I
Bob Garvin watched the Army go, his hands in his pockets, an odd light burning in his eyes. He waited until the last truck had swung off Fourteenth Street and turned toward the Lincoln Tunnel, until the last man had marched out of sight, until the flashes of sun on gun barrels had winked out. Then he stepped back, apologized to a citizen he bumped, and walked over to the group clustered around Brent Mackay.
“Morning, Mayor,” he said.
“Ah, good morning, counselor! Out here like all the rest of us, I see.” Mackay was an oddity. He looked as lean and hard as any man, but he was soft at the core—like a bag so full of wind that the cloth stretched drum-tight and strong; but, nevertheless, only full of wind.
“Have to wave bye-bye to the brave soldier boys, you know,” Bob said.
One of the Mayor’s retinue—a steely-eyed man named Mert Hollis—laughed metallically. A wave of sly chuckles swept over the group.
“Well,” Bob Garvin said, “let’s get back to work. There’s still a government in this city, even if the Crown Prince has gone a-hunting again.”
Mackay nodded hastily. “Of course. You’re quite right, counselor.” He turned to the rest of the members of the City Council and their assistants. “Let’s go, boys! Back to the salt mines. Got to get that sewer project in the works.”
“Ah—Mayor…” Garvin interceded softly.
“Yes, counselor?”
“I’d think that could wait a little. Rome wasn’t built in a day, you know. l’d like to get that question of voter eligibility straightened out this morning.”
“Why, certainly, counselor!” Mackay chuckled easily. “You know, that had slipped my mind. Thanks for reminding me.”
“You’re welcome, I’m sure.”
The Army of Unification took Trenton easily. It ran into a very strong defense in Philadelphia, and, for a moment, Berendtsen debated whether it might not have been a better idea to enter southern New Jersey, instead of by-passing it. But a flanking column finally battered its way up from Chester, and the city fell. Camden then fell with it, and the strategy of quick gain was justified. With a strong garrison in the Camden-Philadelphia district, southern New Jersey was bound to be gradually assimilated, with a far lower ratio of losses, and meanwhile weeks of time were gained.
The Army pushed south.
[Image]
Eating slowly, Bob Garvin savored his mother’s cooking. He smiled at her fondly as she spooned another portion of potatoes on his plate. “Thanks, Mom, but I’m just about full.”
“Don’t you like them?” his mother asked anxiously.
“No, no, they’re fine, Mom!” he protested. “But there’s only so much room, and I’ll want some of that pumpkin pie.”
Mary looked at him acidly. “Home life of the public figure,” she said. “Popular candidate for Councilman from the Sixth District enjoys home cooking. Goes home for one of Mom’s pies on night before municipal elections.”
“Mary!” Margaret Garvin looked at her daughter reproachfully.
Mary looked down at her plate. “Sorry, Mother.”
“I can’t understand what’s come over you lately,” Margaret Garvin was saying, her face troubled. “You never used to be this way.”
Mary shrugged. “Nobody’s the way they used to be.” She toyed with her knife. “But I’m sorry. I won’t do it again.”
Margaret Garvin looked anxiously at her son. Bob was smiling slightly, as he often seemed to be. Apparently, he was impervious to anything his sister might say.
“Well…” Margaret Garvin began irresolutely. She frowned as she realized she had no idea of what she was going to say next. She’d been this way more and more often, since Matt…
Matt was gone. There was no sense in hurting herself by thinking about it. He was gone, and she was here. And if she seemed to miss his strength more and more every day—well, everyone grew old, some time or the other.
“I’m going over to see Carol Berendtsen,” she said at last. “You children can manage your own dessert without any trouble. The poor woman’s worn down to a shadow.”
She missed Ted. Her boy had been her life, since Gus…
She would not think of death!
…Since Carol didn’t have Gus anymore. And no one knew where Ted was, beyond an occasional radio report about this city besieged, that town captured. And more than that. More than that—and the same thing that put the pain in Mary’s eyes. Wife and mother, both wondering what was happening inside the man one had borne and the other married, but neither understood.
Margaret Garvin stood up. Her own oldest boy, Jim, was with Ted. Perhaps she, too, should be worried. But she never worried about Jim. Jim was like seasoned timber, holding up a building. Nothing could hurt him, nothing could move him. Jim could take care of himself. Never worried? Well, no, not that. She knew that Jim was as weak as any man whom a bullet might strike down. But Jim was not the complex, delicate organism that Ted was, or that Bob was. It was impossible to believe of him, as one could easily believe of the other two, that one slight shock could jar the entire mechanism.
“Will you be here when I come back, Bob?” she asked.
Bob shook his head regretfully. “Afraid not, Mom. I need a good night’s sleep before tomorrow. Vote early and often, you know.” He chuckled easily.
She went over to him and kissed him good night. “Take care of yourself, Bob,” she said gently.
“Always do, Mom.”
Bob shot a glance at Mary after his mother had left. Mary Berendtsen was staring distantly at her teacup, her eyes lost.
“Worried about Ted?” Bob asked softly.
Mary did not look at him. Her mouth twitched into a thin line.
“I have no quarrel with you,” he said sincerely.
“You’ve got one with my husband.”
Bob shook his head violently. “Not with him. With his ideals. His social theories, if you will.”
Mary looked up, smiling thinly. “You tell me where the one leaves off and the other begins.”
Bob shrugged. “That’s what makes it look like I hate him personally. But I don’t! You know that.”
“You’d have him killed if you could get away with it. If you could have gotten him killed, you’d have done it two years ago, when he came back from the north.”
Bob nodded. “I’ll admit that. But not because I hate him—or don’t admire him, for that matter. Because he stands for the reigning social theory. A theory that’s going to drive us back to the caves and snipers if it keeps on.”
“Don’t campaign around me!” Mary snapped. “Don’t fog your pretty speeches at me! What it boils down to is that, despite Mackay, despite Chief of Police Merton Hollis, despite the City Council in your pocket, you know damned well that if Ted comes back to stay you’ll be on the outside in two bounces! And then all the pretty plans and fat jobs won’t be worth this!” She snapped her fingers.
Bob shook his head. “No, Mary,” he said gently. “You’re mad at me, but you know that’s not true. Mackay’s a tool, true, and not a clean one, either. Neither are the things I’m forced to do. But you know why I want to control the government. And it’s not the fat jobs.”
