.

At closing, Ken remembered someone was working for him that he hadn't hired. He found Julio mopping the kitchen floor. To Ken's disappointment Julio would only take the job part time. Short of hiring a kraut, what was he going to do?

"Sorry, Julio," Ken said. "It's the damned krauts."

Julio relaxed. Ken had his full sympathy. The Ring of Fire changed everything, mostly. He still spent third shift mopping, vacuuming, cleaning bathrooms, and washing windows at the bank and elsewhere. Food had changed. Bread didn't come pre-sliced in plastic bags. Canning jars came up out of the basement. Pepper had to be ground. Salt didn't come in round boxes anymore. Ken had him take an ice pick and make the holes in all of the salt shakers bigger, but getting it out was still a problem. The big difference, though, was "the krauts."

"I'm sorry," Ken continued. "I'd hardly gotten to sleep last night when, at the crack of dawn, a bunch of damned krauts woke me up singing hymns off key, right out side my window!"

"What're you talkin' about?"

"My neighbor, damned hypocrite, is letting a bunch of damn bible-thumping krauts use his storage shed for a church," Ken said.

"They can't do that! It's not been consecrated. You can't have a church without an altar, or an altar with out a relic. The saint has to be installed by a bishop. They sure wouldn't put one in a garage." Julio didn't get to Mass as often as he should, but knew his catechism from when he was an altar boy. "When the cops stop in, you tell 'em about it. If people can complain about us making noise late at night, then they ought'a do something about the krauts waking you up."

"The cops?" Ken growled. "Just great! What in hell are they doin' here?"

"They're here every Sunday," Julio said. The police investigated every complaint. As sure as God made little green hypocrites, one of the old ladies in town called the station after Sunday dinner and complained.

As Julio predicted the cops showed up on a noise complaint.

The cops were Hans and Hans. One was Hans Shruer, the other was Hans Shultz. Ken Beasley couldn't remember which was which. It didn't matter. They came in a matched set, Catholic and Lutheran. It was too bad the sign on the door, "No Dogs And No germans Allowed," didn't apply to cops.

As cops went, Hans and Hans were all business. If they talked to each other about anything else, it ended in an argument about religion. They sure couldn't talk of families. Hans Shruer had watched from the hill while a Catholic troop burned his home, raped his mother and sister and tortured his father. Hans hated Catholics, collectively and individually. The only redeeming fact in a Catholic's favor was he would be spending eternity in Hell. The sooner he got there, the better.

Hans Shultz's family had been well off before the Lutherans came. They lost over half of the family and everything but the clothes on their backs. Compared to Hans Shultz's attitude towards Lutherans, Hans Shruer was a soft spoken, forgiving moderate.

"You want to talk about noise?" Ken blew up. "What are you going to do about those damned Baptists waking me up at the crack of dawn with their singing?"

"Mister Beasley, you live over a mile from the Baptist church, and they start at ten," Hans Shultz said.

"Well, maybe it wasn't dawn but I'd just gotten to sleep. And I'm talkin' about the ones who've moved into the garage behind my house!"

A blond haired, heavy set man in a plaid shirt sitting at the bar spoke up. "They ain't Baptist. That's why they got thrown out of the church. They're Anna Baptist. But I got no idea who Anna is."

Jimmy Dick called out, "Read your bible, Bubba. Anna Baptist is John Baptist's sister."

Julio spoke up to straighten Dick out. "Anna is the mother of the Blessed Virgin Mary, the mother of God." He had stacked a half full tray of glasses on the pile under the bar as an excuse to leave the sink when the cops showed up.

"Well, if that don't beat all," Bubba said. "No wonder they got tossed. It's bad enough, the Catholics worshipin' Mary. Now you got people worshipin' her mother! Humf." He snorted. "Sssshit! Does that make her the grandmother of God?"

At the accusation that Catholics worshiped Mary, Hans Shultz started to object. Veneration is not worship. It might be a small hair to split, but the difference is very important to knowledgeable Catholics. At the words "Anna Baptist" Hans lost all interest in straightening out one ignorant, obnoxious up-timer.

"Anabaptist?" Hans Shruer asked in a shocked voice.

"Yeah." Bubba agreed. "That's what I said. Anna Baptist."

Hans and Hans looked at each other in apprehension bordering on fear.

Hans Shultz spoke slowly in a soft voice, as if it were bad luck to speak the name aloud. "Anabaptist."

Ken was very good at reading people, especially people who were scared or angry or just plain crazy enough to start a fight. Fights were bad for business. Hans and Hans suddenly needed watching. "What's wrong with Anna Baptist?"

"Mister Beasley, they're trouble! Every one knows that! Even the English heretics have outlawed them! They are… what is the word. .. people without respect for authority, who do whatever they please, without concern for decency or order."

"Red necks?" Bubba volunteered.

Hans ignored him.

"Antichrist?" Hans Shruer supplied cautiously.

"That will do. I was looking for anarchist. Anabaptists are anarchist, rebels, nihilists, fanatics, troublemakers! Luther, Calvin, the king of England and the pope all outlawed them!"

"Sounds like red necks to me," Bubba said.

"Shut up, Bubba," Ken said. "So what's so wrong with Anna Baptist?"

"They do not give proper respect to the civil authorities. Their practice of re-baptizing strikes at the very root of Christianity. They want to tear the church down and start over, their way. Have you heard of Munster?" Hans Shruer asked.

Ken shook his head.

"A thousand Anabaptists took six wives each, declared the city of Munster an independent republic. It took war to stop them!" You don't need all the facts completely right when you are spreading slander.

Bubba was on a roll. "Sounds like my kind of red necks. Six wives? Where do I join up?"

Ken tried to shut him down. "Shush up! You can't handle the wife you've got or you wouldn't be in here every other night, drinking."

"Do you know of the peasant's revolt?" Hans Shultz asked.

Ken shook his head.

"They nailed priests to the doors and burned the churches. They raped the nuns. They burned manor houses, convents, castles, entire villages. They drank the cellars dry, looted…"

"Sounds like red necks to me," Bubba said.

"I said shut up, Bubba!"

Hans ignored the interruption. "… every thing they could carry and burned everything they couldn't. Even Luther condemned them.

"It took the armies from four countries to put the revolt down, and the nobles back in charge. Anabaptists are evil incarnate." The last four words were rote dogma.

"We need to tell the chief! He needs to do something before it gets bad."

"Like what?" Ken asked. "Run them out of town?" Hans and Hans didn't catch the note of sarcasm.

"That would work," Hans Shultz said.

"Like hell it will!" Bubba didn't catch the note of sarcasm either.

"Shut up, Bubba," Ken said.

"Hey, Ken. What cha' got against religious freedom?" Bubba asked.

"I ain't got nothin' against it, Bubba. I just don't want it in my back yard."

Later in the night, Lyndon Johnson stopped in. Departmental policy required a follow up call to anyone making a complaint after an investigation.

"Mister Beasley," Lyndon said with the serious demeanor he used for official police business, "Hans and Hans said you want some people run out of town and they agree with you.

"The two of them were adamant. Hans said 'the disease-carrying vermin should be exterminated for the good health of the community and the general improvement of mankind.' They were distraught and sure there would be trouble. Chief Richards told me to check it out and file a report."

Ken shook his head. "Officer, they said something had to be done, not me. Usually, when I hear talk like that, it's from some old lady talking about the bar. The next words would be 'run it out of town.'

"So I asked, 'You mean something like, run out of town' and they agreed. I don't want them run out of town. I just don't want them over my back fence." Ken glanced both ways and leaned forward before asking, in a voice too soft to carry, "Lyndon, what's goin' on? Who are these people?"

Officer Johnson leaned forward over the bar. "Ken, that's what is really strange about this whole thing!

"Hans and Hans came in to the station all hot and bothered. I mean to tell you they were really wound tight. They're pretty good cops for a couple of krauts. So Chief Richards told me to look into it, quick! I went over and had a chat with Shultz's pastor, then with Shruer's pastor, then with Reverend Green down at the Southern Baptist church. Green said Joe Jenkins was the pastor of the Anabaptist church and I should go talk to him if there was a problem."

