itself. She had grumbled about that.
Brigadier General-Rowling? — wouldn't listen. He said, 'Your president agreed to it, so you're stuck with it.'
She had no answer for that. What Jake Featherston said, went. 'Let them enjoy it while they can, then,' she said, 'because they sure won't be doing any voting after Kentucky comes back where it belongs.'
The U.S. officer scowled. She'd hoped he would. He said, 'Maybe you'd like to go into the colored district yourself on Tuesday so you can see everything is on the up and up?'
'I'm not afraid, if that's what you mean,' she said.
'Bully for you,' said the fat man from the United States. Anne couldn't remember the last time she'd heard anyone say bully, even sardonically.
January 7, 1941, dawned clear and cold. Anne Colleton got up to see the sun rise to make sure she missed none of the plebiscite. Polls opened at seven. Polling places were officially marked by the Stars and Stripes and the Stars and Bars flying in front of them-and unofficially by the armed U.S. soldiers who stood outside each one to make sure there was no trouble. Jake Featherston had offered to send Confederate soldiers into Kentucky and Houston and Sequoyah to help with that, but President Smith had told him no, and he hadn't pushed it. For the moment, they remained U.S. territory.
For the moment, Anne thought with a ferocious smile.
Both the USA and the CSA had poll watchers at every polling place. They checked the men and women who came in to vote against the lists of those who were eligible. Every now and then, they would argue. Both sides kept lists of contested voters. If the plebiscite turned out to be close, those lists would turn into weapons. In Kentucky and Houston, at least, Anne didn't think the vote would be close.
She did go into the colored part of Covington. Her motorcar flew the Stars and Bars from the wireless aerial. In most of Covington, people had cheered when they saw it. In the colored district… Anne wished she'd thought to take down the flag.
Some of the U.S. poll watchers in the colored part of town were Negroes: young men who'd grown up and got an education while Kentucky belonged to the USA. Because the voting rolls for Negroes were new and imperfect, they bickered constantly with their C.S. counterparts, and argued with them as if they believed they were just as good as whites. In the Confederate States, that would have been a death sentence.
One of the Confederate poll watchers said as much: 'When this here state goes back where it belongs, you better recollect what happens to uppity niggers, Lucullus.'
The Negro-Lucullus-looked steadily back at him. 'You better recollect what happens when you push folks too far,' he answered. 'You push 'em so far they don't care if they lives or dies, why should they care if you lives or dies?'
'Talk is cheap,' the white man fleered. Lucullus said not a word. Anne feared he'd won the exchange.
When she came out of the polling place-a little storefront church-she discovered her auto had a smashed windscreen (though they said windshield in the USA). Her driver was out of the motorcar, hopping mad and yelling at a U.S. soldier: 'Why the hell didn't you stop that goddamn nigger? He flung a brick right in front of your nose, and you just stood there.'
'I'm sorry, sir.' The green-gray-clad soldier sounded anything but sorry. By his accent, he was from nowhere near Kentucky. 'I didn't see a thing.'
'What is your name?' Anne demanded. 'I'm going to report you to your commanding officer.'
'Jenkins, ma'am. Rudy Jenkins,' the soldier answered. 'And you can report as much as you please, but I won't lose any sleep over it.'
She thought about telling him where to go and how to get there in the sort of language he would use himself-thought about it and decided it would do no good. Oh, she intended to give his name to that stuffed pork chop in a brigadier general's uniform, but she was sure that would do her no good, either. Jenkins might get a public slap on the wrist, but he was bound to get some private congratulations along with it.
She turned to the driver. 'Just take us on to the next stop. This fellow can laugh as much as he pleases, but he'll be leaving soon, and we're going to stay.'
The driver fumed. But Rudy Jenkins fumed even more. Anne nodded to herself. She'd done that right.
Before she left the colored district, the auto picked up a couple of more dents. The driver plainly wanted to curse some more; her presence in the motorcar inhibited him. 'To hell with these goddamn bastards,' she said, her voice crisp. 'From now on, no one will give a shit what they think. Right?'
'Uh, yes, ma'am.' He sounded scandalized. She smiled; she'd heard a lot of men sound that way. On they went, to a new polling place in the white part of town. There, Freedom Party stalwarts waving Party flags paraded just outside the hundred-foot electioneering limit. The U.S. soldiers by the polling place looked as if they wanted to shoot the men in white shirts and butternut trousers. The stalwarts were careful not to give them an excuse.
Anne went from one polling place to another till the polls closed at eight o'clock. Then the driver took her to the Covington city hall, where the votes would be counted. As at the polling places, both the USA and the CSA had observers present to make sure the count went straight.
Watching it progress, Anne found more people in Covington voting to stay in the United States than she would have liked: certainly more than the Negro vote-and what a mad notion that was! — accounted for. Some of the whites who'd grown up in the USA must have been too lazy to want a change. Even so, returning to the Confederacy took an early lead in Covington, and never lost it.
Wireless sets blared in the white-painted, windowless, smoke-filled room where the ballots were tallied. They let the counters and the observers keep track of what was going on in the rest of Kentucky and in the other states where there were plebiscites. Return to the CSA held the same sort of lead in Kentucky as a whole as it did in Covington-less than Anne would have liked, but plenty to win. Houston was going for the CSA in a rout: better than three to one. Sequoyah… Sequoyah gave the damnyankees something to smile about, because the people there seemed to be choosing to stay in the United States.
The tally in Covington finished about half past one. By then, Anne's driver had fallen asleep in a folding chair. She eyed him in some admiration; she didn't think she could have done that in a quiet room, let alone in the noisy chaos at city hall. He jerked and almost fell out of the chair when she shook him awake again. She was sorry about that, but not sorry enough to keep from doing it.
Noisy chaos roiled through the rest of Covington, too, as she saw on the short trip back to her hotel. Freedom Party stalwarts and others who backed the CSA danced in the streets, waving Party flags, the Stars and Bars, and the Confederate battle flag. A lot of them were drunk. They cheered the Confederate flag on the aerial of Anne's battered auto. Somehow, the cheers turned into a rousing chorus of 'Dixie.'
Anne wondered if the celebrants would go into the colored district and take their revenge on Covington's Negroes for voting to stay in the USA-or for having the nerve to vote at all. Maybe the U.S. soldiers who still patrolled the town would keep them from doing that. But any Negroes who stayed in Covington after Kentucky changed hands wouldn't have a happy time of it. Anne supposed a lot of them would go while the going was good. The United States are welcome to them, she thought.
She snatched a few hours' sleep. When she came downstairs for breakfast, she got a copy of the Covington Chronicle. The banner headline summed things up:
UNTIED STATES!
A smaller subhead below gave the details:
KENTUCKY, HOUSTON RETURN TO CSA!
SEQUOYAH STAYS UNDER STARS AND STRIPES!
After bacon and eggs and lots of coffee, Anne paid a call on the U.S. commandant in Covington. 'The people have spoken, Brigadier General,' she said-and if she was gloating, she thought she had good reason to.
A cup of coffee steamed on the fat officer's desk. He looked to have had even less sleep than she had. 'The people are a bunch of damned fools,' he said. 'They elected Featherston, didn't they?'
'I don't talk about your president that way,' she said.
'Why not? I do.' The commandant swigged from the coffee cup. He got down to business: 'Under the agreement, we have thirty days to withdraw our men. Yours are not to follow. Kentucky will stay demilitarized. U.S. citizens wishing to leave the state may do so until it passes under Confederate sovereignty. A lot of them, I expect, will already have made plans to do so.'
'Collaborators and niggers,' Anne said scornfully. 'You can have 'em.'
