Empire

dead—how can I take advantage of it?”

“And you’re nine years old, right?” asked Cecily.

“I know you think I read too much fantasy,” said Nick, “but this is what it’s all about. Power. Somebody dies, somebody leaves, everybody comes in and tries to take over. And you just have to hope that the good guys are strong enough and smart enough and brave enough to win.”

“Are they?”

“In the fantasy novels,” said Nick. “But in the real world, the bad guys win all the time. Genghis Khan tore up the world. Hitler lost in the end, but he killed millions of people first. Really bad stuff happens. Evil people get away with it. You think I don’t know that?”

Our children are way too smart for their own good, thought Cecily. “Nick, you’re absolutely right. So do you know what we do? We make an island. We make a castle. We dig a moat around it and we put up walls that are strong, made of stone.”

“I guess you’re not talking about Aunt Margaret’s house,” said Nick.

“You know what I’m talking about,” said Cecily. “I’m talking about family, and faith. Here in this house, we’re not trying to take advantage. Our family doesn’t try to profit from the death of the king. Our family always has enough to share, even if we don’t have enough to eat. Do you understand?”

“Sure,” said Nick. “That’s church talk. Because Dad has a weapon and goes out and kills the bad guys. He doesn’t just hide in a castle inside a moat and help the poor and the sick.”

“Your dad,” said Cecily, “does not go out and kill the bad guys. He goes out and does what he’s ordered to do, and the goal is to persuade the bad guys that they won’t get their way by killing people, so they’d better stop.”

“Mom,” said Nick, “all you’re saying is that our Army persuades them to stop killing people by being better at killing people than they are.”

She slumped back in her chair. “Hard to reconcile that with Christianity, isn’t it?”

“No it’s not,” said Nick. “’Greater love hath no man than this, that he lay down his life for his friends.’ ”

“You listen?”

“I read.”

“I just turned down an offer from the President. LaMonte Niel-son. I used to work for him. I must have done a good job, because he wants me to come work in the White House.”

“Are you going to?”

“No, I’m not. And do you know why?”

“Because of us?” said Nick.

“Because the best thing I can do to make this world a better place is to do a really brilliant job of raising you kids. And I can’t if I’m not home to do it.”

“If you worked in the White House,” said Nick, “you might have been one of the ones they blew up.”

“But I wasn’t. And I won’t be.”

“They’ve got to be mad at Dad,” said Nick.

“Who?”

“The boss terrorists. He shot their guys. He stopped one of their rockets. He almost stopped them from killing the President.”

“I suppose they’re a little bit mad at him. But they didn’t expect us not to shoot back.”

“They’re not going to come here to kill us, are they?”

“No,” said Cecily.

“In the movies, they always go after the hero’s family.”

“They do that because it’s a Hollywood formula. To make the movie scarier so you’ll keep watching for the whole two hours. In the real world, these terrorists don’t care about regular people like us. They strike at big targets—like the World Trade Center and the President.”

“And the Pentagon,” said Nick.

“And soldiers in the field. We’ve always known that was Dad’s job. But our house? Like I said—it’s a castle.”

Nick nodded. Then he got up and went to the fridge and opened the freezer compartment and took out a fudgesicle. “Want one?” he said.

“I don’t like chocolate,” Cecily answered.

“A creamsicle?” said Nick.

“Bring me one, you monster of temptation,” she said.

He tossed her a creamsicle and kept the fudgesicle for himself. “Do you ever wonder,” he said as he unwrapped it, “what it would feel like to smear this all over your body?”

Cecily made the connection. “You didn’t happen to say that to J. P., did you?”

“His fudgesicle was dripping all over his hand and he was getting all frantic about it.”

“He was in the back yard?”

“He turns doorknobs just fine, Mom. Didn’t you know that?”

“So you said, ‘Wonder what it would feel like to smear this all over?’ ”

“I told him he was already halfway covered in fudgesicle, he might as well take his clothes off and finish the job.”

“And you didn’t think to watch him to make sure he didn’t?”

Nick looked at her like she was crazy. “Why would I do that? It was funny watching him wipe his butt with a fudgesicle.”

“Oh, yes,” said Cecily nastily. “You read comic fantasies.”

“What’s the point of having a little brother if you can’t talk him into doing stupid things?”

“Nick, please don’t do that again. J. P. is not your toy.”

“He’s your toy. But aren’t you supposed to share?”

“You know I’m very angry with you.”

“Not very” he said, reverting to their old game.

“Very very” she said.

“Not very very very.”

“Very very very very very very very verivervy. Very,” she said.

“You did that on purpose.”

“I cannot say ‘very’ that many times in a row without stumbling.”

“Come on, Mom, you speak a language that has no vowels.”

“Croatian has vowels. We just don’t need them in every syllable.”

Then everybody trooped down from upstairs and the private conversation was over.

Cecily didn’t get a chance to be alone with Reuben until dusk, when they went out and sat on the glider on the patio. Cecily told him about talking to the President and declining his job offer. Reuben told her about talking to Leighton Fuller at The Post. “And Cole telephoned me,” said Reuben. “General Alton is planning a coup. Keep Nielson as a figurehead. Maybe it’ll happen. Alton’s always been a big talker. But there are people who see the world his way. Maybe he has support. Maybe people will go along with him.”

“So what are you going to do about it?” asked Cecily.

“Keep my head down,” said Reuben. “There are things that a major in the United States Army doesn’t have the power to do. If they really do it, though, I’m resigning my commission. I signed on to serve the United States of America, not some committee of generals who think they have the right to decide how the country should go.”

“It won’t happen,” she said. “It can’t happen. That’s… it’s so Latin American. So Turkish. It doesn’t happen here.”

“Until it does,” said Reuben. “Something else Cole said.”

“What?”

“He quoted something General Alton said to him. Quoted to him. What he remembers Alton saying is, ‘Soldiers want to get paid and not die. Civilians want to be left alone. We’ll pay the soldiers and we won’t ask them to die. We’ll leave the civilians alone.’ ”

“That’s pretty cynical. Does he really think people will give up freedom that easily?”