Ring of Fire III

Do It Once and Do It Again

Wietze Oil Field, August 1635

“Hannsi, I’m telling you, you’re sitting on a gold mine,” Hermann said.

“And I’m telling you, you’re crazy,” Hanns replied.

“No, I’m not.”

Hanns was dressed no better than, if as well as, a prosperous farmer. Hermann was dressed in a color-fast, light mud-brown-what the Confederates called butternut and others called khaki-long-sleeve, button-down, collared shirt, like the up-timers wore. A local seamstress was selling them as fast as her sewing machine could turn them out. The oil workers wanted to look the part and that is what they decided the part should look like. The two men sat drinking at a table in the Wild Cat Bar and Grill, which had just changed its name to reflect the mood and vocabulary of their up-timer customers, and they had just expanded to better serve the Wietze oil field community. The owner overheard a conversation once. Once was enough.

“This place needs more tables.”

“Yeah, but where else, close by, can you go?”

“Well that’s true enough for now. But, I’ll tell you this, if he doesn’t add on it won’t be true for long.”

The oil worker waved a hand at the south wall, beyond which the oil works lay. “Hannsi, you’ve seen what they’re doing out there.”

“So? What has that got to do with me?”

“Look, you’re the one who owns grandfather’s rights,” Hermann said.

“Just what are you going on about?” Hanns asked.

Hanns and Hermann both were thoroughly familiar with their grandfather’s “rights” and all of the circumstances that surrounded them. They were fully aware of the fact that downward mobility was much more readily available to the nobility than upward mobility was to the commoner. Not that grandfather had been all that high to begin with. At this point in time there wasn’t a whole lot left.

Three villages’ worth of land was leased out for ninety-nine years or three generations, whichever came first. But grandfather had mortgaged the rents. His second child, a daughter, was, to use an up-time expression, drop dead gorgeous. He spent money he should have put elsewhere to send her to the court of Henry Julius of Brunswick, duke of the principalities of Wolfenbuttel, Gottingen and Calenberg, where she could be seen. The investment paid off. She married well above her station to a widower. Before the investment could be capitalized the daughter died in childbirth.

The third child, also a daughter, was even prettier than her sister. Having done it once, Grandfather knew he could do it again, so he mortgaged the rents to send her to court, where she caught the eye of a young visiting Hochadel. She claimed he was a prince. Before the fairy tale could unfold the graf was thrown from his horse and broke his neck. It happened on the day she told him she was with child. Home she came in disgrace with an unacknowledged, unsupported bastard in her belly.

When the manor house caught fire, grandfather died rescuing something that he valued as much as life itself. To say that the first child, a son, rebuilt the manor house is misleading. He tried, but the replacement was a pale reflection of what the old house had been. The son, Hanns’ father, supported a wife and four children, of whom only Hanns and one sister survived, along with his sister and her whelp, in what might graciously be called genteel poverty. The manor, along with a lot of hunting, barely kept them fed. Anything of value went for cash, as cash was needed from time to time, while the family waited for the leases to lapse so the sold rents would revert. The right to a tithe of the grain the villagers sent to be ground in the mill on manor lands helped feed the family, after a miller was paid, of course. The wood lots were watched very closely to see to it that only those who had a right to cut wood did so and then only in the allotment that fell to them, and the tenants knew better than to even think about hunting the game. The right to hunt belonged to the landlords, and the family in the manor spent a great deal of time watching every right like a hawk, in order to collect every last half-copper coin they had coming.

There was no going to court for Hanns. There was no going to a university either. His education ended with what he learned at the local grammar school in the nearest village. A tutor for even one season was out of the question. Hermann received the same scant education his cousin did. In better times Hermann might have gotten a better education and made a life as an officer in the military. In better times, without an education, he might have raised a mercenary unit and made his way in the world. But outfitting a company took money. In better times he might have joined someone else’s outfit as an under-officer but equipment took money. In better times he could have scrounged old equipment out of the attic and gone off as a mercenary but what survived the fire was long gone for cash.

