A Game of Chairs and Apples
"Gentlemen, I regret that Jakob has yet to return from his visit to his grand tour of his western factories. The making of tar, ships, saltpeter, lime, paper, glass, timber and the rest is surely more exciting than the prospect of a ride homeward to discuss mere matters of state. But let us not wait to discuss some of those matters, agreed?"
Louise Charlotte had been Duchess since the summer only, and had already earned a measure of deference among Jakob's primary advisors. Today's guests were "the Fs" (Firkss, Filkersamb, and Fischer), plus Dönhof, ben Elisha, and Pletenberg. In such company, deference to her came from at least three things, in varying orders of importance depending on the advisor:
- that she was their Duchess by marriage to Jakob
- that she had in mere months taken the estates of her dowry and launched those estates into dairying and the advancement of her "dowry gardens"
- that she was already with child, and in no way slower for it.
The men all assented, and her Goldingen household staff brought refreshments.
"You are all by now well in the habit of conversing with Jakob about his various enterprises. I will leave you to
all that upon his return. For two reasons:
primo, that you are his council (official or otherwise)
because you are all men capable of furthering his initiative, and
secundo, that being such men as to advance such initiatives serves to amplify two critical things. Namely, Courland's ability to achieve Jakob's dreams on the one hand, and on the other, Courland's inability to see what Jakob has the inability to see."
At this, the men were generally stunned. Firkss, the chancellor, spoke first.
"My lady, you have a rather savage way of getting directly to the point. In the duchy's interests, let's dispense with expressing gratitude for the compliment you paid in the first half of that. What is Jakob unable to see?"
"For every month I have been in Courland, you have all worked 10 months under his leadership, plus however many before that under Frederick, when Jakob and his thinking were already surely well known to you. The duke is a man of paramount vision, and possesses the capacity to see the future of any enterprise, particularly those related to commerce or industry, and is a superlative judge of how all the steps necessary to realize such enterprises might be taken for optimal results. And yet: in no way does being an excellent judge of
enterprise serve to make him even an average judge of
character."
"And we, who are charged primarily with the advancement of his various enterprises, we worsen this about him?"
"The more Jakob sees successes and challenges in all you do" - she gestured generally in front of the men - "the more his attention is drawn to further such successes and challenges. You make him better at what he is best at. It may be the duchy also needs men to make him better at what he is presently
worse at."
This inflicted upon the room a thoughtful pause. It was ben Elisha*, the "Mapmaker of Mitau" who spoke first.
"My lady, what might the responsibilities be for a
Minister of Judgement of Character? To assess the
trustworthiness of men upon whom Courland's success most relies?"
That, and to focus on matters toward which the Duke's considerable energies are simply
not directed."
"Such as war." Filkersamb spoke it plainly and neutrally.
"Yes. Or matters of relationships somewhat adjacent to war." She narrowed her eyes. "Gentlemen, kindly stand up. You're going to play a game, and to play it, I wish to move your chairs. The "Fs" first. You shall be a team. Firkss, bring yours here. Sit - you are Sweden. Here I walk across the Gulf of Bothnia, the Baltic, the Gulf of Finland, and - Filkersamb, your chair goes here. You are Russia. I am admittedly placing you nearer Novgorod than Moscow, but so be it, the room is only so large, as we don't want you so far you can't hear the rest of us. Fischer, that leaves you about there" - she pointed - "as the Turkish Empire."
This left five chairs somewhat inside the area surrounded by the three already positioned, geographically unspecified.
"So, we have F for
foes. Pletenberg, as your name starts with 'P', you shall be Poland. Do sit here. Ben Elisha, with my apologies, your name starts with a 'B', so you'll be
Bohdan Khmelnytsky's Cossacks in Ruthenia. Over here, in front of Fischer."
All eyes turned to Dönhof. "Am I to be 'D' for
Deutschland, then?"
"Fine. Near enough. You are the supposedly
Holy, assuredly not
Roman, certainly
Empire of Ferdinand the third. Sit here - your chair is vaguely Vienna."
With that, Louise Charlotte was the only one left standing, barring servants. She nudged the last two chairs into position, almost in a row between Pletenberg and Firkss. She then moved tow small tables to each side of the empty chair nearest Firkss, and relocated the trays of apple slices and pitchers of drink to those tables. She then sat in the chair between them.
