“Well, you used your .45, Bass. Dammit, what’s the diffence?” demanded the Professor peevedly.
“The difference is that I have over two hundred rounds for the Colt, but only fifty—less than that, now—for your piece or for Buddy’s, and once they’re fired, there’ll be no more.”
The older man delved a hand into one of the pouches his belt—his contemporary clothing had no pockets—then tended the open palm containing a trio of 9mm cases to Foster. “Reload them, as you reload your shot shells. I’m reasonably certain that I can devise a means of fabricating primers.”
Foster shook his head slowly. “You, your many accomplishments, never cease to amaze me, Bill. You’re not at all the sort of man I assumed you to be during the first day I knew you. You’re the best pistol or rifle or wing shot I’ve ever seen, and I’ve seen a lot. You can fence me into the ground, and I wasn’t all that bad a fencer, once. You’re a better horseman than anyone at Whyffler Hall . . . except, maybe, Sir Francis and Geoff Musgrave.
“It was you that remembered Webster saying that he was hauling a load of chemical fertilizer, and you that worked out a way to use it in place of niter crystals. It was your mind and Pete Fairley’s hands that also worked out a quick and simple method for converting matchlocks to flintlocks. And it was you who thought up the bit with my Jeep pickup.” He couldn’t repress a grin and a chuckle. “Christ, I’ll bet some of those barefoot bastards are still running.
“No doubt you’ll have other surprises in store for us, in time, and I don’t doubt for a minute that you can and will make primers when the couple of thousand I have with my reloading set are gone.
“But, Bill, there are one or two gaps in your knowledge. First off, my Colt and Luger and Buddy’s .380 are all three automatics; that is to say, they’re operated by their recoil and the gases from their charges. Black powder just isn’t a powerful enough propellant to make them work.”
Then put in more powder, Bass.”
He grimaced. “The cases aren’t big enough to put in that much powder, Bill—as much as we’d need, I mean. Besides which, there’s more to reloading cases than simply knocking out the old primer, fitting in a new one, and adding powder. You need the proper dies for each caliber, and the only dies I own are for three shotgun gauges. You start playing around with reloaded ammo, you’ll soon wind up missing fingers or a whole hand or with a big chunk of steel in your head. I stick to the rules and the load tables, and I’m not about to do any experimenting . . . not unless somebody else is going to do the test firing. Unless you want that job, you’d better just forget about reloading 9mm or .45 hulls, Bill, and hoard the few you have for a real emergency.
“Use the horsepistols, and thank God Carey’s load included a case of those single-shots. You may think they’re slow-firing, but believe me you’ve got one helluva edge over these muzzleloaders.”
Sir Francis stamped in, his fine-boned face a study in disgust, frustration, and rage. “Och, the black-hirted, self-sairvin’, meacock wretch of a whoreson carpet-knicht! Wi’ the domned French and Flemings landed ain the east, the wild Irish ain the west, Spanishers and Portagees a-gnawing at the Southerly coasts and the domned Scots massing their domned army on the north bank o’ the Tweed, still the bull’s pizzle pandar be oot tae line his purse, and me wi’oot gold enow tae sate his base demands! I fear me we’ll nae see the King, alas.”
“Bureaucrats are always the same, eh, Bill.” Foster smiled “My late father used to say that ‘crooked politician’ was t gross redundancy.” To Sir Francis, “How much does the thieving bastard want?”
The old man sighed. ‘Ten shilling tae see the King late next week, twenty tae see him arily next week, but it maun be in gold, nae siller.”
“And how much to see him tomorrow?” Bass asked, while unzipping his coveralls and pulling up his T-shirt, glad now that he’d heeded the hunch and brought part of Carol’s coin collection along.