"Yes, I'm sure," Maureen said, when she recovered. "The dowager countess is none too pleased about it, mind you. But I checked with my contacts in the Committee of Correspondence."
Emelie glanced at Anna Sophia and smiled. "Your very extensive contacts in the CoC."
"Well, yes. In this instance, I checked with Gunther himself. Then, after hearing his story, I had my husband ask around in the navy yard. If anyone has anything bad to say about Thorsten Engler, they're keeping very quiet about it."
"As if anyone could hide anything from those people, with their spies in every house," the dowager countess said stiffly. "I do not approve, Maureen. I say it again. No good will come of this."
She didn't add mark my words, but she might as well have.
Her sister-in-law resumed her seat. "Oh, stop it, Anna Sophia. We've had no trouble with the CoC at all. What really upsets you is that our work depends so heavily on them."
"We should be relying on the churches," the older countess insisted. She and her sister-in-law shared the same birthday, June 15, but they were thirty years apart in age-and at least that far removed in some of their social attitudes.
Maureen slouched back in her chair with her elbows on the armrests, and steepled her fingers. Then, gazing at Anna Sophia over the fingertips, said: "I will be glad to, Countess-as soon as you can find me more than three churches in the city whose pastors or priests don't insist on imposing doctrinal qualifications on our clients. I will add that the only one of those three churches which carries any weight is-brace yourself-the Catholic church."
Anna Sophia's lips tightened but she said nothing. If she had, Maureen suspected, the words she'd have said would also have been: Those people. With perhaps even more disapproval in her tone than when she used those people to refer to the Committees of Correspondence. Like most upper-class Lutherans in the USE-young Emelie being one of the exceptions-the dowager countess of Schwarzburg-Rudolstadt viewed the recent upsurge of the Catholic church in Magdeburg with great alarm.
By what insidious devices had the miserable papists come to wield so much influence over the masses in central Germany? Until very recently, a bastion of Lutheran orthodoxy?
In public, they usually ascribed the phenomenon to the well-known deviousness and cunning of the Jesuits, "the damned Jesuits" being a handy catch-all explanation for Lutherans of their class. Or they ascribed it to the supposedly massive immigration of uneducated Catholics into the burgeoning capital city. But Maureen wondered how much they really believed that themselves. The great majority of immigrants into Magdeburg came from Protestant areas of Germany and Europe, not Catholic ones. And while the reputation of the Jesuits was well-deserved in some respects, the near-magical powers ascribed to them by their enemies was just plain silly.
No, the explanation was far simpler, and required no formula to explain beyond the well-tried and ancient one. As usually happens with powers-that-be, the Lutheran establishment in central and northern Germany-laity and clergy alike-had gotten fat, self-centered and complacent. And more than a little selfish. The headway made by the Catholic church was no more mysterious than the headway Protestant churches had made against Catholicism in the Latin America of the world Maureen had left behind in the Ring of Fire.
But there was no point in raking this old argument over the coals again. Anna Sophia was one of a dozen important figures in the Lutheran establishment in Germany-which, in this area, was essentially identical with the political establishment-who'd been willing to serve as public sponsors for the settlement house. With no lesser a person than the queen of Sweden herself as the figurehead-and her very energetic seven-year-old daughter as a frequent and enthusiastic visitor.
For Maureen Grady's purposes, that was plenty good enough. Emelie was the only one of the "Elles," as Caroline called them-"Eminent Lutheran Ladies"-who had a get-your-hands-dirty involvement in the daily work of the settlement house, anyway. Whether as a matter of personal temperament or simply because she was by far the youngest of the Elles, being still a teenager, Emelie had no trouble working with either the CoC or the Catholic church in Magdeburg.
In any event, it was time to break off the gossip session. The door was opening and Caroline was ushering the Engler fellow into the room.
Thorsten's relaxation at Caroline's obviously friendly attitude vanished the moment he went through the door she'd led him to. Other than Maureen Grady, he knew neither of the women in the room beyond. But everything about them, from the obviously expensive clothing they wore to their hair styles to subtleties about their expressions and mannerisms made it clear as day that they were noblewomen. Probably Hochadel, to boot, not lesser nobility.
Thorsten didn't share the automatic hostility toward the German aristocracy that many CoC members possessed. But he was certainly not partial to them, either-and, more to the point in this situation, had had so little personal contact with any real ones that he didn't know how to conduct himself properly. The one reichsritter who'd lived near Engler's village had been a very small landowner without much more in the way of pretensions-and certainly not refined manners-than any prosperous farmer in the area.
Fortunately, the younger of the two noblewomen smiled and extended her hand for an American-style informal handshake. That much, Thorsten had long since mastered.
"A pleasure, ma'am," he said, managing to get the words out smoothly and evenly.
"I am Emelie, the countess of Schwarzburg-Rudolstadt," she said. Then, gesturing toward the older noblewoman sitting by the window: "And this is my husband's sister-in-law Anna Sophia, the dowager countess."
There being no offer of a handshake coming from that quarter, Thorsten simply bowed. "A pleasure, ma'am." The elderly countess nodded in return but said nothing.
"This is the inner sanctum, Thorsten," said Caroline. "I figured I'd bring you in here first, so you wouldn't think this place was being run according to principles of anarchy. Appearances to the contrary. But we can go now, and leave the ladies to their machinations. See you later, Maureen. Emelie. Countess."
And off she went, taking Thorsten by the hand and leading him out. He made no protest. Leaving aside his own desire to escape, this was the first time they'd had any physical contact. He was quite thrilled.
After the door closed, the dowager countess of Schwarzburg-Rudolstadt emitted a sniff. "I find myself wondering if your precious CoC fellow made any recommendations about her. She's quite shocking at times, you know."
"Don't be silly, Anna Sophia. I find Caroline immensely refreshing."
Maureen looked from one to the other. "For what it's worth, I share Emelie's enthusiasm for Caroline-and, yes, Anna Sophia, sometimes the girl practically defines the term 'bluntness.' But what I mostly care about, seeing as how I really know very little about Thorsten Engler, is that I'm seeing a human being's emotional paralysis finally coming unraveled."
Now simply interested, the older countess raised her head. Maureen nodded toward Emelie. "She knows the story, but I don't think I've ever told you. Caroline's not a native of Grantville like most of us here. The only reason she was in town when the Ring of Fire hit is because she was one of Rita Stearns' college friends attending her wedding to Tom Simpson. Part of the reason she came is because she thought she might pick up some good tips-seeing as how she was supposed to get married to her own fiance six weeks later. In Philadelphia, where he lived-and where the Ring of Fire left him."
"Ah." Anna Sophia looked out the window again. "I wonder if we will ever understand God's purpose there. I don't think so, myself, whatever the parsons say. The learned arguments they advance today to explain the Ring of Fire are no more learned, after all, than the arguments I can remember them advancing not so many years ago-which sagely explained why the age of miracles is long past and will never return until the Christ himself."