"We are ready, then. The empty chair is my father's family in Prussia. I am fittingly not sitting there, as my place is now here," she pointed at her own chair. "This last chair is Courland in our game. And my apologies to you all, but Courland is pregnant and easily tired, so the food and drink is with me. Perhaps that's reason to covet my chair." She grabbed a slice of an apple from a tray and made quick work of it.
"I will propose to you something that could reasonably happen in any of these lands represented in our chairs. Or I will state some fact. I will then ask you each what you do in your roles. Simple."
"Pletenberg! You've failed to convince your nobles to let you raise a decent army or build any navy at all. Ben Elisha - you see this clearly every time you thrash another Polish fighting force in the field. Dönhof - do you care? Do you act?"
"Care, yes. I may need to marry off some Hapsburg princesses. Act, no."
She picked an apple off the tray and threw it to ben Elisha. "Congratulations, you pluck the heart of Poland. If I recall my husband's vassalage correctly, he puts three hundred cavalry in the field at some point in the failed defence." She flicked another apple slice off the tray as the made the point. It broke in two on the floor. "Courland loses too."
"Next: Russia and Sweden each want more of the Baltic. Both are strong, but not confident enough in themselves and each other. They enlist the Sultan for help, in Constantinople and a little nearer in Crimea. Our 'F' team works in concert. Fischer, what do you want in such an arrangement?"
"Good relations with major powers. I like a stronger Sweden and a stronger Russia, so long as their strength is further away from my lands. I also like anyone on my Balkan borders nervous. Lastly - Crimea's not mine, my lady. They are just my friends."
"Fair. So you help Bohdan enough to keep Ruthenia out of Russian hands, and maybe help your Crimean friends - thank you for the correction - gain lands or slaves or whatever they like. Meanwhile up North, Sweden and Russia are emboldened to act. Filkersamb, how do you act?"
"I take Smolensk back from Lithuania. I'll keep going to Riga if I can get there, then use it to take any foothold on the Baltic I can get. Otherwise, I play nice with Sweden and offer them support to strengthen their hold around Riga if they'll give me any port in Livonia - say, Narva."
"Firkss, does Sweden love new Russian friends that much?"
Firkss simply scoffed. "I send fleets across the Baltic from Sweden, and armies by land down from Livonia. I take Riga before the Filkersamb wakes from having a dream about it."
Where the Duchess had been most animatedly directing the game and conversation thus far, she nearly whispered now: "And then?"
"I suppose an army in Riga might as well conquer Courland too. Maybe I coax Prussia to become a Swedish vassal instead of a Polish one. The Eastern Baltic is mine. I sue for peace once I have the lands I want, so Russia's advance is halted earlier. They get Smolensk, and perhaps some more of Lithuania."
The duchess grabbed another three apple slices from the tray. "Half of Poland" - she tossed a slice to ben Elisha. "Half of Lithuania" - another slice, to Filkersamb. "The rest of both" - she rose and tossed the third slice to Pletenberg. Then she turned the empty Prussia chair toward Firkss.
Then she kicked the Courland chair over.
"Courland dies, gentlemen. Its foundries, shipyards, timber mills and whatever else either go silent, are destroyed, or become Swedish. I have no meaningful defences, no army or cavalry of note, and no tax base for mercenaries."
She reached down, casually, and lifted the chair back to its original position. Then the turned the Prussian chair back around.
"Care for another round? Some of you might get more of these lovely apples. The empty chair might face different ways" - she illustrated by pointing it toward Filkersamb, then her Courland chair, then back to Pletenberg - "but I promise you my chair will get kicked over rather a lot."
As it was no longer a game, the men collectively and wordlessly resolved that to play another round was not necessary.
By the time Jakob had returned from his tour, his council had resolved that Courland needed better fortifications, that better fortifications were almost certainly insufficient to defend it, that Courland most particularly needed to generously offer good deals on apple slices to its neighbours in order to avoid said neighbours kicking over its chair.
Or, failing that, Courland needed plans to get its trays of apple slices safely away when the this or that chair-kicker came.
- - -
* the same Tevel we met in the "Motke the Merchant" chapter, now employed at gathering all possible maps and geographical knowledge with which to equip Jakob's colonial ambitions, as well as better informing Courland's shipbuilding where possible.