“The axle grease seep.” Hermann said in response to his cousin’s question.

“Hermann, there isn’t that much of it. Besides, the village has the right to harvest anything that comes up. You know that every bit as well as well as I do.”

Hermann smiled a smile that forced his ears further apart. “Exactly!”

“What do you mean by that?” Hanns asked.

“They can harvest what seeps to the surface. The family still owns anything deeper than a plough can turn.”

“So?”

“Oil, Hannsi, it is all about the oil. The family is sitting on a gold mine and you own it.”

“Oil?”

“That’s right! Oil! We will sink a well over the grease seep.”

“Hermann, the village is not going to let us drill a well and pump out oil without making a fuss.”

“Hannsi? How are they going to stop us? We own the land. We own what is on it and what is under it. The tenants hold a lease. They have leave to farm the land and build in the village. Someone else owns the rents. But the family still owns the land,” Hermann smiled. He knew there was something a bit odd about the terms of the Lehen the family held.

When their ancestor was given the fief ages ago, in return for his knightly service at arms, he thought there might be something worth mining on the land. So he asked for and got the right to mine. The family figured the Herzog gave it to him because the then “His Grace, the duke” knew there was nothing there. They owned the mineral rights free and clear in the face of any custom to the contrary and they could prove it. Hermann’s grandfather staggered out of the burning manor house with his arms wrapped around an iron-bound chest to die a slow painful death from horrible burns. The chest held the family papers. Some were so old the parchment was brittle. “I told you, you’re sitting on a gold mine.”

“So, maybe I have a right to the oil? But the tenants have the use of the land.” Hanns was skeptical.

“Hannsi, they have never cropped that portion. They have never run stock on it to graze. They don’t harvest the grease anymore.” Hermann was sure of this because they always checked anytime they hunted through the area. If they were harvesting the grease a toll was due the family. “They are not using it, they haven’t ever used it other than years ago to collect any grease that came to the surface and they can still do that. It is like the wood lot next to it, if it isn’t technically part of the wood lot anyway. They do not have the use of the land other than the limited right to harvest the grease, just like there is a set portion of the trees they can take.”

“Still, Hermann, we don’t have one of those things that goes hiss and thump.”

“You mean a steam driver?”

“Whatever you call it. We don’t have one and we can’t afford to hire one. We couldn’t even get one to the seep if we did. There is no road back there, only a path and the only bridge is a log across the creek.”

“Don’t need one. All a steam driver does is push enough steam under the hammer so the weight goes up then the steam escapes and the weight comes down. Ten men with a rope can do the same thing.”

“Hermann, you’re not listening to me. We don’t have the money. We can’t afford to hire ten men.”

A stranger turned from the next table turned to face them and said, “Excuse me, I don’t mean to intrude. And I wasn’t meaning to eavesdrop on your conversation. But you weren’t being particularly quiet about it. Do I understand correctly that the only thing between you and an oil well is capital to hire labor and buy materials?”

“No,” said Hanns.

“Yes,” said Hermann.

“Let me introduce myself,” the short, blond, blue-eyed stranger said, pulling his chair up to their table. “My name is Adolph Holz.” He faced Hanns. “You have a grease seep?”

Hanns looked at the short man with ice blue eyes and blond hair that was almost white from the summer sun and formed an opinion. He was probably a small-time merchant or a younger son of a larger merchant house. His clothes were not rich, but he was not a laborer by a long spell. Hanns decided he could trust the man to be reasonably honest as long as he kept an eye on him and counted the change. “Yes. But there isn’t that much of it and the tenants have a right to what there is,” Hanns said.

Herr Holz turned to Hermann. “You are convinced that you can get oil out of it?”

“Absolutely! I work on a drilling crew and we’ve sunk three wells in or next to seeps just like it. I can do the same on family land. All Hanns has to do is turn loose of the money and I can make the family rich again!” Hermann glared at his cousin.

