There was no formula for the little stories speckled through the inner pages of the Rosenfeld Register, either. The editor, no doubt, would have called them "human interest" pieces. Mary sometimes wondered about the sanity of any human being who was interested in stories about a two-headed calf nursed by two different cows or a man who pulled a boxcar with his teeth-and false teeth, at that.
But she looked at the filler pieces herself. A story about a mother cat nursing an orphaned puppy could make her smile. So could one about two former sweethearts who'd both moved away from the small town where they grew up, then didn't see each other for twenty-five years till they were standing in line at the same Toronto cinema. One had never married; the other was a widower. They'd fallen in love all over again.
Some of those "human interest" stories made Mary grit her teeth, because propaganda poisoned them. The one about the Yank flier who'd requalified as a fighter pilot after twenty years away from aeroplanes was particularly sappy; she had to resist the impulse to crumple up the Register and throw it across the living room. The last paragraph said, Our bold hero, now also a successful barrister specializing in occupation affairs, is married to the former Laura Secord, a descendant of the "Paul Revere of Canada," who had the same name. They have one daughter. Thus we see that the two lands are becoming ever more closely intertwined.
Mary saw nothing of the sort. What she saw was a traitor living high on the hog because she'd married a Yank. And hadn't Laura Secord been one of the people who'd betrayed the uprising in the 1920s? Mary nodded to herself. She was sure she remembered that. She wouldn't forget the name, not when she'd learned it in school before the Yanks started changing what was taught. Had the woman been intertwined with this Yank flier even then? The lewd image was enough to make Mary's cheeks heat.
She'd promised herself vengeance on the people who'd made the uprising fail. She'd promised, and then she hadn't delivered. Her father would have been ashamed of her. Up there in heaven, Arthur McGregor probably was ashamed of her.
"I'll take care of it," she whispered. "I'll take care of it if it's the last thing I ever do."
Then she had to take care of something else, because Alec woke up with a yelclass="underline" "Pooping potty!" That was his signal that he needed to use the toilet-or, sometimes, that he'd just gone. Mary rushed in to lift him out of the crib and see which it was this time.
"You're dry!" she exclaimed in glad surprise after a hasty check-he did have accidents in his sleep.
"Dry as a fly," he answered, echoing one of the things she said to him.
"What a good boy!" Mary took him out of the crib, gave him a kiss, and stood him on a stool in front of the toilet. He did his business, and almost all of it went where it was supposed to go. Mary cleaned up the rest with toilet paper. "What a good boy!" she said again. Another woman in the block of flats insisted babies didn't turn into people till they were toilet-trained. Mary thought that went too far… most of the time.
His clothes set to rights, Alec went off to play. Mary went off to keep at least one eye on him while he was playing, to make sure he didn't knock over a table or pull a lamp down on his head or try to swallow a big mouthful of dust or stick his finger in an electric socket or do any of the other interesting and creative things small children did in their unending effort not to live to grow up.
This afternoon, he made a beeline for the ashtray. "Oh, no, you don't!" Mary said, and got there first. He'd tried that before. Once, he'd managed to swallow one of Mort's cigarette butts, as he'd proved by puking it up. Keeping an eye on her son, Mary understood how her mother had come to have gray hair.
Every so often, she cast a longing glance across the street at the diner. When Mort got back, she'd have another pair of eyes in the flat to keep watch on Alec. One toddler left two parents only slightly outnumbered. Dealing with Alec by herself, Mary often felt not just outnumbered but overwhelmed.
But when Mort did come home, he sank down into the rocking chair with a bottle of Moosehead and complained about how busy he'd been all day at the diner. "Lord, it's good to get off my feet," he said.
"I have the same feeling when Alec takes a nap," Mary said pointedly.
Her husband didn't take the point. "It was a madhouse over there today," he said. "We made good money, but they kept us hopping."
"Alec always keeps me hopping," Mary said.
"This little fellow? This little fellow here?" Mort grabbed Alec and stuck him on his lap. Alec squealed with glee and cuddled up. If I tried that, he'd pitch a fit. Either that or he'd just jump off ten seconds later, Mary thought. Mort ruffled the toddler's fine sandy hair. "You're not so tough, are you?"
"Tough!" Alec yelled gleefully. "Tough!"
"You're not so tough," Mort said again, and turned him upside down. Alec squealed in delight. Mary hid a sigh by turning away. Mort could do things with their son that she couldn't. She'd seen that very early on. He could get Alec to pay attention and do what he was told when she couldn't. Maybe it was just that he had a deep, rumbling man's voice. Maybe it was that he was gone more and Alec wanted to please him while he was around. Whatever it was, it was unquestionably real.
So was Laura Secord's treason. Alec has his father, Mary thought. I made a promise to mine a long time ago. I haven't kept it yet, but that doesn't mean I won't. Oh, no. It doesn't mean that at all. She nodded to herself. Then she smiled. She wasn't annoyed at Mort any more, not even a little bit.
Conscripts were filling out the ranks of the Confederate Army. It got stronger week by week. Confederate aeroplanes carried guns and bombs. The fastest Confederate fighters could go up against anything the USA built. And the United States, while they'd grumbled, hadn't done anything but grumble. As far as Clarence Potter was concerned, that would do for a miracle till a bigger one came along.
Jake Featherston had thought it would work like this. If it hadn't, whether Featherston got-extorted-the right to run for a second term wouldn't have mattered a hill of beans' worth. The country would have thrown him out on his ear if the USA didn't take care of the job.
The Confederate States were ever so much stronger than they had been. Potter knew just how strong they were-and how strong the United States were. A fight would have been no contest. But no fight came. Featherston had been sure none would. And he'd been right.
"By God, he's earned a second term for that," Potter muttered at his desk down below the War Department building.
He shook his head in something halfway between bemusement and horror. Did I say that? Did I say that? he wondered. By God, I did. I meant it, too. He'd spent more than fifteen years as one of Jake Featherston's sincerest enemies-sincerest, because he'd known Featherston longer and better than any of the other people who couldn't stand him. And now he had to admit Jake had known what he was doing after all.
Potter wouldn't have dreamt the USA would sit quiet and let the CSA rearm. He would have thought-hell, he had thought-you'd have to be crazy to take a chance like that. Featherston had taken the chance, and he'd got away with it.
So what did that make him? A crazy man saw things nobody else could see. But what about someone who saw things nobody else could see-but that turned out to be there after all? There was a word for people like that, too. The word was genius. Potter didn't like using that word about Jake Featherston. He still remembered the weight of the revolver he'd carried up to the Olympic swimming stadium, intending to get rid of Jake once for all.
But he hadn't. He'd got rid of the colored would-be assassin instead, and the whole world was different on account of it. He looked down at his butternut uniform. He wouldn't have put that on again, not in a million years.