"Old Joe?" Ken asked. "A pastor? Can he do that?"

"I asked Green about it," Lyndon answered. "Green said he could. Seems he was ordained in some off-brand Baptist denomination years ago. Green says it's still valid.

"As I was saying, Hans and Hans were making some mighty wild claims! Shultz's pastor said they were true. Shruer's pastor agreed."

The down-timer Shultz called Father and Lyndon addressed as Reverend assured Lyndon the Anabaptists were trouble just waiting to happen.

The Lutheran pastor's first words were "Spawn of Satan! The Augsburg confession clearly condemned them." He was sure they were Arminians. It was the only one of Pastor Holt's six syllable words Lyndon remembered because he knew where Armenia was. Holt made it sound contagious, vile and shameful. Any Anabaptists discovered in a Lutheran country would be lucky to escape with their lives. He was sure they were nothing but lawless, reckless, rioters without morals, decency or self control.

By the end of the second conversation, Officer Johnson was convinced Grantville had a real problem on its hands. He was wondering how they had managed to miss it so far.

"I caught Reverend Green right before his evening service," Lyn told Ken. "He didn't have time to talk right then but he had someone go to the office and get me a list of the Anabaptists who'd left and those who agreed with Southern Baptist doctrine and stayed, which was over half of them.

"I asked about them being thrown out. He said they left by mutual agreement, which means 'left quietly.' I took the lists down to the office, to have names cross reference to complaints for the report.

"Then I drove out to the Jenkin's place to let Joe know what he'd gotten into so he could get out before he got hurt. And let me tell you did I get an ear full!"

"Joe, what's this I hear about you starting a church for a mess of bad news Germans the Baptists threw out because they're Armenian Anabaptist?"

"Lyndon, first off, all Baptists are Anabaptist. They only baptize adults. It is true most Baptists are Calvinist, but a few of us are Arminians."

Lyndon was shocked and puzzled. Joe sounded proud of it. So he asked, "What is an Armenian?"

"An Armenian is someone from Armenia. An Arminian holds a doctrine the Calvinists dislike."

Lyndon leaned a bit farther over the bar. "You know what 'once saved, always saved' means?"

"I think it means if you're born Baptist you can do whatever you want and still think you're not goin' to hell," Ken answered. It was an impression he got from listening to drunks.

"Well," Lyndon said, "according to Old Joe, an Arminian is the other side of it."

Officer Johnson looked at Old Joe Jenkins, who was on his back porch in an old rocking chair. The last light faded from the sky along the ridge line. Joe nursed a shot of corn squeezin's his father had put in the cellar. He smoked a hand rolled cigarette made from tobacco raised in a cobbled up green house behind the barn. There was a crate of papers, bought wholesale, in the house. He had offered Lyndon some of each but Lyndon didn't drink or smoke.

"That's it?" Lyndon asked. "That is what all the fuss is about?"

Joe looked at Lyndon and smiled. "If it's already decided, why bother tryin' to change things? If it's a matter of choice, then if things are bad you're obliged to try an' change 'em."

Lyndon didn't think through the implications of Joe's statement. "You know there are a lot of people mighty riled up over this. They're sayin' these people are trouble."

Joe smiled again. "Check the records."

"They're being checked now," Lyndon replied.

"You won't find nothin'."

"If that's the case, why is everybody so upset with them?"

"It's not their theology," Joe replied. "It's their politics."

Lyndon thought what does theology have to do with politics? Then in short order his mind clicked through the Moral Majority, the Christian Coalition, and Right to Life. Maybe theology does affect politics.

Joe explained. "They want the government to stay out of religion and religion to stay out of government."

"Separation of church and state?"

Joe snorted. "Where did you think the idea came from?"

"The Constitution," Lyndon said. "People went to America for religious freedom."

"Yeah," Joe said. "Freedom to have their own church. But when Roger Williams started preaching free will, he got chased out of Massachusetts for heresy and went down to nowhere and started the Rhode Island colony where you could believe anything you wanted and worship God any way you pleased. And from there it got into the Constitution."

"You mean we got these Arminians to thank for freedom of religion?"

"Pretty much," Joe said.

Lyndon didn't know whether to believe him or not but decided he'd ask a history teacher first chance he got.

Ken Beasley looked at the young, clean cut police officer in puzzlement for a few seconds. Ken knew the kid and liked him. Lyndon had briefly dated his stepdaughter, Morgan. The boy had been polite. He got her home before the deadline with time to spare. He had treated Morgan well, and her mother with respect. Ken and Lyndon had formed an odd friendship in spite of the difference in age and attitude. Morgan broke the relationship off when Lyndon wanted her to start going to church with him. Finally, Ken asked, "That's all this is about?"

"Looks like it, Ken." Lyndon stepped back from the bar and back into the voice and demeanor he used when he first entered. "Mister Beasley, they ain't doin' nothin' I can do anything about. Shoot, if everybody was as good at staying out of trouble as these folks, I'd be out of a job.

"I mentioned the noise to Joe. He said he was sorry but didn't think it was overly loud. I'll stop by Sunday and see for myself, but I'm afraid I won't be able to do much about it."

"Why am I not surprised?" Ken let sarcasm drip off the end of every word.

Lyndon started his written report with a one paragraph summation concluding with his recommendation.

"This alleged noise violation is nearly the only complaint to be lodged against anyone on either list of Anabaptists Rev. Green gave me. All other accusations are lodged against the group in general and arise from blatant prejudice. I recommend no action be taken at this time."

February, 1635

"Hey, Tom. Let me buy ya' a beer," Dick said when Tom stepped up to the bar.

Tom was chronically short on money. His wife counted his pocket change to keep track of how much he was spending on beer and bad company. Dick was chronically short on someone to drink with. He rubbed everybody the wrong way.

"Ain't seen much of ya' lately. What's the matter? Won't the little lady let ya' stop for a drink on your way home from work?"

Tom didn't say anything.

Dick saw a sore spot and pushed. "Hey buddy! What's the matter? Cat got your tongue?" The attitude, a malicious condescension, was raw. "The old hen pecked problem, huh?" Dick was not going to drop it.

Tom needed a reason why he hadn't been in lately. "I don't like drinkin' in a place that lets in krauts."

Dick smirked, and looked around. "No krauts here."

"Yeah? What about Sunday morning?"

"Shoot, they don't count. They're gone before the bar opens," Dick said. "Besides, there's krauts and there's krauts. These are our kind of krauts."

Ken heard it and shook his head. Just yesterday, Dick was complaining about the krauts using the place to hold church on Sunday morning. Jimmy Dick would argue either side of anything.

"Don't see it," Tom said.

"Then ya' haven't looked. Open your eyes man! These krauts are red necks."

"How do ya' figure?"

"Well first, how many churches ya' know who'd ever hold services in a bar?" Dick asked.

"None," Tom said.

"Wrong! Wrong! Wrong! Ya' know one. This one, so they ain't your average, run of the mill, goody two shoes. Second, Zane was a good old boy right?" Dick asked. Zane was a drunken reprobate who wasn't home for the Ring of Fire.

"What's your point?" Tom answered.

"Well, the Baptist church threw him out. They threw these krauts out too. Makes 'em our kind of people."

Tom shook his head. "Don't see it."

"Three," Dick said. "Half the people in here can't stand somebody else in here. Right?"

"So?"

"So these here krauts can't get along with each other either. Ken didn't offer to let them use the place until they started havin' two services back to back 'cause they couldn't get along. So ya' see, they're our kind of people."

This time Jimmy was half right. Some of the Anabaptists were non-violent, amongst other things. They wanted to hear their own speaker. The other group liked Brother Fiedler's preaching. The building was getting too small for all of them at once so they went to two services. If Ken had known they'd take him up on the offer, he wouldn't have made it. Still, the rent helped.

"Don't see it," Tom said.

"Well, we don't like krauts and the krauts don't like us. Right?"

"And?" Tom asked.

"So the other krauts can't stand these people. I mean Catholics pick on Lutherans and Lutherans don't like Calvinists. But all three of them got it in for Anna Baptists."

