"I haff come to t"ank you, Herr Cliffort. You vas very kind to Kurt und me." She was so sincere and so
calm that Dice had trouble keeping his smile under control. In her unhurried speech, she showed the
food she had prepared for him and could she pliz use his kitchen to make him a hot meal?
Now Dice was an old coot. But Mama Clifford didn"t raise no dumb puppies and he was well aware of the barren nature of his cupboard. Turn down a hot meal? Not b.l.o.o.d.y likely!
She firmly ejected him from the kitchen and set him down at the end of the table with a salad of green leafy strips, pieces of boiled egg, grated yellow cheese and the last of his Thousand Island dressing from the refrigerator. It was very good! But the edge of one leaf piqued his curiosity. Unfolding one of the larger pieces-it was a dandelion! d.a.m.n! No wonder she was harvesting the stuff! Clatter of dishes, clank of saucepan and skillet, even a beep beep beep of the microwave. Now he was impressed. He was tempted to peek, but restrained himself by pretending to read a magazine but his ears were tuned to the noises from the kitchen.
"Oakee Doakee. Iss ready!"
Elfriede placed bowls of hot food on the table and stood with her hands folded primly before a spotless white ap.r.o.n. Flowers from who knows where made a yellow and purple centerpiece.
This wouldn"t do. From the cabinet, he retrieved a second setting and placed it at the opposite end of the
table.
"Now iss ready," he deliberately misp.r.o.nounced, and held her seat expectantly. Fl.u.s.tered, she paused uncertainly before taking the offered seat.
The food she had provided was rich and tasty. The tender chunks of venison, carrots, potatoes, onions,
and celery in a thick clear broth was unlike the canned stew he used to nuke in the microwave. Also there was a ca.s.serole of yellow something that he had at first mistaken for mashed potatoes. But it was
topped with baked yellow cheese and delicious.
To Effi"s delight, he praised her stew, made from scratch from available provender. But she wanted to have something American, too and had made some thrice cooked cheese grits from Sarah Jane Mason"s recipe. She had a moment of panic when he stopped for a second at the first bite. But then appreciation showed on his face and he took another big bite.
"What is this?"
Now she was confused. Sara Jane had p.r.o.nounced her grits to be very good. "Iss gritz. Iss not goot?"
"Grits?" These were better than the horrible stuff they served instead of hash browns at the restaurants.
"No. Yes. They"re very good! Excellent!""Eggs of Lent? No. Cheese-Kase-Fromage! You like?""G.o.d! I need a dictionary!""Ach! I haff a dikzhunary!" She bounced up and retrieved a precious paperback English-German dictionary from her bag, borrowed especially for this event. In minutes, they had pulled their chairs and placemats around to the long side of the table and were looking up words between bites. * * * Dice leaned back in his La-Z-Boy with a bulging belly, a book and a beer. It reminded him what it was like to be married. But since Karen, women had always been too much trouble. He never dated much and when he did, his dates usually bored him by talking too much about people he didn"t know or didn"t like. After a while he stopped asking them out. He would come home, nuke a dinner, watch some TV and go to bed.
Until the Ring of Fire.
Now he was an old fart that people thought was a bit "tetched." That was okay before, but now, after two
evenings of company and activity, he discovered that he had become a lonely old man.
Clattering from the kitchen stopped and Elfriede came with her much emptier bag to the living room.
Her smile lit the room better than electricity ever could, but Dice was a realist. The pretty, thirtyish blonde would have no reason to find an old man like him attractive. He was satisfied that she had been
grateful enough to bring him a dinner. But he could still stall for time. The thought of her leaving sent his brain scurrying for a reason to delay the return of solitude.During the meal they had looked up "printing" and "press" in the Worterbuch, so she knew he was a Drucker, but he had an ace in the hole. Actually it was a press in the bas.e.m.e.nt.His plan. His project. His salvation."Would you like to see mein Druckerpresse?"
* * * Effi had seen printing presses before. They were big wooden machines with iron frames of lead type. But her eyes lit up when he asked her to see his press. And he had remembered the German word, too. She now had a reason to stay longer in this fine house. And instead of treating her like a servant, he had insisted she dine with him at his own table! It wasn"t a castle, but it was beautiful and clean and quiet. To find quiet, she went to the forest. But to live in a quiet, peaceful place like this with a man who treated her so kindly would be heaven.
And though he was old, these Americans stayed vigorous way beyond the age when most normal people shriveled up and died. He was strong. She had felt his forearm the night before and he had good breadth of chest. That would be from pulling the big wooden handle on his press. He was hearty. She had seen him striding down the sidewalk like a much younger man. But what would a rich American want with a poor German widow and two children, and whose English was so poor and whose skills were hundreds of years behind his? Ah well . . . she could dream.
* * * Dice flipped on the stairway and bas.e.m.e.nt lights and led the way down the stairs. The full bas.e.m.e.nt was divided without walls into Dice"s areas of interest. The laundry corner held the water heater, washer and dryer and the double tub. The furnace sat squat in the middle of the floor and boxes were stacked three deep along one wall. The entire west half of the bas.e.m.e.nt was given to his new workshop. This was where he was going to stop being a pressman and start being a captain of industry.
There, on a st.u.r.dy table, was the Clifford Mark I Hand-Powered Rotary Press. It was little more than a foot square, two feet tall, and had a big handle and a flywheel. Dice spread ink on the fountain roller and started cranking. When the ink covered the plate, he handed the job over to Elfriede. Dice stood on a box at the end of the table and put on a rubber finger cap. He flipped the engagement lever and fed a dozen sheets of bond paper into the top of the machine one sheet at a time. As the press engaged, the speed slowed momentarily, but Effi picked up the pace without instruction. One sheet per second slid smoothly onto the catcher!
