But the point was that American women, and not just up-timers-he shuddered internally as he considered Gretchen Richter-considered themselves just as capable as any man and acted accordingly. Which might be all very well for them. In fact, the colonel was prepared to admit that however unsettling he might find the concept himself, the Americans were probably onto something. Certainly it didn't make any sense to tell someone who could shoot like Julie Mackay that her place was solely in the kitchen and the nursery! None too safe to try, for that matter.
But Princess Kristina wasn't an American, any more than Gustavus Adolphus was, "Captain Gars" or no. This little girl was going to grow up to become the queen of Sweden. And if her father succeeded in his plans-as he had a habit of doing, Ekstrom reflected with a certain complacency-she would also become empress of the Confederated Principalities of Europe. No doubt brilliance would be very useful to her in that case, but how prepared would her subjects-and especially her aristocracy-be to accept a brilliant queen and empress who'd been… contaminated by American modes of thought?
He didn't have an answer for that question. But one thing he did know, even on this short an acquaintance with the princess: the razor-sharp mind behind that child's eyes was not the sort to accept compromises or subterfuges which required it to pretend to be less than it was.
Which could have all sorts of… interesting consequences for the future of Europe.
Chapter 25
After she finished tightening the gauze mask over her face, Melissa took the spray gun handed to her by Darryl. She gripped the device much the way a devout Christian might grip a heathen fetish: on the one hand, with great and squeamish reluctance; on the other, very tightly-lest the horrid thing escape and inflict unknown havoc upon nearby innocent children.
Everyone in the room burst into laughter. After a moment, Melissa couldn't help smiling herself.
"God, do I feel stupid," she chuckled.
Darryl's laugh faded into a simple grin. "Hey, Melissa-I told ya. I'll be glad to do it myself. The stuff doesn't bother me any."
Melissa sniffed. "All the more reason for you not to do it! It should bother you. You'll be careless."
Darryl's eyes rolled. "Fer Chrissake," he muttered. "It's just DDT. You're acting like it's nerve gas or mustard gas, or sumthin'."
Melissa eyed the spray gun with distaste. "Besides, I'm by far the oldest person here. So whatever the foul stuff does to me it isn't likely-I suppose-to kill me off until I'm dead of old age anyway. And since I'm past menopause, there's no problem with effects on my offspring."
Now it was Rita's turn to roll her eyes. In the two years since the Ring of Fire, Mike Stearns' sister had devoted her energies to nursing and medical studies. Although she was no doctor-nor even a nurse, by the strict standards of a pre-Ring of Fire RN-she had far more medical expertise than anyone else in the U.S. delegation to England.
"Melissa," she said, almost sighing, "how many times do we have to go over this? The health hazards involved in using DDT are long-term, and have a lot to do with how frequently you get exposed to it. It's not likely to hurt any of us to spray it once in a while, especially if we take simple precautions like wearing a breathing block-" Here she nodded toward the gauze mask on Melissa's face. "-wash the clothes used afterward, keep the windows closed while spraying so it'll settle quickly. Hell, people have even been known to eat the stuff and not die from it." A bit hastily: "Not that it's a good idea, of course. It is toxic, no doubt about it. And for a rich country like our old U.S. of A., it made plenty of sense to stop using it. But-"
Melissa waved her hand impatiently-just for a brief moment, before she resumed her firm clutch on the heathen device.
"Spare me the lecture," she grumbled. "I admit I'm probably a little eccentric on the subject-old habits die hard-but I'm not actually crazy. I know perfectly well that the fatality rate from typhus or bubonic plague makes the toxic side effects of DDT look like cotton candy. I still don't have to like it."
She waved the spray gun around, almost threateningly. "Now get out of here, all of you. To quote the Bard-whoever the hell he is, and that's something else I'd like to find out while we're here because I still don't quite believe Balthazar about the earl of Oxford anymore than I believed those slick-talking company spokesmen I can remember swearing that benzene was harmless-until the poor slobs on the factory floor who were making it started dropping like flies from cancer of the liver-and dammit, I liked the idea that the English language's finest poet and playwright was a nobody from the sticks-"
Everybody's eyes were now almost crossed, trying to follow the convoluted thought processes. Melissa stopped her prattle, cleared her throat noisily, and got to the point:
" 'If t'were done at all, best t'were done quickly.' Scat!"
The Schoolmarm's Voice, that last. Everyone scatted-hastily-while Melissa marched toward the far corner of their rooms in St. Thomas' Tower. Darryl was the last one to emerge onto the walkway connecting their suite to the inner walls of the tower. By the time he closed the door, he could hear Melissa's growls interspersed with the spish-spish of a manually operated spray pump being furiously worked.
He grinned, and pressed an ear against the door. "That's telling 'em, girl!" His voice took on a little falsetto, mimicking Melissa. " 'Die, bug, die! Out, damned louse!' And then there's something in… sounds like Latin, maybe. 'Sick sumper rickets perwacky,' I think."
Rita was grinning too. " 'Sic semper Rickettsia prowazekii,' I bet. That translates more or less as: thus to all the damned critters that cause typhus. Rickettsia prowazekii is the germ involved in that disease. It's sorta like a bacterium."
"Only good bug is a dead bug," said Darryl, nodding approvingly.
Tom Simpson chuckled. "Don't let Melissa hear you say that, Darryl-not unless you want a lecture on how most bugs are our friends and you shouldn't squash spiders."
Darryl winced. Tom started to add something else, but felt a hand on his elbow. Turning his head, he saw that one of the Yeoman Warders standing guard on the walkway-as always, keeping the Americans from entering the inner Tower except under escort-had come up behind him. Politely, the man was leaning his partisan away.
Away, yes-but the great blade of the weapon was still honed sharp, and gleamed in the morning sun.
"Yes, Andrew?" he asked. By now, Tom had made it a point to learn the names of all the Yeoman Warders assigned to stand guard over the American delegation. They all had.
"If you'll pardon my asking, m'lord-ah, sir-what are you doing in there?"
The words were not spoken in a hostile tone. This was not the query of a guard investigating suspicious conduct, simply the question of man puzzled-not for the first time-by the sometimes odd conduct of these rather eccentric Americans.
"We're spraying our rooms with a chemical we brought with us. It's called 'DDT' for short." Tom nodded toward Rita. "You'd have to ask my wife what the letters actually stand for. I've forgotten. Some long bunch of chemical terms."
Andrew frowned. "Why?"
"The stuff kills most kinds of germs-small things; you can't see them with the naked eye-that carry disease. Well, some diseases, anyway. It'll work against the germs that carry typhus-what you all call 'Gaol fever,' I think-and bubonic plague, I know that."