Tom became half interested in spite of himself. "Yeah? Why's that?"

"'Cause they won't buckle down and go along. They insist on doin' things their own way. Like only baptizin' adults and to hell with the consequences. Sounds like red necks to me." Dick grinned.

"Don't see it." Tom shook his head.

"And I hear tell back in the world, it was these people who got freedom of religion put in the constitution."

"They didn't do it from Germany," Tom answered.

"Well, how about the place bein' cleaner since they started usin' it?" Dick asked.

They came in the first Sunday and moved the tables and set up the chairs. Before they put the place back together they mopped the floors and wiped down the chairs and the tables.

"So? Ken could hire an American to do it," Tom said.

"Yeah? With what? So many of us are in the army or off somewhere else, business is way off. Shoot, with the rate we're droppin', all of his regulars will be dead shortly anyway. He can't afford to hire more help. Besides they were keeping Ken awake, singing and preaching just over his back fence."

"He could sleep here Sunday nights," Tom suggested.

Dick grunted. "And not go home to the missus? Not Ken. But then he's not henpecked."

"I ain't henpecked," Tom muttered.

Dick took out his wallet and put five twenty dollar bills on the bar. "Hundred dollars right here says ya' are."

"Well, I ain't. Who we goin' get to settle it?" Tom asked.

"Uh uh. If you ain't henpecked, then she'll do what you tell her." Jimmy Dick pointed at the door. "The day she walks through that door and stays for one hour you win the bet."

"I ain't got a hundred dollars on me."

Dick sneered. "And you won't have it come pay day. Shoot, you won't have it at twenty a week. Hell, you won't have it at five a week, 'cause you're a loser. I tell ya' what, I'll put up the hundred against you admitting you're henpecked. Hey, Ken."

"Just a minute, Jimmy Dick," Ken called back. Ken finished the order he was working on. Since the bartender quit, he'd gone back to doing it all himself. "What do ya' need?"

"Tommy and me got a bet goin'. Can you put this in the box until we settle it?"

Ken went down to the cash register and grabbed a lockbox out of the cabinet. When he got back, he opened it and took out a pad of paper. "Okay, what's the bet?"

"I bet Tommy one hundred dollars he's henpecked."

"How ya' gonna settle it?"

"If his wife comes in and stays for an hour any time in the next month, the hundred is his. If she don't, then he answers to henpecked."

"You agree, Tom?" Ken asked.

Tom was caught in a web. "Sure. Why not?" What in hell did I just get my self into, he thought. Maybe if I agree to go to church with her? Naw, won't work she won't agree to come in here anyway. Then it clicked.

Tom smiled. "Sure! If she comes through that door and stays for an hour anytime in the next month the money is mine. Give me the pen."

Tom snickered as he signed his initials to the bet slip. "You just lost your hundred dollars, Dickhead." Then he tipped back his beer and drained it.

All the way home he tried to figure out the best way to get his wife to agree to the plan. He settled on goading her into bugging him to go to church. She did it often enough without his trying. Then he would agree to go if he got to pick the church. When she balked, he'd offer to go with her to her church after she went with him to the church of his choice.

The bet was any time in the next month. Sunday morning would do just fine.

April, 1635

"What can I do for you fellows?" Ken asked as Hans and Hans approached the bar. He had talked to them on Sunday when they routinely "investigated" the noise complaints called in on Sunday afternoon. Now it was Monday and the cops were back.

"Mister Beasley, do you know where your congregation was on Sunday?" Hans Shruer asked.

Ken Beasley broke into a deep belly laugh. Somehow, they were his congregation and he was supposed to know what they were up to. The cops seemed to think he knew what his regular patrons were doing twenty-four, seven. Now he was supposed to keep track of the Anabaptists, too.

The fact was he knew exactly where they were on Sunday morning. Tom Ruffner and his wife Jenny were part of the congregation now. Tom had stopped in for a beer last night. Oddly, his wife didn't mind his having a beer now and again anymore. She even came with him for an hour one evening. She found out about the bet with Jimmy Dick and said it wasn't right. He said he wasn't giving it back. So she traipsed in one evening, hopped up on a bar stool and ordered a cup of coffee. Then she announced it was six minutes after six. At seven minutes after seven, she walked out the door.

When Tom stopped in for a beer, Ken complained about the mess.

"Ain't our fault," Tom said. "Weren't none of us here. We all went over to Rudoltstadt for the first service of a church Joe is starting over there. They're gonna have some trouble on account of Rudolstadt being nothin' but Lutheran. We went over to show support. If there was a mess, it was your mess."

Ken had to concede the point. Still, just because he knew where they were didn't mean he was going to tell the cops anything, especially not in front of Jimmy Dick. James Richard Schaver was the only patron in the place at the moment. The lunch drinkers were gone; the "beer or two on the way home" crowd wouldn't trickle in for awhile and it was way too early for the every-night late-night regulars. If he told the cops anything, sure as Saint Patrick wasn't Jewish, Jimmy Dick would see to it everybody knew it. His patrons expected privacy with their beer.

When his laughter ran down Ken responded to the question without answering it. "Joe Jenkins hasn't been in yet to pay this week's rent. When he does, I'm going to complain about the mess they left me. It almost looked as if there hadn't been anyone here at all."

Hans and Hans exchanged knowing glances.

"What's up?" Ken asked.

"We got a query from over in Rudoltstadt. It seems someone with a truck was at an unauthorized church service," Hans said.

The description of the truck matched Joe's ancient (early fifties vintage) coal hauler to a "T." Joe ended up with the old thing when the company he was working for went bankrupt. It was so old the army didn't want it. Even the tires weren't worth taking. Now, it had a propane tank for natural gas over the cab. The bed was boxed in against the weather with benches down each side, with a door and steps to the rear for people. Joe was using it for a church bus.

"Unauthorized?" Jimmy Dick piped in. "It was Sunday. How much more authorized do you need to be?"

"Mister Schaver," Hans said. "The ruler in Rudoltstadt is Lutheran. So the church in Rudoltstadt is Lutheran."

"And if you ain't Lutheran?"

"Then you convert, or you move," Hans said.

"That ain't right! What ever happened to freedom of religion?!"

"Rudoltstadt is not America. Not being Lutheran in Rudoltstadt is a punishable offence!"

The law in the USE called for religious tolerance, but the gap between custom and law is often quite large.

"That just ain't right," Jimmy said.

"Punishable, how?" Ken asked.

"Fines, confiscation, exile, imprisonment, beheading." Hans knew full well capital punishment was rare even before the USE. Still, getting sick or starving to death in prison or on the road was not in the least uncommon.

Jimmy practically squealed. "That's medieval!"

"And just when do you think you are, Mister Schaver? This is the year of our Lord sixteen hundred and thirty-three. You are in Germany and this is the way things are done," Hans said.

"Mister Beasley, when…" It was clearly when, not if. "… you see Joe Jenkins, please let him know we would like him to stop in at the station. We need to assure the people over in Rudoltstadt that it won't happen again."

Having made that pronouncement Hans and Hans stalked out. Ken watched them leave with a feeling of anxiety.

"That's bull shit!" Jimmy Dick said. "They can't tell our krauts what to do."

Ken's head snapped around. "Our krauts? Since when did any of those shit-heads become our krauts?"

"Ken, there ain't a conversation in this bar you don't know about." It was a slight exaggeration, but only a slight one. "You know we've been sayin' the krauts holdin' church here are red necks and our kind of krauts."

When Jimmy said "we" he was talking about himself. But no one was shutting him down, which he took as agreement. "We ain't gonna let them push our krauts around. Not when it comes to religious freedom."

"Jimmy Dick, you're full of shit!"

"Well, sell me another beer."

Later, Jimmy Dick was riding a high horse hell bent for leather. What surprised Ken was that people were listening. Normally, Jimmy had to buy to get anyone to drink with him and listen to his ranting insults. But he started talking about religious freedom.

