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Lutheran churches that's true enough. Connections still help in getting an appointment that's true, too.
But they can't appoint just any ne'er-do-well cousin who needs a sinecure. Not anymore. They pick off a
list of church-approved candidates who've finished a theological course, sometimes at a university and
sometimes at a seminary, and who have been examined and approved by their own church board for the
principality the consistory, it's called, mainly, or sometimes the general synod. There's no rule about
what it's called. It works pretty much the same in the Calvinist principalities. Actually, a lot of it has
rubbed off on us Catholics, as well. Compared to the middle ages, one thing that Europe has now is a
clergy that's a lot more literate, a lot more educated, and a lot more committed to the job."
Ed grinned. "Of course, all of those things mean that as a general rule they spend a lot more time reading
and arguing about fine theological points than back in the days when quite a few rural priests could barely
stumble their way through the liturgy. Not to mention that the fashion for long sermons means that the
parishioners hear a lot more about points of theological controversy, too. A fair number of homilies seem
to encapsulate the major points that the local pastor intends to make in his next letter to a neighboring
minister with whom he disagrees about the nature of the Real Presence or the significance of Christ's
Descent into Hell."
Mike's eyebrows were still raised high.
Ed persisted. "Shall I go over it again? We can't just do things according to our own priorities. We have
to factor in the priorities of our allies. Mike, we're living on their street. They're our neighbors. Theycare
about this. They really, really, do. Therefore,we care about this. Whether you want us to or not. And we
will send a delegate of equal status to the chancellors of all those allied territories. That's me."
"So everything else gets dropped for a month?"
"No. I'll just make Arnold Bellamy 'acting.' He's perfectly capable of keeping everything else on track. If
I die of the plague or get thrown off a damned horse and break my neck, he will be doing the job. That's
why there's a Deputy Secretary of State."
* * *
Mike frowned a little, thinking that almost a year ago, when Grantville's delegates first met with Gustavus
Adolphus, Ed hadn't been anything like this assertive. He had stood there looking very
behind-the-scenes, very advice-but-not-policy, very subordinate-in-a-clear-hierarchy-of-authority. He'd
had a lot of on-the-job experience as Secretary of State since then, of course, but still, how had he
changed so much?
Then Mike reconsidered, and decided that it was last April that was the aberration. Ed's whole career
track had been aimed at being a principal: not a vice-principal or a deputy principal. He'd run the high
school with a fair amount of input there was a faculty senate and a student council. He'd run it with
good cheer, common sense, and an even temperament. But somehow no one, neither teachers nor kids
nor even the county superintendent of schools, had doubted that the hand that directed Grantville High
School belonged to Ed Piazza. Before the RoF, after the mine had closed, Ed had managed the single
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largest enterprise in Grantville, from the standpoint of budget and personnel, and he'd never been afraid
to make a decision once he had the data on which to base it.
"What if I directly order you not to go?" he asked.
"If you directly order me not to go, I will stay here. But I will continue to think that you are wrong." Ed
leaned forward in his chair. "Don't just take it from me. Ask the rest of the cabinet, if you want to. Bring it
up for debate. But Ishould go. From beginning to end. That's where I stand."
* * *
They also serve who only sit and sit.
Ed had only brought the essentials for this stay in Jena. In his view, the essentials included an old
aluminum Drip-o-lator and a thermos bottle with the kind of top that nested six different sizes of plastic
cup. He could remind himself a thousand times that this was not a quaint Renaissance Faire staffed by
costumed reenactors but rather the modern world insofar as there was a modern world. Nonetheless,
the thought of beer for breakfast turned his stomach. His wife Annabelle had concocted some reusable
filters out of an ancient roll of gauze she had turned up somewhere. Turkish coffee arrived in beans rather
than pre-ground, but he'd managed to modify a peppermill to deal with that problem. He stood in the
public room of the Black Bear Inn the next morning, brewing coffee with a dramatic flourish for the
benefit of his entourage.
Since the secretary of state's support staff in Jena consisted entirely of kids who had gone to high school
since he joined the staff, they expected the flourish even early in the morning. They would have been
disappointed not to have it. Before he became principal, Mr. P.'s "extracurricular" had been directing all
the school plays usually teaching by doing. Ed could drop into any role. His students never quite
understood how, when a demonstration was called for, a burly man of about five and a half feet, wearing
a yellow polo shirt, could turn into an imaginary six-foot-tall rabbit (Harvey), a psychopathic killer (
Night Must Fall), a Russian empress (Anastasia), or a ditzy spinster (Arsenic and Old Lace) without
even putting on a costume. When he became principal, his first addition to the staff had been Amber
Higham as a full-time drama teacher, but he had still dropped in on the rehearsals whenever he could find
a minute.
But they all knew his favorite role. "Hey, Mr. Piazza," said Tanya the radio operator, as Ed poured
boiling water into the Drip-o-lator, "Give us the serenade."
The serenade was Ed's glory. Six times, during his life, he had been called to this acme of thespian
desires in high school already; in college; while he was in the army, during an R&R in Guam; three
times for community theaters. He had met Annabelle during the first community theater version. It was
never enough. There couldn't be too many productions. So as Leopold Cavriani came in, hoping to
extract data about the previous evening's conclave of chancellors, he found the odor of coffee, six
apprentice diplomats (only one of whom officially worked for the Department of International Affairs)
sitting around their breakfast table wearing borrowed St. Mary's second-best choir robes that they tried
to pretend were seventeenth century academic gowns, enthusiastic applause, and the secretary of state,
garbed in a matching choir robe, throwing himself into a glorious basso rendition of "Some Enchanted
Evening" as the sun rose.
That was another thing that Ed had learned about colloquies. They started early. The participants were
not inclined to waste daylight.
* * *
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"Ah, M'sieu Cavriani, good morning. Do join us. My staff Tanya Newcomb, our tech. She's based in [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]