Eric Flint: Grantville Gazette Volume XI

Natasha knew that quite well. It took some effort to control her expression. Cass Lowry's comments about "krauts," "russkies" and "I guess you're living in the armpit of the universe" had not gone unnoticed. Not in the least. "Brandy says it is because he was the only person who knew cars well enough who was willing to make the trip. Vladimir wanted, very much, to have someone who knew cars travel with your 'Precious.'"

"My what?"

"See." Natasha waved Brandy's letter. "Brandy says 'tell Bernie that Cass is traveling with Precious because Cass is the only guy we could find who wasn't doing something else.'"

Bernie's face was a study. Part outrage, part pout. "The car is not named Precious. Are you sure she didn't say 'your precious car' or something?"

Natasha perused the letter again and shook her head. "No. It even has the capital P. I assumed it was the name for it. At any rate, your Cass will be arriving in a month or so. We should probably arrange for you to meet him. He, according to Brandy, wants to visit us for a while. And you never know, he might help."

Bernie slumped into a chair. "I doubt it. Don't get me wrong. Cass is smart smarter than me. It's just… I don't know… he has a knack for screwing things up. You're probably not going to care for him one little bit. Neither will Boris or Filip." Bernie shook his head in disgust. "Why did Brandy have to send him?"

Brandy had not sent him, Vladimir had. He had been fully aware of Cass' drawbacks and had stressed the need to put up with them while he was milked for information, especially on weapons and tactics used by the up-timers. "Mr. Lowry," Vladimir had written, "is not a person we would want in our home. But he does have knowledge that could be useful to Muscovy. Try to keep anyone from killing him for the insults he will surely give." Natasha had wondered if Bernie's view would agree with Vladimir's. While there were subtle differences, for the most part it did.

Bernie shivered. Theatrically, Natasha thought. "Well, at least it's not a horse. It may be colder than a witches… ah, never mind. It may be really cold, but at least we aren't riding horses."

"Indeed, we aren't." Natasha smiled. "And you must admit that it's a very nice coach, Bernie, very nice."

And it was, in fact, a very nice coach. It had special springs for the skis. Outside it was cold enough to freeze the balls off a brass monkey and the snow was still pretty deep. But the streamlined coach-on-skis had double-walled construction and a lacquer polish job that acted as sealant, as well as making the whole thing shiny as all get out. It was relatively warm inside, even if it did look kind of weird. It needed high road clearance because even the improved roads weren't exactly highways in the up-timer sense of the word. They were reasonably well-graded dirt roads with a bit of crushed rock spread over them. Plus, at the moment, a layer of snow. There remained rough bits here and there. The coach was not as high as the old west stage coaches, but was higher than a modern car. Most of the time the coach could travel ten to fifteen miles per hour. There were places, though, where they had to slow way down and work their way between ruts.

Only a relatively small part of the design for the coach was from up-timer information. More of it had to do with a down-timer coach maker who had joined the team after the czar had seen some up-time car magazines. Czar Mikhail had liked the idea of cars and smooth rides. He'd decided that if he couldn't have an engine, he at least wanted a streamlined design and shock absorbers.

The coach maker, Ivan Egorovich Shirshov, had taken note of that desire. The czar had seen to that. Ivan Egorovich had arrived at the dacha with a medium-sized chip on his shoulder over the whole mess. Then he talked to Bernie and found that Bernie agreed with him. But it was no more up to Bernie than it was to him. They had gone over Bernie's car magazines, then over sleigh designs and coach designs, trying to figure out what they could do. Ivan Egorovich now had a permanent dent in his forehead from pounding it against the wall in frustration. And Czar Mikhail had a new coach. So did Bernie.

Bernie grabbed the edge of the seat. "Hang on. We're about to hit another rutted bit. And I still can't figure out why you wanted to come on this trip, ladies. You're probably going to get frostbite on your noses."

"The 'advance team' as you call it has made arrangements, Bernie. We will be comfortable. And I like traveling. Vladimir and I did quite a bit of it, you know, back when our father was alive."

Aunt Sofia grinned widely. "The weather, it is not so bad."

Bernie shuddered. If it hadn't been for the long johns, he'd have had frozen b… ah… parts by now.

The trip to the Swedish border had several purposes. One was to investigate the road work. Road work had been continuing apace since only a month or so after Bernie's arrival. Since he had worked on the road gangs around Grantville and had a mechanical turn of mind, he had a good knowledge of the horse-drawn grader and other horse-drawn road improvement equipment. The equipment he had helped design for Muscovy had been used extensively for almost a year now and was showing real effect. The czar's highways mostly went south and east, roughly toward China. One, however, went north and west toward the coast of the Baltic Sea.

That was the highway they were traveling. It was a fairly slow trip. They stopped occasionally to examine the road work. Most important to Bernie, though, was that the trip's second purpose was to pick up his car. It had been shipped from Grantville by way of the Baltic Sea to the Swedish-owned coast.

Muscovy had lost this particular bit of land to Sweden a couple of decades before. Thankfully, relations between the two nations had greatly improved in the ensuing years. This was mostly because both Sweden and Muscovy disliked Poland more than they disliked each other. But, also, Czar Mikhail Fedorovich Romanov was honestly impressed with the charismatic Swedish monarch.

Natasha had decided to join the party at the last minute, well, the last day. The amount of advanced planning needed to travel just a couple of days was mind boggling to Bernie. And this trip would take at least a month, new coach or not.

"I can't believe it." Bernie's voice was harsh and his nose bright red from chapping. "I can't believe it took five freaking weeks to get here and the ship still hasn't made it." Bernie stomped around the room for a bit, working off some excess energy.

"Now, Bernie." Vladislav Vasl'yevich Vinnikov, Natasha's captain of guards tried to soothe him. "It was a long way, a hard trip at this time of year. I would imagine that it was even worse on the sea. Your friend will be here. You must just be patient."

"Why the heck can't we just go to the coast to meet him?" Bernie threw his hands in the air. "I'm worried. Why stay here, so far from the coast?"

Vladislav Vasl'yevich wasn't about to answer that question directly. It wouldn't be the correct thing to do. Bernie just didn't, as he himself often remarked, "need to know."

"The villages in the area, Bernie. We should look at the villages. The soil is a bit different, perhaps. You could take notes, it would help with the development of the plows and reapers, I'm sure."

Bernie brightened a bit, not much. "Well it's, something to do anyway. Sure, we'll go take a look."

Natasha, who had been quiet for a few moments, added, "As well, Pavel Andreyevich would like you to design your plumbing for his home. He is most interested in it. And you are invited to utilize his banya, if you wish."

Bernie grinned. Banya's were certainly a way to get warm. Overly warm, if the truth were known. Bernie hadn't quite been able to make it to the third level of the banya back at the dacha, not yet. Nor had he quite had the guts to roll around in the snow afterwards, although he had progressed to dumping buckets of not-quite-cold water on himself. Banya's were sort of a sauna, but not quite; sort of a steam room, but also not quite. And the first time Filip had shown him the use of the venek, well… that had been sort of a revelation.