'Sir Conrad, you keep saying cleanser. Aren't you using soap or wood ashes?'
'Soap is a boiled mixture of ashes and grease. The wool already has grease on it. It is what we are trying to remove. Raw ashes have a lot of solid particles that would make the wool dirty.'
'Instead, we leach the ashes first. We put them in a barrel with a cloth bottom and run hot water through them. The water that drips out contains sodium hydroxide, lye, which is a stronger cleanser.'
'So there is a worker at each tub?'
'Probably not, my lord. Working all day over the two boiling tubs would be arduous. We plan to have each worker follow a given batch of wool up the line.'
This grilling went on for hours before Duke Henryk called for beer and I could slake my very dry throat. We were seated in the count's hall.
'Sir Conrad, as you have described the washing line, it seems to me that it can wash more wool than your wheels can spin.'
'True, my lord. It will be free much of the time for other things. Washing clothes, for example.'
'You have explained what you -are doing but not why you are doing it.'
'Why make cloth, my lord? So that people can wear it!'
'No. I mean, you are a foreigner among us. What do you want? Is it money?'
'I have plenty of money, my lord. More than I want for myself. And I am not a foreigner. I know that my accent is strange to you. I grew up in ... another place. But all of my ancestors were Poles, and I am a Pole, and this is my country.'
'Indeed. I am told that you may not discuss your place of birth, and I will not press you. But why are you doing what you are doing?'
'Because Poland is divided and backward and weak! Because our people are cold and hungry and illiterate! They die like snowflakes touching a river.'
'And because the Mongols-the Tartars-are coming! They want to kill all our people and turn our fields into grazing lands for their war-horses!'
'Calm yourself, Sir Conrad. It is good that you are concerned with the lot of our people. These mills, these looms of yours, they are good things. I will see that their use is encouraged. But as to the Tartars, why, Genghis Khan died five years ago, so why worry about them?'
'Genghis had sons, and his sons have sons. They will come.'
'When?'
'In nine years. A little less than that.'
'Hmm. You know their plans so far in advance?'
'They will come, my lord.'
'If you believe that, then why are you wasting your time on these peaceful pursuits? Why are you not building weapons of war?'
'I will build weapons, my lord. But who will use them? In Poland now it takes a hundred peasants and workers to support a single fighting man, a knight. When the Mongols come, they will come with every man in their tribes under arms. By numbers alone they will overwhelm us. My machines will give all the people the time and the weapons to train for war. Poland can survive only with a citizen army!'
'You would arm commoners? That would upset the social stability.'
'You are right, my lord. But there is nothing as stable as a dead man. He just lies there and doesn't move at all.'
'You are a strange man, Sir Conrad the Giant.'
And so I was dismissed. As I walked away, I knew that I had blown it. I had gotten so wrapped up in technical details that I had forgotten what it was that I should have been trying to accomplish. I was like the engineer who became so involved in fighting alligators that he forgot that his job was to drain the swamp.
It didn't matter what the duke thought of my mills and factory. They were already being built, and he would not be likely to stop them, no matter what he thought.
The important thing I needed was his approval on a grant of land. Without my own land, everything I had done so far would be trivial.
And I had come across like a lunatic prophet of doom' I couldn't have done worse if I'd been carrying a sign proclaiming the end of the world.
I was in a black mood when I learned that the Krakowski brothers had arrived with a packtrain loaded with my brass mill fittings. City folk didn't pay much attention to most of the country holidays. When there was work to be had, they worked. The collars were so big that they had to be slung between two mules each, like sedan chairs.
I called Vitold, Ilya, and Angelo away from a sort of soccer game and introduced them to the Krakowski brothers. We discussed our mutual needs: the fittings for the dry mill, tubs for washing and dyeing, axles and bushings for wheelbarrows.
Fortunately, the Krakowski brothers understood my technical drawings, and I had a thick stack of parchment for them to take back.
It took Vitold a long time to grasp what a wheelbarrow was all about, but he agreed to make a gross as soon as the sawmill was done. They would help in getting in the harvest.
Then there were the clay crocks for Ilya's steelmaking. The brothers agreed to make them but insisted on understanding the cementation process. They already had the clay and the charcoal and the ovens. They were impressed by Ilya's axes and wanted to get into the cementation business themselves. I gave them my blessing.
They had the idea of casting brass into molded clay forms and a hint from me about stacking up small clay forms and casting many objects at once. They were already selling belt buckles and door hinges by the gross.
I called over Piotr Kulczynski and swore him to fealty before the group. It took a while to make the brothers understand that Piotr was not their boss-they could run their business as they saw fitbut they were expected to keep him informed on all financial transactions, and he would be reporting to me.
It was understood that Piotr was to live in my room at the inn and keep the inn's books as well. I gave him a letter to the innkeeper confirming this.
Finally, Thom Krakowski brought up a delicate subject. Despite the fact that they were working for me, I had agreed that they should get one-twelfth of the profits of their work. He therefore felt that I should buy the present fittings and the order I had just placed, just to get it on the books so that they could figure up their bonus. I would get much of this back as my profits for ownership.
I had to agree that this was fair but stipulated that they would be paid from the surplus from the inn. This was agreed on.
Their bill came to 19,500 pence.
It was growing dark, so I invited all present to a quick meal in the count's kitchen. We were halfway through the meal when Lambert came in.
'Sir Conrad! Where the devil have you been? There was a high place for you at supper that stood empty!'
'I'm sorry, my lord. I didn't know that I was invited. The brass mill fittings came in, and there was much to discuss.'
'I saw the brass. I've never seen so much brass in one place in my life! You paid for all this?'
'Well, yes, my lord. When I left for Cieszyn, you were distracted with the planting, so I thought it best to take my own money along.'
'But you agree that the mills are mine?'
'Of course, my lord.'
'Then I owe you your expenses. What were they?'
'The present fittings, plus those for the dry mill, the tubs for the factory and the dye, the mules, and the Florentine came to ... uh ... about twenty-three thousand pence.'
'Twenty-three ... Come talk with me in my chambers, Sir Conrad.'
When we got there, he said, 'Twenty-three thousand pence is a huge amount of money, Sir Conrad.'
'Yes, my lord.'
'Hmm. You wouldn't wager on your chess playing. Would you wager on your mill? I would bet you that your