“Hermann, you’re crazy. Besides I haven’t got enough money to do it. And anyway, I wouldn’t let you throw it away even if I had it.” Hanns glared right back.

“My good fellows, please, there is absolutely no cause for family to turn against family here. Now, Hanns, I gather it is not the idea of trying for an oil well that you dislike but the thought of spending the money?”

“I don’t have the money!” Hanns replied.

“Yes he does! He just won’t turn loose of it!”

“And if Hermann could do this without you having to invest any money in it, then would it be all right for him to try?”

“I guess so. Yes, if the tenants don’t object and if the rent holder doesn’t object, and I don’t really see how they can do anything other than grumble, I can let him drive a well on the land, it should be all right. After all, it is our land. Yes, as long as he pays for it and it doesn’t cost me anything then he can drill his well.”

Hermann sneered. “You know I can’t raise that kind of cash.”

Holz smiled. “But if you had the cash you are sure you can bring in an oil well?”

“Sure I can!”

“Then the solution is simple.” He looked at Hanns again, “I will put up the money, Hermann will organize and run the project, you will provide the land and we will split the income three ways.”

“Fine,” said Hanns.

“No way!” said Hermann.

“What?” Hanns was truly shocked.

“That oil is ours. I’m not giving away one third of it just because you are too cheap to pay for the drilling.”

“Hermann, I really don’t have the money!”

“Then we will find it somewhere else.”

Adolph Holz saw his chance at a life-changing dream slipping away. “One quarter?” He offered, while waving to a bar maid and making the hand down circular motion that the Wild Cat patrons had learn meant another round. The patrons and staff now accepted it as a way of saying, “Bring another of whatever anyone in the group is drinking.”

In the end, they agreed it was a loan and Adolph would get one half of the output until the loan was paid back, then, a hard-bargained seven percent of the profits after that.

“Why are you doing this?” Hanns asked the stranger.

“I have the money.” Which was true. Even if it wasn’t his money, he did indeed have it. “I like to gamble.” This too was true. “This sounds like a better bet than a game of cards.” This, though, was a cold blooded lie.

“Hermann, why didn’t you hire a steam hammer?” The brawny fellow, who was sweating away, stripped to the waist, in the August heat, asked his friend.

“Johannes, we’ve been over that before. It would have been too much trouble to get it here and it cost too much! We would have had to build a road and a bridge just to get it across the creek. This way all we had to do was build a derrick and the trees for the lumber were already here.”

“If we have to go very deep this is going to take forever.”

“When I was child the crude was practically bubbling up out of the ground. It looked just like that last seep we sank a well in before we quit to come here,” Hermann said for the fourteenth time.

“Quit your grousing and pull,” was all Adolph Holz had to say on the topic. Once he put up the money, Holz wanted to be involved in every step of the project. On the first day, when he tried to sit and watch, work ground to a halt. It wasn’t like his name was von Holz or something. So he was bending his well-dressed if scrawny back to the rope along with Hermann and the hired help. Hanns, of course, claimed he could not free up the time to work on the project. “Hey, I’m providing the land and the lumber you want to cut for the scaffolding. Don’t ask me to waste my time on top of that.” There had been an argument about the lumber until it was pointed out that it would still be there when they were done and it would be cut and ready to be dragged out.

Once the derrick was up they started driving. They had been at the actual process of picking up and dropping the hammer for four days. Late in the day they took a rest from the backbreaking labor. Hermann, as always, dropped a lead weight on line down the pipe. When he pulled it up the last two feet were dark, slimy and stinky. Hermann’s shout of sheer joy brought the tired crew up from the ground on the bounce.

“Well, we still have to build a road and a bridge to get the crude oil to the river,” Johannes said, “unless you want to wait until winter and move it on sleds.”