"We shouldn't let them outside krauts over the border push our good old boy, red neck krauts around. Our krauts ain't too stuck up to hold church in a bar. Are we goin'a let some asshole over the border tell them what they can and can't do? We ought to take our shotguns and go over there to church next Sunday and how ever many Sundays it takes until they figure it out and leave our krauts alone." Jimmy actually had people buying him drinks.

Ken heard it and the sinking feeling in his stomach started turning into a large knot.

Joe Jenkins turned up the next day after the lunch crowd was gone. Ken let him know right away the cops had been in looking for him.

"I've already talked to them."

"Then you're shutting down the church over there?" Jimmy Dick asked. He was there for lunch, as usual, and would likely stay to closing. Between his disability from the army and family money he hadn't held a job since coming back from Nam.

"No," Joe answered.

"Good. Me a few of the boys are talkin' about comin'."

"Be glad to have you."

"You got this week's rent?" Ken planned to tell Joe it would be going up.

"We didn't use the place this week."

"Why, you cheap S.O.B. Get your worthless, sorry ass out of my place and don't let me ever catch you in here again." In truth, Ken was relieved. He knew in his bones something bad was going to happen and he didn't need to be part of it.

"Sorry ya' feel that way about it." Joe sighed.

Hans Shruer requested permission to handle the follow up on the complaint that Grantville was exporting heresy. Hans wanted it handled by someone sympathetic. He was not sure an up-timer would show proper respect for a pastor.

Despite everything he loved in Grantville, there were things which troubled him. Their willingness to treat all men as equals was refreshing. It was amusing when the emperor became Captain General Gars upon entering Grantville. It would not be amusing if someone was less than deferential to a pastor.

Hans rose early, mounted a borrowed horse and made his way across the boarder. Pastor Holt received him in the study. The room's fireplace was welcome on a chilly April day. A writing desk, a magnificent library of seven books and two comfortable chairs in front of the fire furnished the room.

"Pastor, I am here in response to the complaint you lodged with the Grantville Police."

"Good." Pastor Holt said. "We need this nipped in the bud with as little fuss as possible."

"I couldn't agree with you more, Pastor. But I am afraid I must inform you the chief of police feels there is nothing he can do."

"What?"

"He says it is outside his jurisdiction."

"He intends to let these, these blasphemers, carry on their criminal activities because they cross the border to do it?"

"Pastor, first, he does not see it as criminal."

"Nonsense! It is against the laws of God and man!"

"Pastor, the laws of God are not the laws of the USE. Or of Grantville."

"They should be!"

"I agree. But unfortunately they are not. The different churches cannot agree was to what those laws are and…"

"On this point we are in agreement! The re-baptizers strike at the very root of Christianity. How can anyone have confidence in their salvation when someone claims baptism does not save?" Pastor Holt shuddered. "Where does this leave those children who die an early death?"

"I understand completely. You are absolutely right. Except all of the churches do not agree on…"

"Nonsense. It was settled at the second Diet of Speier. The Catholics, the Lutherans, and now the Calvinists, all agreed the Anabaptists are not to be tolerated."

"Pastor, there are three established churches in Grantville who practice only adult baptism. They have, or will have, existed for hundreds of years in America. Their existence is not a threat to the Lutheran church or Christianity. The chief feels you will just have to make an accommodation in your thinking. You know they have a radical concept of religious freedom."

"I can do nothing about what 'they' do in Grantville." It is amazing how much can be said with how a word is pronounced. "But, I will not allow this travesty to be inflicted on the people of my parish."

"Pastor, Joseph Jenkins claims to have the count's permission."

"Nonsense! The count is a loyal member of the Lutheran faith. He would never condone this."

"The chief has known Mr. Jenkins for years. He accepted his statement without bothering to verify it. I overheard the conversation. Mr. Jenkins claimed to have talked with the count. He claimed the count does not want to lose a large party of gunsmiths who were about to move so they could attend church without walking miles and miles. The count, according to Jenkins, feels this acceptance of any faith as long as it does not create social disorder is one of the secrets of Grantville's prosperity."

"Social disorder? What does he think rebaptism is? Doesn't he know about Munster?"

"Pastor, you will have to ask the count. I fully sympathize with your problem. Believe me, I will do anything I can to help. But the response I was sent to deliver is: the officials in Grantville are not prepared to do anything."

"Surely you jest?"

"I wish I did."

The count did not relieve Pastor Holt's frustration. "Pastor Holt, I know you are aware the Emperor has declared religious freedom."

"Religious freedom? Yes. But surely it does not include these people."

"Yes. It does."

Next Sunday's sermon was a railing accusation against Godless polygamists and anarchists. On Monday, word came from the count to drop it. Pastor Holt had no choice but to obey. After all, the count was the one who appointed him to the pulpit and paid his salary.

About three months later, the English version of the Magdeburg Freedom Arches propaganda broadside started turning up in Grantville. When Jimmy Dick saw the lead article, he wondered just how long he would have to do his drinking at home.

Red Necks to the Rescue by Leo Nidus

If you have not been to Grantville then you may not know of a private drinking establishment called "Club 250." There is a sign on the door "No Dogs and No germans Allowed."

The people who drink there are referred to by the general population of Grantville as "red necks." This is a derogatory term designating a lower class of people. They are presumed to be louts, willfully ignorant, belligerently pugnacious, and ethnocentric in the extreme, as noted by the sign on the door. They are not well considered and clearly stand in opposition to the general policy of acceptance which is a hallmark of Grantville. But since tolerance is so highly esteemed by Grantville's ethos, even red necks are secure by law from any disapproval beyond verbal condemnation.

Why should I write of these dregs of their culture, the lowest order of society? That is simple. I write of them because of the nobility of their actions and the generosity of their spirit.

When no place to worship could be found amongst the established churches-yes, churches. Grantville's tolerance fosters over half a dozen different faiths existing side by side without even covert violence-for a small Anabaptist sect, the red necks of Club 250 opened the doors of the club to them in off hours, asking only that they be gone well before the club opened for business. When the sect opened a church across the border and encountered active opposition, including the threat and actualization of violence, these same "degenerate louts" undertook to guarantee the safety of the congregation by standing armed vigil over the services until the violence subsided.

Why would the dregs of society, the despised lowest order, the willfully ignorant do such a thing? Because they know in their hearts, they hold the conviction deep in their souls, that freedom is not free. They understand that when one man is not free, then none are truly free.

If today we allow the Anabaptists to be denied the right to freely assemble, then tomorrow that freedom could be denied to others and then to us.

The price of freedom is the defense of the rights of others, even if it is the right to be wrong. As one red neck put it, "the price of freedom is the defense of idiots."

Fly Like a Bird by Loren Jones

Paul Meinhart left Grantville in the autumn of 1632, but not before he spent several months in the Grantville jail. He'd been imprisoned for such a stupid little thing, yet the Americans had treated him like a murderer. The one good thing that came out of his imprisonment had been knowledge.

He couldn't read English. He couldn't read German all that well. But he had a good memory, and the books and magazines that had been provided to him in prison had shown him wonders. One of the magazines, a serial dedicated to things of a mechanical nature, had been inspiring. Especially the pictures. There had been pictures of just about everything, often in fine detail. Including flying machines.

Paul wasn't able to steal the magazine when he left the jail, but he had been able to copy several of the pages by hand while he waited, tracing the drawings and writing down what he could of the information with them. There was a kind of triangular flying machine that was simple to make, and he knew he would be able to build it. He had the drawings in his pockets when he left.

Paul turned south, heading toward a warmer climate as the year turned cold, and finally made his way to Venice. He gave out dribbles and drabbles of information about the strange people in Germany and their amazing devices to several wealthy men in search of a patron, and finally found one in Don Giovanni Romano, a merchant with ties to many other wealthy men.

"You speak of wonders, Heir Meinhart," Don Giovanni said when they had first met.

"Wonders indeed, Don Giovanni," Paul had replied, bowing low. "Wonders that let but a few handfuls of these people defeat whole armies. Wonders that they freely discuss amongst themselves, and pay no attention to who might be listening."

"Tell me of these wonders," Don Giovanni commanded, and Paul happily complied.

