Part 34 (1/2)

”Good. I'll get right on it and have Grigorii make a drawing as well.” When Bernie had arrived at the dacha, he had been introduced to a secretary and an artist. Grigorii Mikhailovich was the artist whose job it was to take Bernie's descriptions and very rough sketches and turn them into usable drawings.

”Brandy can probably find out what I've done wrong. It's a darn good thing your brother stayed in Grantville. When I've finished the letter, I'll take a look through the books and stuff he sent. Maybe I can figure out how to explain gravity.”

”Seriousness?” Natasha's voice was curious. ”Don't they know what seriousness is?”

Bernie groaned. Then headed back to face the brain cases.

”Bernie Janovich, what is the center of gravity?” Pter Nickovich had been waiting impatiently while Bernie was out of the room. His English was not good and the discussion of gravity was more confusing than helpful. He knew there was something there because the notes he had received on flight mentioned gravity regularly. Center of gravity, specifically. He sat and thought, giving no sign how much it hurt him not to understand about gravity and how to fly. Finally, Bernie returned with the letters and Pter asked his question before the sewer system could distract them again.

”Hey, I actually know that one.” Bernie grinned at Pter. ”Cars need a low center of gravity for stability.”

Pter just looked at him. As usual, Bernie hadn't explained anything.

Bernie lost his grin. ”Okay. Try it this way. Bend over.” Bernie bent over. ”As your head moves forward, your rear end moves backward, otherwise you fall on your face. That's to keep your center of gravity over your feet.” Bernie stood up again. ”Try to balance something on one finger. It's the same thing. To keep it balanced you have to keep your finger under the center of gravity.”

”You mean that center of gravity just means the point of balance?” Pter couldn't help his look of shock.

”The place where you would place the fulcrum?”

The outlander shrugged. ”Pretty much.”

Pter considered, then asked. ”Then why does how high the center of gravity is matter?”

”There is other stuff besides gravity. Centrifugal force and stuff.”

”Explain that, if you would.” Pter tried not to grit his teeth. He knew he was close to something but wasn't sure what. He listened to Bernie's rambling explanation. It was there he knew, if he could just grasp it. The secret to everything. It came in bits and drabs . . . gravity was a force like centrifugal force.

Then another piece when Bernie squared his stance and had someone push from the side. The person pus.h.i.+ng on him to try and over balance him was a force. The key came when he asked why they used rockets to get to the moon. ”Why not wings?”

”No air in s.p.a.ce.”

”Why not?”

”Gravity, dude,” an obviously frustrated Bernie insisted.

Pter froze. He could see it in his minds eye. ”How much does air weigh?”

”I don't know.” Bernie shrugged. ”It's pretty light; we can look it up. Uh . . . maybe not, but we can writeVladimir about it.”

The outlander didn't realize. Howmuch air weighed didn't really matter. What mattered wasthat air weighed. That it had weight. It was pulled down to the ground by a force; water was, too, but more so.

They wouldn't have to look the weight of air up, Pter could think of several ways to work it out. Looking it up might be easier if it was in one of the books. The important point was that air had weight. That was how the balloons worked. That was how it all worked.

Vesuvius erupted. Russian words spewed forth. Bernie didn't understand. Didn't want to understand after he caught the Russian words for idiot and uncultured repeated several times. At least this time everyone was an uncultured idiot, not just Bernie. Which was a relief. Everyone, Pter included, everyone from Adam to Aristotle . . . especially Aristotle. Everyone in the entire history of the world, both histories. Only two exceptions could be made: G.o.d and Sir Isaac Newton. G.o.d for creating such a complex world from such beautiful simplicity and Sir Isaac Newton for understanding it.

”Don't you understand, you uncultured outlander? We can fly.”

”What in blazes are you talking about?” Filip Pavlovich was not one to accept being called an idiot by much of anyone. ”Of course we can fly, once we know how. If the outlanders from the future could do it we can learn to do it.” He froze then. ”You know how?”