Adolph heard him and quickly snapped, “No.” Then in a calmer voice he said, “Oh, we’ll need the road and the bridge but not for the crude. We’ll refine it here and only ship out what we sell. The rest can go to surfacing the road.”

“We can’t get a cracking tower in here, even if you are willing to pay for one. It will have the same trouble we would have had trying to bring in a steam hammer. It is just too big and too heavy,” was Hermann’s comment.

“The cracking towers are new, aren’t they? Do we really need one?” Adolph asked. No one wondered why or how Adolph knew so much theory and history of the oil fields while having little or no actual experience. Watching and talking about the up-timers, and what they were doing, was a major pastime in the Wietze community.

“Hermann,” Johannes said, “you didn’t start working in the oil fields as early as I did. I helped sink the very first well. You don’t need a cracking tower to get started. You need a still.”

“You mean like they use to make brandy?”

“Yes, but bigger. And you can make it out of iron, not copper. Because after the first still, which, I think, they actually did get from a brandy distiller, they built the next one out of iron. Instead of a coil it fed into a forty-foot-tall cooling tower.”

“The cracking towers aren’t that tall,” Adolph objected.

“No, they’re not,” Johannes said. “But they’re all metal and they operate under pressure. This was just two layers of ironbound wood with catch basins at different points. You see, the heavier oils won’t go as high when they’re vapors. So the gasoline is collected near the top of the tower, there is only one basin higher, and the asphalt collects at the bottom. What gets cleaned out of the boiling pot any time the system goes down is good for road work too.”

“Iron bound wood? You mean like a barrel? Can we get the cooper in the village to make it for us?” Hermann asked.

“Why not?” Johannes answered. “That’s who they got to make the first one at Wietze; the local cooper built it for them.”

“We’re going to need a steady supply of barrels anyway,” Hermann said, “We might as well hire the cooper full-time if we can. His son should be able to handle their farm.” The cooper and his family were half farmers. They did not have the right to cultivate enough land to make a living so they made barrels when they weren’t working the land.

“Yes, but even if he can build us a barrel that tall, we would have to know where to tell him to put the catch basins, and we would need valve cocks to drain what is caught,” Adolph objected.

“Herr Holz, the latter are just oversized barrel spigots,” Johannes tapped the side of his head, “and where to put the basins is all right up here.” He was part of the crew that put the first one together and he could reproduce the gaps between the basins in terms of how many body lengths it was between taps and where the taps fell on his body when he was standing next to it. In other words he could place them within a few inches of where they needed to be.

“If it was that easy, why did they go to the all metal high pressure cracking towers?” a skeptical Adolph asked.

“They could get more of what they wanted out of the crude that way. But we can sell the gasoline and the kerosene and the fuel oil to whoever wants it, what comes out under the fuel oil and over the asphalt base we can sell to the refinery at Wietze and they can crack it.”

Adolph looked at Johannes. “If you know so much about it, why don’t we just build a cracking tower?”

Johannes laughed softly. “Because the first cracking tower took forever to build; then it took even longer for them to get it to work right. It kept springing leaks. When they got it tight they had to install bimetallic strip temperature gauges and a lot of other claptrap I never had anything to do with, don’t understand and can’t do. But I can build a condensing tower, if you can get a blacksmith to set up a forge out here and a cooper to work on site, then a week from now we can be hauling refined oil off to Wietze.”

Adolph look at Johannes and smiled. “Let’s go talk to the smith and the cooper and see if we can get ’er done,” he said, using a fashionable up-time phrase.

“Herr Holz, are you sure you want to do this? We can sell the crude to the refinery in Wietze. Right now all you’ve got tied up is a week’s labor for the crew, some tools, the drilling head, pipe and the metal parts for a walking beam to pump it out of the ground. We can turn a clean profit in short order.”

“Yes, but we can make a lot more selling to the end user instead of a middleman.” Holz gave Hermann an explanation that made sense, even if it was far from the whole reason. “I’ve got the money, and shouldn’t we get a steam engine in here to run the pump?”