"These people have weapons that shoot a hundred bullets in the time it takes a musketeer to shoot one. They have great machines that move on their own, traveling faster than the fastest horse, and carrying many men shoot thing their terrible weapons. And, the greatest of their wonders, they possess the knowledge of how to fly."

"Fly!"

"Fly, Don Giovanni. I had the opportunity to copy some plans for a simple flying machine, one that they don't think of as valuable. " Paul sat forward, sensing that he had the rich fool hooked.

"Show me," Don Giovanni demanded and Paul brought out his drawings.

"You see, it is simple. A frame and some cloth, stretched tight. While I couldn't copy all of the drawings and pictures, I remember them well enough to be able to build one of these machines-with the proper patron, of course." Paul smiled and Don Giovanni smiled back.

"Of course."

Don Giovanni provided Paul with everything he asked for, and in return Paul provided Don Giovanni with a flying machine. It was triangular, seven yards across the base and four yards from tip to tail. Don Giovanni had provided Paul with fine, light-weight yew wood for his spars, and a small fortune in silk for the cloth. It took some time, and not a little trial and error, but the day finally came that Paul arranged for Don Giovanni and his friends to meet him on a hillside near the sea.

"Don Giovanni, I am pleased that so many of your friends could join us today," Paul said as he bowed to all of the nobles.

"I hope you have something to show us that is worth the trouble," Don Constanza said. "I have a much prettier person I would rather be spending the day with."

"You will soon be happy that you came here today, Don Constanza," Paul said, not adding that if he had been a man of vision he would have been the one celebrating this day instead of Don Giovanni.

Paul walked over to where his helpers were holding his flying machine, the so-called "hang glider" and got under it. He lifted the contraption and looked at the supports. He'd eliminated several of them in order to shed weight, but still it felt like he was carrying a barrel on his back. He felt the breeze in his face and remembered the pictures of men running down a hill and sailing away, and his feet began to move.

Faster and faster Paul ran, and as he did he felt his load lighten. Then, as the breeze freshened, he felt his feet start skimming along the ground, and he jumped up to drape his stomach across the bar. A gust of wind lifted him and he felt a rush of excitement as he soared over the astonished nobles. Then he heard a crack.

Don Giovanni and his friends watched Paul soar fifty meters into the sky. They cried out in wonder as the flying machine lifted the man high above them. Then it collapsed, folding around its inventor like a napkin around a bone, and crashed to earth.

Don Giovanni heaved a great sigh of disappointment. "He seemed so sure." Turning to the men who had been assisting Paul, he said, "Salvage the silk. Whatever you do, salvage that silk. Take the body to the church for burial."

"Man was not meant to fly, Don Giovanni," Don Constanza said. "I told him that when he approached me. Come, I know what will lighten your heart."

Gearhead by Mark H Huston

It was quiet. Way too quiet. Of all the things Trent Haygood hated about the seventeenth century, the quiet was the worst. He missed the sounds of engines. Internal combustion engines. Hell, he'd be happy with some noise from a steam engine. As he sat on the front porch of his parents' home, he leaned forward and listened.

He held his breath and focused his hearing for some sign of mechanized civilization, anything. He listened carefully.

Only a cow mooed in the distance.

He sighed, leaned back into the chair, and put his hands behind his head. Back up-time, he could almost always tell you what kind of vehicle was coming down the road just by the sound of the motor. Mopar, Chevy, Ford, old KW or Freightliner.

Things were getting a little noisier lately, he had to admit. It had been a slow rebuilding. There was the occasional airplane now, built from Formica and car engines. Someone else was also building aircraft, having bought up a lot of motorcycle engines for propulsion. Cars and trucks never did go away altogether. Folks were pretty creative in these parts, so if there was something to be had that was sorta liquid and flammable, then someone modified a motor to run on it. His old man had reestablished the family distilled spirits business while he was away, and that was always good for fuel or trade.

He still missed the background noise of motors. He considered it the basis of true civilization. Not the stinky, organic things-like horses and oxen-that moved people and goods from place to place in this time. Or the dreadfully slow barges, lolling up and down the river like some demented version of "Life on the Mississippi" that went horribly bad.

There was the train. A bunch of folks had gotten together and built an honest-to-God steam engine. Still, it wasn't the same thing. It was slow, maybe five miles per hour. But it worked. He sighed. Maybe by the time I'm fifty or sixty, there will be real racing again. Not horse racing, but NASCAR. God, he missed NASCAR. Big E and Little E were the thing in 2000. Daytona had happened, the season was underway, and it was looking like another great year. Ford had a good car, and Jeff Gordon was as still strong. Trent never liked Jeff Gordon. Too pretty. Plus he was from California, of all places. Who ever heard of a NASCAR driver from California for crying out loud?

It was still quiet. No engines anywhere to be heard. He sighed again.

Trent had been a high school senior when the Ring of Fire hit Grantville and had been conscripted into the military at graduation, along with the rest of his class. He had spent most of his time drilling, marching, and waiting. He never got to fire a shot in any battle. In the first his rifle had jammed, and in the second he had been held in reserve, and in the last one he had broken his ankle marching and sat out the whole thing in the rear. It wasn't like he was trying to avoid things; it just worked out that way. He didn't even have any good stories.

He had been transferred to Grantville, detailed to work with the phone company as a trainee, but still stuck in the army. It was boring. He knew that wasn't what he wanted to do with his life, telephones or the army. He had known back home, back up-time. He had gotten a small scholarship to become a race mechanic at a school in North Carolina. He was going to work for a NASCAR team. He had built and raced his own car senior year and had done pretty well. He finished third at Tyler County speedway in his first season. It was not what you would call a big time racecar, just an old P-Stock Camaro that he had welded a cage into, and built a motor to meet-well, exceed actually-the rules. His dad and a couple of buddies had been the crew. They didn't spend a lot of money, as it was a basic car, running in a basic class on a small dirt oval track. Towing the car to the track was the toughest part of the deal. God, he loved that stuff. The odor of racing gasoline and the smell of hot brake pads were perfume to his nose. They had called him Mario Haygood at school.

Some of the funds for the racecar came from the little side business his old man had, back before the Ring of Fire. Trent smiled as he recalled the fun he had making the "runs" over to Clarksburg.

Today, all that remained of that car was the V-8 engine on a stand in the garage, a transmission, front subframe, drive shaft, and the wheels and tires. Everything else had been salvaged, scrapped, sold or substituted for something else. The fuel cell and most of the safety equipment and the racing seat went to the air force, the battered body went to the scrap yard and the roll cage tubing was pulled out and sold. Other than some glass and wiring odds and ends, it was all gone.

He stood up and stretched. The family home was not in Grantville proper, but on a road off Route 250, about a mile and a half from town. Dad moved here because it was quiet, before the Ring of Fire happened. Quiet. Still too quiet. He sat back down into the lawn chair.

Times like this, up-time, he would get into his street car, an old beat up Ford Fairmont and go blasting around the back roads, chewing up the already old tires, and overheating the inadequate brakes. The thing had an old straight six in it, and it barely had enough power to get out of its own way. But it was still driving, and West Virginia hill country had some challenging and twisty back roads that were his playground. Guys would make fun of his beater, but all his extra money went to the racecar. Even in the land where beaters were almost an art form, his was a beater. He smiled at the memory of that car. That one, too, had gone to the scrap yard, after stripping some of the items out of it. He kept the steering wheel, almost everything else was gone.

That old beater was special. After all it was in that car that he and his first girlfriend had-he paused again. His old girlfriend had gone off and gotten married while he was off getting bored to death in the army. He started to feel even more depressed.

"I wish I could go for a drive. Somewhere. Fast. Push it to some limit, screw conserving resources. Fast." He paused, surprised that he had been speaking out loud. "Way too frigging quiet. I am talking to myself, for heaven's sake. Out loud." He walked to the front yard, and shouted at the top of his lungs. "This SUCKS! It REALLY SUCKS! I WANT EVERYONE TO KNOW THAT THIS REALLY, REALLY SUCKS!" He paused to listen.

The cow mooed again, off in the distance.

Trent gave the unseen cow a defeated shrug, walked back into the house, and flopped onto the couch.