”It's all forces don't you see . . . d.a.m.n Aristotle to the worst region of h.e.l.l. Innate desire. Natural tendency. Bah . . . it's forces. Water is heavy, air is light, the force of gravity works better on heavy than light, that's what makes it heavy.”

Jeez, Bernie thought, you'd think he just found out that Jennifer Lopez was a sure thing.Bernie left the geeks to their talk. Somehow he couldn't stop grinning. These guys got such a charge out of this stuff.

Now if only he could get the plumbing to work.

That night, instead of the studying, Bernie watched as Gregorii Mikhailovich drew out another Rocky and Bullwinkle episode for Daromila. One of the other letters was one from her, pestering him about it.

And he had promised, after all. It was kind of hard, sometimes. Gregorii didn't like the dress the Natasha of the cartoons wore. He even blushed a bit.

The older he got, the less he slept. Filaret stalked around his room, thinking. They were on a dangerous path and he didn't think Mikhail realized just how dangerous it was. Mikhail was a good boy, but too gentle for the real world. Still, something he'd said kept coming back to Filaret.Knowledge, freely given.

Filaret had started the only print shop inMuscovy . Like most things, it was a royal monopoly. He had also been instrumental in starting schools in monasteries. Again a monopoly, this time of the church.

Giving things away didn't come naturally to him, especially something as valuable as knowledge. Freely giving knowledge had its drawbacks, didn't it?

But the more he thought about it, the better it sounded.Freely given. Charity. A gift to the poor. Alms of knowledge? What an interesting idea. The agreement with the Yaroslavich family was that the government could do what it wanted with the knowledge from the Dacha. It wouldn't do to give everything away. But some of it. . . . Things that would help a lot of people and would cost a lot to administer.A gift from the czar, granted freely to every citizen and serf inMuscovy . The right to make the turning plow. One of the new plows produced by the Dacha. And, of course, the Yaroslavich family could still sell the right to make the plow to anyone who would buy what had already been given them for free. It would serve as a reminder to the Yaroslavich family who was Czar. At the same time, it would remind everyone that even knowledge was the czar's to give and withhold at his will.

Boris stared. A flying s.h.i.+p. Not a little one that they talked about in Grantville, but something the nerds-Boris liked that word-at the Dacha were calling a half blimp. There were drawings, still rough sketches, rough estimates of carrying capacity, all of which seemed to agree that bigger was better to the extent that they could build bigger. Everyone in the section would have seen it by now. The rumors would be flying faster than the half blimp could travel. And he had to come up with a recommendation. How was he supposed to know if it would work? Meanwhile, he had dozens of requests for things he knew they could make. And suddenly hundreds of requests for transfers to his section. ”Pavel, get in here.”

Pavel came quickly enough. Boris smiled. Pavel looked nervous, as well he should. ”You will be missing dinner at home again.” Boris handed him the report. ”Go out to the Dacha and find out about this.”

”But, Papa,” Pavel started to complain.

Boris cut him off. ”I know all about the party at the Samelovich house. They want you to get their little Ivan a job in the section, but he doesn't speak English and the only thing I've heard he's good at is getting drunk. Make your apologies, but get out to the Dacha.”

Boris put the rest of the reports in his case and headed for home.

Daromila was snickering again. Boris looked up, a bit bleary-eyed from reading reports. ”Woman-” he put on his ”stern patriarch of the family” voice. ”-what are you on about this time?”

She snickered again. ”Nothing, dear. Just a letter from Berna.”

”Oh ho!” Boris puffed out his chest. ”I shall have to have words with him. Stealing my wife's affections from me. That's what he's doing.”

Daromila gave him a telling look. ”Boris, dahlink,” she said, using the same sultry voice Natasha occasionally used when she was teasing. ”You know you are the only man for me.”

Boris groaned a bit. Daromila and Natasha both teased him about the inept spy Bernie spoke of. ”I never should have brought him here,” he said mournfully. ”I knew he was going to be a bad influence.”

Daromila grinned. ”Possibly more than you know.” Then she wouldn't say more, just began writing another letter.