“I suppose we should so the well can pump around the clock and not just when someone is walking the beam. It’s okay with me, if you want to spend the money. I’ll get the crew started on the bridge across the creek,” Hermann said. “That’s just labor and lumber and Hanns can scream all he wants to about us cutting trees.”

“Why don’t you start by rough splitting forty-foot barrel staves out of one of those big old oaks?” Adolph asked, pointing to the stand of oaks on the ridge overlooking the seep. Some of the trees were well over a hundred years old and the oldest were over a hundred feet high. Each and every one of them was accounted for. If one fell in storm then the tenants had the right to cut it up for firewood. If they wanted structural lumber it would have to be paid for.

“I can hear Hannsi screaming now.” Hermann grinned from ear to ear.

“Is that going to be a problem?” Aldoph asked.

“No, we’ll go ahead and get started on it.” Herman replied. “Hannsi will okay it when he figures out it means more money in the long run. You tell the cooper the rough staves are waiting for him. Then after you are through in the village, go see Hanns and tell him he needs to settle up with the tenants and the rent holder for widening the path into a road. You can mention that we are building a cracking tower. I’ll deal with him over cutting the tree when he comes out to see what a cracking tower is.”

Johannes was a bit overly optimistic in his estimate. It took two weeks before the first run came pouring out of the tower and into barrels. It was three and a half weeks before the oxen pulled the first stout tanker cart the cooper and wheelwright put together, full of heavy oil, over the new bridge across the creek to start its journey to Wietze. It took that long to get the paperwork settled with the tenants and the rent holder for the road across the leased land.

Hanns, Hermann, Johannes and Adolph walked into the field office and told the receptionist they wanted to talk to Jerry Trainer.

“Can I ask what you wish to see him about?” the clerk asked.

“Yes,” Hanns said. “We need to know if he wants to buy our full output or just our heavy oil for cracking?”

“What are you talking about? All of that is settled before they send in a drilling crew.”

“Well, they didn’t send in a crew, we drilled it ourselves. We’ve got fourteen barrels of heavy oil in a tanker cart outside. You can pretty much dictate the price on it, but if he wants the gasoline, the kerosene and the fuel oil, then he’s going to have to give us the full market price on it or we’ll sell it ourselves.”

Jerry Trainer walked through the open door of his office. He looked over the four men standing there, made eye contact with one of them and said, “Johannes? I heard you went wildcatting. We were wondering whether you had any luck or not. You’ve got a cart of crude outside?”

“No, Herr Trainer, we have a cart of heavy oil. We cannot crack it so we thought to sell it to you. Of course, if you do not want to buy it we can burn it to distill the next run.”

They would have to use part of the last run to boil the next one anyway. Hanns made it clear that he was not about to let them cut any more firewood without paying for it. Fortunately the trimmings off the trees that went to build the derrick more than met their needs so far. But that was it. Hanns was adamant. Even the trimmings from the timber cut for the bridge and what the cooper didn’t use was now set aside to wait for an itinerant charcoal burner to come through. The charcoal burners preferred to work with well-seasoned small branches. The firewood was corded up and shortly would be on its way to the manor house now that a bridge spanned the creek. Until the charcoal burner came, the brush pile encouraged rabbits and other small game, which Hanns thoroughly approved of and the farmers truly hated. Even with the prospects of the oil money coming in, the habit of being tight with the resources was deeply ingrained.

“Well, let’s go take a look at what you have, shall we?” Jerry said.