Face down on the couch, he mumbled into the cushions, "This still sucks." He rolled over onto his back, and put his feet up and stared at the ceiling. "What are you going to do with your life, Trent, old buddy? What the heck does a gearhead like you do for a living? There is absolutely nothing here that goes fast. Nothing." He paused, looked out the front window, and sighed again.

At least before the Ring of Fire, when his old man would have him make a run over the mountains into Clarksburg to drop off some of his special distilled spirits, he could have some fun. But since the Feds went away, and Clarksburg went away, and the racetrack went away, motor sports excitement was hard to come by. He smiled as he remembered some of the high-speed runs he made. Dad liked to use him for runs. At the time, he was only sixteen and still a minor. He wouldn't get in as much trouble if he got caught.

The thoughts of those good times made him itchy. He jumped up from the couch, went to his room and grabbed a few dollars, and headed out the door.

He finally ended up at a little joint on Main Street. He took a seat at the window and watched the traffic go by. Foot traffic. Occasionally a horse. Some sheep went by. He grimaced. A couple of years ago, he would have been astounded at a bunch of sheep being driven through town, down to the banks of Buffalo Creek. From where he was sitting in the front window, he could look down the street. He could see the place in the streets where the Croats were cut down as they tried to take the town At the end of the street, the road split into a Y shape and each road crossed Buffalo Creek on a pair of concrete bridges that had made the trip, along with everything else from up-time.

Between the bridges and across the creek, there stood an old brick three story building that was once part of the early mining industry in town. It was now four or five retail shops on the first floor, with apartments jammed onto the upper floors.

The way that the building was situated, made the side of it an ideal billboard at the end of the street, in the crotch of the Y. For as long as Trent could remember, that sign had read "Welcome to Grantville. Worship with us". And then it listed the six or so churches in town. Several had been added, including a synagogue, since the Ring of Fire.

He recalled that his old man had stood in front of that sign when Trent was a kid, and cussed out Reverend Wiley, the Presbyterian minister for the town. Something about his first wife. Or maybe his second. Trent wasn't too sure. But Trent's old man had stood in the same place and cussed Reverend Wiley, that Dan Frost had stood when he opened fire on the raiding Croat cavalry. He had taken out several horses, enough to stop the charge cold. Trent wondered how many of the Croats were able to read that sign before they died. He shook his head slowly. He had been detailed as part of the burial crew. It was not something he ever cared to repeat.

It was while he was staring at the sheep as they made their way down Main Street, that he had the idea. THE idea. His beer was halfway to his lips, when he stopped to listen. He heard a small motor, sounded like a Honda motorcycle, put-putting from around the corner. The sheep took an instant dislike to the noise and began to get fidgety. They parted for the vehicle that was coming down the middle of the street. It had everything that he needed to make a car! Four wheels and a motor, brakes, suspension, everything. Why didn't he think of it before! There was an old LP gas tank on the back of the vehicle, so it was powered by natural gas. Of course. It was a four-wheel drive All Terrain Vehicle. There were hundreds of them in the county! Why didn't he think of it before? There was his racecar. With a few modifications, more horsepower, larger chassis and steering assembly, someplace to sit…

He looked at the ATV as it scooted past the sheep and took off down the road, across the bridge and softly rumbled up the hill and out of town. He smiled. For the first time in a while, he smiled widely.

Trent was going to go fast again, and a highly modified ATV chassis was how he could accomplish his goal. And, like a true gearhead, there was nothing that was going to stand in his way.

He started out by selling his old performance V8 from the racecar to the mine. The mine needed it to operate one of the pumps, and at three hundred horse power, that engine was the only thing that could do the job. That money bought him the basic components; a pair of clapped-out, beat-up, skanky, old ATVs, that looked as if they were pulled out of a creek. They were just about junk. But both engines turned over, they had compression, and the gearboxes were in good shape. He bought them from Mitch Kovacs. Mitch, who Trent knew was not the brightest crayon in the box, thought he had gotten a great deal. Trent knew better.

He dragged the two pieces of junk home by hiring a tow truck. He refused to call it a tow wagon. It was an old rear end off of a tow truck grafted to a harness and a pair of large horses. The driver was proud of what even Trent recognized as very large horses.

Trent scoffed. "I don't see what the big deal is. Hell, it's still only two horsepower."

The tow-wagon driver was unimpressed with the observation.

He disconnected the two ATVs from the tow-wagon, paid the grizzled and now grumpy German, and pushed them into the garage one at a time. He stripped the two machines down, cleaned everything and took inventory. He had purchased what amounted to about three fourths of an ATV between the two junks. Still, it was enough. He even had parts left over, which he promptly sold. Both of the ATVs had good transfer cases and selling those brought in nearly twenty percent of what he had spent on them.

It helped that his old man had the handyman business. Bartering was a large part of that business, so Trent bartered too. Sometimes doing two or three deals to achieve the part, or the welding rod, or the fasteners he needed. It was difficult and sometimes it seemed impossible.

But nothing distracted him. Girls? Nope. Hanging out at one of the bars downtown? Nope. Bustin' ass all day to pay for some minor part, or to buy something to trade, was the only thing he was focused on all summer. And after working like a dog all day, he would come home and work well into the night, by candlelight at times, until he would drop. He would get up and do it all again the next day. He never seemed to tire. He was a gearhead on a mission.

He needed rod end bearings for the steering and tie rods. For those, he acquired a fancy halter, which he traded for an air conditioning compressor that he rebuilt, and then traded for some rod ends that were "acquired" from some piece of mining machinery. His old man always told him never to ask many questions. He didn't.

He also enlisted the help of the boys next door, the Marcantonios. The three grubby pre-teen boys turned out to be excellent scroungers.

With his father's connections, and working "favors," he was able to pay for much of his machine work. He re-roofed three houses that summer for his old man. It took work. Hard work.

He didn't need a lot of drawings before he started the build. He had visualized the entire project in his head on the very first day. First, he lengthened the frame. He then relocated the motor mount, built a roll cage from pipe and tubing, improved the brakes, fabricated the new seating mounts, changed the controls from motorcycle type to car type, including adding a sequential shift that he controlled by hand. He grabbed an alternator and built an electrical system out of the remnants of the old racecar and the Fairmont. Even used some glass for the front windshield. He spent quite a bit of time on gearing and tire size, and he ended up using the old racecar wheels and tires to get the correct gearing for the speed he wanted. They were tough dirt track tires with only a few laps of use. They would be good for a while. The chassis was done. All that remained was the power plant.

What fuel should he choose? Granted, he could use LP Gas, like the other ATV. Conversions were not that hard, he had seen several around town, even before the Ring of Fire. All he needed was a nozzle in the carb, and a pressure compensated regulator. Everything would be easy except the regulator. He looked at other installations; there were plenty to look at around town. But with gasoline now in production, and the old man's former side business of distilled spirits going strong, he chose to stick with gas. Horse-trading the two commodities was already shaping up as a lucrative side business for the family, and everyone did their part.

When the motor finally came back from the machine shop, he could hardly wait to put it together. But he controlled his excitement, and closed up the garage to assemble the new motor. If everything was done correctly, if all of his calculations and the performance engineering handbooks were correct, the motor would produce over one hundred twenty-five horsepower.

Gently, he laid a clean sheet on the workbench to provide a pristine altar for the final assembly. He laid the precious and gleaming components out on his workbench and began to carefully measure everything with his micrometers and calipers. He positioned everything, head, valves, connecting rods and pistons, wrist pins, crankshaft, carefully and in an exact order.

He measured and recorded all that was measurable, and compared it to the ideal. He had carefully figured the copper-and-lead head gasket crush by testing several different combinations. If the gasket was too tall, he would lose horsepower. If it crushed too much when he tightened the head down to the block, the valves could strike the pistons and ruin the motor. He looked at every angle, every measurement, and every dimension as carefully as he could. He knew that there would be no way to go back to the auto parts store and get a new set of valves. If he needed that, he would have to get a motor from somewhere and disassemble it for parts. Finally, after three days of painstaking trial assembly, final assembly, and mounting the motor in the chassis, he was ready to fire it up.