Dice showed her how ink was spread by the rollers onto the plate cylinder and how the impression cylinder grabbed the sheet of paper, transferred the image from the plate, and then dropped the paper into the receiving tray.
"No electricity!" he said proudly, "and it will take any kind of paper at all!"
* * * Her eyes grew big. This was marvelous! It was simple! She could see and understand every step of the process. The ink goes onto the raised letters and is pressed against the paper. But it was tiny compared to the presses she had seen. With every turn of the handle little metal fingers grabbed the waiting sheet of paper from the wooden board on top, carried it to press against the inky letters and immediately dropped the printed piece into the tray. And it was fast! Sixty sheets a minute instead of two!
It was at that moment that she really understood both the gulf between the Americans and people of her
time, and how truly alike they were.
Here was a man who had put uncounted hundreds of hours into a dream, taking the progress of centuries and using that knowledge to build a machine for her time. She walked slowly around the table, trailing her hand over his invention. There was a combination of old and new, shiny rollers and metal pieces in roughly cut sides. Screws and springs and wedges of wood. But it worked. Because he dreamed of
making things better. Just as she had dreamed of finding a better life at the end of the yellow lined roadway to Grantville.
She looked at the walls. They were covered with paper and drawings of machines. Not just his press,
either. On one wall, in the center, was a black and white photograph of a smiling young man sitting at a machine that towered over him. His hands were poised over b.u.t.tons lined up in rows beneath his fingers.
His drawings, dozens and dozens of drawings, surrounded the picture. She recognized some of them as pieces from the machine. She touched the photo.
"Dieses ist Sie, ja?" she said softly.
There were tears welling in the man"s eyes.
"Yeah. That"s me." He snuffled and blinked back the tears before she could notice. Stupid computers!
His first Ring of Fire had been in 1977 when he"d been told he no longer had a job. A d.a.m.ned minimum
wage teeny bopper on a computer had replaced him.
His spread hands encompa.s.sed the wall full of drawings. "And that"s my Linotype." How soon before he could build one? Probably never. But with his drawings, someone, years from now, would be able to figure it out.
Upstairs, they paused at the front door. Dice looked down at Effi. So young and beautiful. How could he ask her to stay? What could he possibly offer this wonderful German girl half his age?
* * * Upstairs, they paused at the front door. Effi looked up at Dice. This rich American . . . so intelligent, kind, and sensitive, so strong and self-sufficient . . . what did he need her for?
He looked ready to say something and she held her breath.
"Uh . . . would you . . . maybe like to go out to dinner with me?" he stammered out, feeling like a teenager. "There is a new restaurant downtown. You could bring Kurt and Anna."
Effi smiled. "I vould like that very much."
The Cla.s.s Of "34
by Kerryn Offord.
The High School Stables.
"Isn"t that JoAnn"s horse you have there?" asked Matt Tisdel, walking towards Liz Manning who was saddling her horse.
Liz ignored the interruption and continued slipping the headstall and bosal over Speedy"s head.
"I mean, you do know that"s "Speedy"? Does your sister know you have him out?"
With a heavy sigh Liz ran a hand gently down the side of Speedy"s neck. She muttered a set-upon "Yes."
"You aren"t thinking of riding him home are you? I mean. JoAnn wouldn"t call him Speedy for nothing."
Liz turned from Speedy to stare at her tormentor. "Yes, Matt. Yes, I know this is Speedy. Yes, I know he is fast. I have been riding Speedy for a while. I am perfectly capable of riding a horse. I am perfectly capable of riding Speedy. Okay? Now if you will excuse me, I have to finish saddling up if I want to get home before it gets dark." With that she made her way over to the saddle and blankets straddling a rail beside the saddling area.
With Liz moving Matt had a clear view of the bridle she had been fitting. The sight shocked him. "Isn"t that a hackamore? Don"t tell me you are thinking of riding that animal with a hackamore?" he asked in horror.
"Okay, I won"t tell you. Though what business it is of yours I don"t know."
"I"m not totally ignorant when it comes to horses you know. It takes a really good rider to control an animal like Speedy with a hackamore."
"What are you trying to suggest, Matt?" Liz asked, fire growing in her eyes.
Matt was taken aback at how the conversation was deteriorating. "Nothing. Nothing. Here, let me help
with that," Matt offered, trying to regain lost ground by reaching to pick up the saddle sitting ready on
the rail.
"Thanks, but I"m perfectly capable of saddling a horse." Liz grabbed the saddle blanket and pad before Matt could lay a hand on them and set them over Speedy"s withers. Turning back to the saddle she found Matt had carried it over. Reaching out she grabbed the heavy western saddle and pulled it from his hands. "Thank you for your help. I could have managed quite well without it." Quickly she threw the saddle over Speedy"s back, letting it down gently. First checking that there were no wrinkles in the saddle pad and blanket, she then bent down and reached under Speedy"s belly for the girth. She had just grabbed the cinch when she heard the heavy tread of someone else coming. Loosely buckling the cinch she looked up to see who had come in.
"Hi, Liz," Kevin greeted her, running his eyes up and down Liz, pausing to stare at her b.r.e.a.s.t.s. He waved a couple of pieces of paper in her direction. "I"ve got tickets for the senior prom. What time do you want me to pick you up?"