Outside, Jerry cracked the wooden valve open just a hair and caught a tablespoon full of oil in the palm of his hand. He looked at the color and rubbed a bit of it between the thumb and forefingers of his right hand. “Yeah, you’re right, it’s heavy oil. You can sell it for lubricant or we can crack it for gas and oil. Let’s see, if you’ve got fourteen barrels of heavy oil then you should have about-” Jerry ran off a very accurate list, measured in barrels at fifty-five gallons to the barrel, of how much of each type of petroleum they had. “If you don’t match those numbers then you’ve not condensed it correctly. And of course we will do a quality control check on every cart you bring in, but assuming it’s okay, then let’s see-” Jerry did some quick math and spun off totals and named prices per barrel which were indeed not far below what he was getting for it. Since he ran the only refinery in the world, until now, at least, it would seem he had an effective monopoly on petroleum sales, other than what found its way onto the black market, of course. He would just as soon keep it that way for as long as possible so it made sense to buy their entire output. “How does that sound, Johannes?”

Johannes looked at Hanns, who looked at Hermann, who nodded to Adolph who nodded to Johannes. “Herr Trainer, can we see that in writing, bitte?”

“Sure, we can do that. Then I’ll give you a sales slip to take to the bank.” The Abrabanels had opened an office in Wietze. It was their office that Jerry was referring to when he said “the bank.”

At the Abrabanel office Adolph stepped up and took control. They had not discussed what to do, Hanns had assumed they would be paid in cash and they would split the money. “We need to set up three accounts, if you please. Then any receipts coming here will be split between the three accounts. Until further notice I get fifty percent and the other two split the rest. After you are notified, I get seven percent.” They had agreed on seven percent of the profits. Herr Holz was claiming seven percent of the gross product.

Hanns of course called him on it. “You are right, Herr Holz, you are entitled to half until the loan is repaid. But then you get seven percent of the profit, which is not seven percent of the output. We will have expenses, there is the rent for the roadway, there is any more wood that is cut, there is the wage for the cooper and the smith and the refiner and his helper. No, after the loan is paid off, we will deposit seven percent of the profit.”

It really was small change, but it was not in Adolph’s nature not to try and it certainly wasn’t in Hanns’ nature to let him get away with it.

Hanns and Hermann took their portion in cash. Adolph left his on deposit. Johannes had already been paid by Adolph when he paid off the construction crew. Outside in the street a very happy Hanns was counting his money. Hermann put his, uncounted, in his pocket. He could do that with the paper currency that was now an accepted standard in Wietze. The same seamstress who was making the shirts was also producing four-pocket pants on the blue jean pattern, complete with rivets.

“Buy me a beer, Hermann,” Johannes said, “and let’s talk about doing this all over again elsewhere, since you’ve got the money to front us. Or do you want to just sit back and run this one for your cousin? If you do, then I’ll have to talk to Herr Holz about investing in another well and tower.”

“No, Johannes,” Adolph said. “I’m through here. I’m heading home.”

“Sure, Johannes, a beer sounds good. Hannsi can hire someone else to run his well for him,” Hermann replied.

Paris, October 1635

A short, blond, blue-eyed man was ushered into the office of one Yves Neff. Of Cardinal Richelieu’s many clerks, Yves was one of the few who had an office instead of a desk. The nature of what he kept track of required privacy from time to time. This was one of those times.

“M. LeBlanc,” the clerk said, “just what is so important that you felt you had to leave your assigned station to share it with me personally instead of putting it in your regular report?”

“I really do think I need to talk to His Eminence.”

“Oh? And why is that?” As a bureaucrat part of his job was to act as a filter and see to it that his boss was not bothered with trivial matters.

“If he will secure the mineral rights to the tar pits near the village of Parentis en Born for me, I can start producing the petroleum fuels you know he will need for the research projects that I am sure you currently have ongoing.”

“Can you indeed?” the clerk asked with just a hint of a raised eyebrow. “I am afraid,” the clerk said, “you have wasted your time in coming to Paris. I shouldn’t tell you this but under the circumstances I will make an exception. There is an ongoing oil fuel project. Top people are working with the best and latest information. We even had a man in Wietze watching for new developments until he decided to return to France without authorization. I shall have to recruit someone a bit more reliable, someone who knows how to stay in place and forward timely reports, to replace him with and get the new man to Germany immediately.