There are times in the life of a gearhead that are special. And when the motor leapt to life without a moment of fuss, exactly as it was supposed to do, Trent knew that this was one of those moments. It was his project, his release, the thing that he had poured his energy, brainpower, and (too much) money into. His very soul finally revved back to life on that late summer evening. The exhaust tone even sounded right, slightly dissonant, unusual, and sharper than it should be as the motor ran. Trent caught his reflection in the rear view mirror as he revved the engine in the back. He looked tired, he thought. Older somehow. His reflection would vibrate as he revved the engine until it disappeared, and then returned when the revs dropped. He checked everything carefully, let the entire thing come up to operating temperature, and shut it down. He began to look at every hose and gasket, inspecting it for any signs of leakage.

It wasn't long before Trent noticed the three faces peering into the open garage door, drawn there by the harsh engine noise. The faces belonged to the kids that lived next door, the Marcantonios. One was an up-timer kid, Joe Marcantonio, the other two, Hans and Manny, were down-timers. All were dressed in cutoff jeans, sneakers, T-shirts and ball caps, and were between ten and thirteen years old. Trent couldn't tell the original hillbilly from the two German ones. And he had done everything he could to turn them into little hillbilly gearheads the past couple of months of summer.

"Damn, Trent," Joe said. "We didn't know that you had the motor back yet. That sounds like… Trent, I have no idea what that sounds like. It sounds-well-nasty."

"Ya. That sounds loud! And fast. How fast can it go?" Hans was nearly shouting.

Trent gloated. Just a little. "Aww, I told you racing virgins that the old racecar was louder than a shotgun going off, except that it's constant. You two smarty-pants said that I was full of Scheiss. Told'ja it was louder than anything that you ever heard. We used to rev up the racecar in the garage and the dust would fall out of the rafters from the sheer noise. But no, you guys said it was just another story. What d'ya think now, boys? Ha!"

Joe stepped across the threshold of the garage door, and the two down-time boys looked at each other and crossed over too. The garage had been verboten to them until now, but if Joe was crossing, and the door was open, maybe it was now okay. They stepped carefully across the threshold.

Joe crouched down to Trent, as Trent was checking some connections in the back, making sure it was all tight, no leaks, and nothing had vibrated loose. "Uhh, Trent. Is there any chance that I might be able to have a-"

"No. No rides. Not yet anyway. I built this for me. For a reason." Trent looked away from the kids, and seemed to focus more than necessary on the task at hand.

Joe scratched his head. "C'mon Trent, we stayed out of the garage and out of your way like we promised. You said that-"

"I never promised you guys rides."

Manny stepped up. "Not exactly, but you said if we left you alone, you'd take care of us when it was done. It looks done. And it's not like you built it all by yourself. Me and Hans scrounged the metal for the brackets off of old Mr. Lawler's fence. And Joe got the drill bit you needed for the steering rack, and I got the seats from-well, don't ask where I got the seats, okay? I just found them. I told you that."

Hans stepped beside his brothers. "We could, ya know, sort of un-find them."

Trent squirmed. "All right, all right. You guys are right. I couldn't have done it without you. But nobody else drives. I drive." He stood up and faced them. "Only I drive this thing. I have no idea how the car is going to handle. It could be pretty squirrelly. I set it up to have a low polar moment of inertia, so it will rotate quickly, and the spring rates are too high for the weight-"

Joe giggled. "You call this thing a car? Looks more like a dune buggy than a car."

"Yeah, what do you know about a car, you doofus? You'll probably never drive anything faster than a horse and buggy." Trent looked at Manny and Hans. "And it is going to be twitchy. I made it that way. And it will take a beating, or at least it should. This motor doesn't have a lot of horsepower, but this thing is lightweight. It should fly with the modifications I've done."

Mannys' eyes grew even bigger. "You mean this will fly too! Holy crap! How high?"

All three of them took turns hitting Manny.

Trent was up before the sun the next day, moving by memory in the cool of the pre-dawn darkness. He opened the garage door, and when the sun was peeking over the hill to the east, he pushed the car out onto the drive for the first time. He looked at his checklist. He rechecked the tire pressures, walked around the car one more time, mentally going over each system that he had built or modified. Finally he was satisfied. He stepped back and looked at his creation. It did look a little like a dune buggy. Lower by a bit, too small of wheels and tires, but the thing did have a roll cage, two seats, and a steering wheel. He sat further forward and lower than he would have with a typical dune buggy, a compromise with the ATV roots of the chassis. He simplified things by keeping it only two wheel drive, and lost the extra weight of the transfer case and the drive shaft. Besides, four wheel drive is nice, but it is a little more difficult to hang the tail out through a corner. Maybe on the next design. He took another step back. Yeah, a dune buggy or maybe something out of one those old Mel Gibson movies, with the post-apocalyptic road racers. Come to think of it, his whole situation wasn't that far off from those movies. He smiled in anticipation.

The sun was now fully over the hill, and the dew was disappearing as soon as the light hit it. It was time. He double checked the fuel level, and snaked his way into the seat around the rollcage. The seatbelt was scavenged from some GM car, it still had the emblem on it, he noted as he snapped it in place. He wasn't sure about the windshield, or if it would fully protect him from the wind. But this was the time to find out. He took a deep breath and let it out. He could hear his heart pounding as he reached for the ignition switch.

"Okay, Trent. You're as nervous as you were the first time on a racetrack. This is just a test drive. You're not going to push this thing very fast, you're just going to check everything out and make sure nothing is going to fall off. Take it easy, okay, buddy? Just take it easy."

He pushed the switch for the starter to crank and the motor instantly jumped to life. The sound was different with the motor behind him; in the open air it was less nasty, not as harsh. But it was clearly not your typical ATV either. He blipped the throttle a couple of times and allowed the motor to rev and then fall. With the machining he did on the flywheel, and the increased compression, the motor lost revs quickly. It sounded nasty.

He caught sight of the three brothers from next door, running across the yards toward his open garage. The noise of the motor brought them out of the house at a dead run. He waved them to the front porch of his old man's house. They hesitated, but he waved them there again. They finally complied, dejectedly.

He sat in the car, listening to the motor as it came up to temperature. Since the Ring of Fire, he'd felt like he was on another planet. That is how different things were. He smiled and waved at the boys. You want different? Here is different. Look out 1634 Germany, and all of you pedestrians, oxcarts, and buggies. Mario Haygood is back in business.

He decided to show off a little. He pushed in the clutch, revved it, let the clutch out too fast with the revs too low, and promptly stalled it. Not what he planned.

Joe whistled at him. "Way to go, Trent. You want me to drive that thing for you?" The other two laughed.

Trent just made a face and restarted the motor. "Nice and easy. Test drive, remember?" He felt his ears burning red in the cool of the morning. "Easy out on the clutch, remember the lightened flywheel that makes it a little harder, ease it out, let it roll, and there we go."

He was doing it. He was driving again. He eased the thing into second gear and picked up a little speed down the driveway. He tapped the brakes, and they grabbed evenly. Back down to first gear, the motor made a nice sound on the downshift. He was at the end of the drive. He had planned to only go to the end of the drive and back, but the motor was just up to temperature, and it felt solid. He smiled. Why not? He turned left down the street and headed out to Route 250, the main drag through the valley.

"Just down to two-fifty. Check the brakes at a little higher speed." His local street had a little curve to it, so he moved the wheel back and forth to check the steering and suspension. It felt okay. A bit twitchy, nervous. Like the steering was too sensitive for the car. "Damn," he thought. "I didn't think of that. I just used the steering rack that I had, didn't think about the steering ratios." Still it wasn't that bad. It still worked. It was just something that he needed to get used to. He came to the intersection of his street and Route 250. He could just pull out, and use the wider road to turn around. But what the heck. He looked at the gauges again, tugged at his seatbelt, and turned left, away from town.

