said, which was not a question at all but at the same time was.
“Everything’s all right,” he replied, an answer that said nothing and at the same time quite a lot.
Mary’s face glowed. “Does that mean you-?” she began, and then abruptly stopped, as if she did not want to hear what it meant. Arthur McGregor only shrugged. With food and coffee in front of him, he didn’t want to think for a while.
He went out to work in the fields. When he looked back toward the farmhouse, he saw the overalls and shirt and socks and drawers he’d worn the night before out flapping on the line. The breeze was strong. They would dry quickly.
In the middle of the afternoon, a green-gray Ford parked between the farmhouse and the barn. McGregor didn’t notice it till the soldiers who got out fired a couple of shots in the air. That brought him in at a shambling trot that told him just how worn he was.
Three privates in green-gray surrounded a tall, skinny U.S. captain McGregor had never seen before. Without preamble, the officer snapped, “Where were you last night?”
“Here at home in bed,” he answered. He felt drunk with joy now, and had to work hard to make sure it didn’t show on his face. If he’d failed, Major Hannebrink would have been the one to bark questions at him. But sending sullen looks toward the occupiers wasn’t hard, not even a little. “Why? What are you going to try and blame on me this time?”
“Somebody set off a bomb in Rosenfeld,” the captain said. “A lot of good men died. Somebody’s set off a lot of bombs in this part of the country since your son received military justice. A fair number of hostages have died on account of them, too.”
“You Yanks have murdered a lot of people in this part of the country besides my son-including those hostages,” McGregor returned. “I don’t love you, but I haven’t bombed you. Major Hannebrink turned this place upside down trying to show different, but he couldn’t show what wasn’t there.”
“Major Hannebrink is dead,” the U.S. captain told him.
“I’ll not shed a tear,” McGregor said. Again, he had to remind himself not to exult. “I wish I had settled him, but I didn’t.” That lie came easy. He’d had lots of practice using it. His conscience, which had once sickened at any untruth, troubled him not at all.
“Shall we search the house and barn again, Captain Fielding?” one of the privates asked.
McGregor waited for the tall officer to say yes. If the Yanks found what he’d hidden under the old wagon wheel, he could die content now. But Fielding shook his head. “No evidence,” he said. “Nothing but Hannebrink’s suspicions, and I can’t see that he had anything more than suspicions to go on. You keep your nose clean, McGregor, and you can help us put this country back together again.”
He gestured to his men. They and he got into the Ford and drove away. McGregor stared after them. He’d won his battle, and cherished that: the man who’d ordered his son executed was dead himself. But the Americans had won the war, and still aimed to reshape Canada to suit themselves. If he was going to keep on resisting, he had to get ready for the long haul. Grimly, he resolved to do just that.
Nellie Semphroch came downstairs to start another day at the coffeehouse. She smiled at the plate-glass windows replacing the boards that had fronted on the street. Once word got around that President Roosevelt had given her and Edna medals, people started going out of their way to do them favors, as people had gone out of their way to cut them when they’d thought them collaborators.
Across the street, Hal Jacobs’ cobbler’s shop still presented boards to the world. Nellie didn’t think that was fair. Jacobs had done much more than she had to hurt the Rebels inside Washington. If Roosevelt had given him a medal, Nellie didn’t know about it. Maybe he was naturally modest. Maybe being self-effacing went into making a good spy. Whatever the reason, Jacobs had let no one know he’d done anything out of the ordinary during the war.
Nellie unlocked the door and turned the sign in the window so it read OPEN. As she was doing that, Jacobs opened his own door and came out onto the sidewalk. Seeing Nellie through the window, he waved to her.
A little reluctantly, she waved back. She knew how much she owed him. The coffeehouse never would have made a go of it, let alone flourished, without his help. But, very likely, she never would have had to set eyes on Bill Reach again if not for his dealings with Hal Jacobs. As far as she was concerned, that went a long way toward canceling her debt.
Edna came downstairs. “Morning, Ma,” she called as she started making the day’s first coffee.
“Morning,” Nellie answered. Edna had been subdued since Roosevelt put the medal she did not deserve around her neck. Maybe that was because she realized she didn’t deserve it, and appreciated the contribution her mother had made toward a U.S. victory. More likely, Nellie judged, Edna missed the handsome young Confederate officers who’d filled the coffeehouse for most of three years. That might not have been charitable, but Nellie reckoned it close to the mark.
A U.S. officer came in. He was neither handsome nor young. When he ordered a fried-egg sandwich and a mug of coffee, though, Nellie looked on him with benevolent eyes. When he left a quarter for a tip on top of his tab, she reckoned him a paragon among men.
Another officer came in a few minutes later. All he wanted was coffee. Nellie served him with the best smile she could muster. Business was better than it had been when people shunned Edna and her, but not what it had been when the Confederates held Washington. She didn’t suppose it would ever be that good again, and was glad she’d managed to save some of what she made.
Hal Jacobs walked into the coffeehouse as that second officer was leaving; they did a little dance in the doorway to keep from bumping into each other. Jacobs asked for a cup of coffee, too. When he set a nickel on the table, Nellie shoved it back at him. “Your money’s no good here, Hal,” she said. “You ought to know that by now.”
“This is foolishness,” Jacobs said. “You can use this no matter where it comes from.”
“Like you can’t?” Nellie answered. “I know how many people go in and out of your place every day. It’s a wonder you’ve got any money to spend at all, if you ask me. But even if you had plenty, I wouldn’t take it from you.”
“You are more generous than I deserve,” the shoemaker said. “I was happy to help you and help our country at the same time.”
“Well, you did, and now I’m going to help you, too,” Nellie said. From behind the counter, Edna gave her a look that meant,
Jacobs said, “I know how you can help me, Nellie.”
“How’s that?” Nellie asked cautiously. She thought she knew what kind of thing the shoemaker would say. Sooner or later, every man in the world said that kind of thing. Edna leaned forward so as not to miss a word. By the leer on her face, she thought she knew what kind of thing the shoemaker would say, too. And, by that leer, she wouldn’t let her mother forget it after he said it, either.
Then, to Nellie’s surprise, Hal Jacobs slipped out of the chair in which he was sitting. To her even greater surprise, he went down on one knee before her and took her hands in his before she could pull away. “Nellie, will you please marry me and make me a happy man for all the rest of my days?” he asked.
Nellie’s face heated. She was sure her cheeks had to be red as raw meat. She glanced over at Edna, whose jaw had fallen and whose eyes were wide and staring. Whatever else her daughter might do, Edna wouldn’t be able to tease her about getting a lewd proposition.
She’d been ready to deal with-to deal forcefully with-a proposition. A proposal was something else again. A man who wanted her enough to ask to marry her without even trying to sample the merchandise first? She’d never known-indeed, never imagined-such a thing. Her experience had always been that men were a lot longer on sampling than on proposing.
And so, after a silence that stretched longer than it should have, she could only stammer, “Mr. Jacobs, I–I don’t know what to say. This is so sudden.”
“Not when we have worked side by side for so long,” Jacobs said, still on his knees. “I know what I would like. I can only hope and pray you would like it, too.”
Before Nellie could find any way to respond to that, Edna hissed, “Say yes, Ma! Where are you going to do better?”
Unlike a good many from her daughter, that was a good question. Nellie looked down at Hal Jacobs. He