“Now as long as you are here, we need to discuss these sizable sums you recently spent.”

“I was authorized to buy information.”

“And that information is?”

“I now know how to drill a well and refine petroleum fuel.”

“You seem quite sure of yourself,” Yves said.

“I am. We started from scratch with nothing but an oil seep, and finished with refined fuel which we sold to the manager at Wietze.”

The clerk sighed dramatically. “You were authorized to buy ‘new’ information! We already knew how to do those things. I am afraid that money you spent on your personal education is going to have to be reimbursed, in full and immediately.”

Henri paled. He had financed the driving of an oil well and the building of a cracking tower. In return he would get the lion’s share of the profit until the loan was paid off. Then he would get a premium for as long as the well was in production. His share in the output of the oil well in Germany would pay what he now owed, but it would be a while in coming. He could end up sitting in debtor’s prison until it did. A man could get sick and die doing that. “I don’t have that kind of money lying around!” M. LeBlanc objected. “I can pay it back. But it will take some time.”

“I understand.” Yves smirked. “Why don’t you see about raising it and come back at the end of the week?” He knew Henri could not raise the money. What he had in mind for M. LeBlanc was a nasty, unpleasant job that he was having trouble getting a reliable man to do. This looked like the perfect leverage to get it done.

By sheer chance near the end of the day the clerk’s supervisor M. DeMille stopped at his small office. “Yves, here is a list of questions about cracking oil we need answered. Get it off to our man in Wietze right away.”

“I am afraid, sir, that we no longer have a man in Wietze.”

“What happened? Was he found out? Was he killed, imprisoned, did he fall ill?”

“No sir, he is alive and well and returned to Paris without authorization.”

“What brought him back? Was he homesick? I can understand that. I have been to the Germanies. The cooking is horrid and the wines are worse.”

“No, he thought we would be interested in setting him up to refine petroleum.”

“As if he could!”

“Oh, he can,” Yves said. “According to his reports, he was involved in every step of the process from drilling a well to carting off the finished fuels.”

The clerk’s superior dropped the stack of papers on the clerk’s desk in excitement. “You are sure he can do it?”

“Reasonably sure,” the clerk replied. “But we have a well in production, another one is being drilled, and a team of our best people are working on a cracking tower.”

“And failing miserably!”

“What?” a startled Yves asked.

“You heard me. They can’t get it to work. It has blown up twice. It has burst and burned twice more. It is consuming money, men, and time at an alarming rate. The money is minor, they can always raise another tax, the men mostly do not matter, the prisons are full enough, but the time is something we cannot spare. The teams working on engines were promised fuel a month ago. They are at a standstill until we get it for them. We’ve bought as much as we can but the people in Wietze are keeping a close watch on it and we cannot get anywhere near as much as we need.

“If we have a man who has practical hands-on experience in fuel production we need him right now.”

“M. LeBlanc says he can do it and I see no reason to question the man’s honesty.”

“Where is this wonder worker? I want to see him immediately.”

“I have a local residence recorded right here,” Yves said, picking up M. LeBlanc’s file.

“Let’s go.”

“What?”

“When I said we need that man right now, I meant right now! Let’s go!”

“But, sir, now?” It was, after all, very near the end of the day.

“Now!”

Yves knocked on the door. When a toothless old woman answered he asked, “Is this where Herni LeBlanc has a rented room?”

“Well, that was fast indeed. When he moved out this morning he told me he had someone else who would take the garret. Do you want to see it?” She really didn’t think they would. They really did not look like the type who would rent such a room up under the eaves.

“No, we do not. You say he moved out? Did he say where he was going?”

“No, all he said was he would send someone else to rent the garret. If that isn’t you, then good day to you.” With those words she closed the door.

“How odd,” M. DeMille said. “Why would the man move so suddenly and without a forwarding address as if something were wrong?”

Yves looked sheepish. “Well, I was planning on offering him that job in the Caribbean that we are having trouble filling. Since I knew I would need some leverage I told him he had to return some misappropriated funds immediately.”

