'I've been thinking,' Blackford repeated, and then, this time, went on: 'I've been thinking we ought to figure out where we're going.'
'Where are we going?' Flora asked bitterly. 'Are we going anywhere?' She didn't want to roll back over. She didn't want to look at him.
'Well, that doesn't just depend on me. That depends on both of us,' Blackford said. He waited for Flora to reply. When she didn't, he shrugged; she felt the mattress shake. He spoke again: 'We can't very well get married, for instance, unless you want to marry me, too.'
Flora's head jerked up. She swiped at her eyes with her arm- she didn't want to see Blackford, or what she could see of him in the near darkness, through a haze of tears. Gulping to try to steady her voice, she said, 'Married?'
Hosea Blackford nodded. She both saw and felt him do that. 'It seems to be the right thing to do, don't you think?' he said. 'Heaven knows we love each other.' He waited for Flora again. She knew she had to respond this time, and managed a nod. That seemed to satisfy Blackford, who went on, 'All over the world, you know, when people love each other, they do get married.'
'But-' The objections that filled Flora's head proved she'd been in Philadelphia, in Congress, the past five years. 'If you marry me, Hosea, what will that do to your career?' She didn't just mean, If you marry me. She also meant, If you marry a Jew.
He understood her. One of the reasons she loved him was that he understood her. With another shrug, he answered, 'When you're vice president, you haven't got much of a career to look forward to, anyhow. And I don't think the party will ever nominate me for president-Dakota doesn't carry enough electoral votes to make that worthwhile. So after this term, or after next term at the latest, I'm done.'
'In that case, you go back to Dakota and take your old seat back,' Flora declared. 'Or you could, anyhow. Could you do it with a Jewish wife?'
'I don't know that I particularly want my old seat back. It seems in pretty good hands with Torvald Sveinssen, and he'll have had it for a while by the time I'm not vice president any more,' Blackford said. He reached out and put his hand on her bare shoulder. This time, she let it stay. He went on, 'All you've done is talk about me. What about you, Flora? How will people in New York City like it if you came home with a gentile husband?'
'I don't think it would bother them too much-the Fourteenth Ward is a solidly Socialist district,' she answered. 'And you wouldn't be just any gentile husband, you know. You're a good Socialist yourself-and you're the vice president.'
'It could be,' Blackford said. 'I can see how it could be that that would do well enough for your district. But I don't have a lot of family back in Dakota. What will your family think if you go home and tell them you're marrying a gentile?'
Flora rejected the first couple of answers that sprang to mind. Her family might indeed be delighted she was marrying at all, but Hosea didn't have to know that. And her father, an immigrant tailor, might indeed be so awed she was marrying the vice president that he wouldn't say a word even if her fiance were a Mohammedan-but she doubted that. Abraham Hamburger wasn't so outspoken as either Flora or her brothers and sisters, but he never had any trouble making his opinions known.
And the question Blackford had asked cut close to the one she was asking herself: how do I feel about marrying a gentile? Somehow, she'd hardly given that a thought while they were lovers. She wondered why. Because being lovers was impermanent, something she wouldn't have to worry about forever? She didn't think that was the whole answer, but it was surely part.
She ended up answering the question in her own mind, not the one Blackford had asked: 'When we have children, I want to raise them as Jews.'
'Children?' Blackford started, then laughed wryly. 'I'm getting a little long in the tooth to worry about children. But you're not; of course you'll want to have children.' Much more to himself than to Flora, he muttered, 'I won't be sorry not to wear a sheath any more, that's for sure.' After a few seconds' thought, he spoke to her again: 'Your faith has a stronger hold on you than mine does on me; I've been a pretty pallid excuse for an Episcopalian for a long time now. If I'm not shooting blanks after all these years, I suppose it's only fair we bring up the children your way.'
That was as rational an approach to the irrational business of religion as Flora could imagine. She'd seen in Congress that Blackford approached problems in a commonsense way. She'd seen he did the same in his private life, too, but this was an important proof. She said, 'I think my father and mother will get along with you just fine.'
'Does that mean you'll marry me, then?'
'I think it does.' Flora knew she shouldn't sound surprised at a moment like that, but couldn't help herself.
'Bully!' Blackford said softly. He took her in his arms. She felt his manhood stir a little against her flank, and tried her best to revive him. Her best turned out not to be good enough. He made a joke of it, saying, 'See? This is what's liable to happen when you have an old man for a husband.' Under that light tone, though, she could tell he was worried.
'It's all right,' she said, but it plainly wasn't all right. She cast about for a way to reassure him, and finally found one, even if it meant coming out with the most risque thing she'd ever said in her life: 'Your tongue never gets tired.' She was glad the only light came from a single lamp in the front room; he couldn't possibly see her blush.
'Yes, some parts do still work better than others,' Blackford said, doing his best not to sound as if he were taking things too seriously. But, however hard saying that had been, Flora was glad she'd done it. She knew she'd eased his mind.
'I didn't really expect-this,' she said, and then, 'I didn't expect any of this, not when I first came down from New York City. I was green as paint.'
'I didn't know what to expect, either, when I met you at the Broad Street station,' Blackford answered. 'Lord knows I didn't expect this-but then, I didn't expect any of the wonderful things you turned out to be, in Congress or out of it.'
Nobody else said things like that about Flora. She didn't know how to take them. 'Thank you,' she whispered. She said it again, on a slightly different note: 'Thank you.' The day had been long and boring. The night had been even longer, and lonely. Going to sleep was the most she'd had to look forward to. Now, in the space of an hour, her whole world had changed. That had happened once before, when she was elected to Congress. She looked forward to these changes even more.
Judge Mahlon Pitney slammed down the gavel. He looked every inch a jurist: a spare, erect, handsome gray- haired man in his early sixties, his gray eyes clear and alert. 'Here is my verdict in the action Smith v. Heusinger,' he said, with a glance toward the court clerk to make sure that worthy was ready to record the verdict. 'It is the decision of this court that title to the property at issue in the above-entitled action does rightfully rest with the plaintiff, John Smith, who has shown right of possession sufficient to satisfy the court.'
Letting out a whoop would have been undignified, unprofessional. That very nearly didn't stop Jonathan Moss, who instead reached out and shook hands with his client. John Smith looked more nearly amazed than delighted.
On the other side of the courtroom in Berlin, Ontario, Paul Heusinger stared daggers at Moss. Well he might have: Moss had just shown Judge Pitney he did not have good title to the land on which he'd built his office building-the building in which Moss had his law office. 'You're gone,' Heusinger mouthed. Moss nodded. He'd known he was gone whichever way the case went. At least he was going out a winner.
John Smith tugged at Moss' sleeve. 'Will he appeal?' the mousy little Canadian whispered.
'Can't say for sure now,' Moss whispered back. 'I'd guess not, though. I think we have a solid case here-and appeals are expensive'
Back in the spectators' seats, a couple of reporters scribbled furiously. They'd been covering the case since it first showed up on the docket; occasional man-bites-dog stories appeared in the Berlin Bulletin and, Moss supposed, some other papers as well. He didn't mind-on the contrary. The stories had already brought him three or four clients much more able to pay his usual fees than John Smith was.
But for the reporters, the spectators' gallery was empty. As far as Moss could tell, Heusinger had not a friend in town. Smith probably had had friends here, but those who weren't dead were scattered. The war had been hard
