"Twenty-seven dollars and sixty cents," Magdalena said without a moment's hesitation. "I saw just the one I want in the Henderson and Fisk catalogue." Henderson and Fisk was a leading Confederate mail-order house, and had been since before the Great War. Only after the currency stabilized again, though, had its catalogues started coming to places as remote from the concerns of most of the CSA as Baroyeca. Magdalena went on, "It's called the Southern Sunshine cook stove, and it will do everything I need." Again, the name of the stove came out in English.
"A stove," Rodriguez said musingly. "I'd bet a lot of women in Baroyeca itself don't cook on stoves." Changes filtered down to southern Sonora more slowly than almost anywhere else in the CSA, and the Confederate States had been founded on the principle that change was a bad idea.
"I'm sure you're right," his wife agreed. "But I don't care. We have the money. We even have the money for the stovepipe to take the smoke outside-another eighty-five cents."
If she said they had it, they had it. She kept track of finances with an eye that watched every penny. Even when the money went mad after the Great War, when a billion dollars had been nothing much, Magdalena had stretched things as far as they would go. The patron had never had cause to complain about the Rodriguezes. The patron… "Does Don Gustavo's wife cook on a stove?" Rodriguez asked.
Magdalena let out a dismissive snort. "Dona Elena doesn't cook at all. They have a cook of their own, as you know perfectly well." But it was a serious question. If the patron didn't have an iron stove in his house, what would he think of a peasant family's getting one? Seeing the worry on Hipolito Rodriguez's face, Magdalena said, "Don't worry. I found out. Dona Elena's cook does use a stove."
"All right. Good. Very good." Rodriguez didn't try to hide his relief. Things weren't so rigid in the CSA as they were down in the Empire of Mexico, and they weren't so rigid now as they had been in his father's day, but he didn't want to offend Don Gustavo even so. Better safe than sorry, he told himself. To his wife, he said, "Next time I go to town, I'll send the order to Henderson and Fisk."
"Good, yes." Magdalena nodded. "And then the railroad will bring the crate, and then we will have a stove."
A hamlet like Baroyeca would never have had a railroad connection if not for the mine close by. In plenty of places in Sonora and Chihuahua, the last leg of the journey from merchandiser to customer would have been by rattling wagon (or possibly, these days, by rattling truck). But not here. The trains that took out precious metal could bring in a stove from Birmingham.
The mine also meant Baroyeca boasted a post office, a few doors down from La Culebra Verde. The Stars and Bars floated above the whitewashed adobe building. When Rodriguez went in, Jose Cordero, the postmaster, put aside the newspaper he'd been reading. He was a plump man with a small mustache and with his hair parted on the right and greased immovably into place. "And what can I do for you today?" he inquired. "Postage stamps?"
"No, senor. I have some," Rodriguez replied politely; by virtue of his office, the postmaster was a person of consequence. "I wish to purchase a postal money order, and to send the money to Henderson and Fisk." He spoke with a certain amount of pride. Not every farmer could scrape together the cash for such a purchase.
Cordero's answering nod was grave, for he recognized as much. He made a small ceremony of taking out the book of money orders. "What is the amount?"
"Thirty-one dollars and seventy-six cents," Rodriguez said; that included the stove, the stovepipe, and third-class freight. He set banknotes and coins on the counter till he had exactly the right amount.
The postmaster counted the money, then nodded again. "Yes, that is correct for the order itself," he said. He filled out the money order, then added, "You must also know, of course, there is a fee of thirty-two cents for the use of the order."
Rodriguez winced. He hadn't sent a money order in so long, he'd forgotten that one-percent fee. He fished in his pockets. He had some change lurking there; he'd intended to visit La Culebra Verde after sending away for the stove. He found a quarter and a dime. Jose Cordero solemnly gave him back three cents. He sighed. He couldn't buy a beer for that. Then he found another dime. He brightened. He could go to the cantina after all.
"How long will the stove take to come?" he asked.
"Ah, is that what you're getting? Good for you," the postmaster said. "How long?" He looked up at the ceiling as he made mental calculations. "My best guess would be three weeks or a month. You should light a candle for every day sooner than three weeks."
"Gracias, senor," Rodriguez said. That was about what he'd thought. Now he could use Cordero's authority when he told Magdalena.
"El gusto es mio," Cordero replied. Rodriguez didn't think the pleasure really was his, but he always spoke politely. He went on, "I hope your wife gets much use and much enjoyment from it. My own Ana has had a stove now for several years, and she would never go back to cooking over an open fire. The stove is much cleaner, too."
"I had not thought of that, but I'm sure it would be." Rodriguez hid a smile. He'd done a little bragging, and the postmaster had responded with some of his own. That was the way life worked.
"It is," Cordero said positively. "You've spent a lot of money, but you won't be sorry for it." He sounded as if he were giving a personal guarantee.
"Without doubt, you have reason." Rodriguez inked a pen, scrawled the name of the mail-order form on the envelope, put in the order form and the money order, and handed Cordero the envelope.
The postmaster looked embarrassed. "Personally, I would gladly send it for nothing. You understand, though, I cannot be my own man in this matter: I am but a servant of the Confederate government. I must ask you for five cents more for the stamp that shows you have paid me postage."
With a sigh, Rodriguez realized he hadn't brought a stamp of his own along. He passed Cordero the dime he'd found, but eight cents wouldn't let him go into the cantina. Before the war, beer had been five cents, but it was a dime nowadays. No help for it, though. He watched the postmaster put the envelope in the bin of mail that would leave Baroyeca. Once it was there, he left the post office.
Standing on the board sidewalk, he sighed again. No point in going into La Culebra Verde when he had no money to buy. He thought little of men who sat around in there hoping to cadge drinks from their more prosperous friends and neighbors. He didn't want to be one of those freeloaders himself. But he didn't want to turn around and head straight back to the farm, either. What point to that? He didn't escape from it often enough to care to go home as fast as he could.
What to do, then? He looked up and down Baroyeca's main street- Calle de los Estados Confederados -wondering which shops he could visit without drawing sneers from the proprietors. A man with eight cents in his pocket couldn't buy much. He jingled the coins. Because of the pennies, they did sound like more.
His eyes snapped back to a building at the far end of the street. It had stood empty since the weekly newspaper folded in the middle of the great inflation. Now, he saw, it was empty no more. A couple of bright new words were painted on the front window. From his angle, he couldn't make out what they were. He ambled toward the building, still jingling his few paltry coins.
Before long, he could read the words. He stopped in surprise and pleasure, a grin spreading over his face. FREEDOM! the window shouted, and below that, in slightly smaller letters,?LIBERTAD! As he got closer still, he could make out the much smaller words under the big ones: Freedom Party Headquarters, Baroyeca, Sonora. Everyone Welcome.