"Just run it up to third gear, see how it handles a little bit." So he did, and then fourth gear, and finally fifth gear. He was just loping along with very low revs, well off the power band, just lugging along… "Idiot!" he yelled. He pushed in the clutch and revved the motor. "Don't lug this motor. It is the only one you have." The low revs and the load on the motor could have damaged a rod bearing. "Think. This is the only one of these you will ever have. Don't break it the first time out." He pulled to the side of the road and revved the motor a couple of times. Sounded good. Good oil pressure.

"Okay. Seems to be all right. Let's just turn this thing around and head back. Make sure everything is tight." He paused. "Well, I suppose I could just run up two-fifty to the high school, turn around and come home." He smiled. He didn't stall it this time as he got the thing moving. The motor was making good horsepower and the suspension was softer than he thought it would be. Everything was feeling good. He paused again, and a face cracking grin slowly spread across his face. "What the hell. Let's open it up a little."

Opal Sizemore loved her police scanner. It sat in the center of her bedroom dresser in the extended care facility. The scanner let her know what was happening in town all the time. She had loved it before the Ring of Fire, and had used it to monitor both the police and fire department. As she shuffled past her dresser that morning, she heard the scanner come alive as it had not in a long time.

"Ahh, Dispatch, this is Car Two. Southbound on Route 250, by the high school, in pursuit of, uhh-stand by, Dispatch… We think it is some sort of dune buggy, no plates."

That would be Ralph Onofrio, she thought. He sounds like he's a little excited.

"Did you say in pursuit, Car Two?"

Opal sat on the edge of her bed in front of the scanner. This was the best thing that had happened in a while! Certainly more fun than that Croat raid. Opal figured that today Angela Baker was running dispatch.

"That's affirmative, Dispatch. We are in pursuit."

"Haven't had one of those in a while."

"Yup, that was Angela all right," thought Opal. She always did have a dry sense of humor.

"Technically, ahh, Dispatch, since Heinrich is uhhh-driving, this is his first one ever."

"Dispatch copies that. What is your speed and position?"

"We just passed the mine road cut off, top speed so far is only seventy-five, but there are some straight parts up here…"

"Roger that, Car Two. Be advised the street cleaner's wagon had its wheel break. It's at the outside of the funeral home curve. It was not all the way off the road; use caution. The tow-wagon has been dispatched."

"Car Two copies, Dispatch. Heinrich, remember the wagon up here. Heinrich. Heinrich rememb-! The SHIT WAGON! SHIT WA…"

Opal leaned closer to the scanner. She heard a squeal of tires, some thumps, like they hit something, and then a long squishing rumbling sound. And then silence, as Ralph must have released his grip on the microphone. She pursed her lips. It sounded like Angela was worried, too.

"Car Two, do you copy? Car Two, do you copy?"

"Stand by, Dispatch. We have a-well, just stand by. We have uhh-broken off pursuit. Yeah. Broken off the pursuit."

"Copy that. You have broken off the pursuit. Do you require assistance?"

"We think it was Trent Haygood, Dispatch. I recognize the driving. Nobody else would be that fast. Wait unit I get my hands…"

"Dispatch copies. Do you require assistance?"

"Well, uhh, sort of, Angela. There's the street cleaner's wagon still out here that will need towing and repair, and the county trucks need to get out here with something to pick up, oh maybe, 'bout a ton of horse shit off the road."

Opal noticed there was a long pause.

"Do you copy, Dispatch? Angela?"

"Dispatch copies. A ton?"

Opal heard laughter in the background, behind Angela's transmission. Quite a lot of laughter.

"Affirmative. And have Heinrich's wife bring him a change of clothes. He had his window open when we bumped the parked wagon. He almost got the car stopped, and he just touched the jack. The wagon teetered for a moment, and it uhhh-yeah. I'm gonna tell her-they're gonna find out sometime, Heinrich-sorry, Dispatch. But it seems the wagon dumped the better part of the load into the driver's window."

"Copy that. So you hit a load of horseshit. In a high-speed pursuit. In 1634."

"That about covers it."

Opal clutched her sweater around her neck. And then laughed like she had not laughed in the last ten years.

"Car One, Dispatch."

"Go ahead, Dispatch, this is Car One."

"Car One, you need to respond to the traffic accident and write it up."

"Already on the way. We just wish we had some film left in the camera."

They found that Opal had passed away in her room later that morning, when she failed to show up for breakfast. She had a curious smile on her face.

"Well, how did't go?" Manny was jumping up and down.

Trent had come flying up the driveway, braked hard, and then pulled the car into the garage and closed the door. He was now sitting on the porch with his three junior hillbilly cohorts, catching his breath, sipping a cold beer, and grinning from ear to ear.

"C'mon, Trent. How was it? Was it fast?" Manny was really jumping up and down now.

Trent turned to look at them. "Yes. It was fast."

"How fast?" Manny was jumping up and down so much he was in the air more than he was on the ground.

Trent looked at them calmly. "Fast enough."

Joe looked at him with a pained expression. "C'mon, Trent. How was it? Tell us!"

Trent looked over at the boys. "Not bad, boys. Not bad at all. Kinda like old times." He felt the grin get even wider, if that was possible.

They all turned and watched as the Grantville patrol car eased down their street, and pulled slowly into the driveway. The car seemed to have a definite purpose, a focus, the way a police car will. The three boys looked at Trent. His mother stepped out onto the porch and looked at Trent. She was not smiling. The police car stopped.

Trent put his feet up on the porch rail and leaned back. He felt better than he had in quite a while. For now, the world was right again. "Yup. Just like old times."

Water Wings by Terry Howard

Somewhere in the North Sea

The line arcing off the boat kinked between deck and water. Eric, watching for just that, yelled to the crew uncoiling the stiff hose, "Hold it! Back it up!" Then the kink swelled a bit. Eric screamed, "Back it up! Back it up now!"

Before the offending line could be pulled back up onto the deck, the kink burst.

"Shit!" Eric yelled. "Get the bell up! Now! Get it up!"

The crew who had been manning the air pump left their now useless post and manned the capstan to raise the bell. Putting their backs into it, they pushed its arms for all they were worth.

Eric watched as the collapsed air line came up out of the water at a fast pace. He had brought the details for a diving bell along with the location of the wreck, due north of Castle Point and west of St. Olef's Bay, back from a strange town in Germany called Grantville and was able to convince a local merchant to fund the salvage effort.

The air line was made of two layers of waxed leather. The book called for rubberized canvas, with the outer layer sewn over the seamless inner layer. No one, outside of Grantville, knew what rubberized meant. It had to be water-proofing. It must really be something because they had absolutely no luck using canvas to make the high pressure air line. Two layers of leather worked. It had to be doused down with hot water before it was lowered away to keep it from cracking and it made a large coil that filled the free deck from rail to rail. The coil barely left room for the air pump and the capstan for lowering the diving bell in the middle.

"Belay that!" the captain called.

"But, sir," Eric protested. "We've lost air."

"I am aware of that, Mister." He turned to the pump crew. "Kyrie Elison, gentlemen," he said, meaning he wanted them to start singing the old church chant and turning the capstan at a slow measured rate. "Bring him up at the regular pace, if you please. We don't need him doubled over and dying on the deck with cramps. That's why we put the valve on the bell."

The line crew lifted the leather hose over the heads of the now chanting men who now turned the capstan. Eric, worried, turned back to the sea and watched the collapsed air line inch up out of the water.

Until now, when a line broke they hauled away with all speed to raise the bell before it lost air. Twice they failed. Twice they succeeded, only to have the man die a painful death from horrid cramps. This was the first time a line had blown since they had installed a shut off valve. The pump had to work harder to push it open but it should hold the air in if the pump failed.

"I can see the bell." Eric called out. Then, without another word, he dove into the cold waters of the North Sea. At the staging platform, eager hands pulled him and the body he had retrieved out of the water.

"I saw him slip out of the bell. He must have passed out. We need a tie off in there so a man stays in if he blacks out."

With the bell up, the capstan was switched over to lifting the cargo cable to see if anything had been loaded.

With five lost to accidents and one lost to illness, Eric wondered if he would be number seven. It was his turn to go down. Well, if my number is up, my number is up. If I die, at least I die rich.