DeMille smirked at his underling’s deviousness. Then it filtered through his mind and he realized if the man could not be found they could not use the knowledge the fellow was carrying around in his head. “That is not fortuitous, Yves. Find the man. Find him immediately and get him working on the fuel production problem. If you can’t produce him by the end of the week, then pack your bags. I think you would be the perfect man for that assignment in the Caribbean.”

Yves paled. He had absolutely no interest in seeing the new world.

By sundown agents and officials all over Paris were looking for one Henri LeBlanc. By sundown the next day only a fast horse could have stayed ahead of the search. The selfsame fast horse carried the word to every port in the country and every way station on the highways and byways to the border and beyond. Henri LeBlanc was a wanted man, a very wanted man indeed.

Behind the closed door an old woman winked at her fair-haired grandson. “Merci, Grandmere,” Henri said. “It seems I owe those fellows a lot of money and it will be a while before I can raise it.”

“How much do you need?”

Henri named a sum.

The old woman shook her head. “I’ve saved a great deal of what you’ve sent home, but not nearly that much.”

“That is not a problem, Grandmere. I will have the money by and by. I just need to stay out of sight and out of debtor’s prison until it catches up with me.”

“Well, you just plan on staying right here, out of sight, for as long as you need to. I will enjoy the company. Besides, the money you’ve been sending home will see to our needs for a good long time.”

Three months and a bit more went by. When he had the money in hand Henri LeBlanc went to the offices of Cardinal Richelieu’s intendants. At the first desk inside the door he said, “I need to see Yves Neff.”

“I am sorry, but M. Neff will be out of the office for quite some time, I am afraid. He is on an assignment in the field.”

Henri thought he detected a glint of humor in the voice of the clerk as he explained Yves’ absence. “Then I need to speak to whoever is handling his case load while he is gone.”

“And you are?”

“Henri LeBlanc.”

“Certainly. Please wait one minute, please. Page,” the clerk called. When the boy arrived the clerk said, “Take this man to M. DeMille immediately.”

At the word immediately the lad hesitated. “Immediately?” he asked.

“Yes, you heard me,” the clerk said with a nod. “Immediately.”

After what seemed like a very long walk that was surely out of the way they passed two armed men who seemed to be loafing in the room they were passing through. Upon seeing them the page quit dawdling and finally moved at a brisk pace until he stopped and rapped on a nondescript door which he then opened without waiting. Henri walked through and the page closed it behind him.

The mature gentleman setting behind an overflowing but organized desk looked up and asked “And you are?”

“My name is Henri LeBlanc, I worked for-”

Before he could even began to explain what the circumstances were the door opened again and the two guards entered the room with their rapiers in hand.

DeMille spoke to the guards first. “Take this man to M. Devereux at the research station.” Then he addressed Henri, “Your absence has cost us three months. I had hoped Devereux would have the cracking tower working by now but he has had no success. Now maybe we can get something done.”

“Oh, I am sorry to tell you this, but I’ve never worked on a cracking tower.”

“What? But your reports said you worked every aspect of making fuel from driving the well to selling the finished product.”

“Yes, sir. I did.”

“Now I am confused. Have you or have you not had experience turning black petroleum into usable fuel?”

“Yes. I have done so and offered to do it again, but M. Neff said I was not needed.”

“M. Neff is looking after something in the Caribbean by now because he overstepped his authority. Before you leave please clear up one point for me. You say you have never worked on a cracking tower, how then can you have made fuel?”

“Oh, that is simple. We used an old-fashioned, outdated still and a cooling tower.”

DeMille snarled, “Get this man out of here.” Then he said, “M. LeBlanc. Understand me and understand me well. If there is not a report on my desk within thirty days telling me that enough fuel for the engine research project is no longer a problem, you may count yourself lucky if you are allowed to join M. Neff in Louisiana.”