The Distance Beacons (16 page)

"Good," she replied, suddenly smiling. "I'll feel much safer."

I couldn't tell if she was kidding. I opened the door and went out into the foyer. When the door was closed behind me, I too felt much safer.

* * *

Gwen was in bed when I got home, but she wasn't asleep. I lit the oil lamp and sat across the room from her. "How is Ms. Kramer?" she asked.

"A little disappointed, I think. She tried to get me to vote for the referendum, but she failed."

"And how are you?"

I considered. "I feel—not guilty." I liked the sound of the words, so I repeated them. "Not guilty." I looked at Gwen. I thought this would please her, but it didn't seem to. "We just talked, Gwen," I said. "She talked, mainly, and I listened. And then I left. Everything's all right."

She turned her face away from me. "I worry," she whispered. "Our world is so fragile, Walter. So fragile."

It was true. Linc was gone now; who would be next? Gwen had made her sacrifice in getting me to England. Now I was back, and she could feel relieved for a moment. But how long could the relief last? I had been unfaithful to Gwen in England; couldn't I leave her for good in Boston? I had dodged bullets there; couldn't one hit me here? Her sacrifice really had changed nothing. Life was still hard and capricious, and we still had to live.

There was no comfort I could give her except myself. I went over and lay next to her. She put her head on my chest. I could feel my heart beating under her, and I wondered if its sound was soothing or frightening to her. Its rhythm was strong and regular, but someday that rhythm would falter and stop. And then what?

I held her in the flickering lamplight. Neither of us spoke, and it was a long time before she fell asleep. I never did.

Chapter 11

The next day dawned dark and threatening. Even Stretch seemed depressed by the weather. "Today is too important for rain," he said. But the Feds didn't control the weather, so there was nothing to be done.

We all walked over to Government Center together. It was early, but there were already people heading to the speech, including families in horse-drawn carts who had obviously come in from outside the city for the big event. This made Stretch feel a little better. Gwen took notes.

The plaza was not crowded when we got there. Martial music blared over the loudspeakers. There were soldiers around, but not many, and none were armed. Stretch found some of his buddies from work and stayed with them. Gwen wandered off to get some interviews. That left me alone to search for suspicious characters.

I didn't find any. Or rather, all the characters were equally suspicious, except perhaps for Stretch and his pals, and maybe some of the teenagers, who didn't know any other world and therefore had only a vague idea of what they were missing. Everyone else had the sullen, dubious look of people whom life has let down once too often; everyone else appeared to have a grudge against the government. And these were the ones who had enough faith left, or enough interest, to show up for the speech.

I ran into an acquaintance named Charlie DePaso. We had survived the youth camps together, and this creates a bond that nothing can quite sever. He was a fisherman now, a gnarled little man with bad teeth and skin like shoe leather. "Why'd you come, Charlie?" I asked him.

"Dunno, Walter," he said. "Better'n mending nets, I guess."

"Gonna vote yes on the referendum?"

He shrugged. "Never voted in my life. Don't see why I should start now."

"But no one has asked you to vote before, " I pointed out. "I hear the president's pretty persuasive."

"Well, I'm gonna need a lot of persuadin'."

My friend Jesus Christ—the one who looks like Flynn Dobler—was also there, dragging his cross and urging people to repent. His little son trailed behind, passing out hand-scrawled biblical slogans. "Do you support the government?" I asked Jesus.

"Render unto Caesar," he replied.

"Think people will vote yes?"

He sighed and readjusted the cross on his shoulder. "The things of this world don't matter, Walter."

"Don't peace and justice and freedom matter? What if the president can bring them to the world?"

Jesus just looked at me and shook his head. His son handed me a piece of paper. I read the message on it:

For Thine Is The Kingdom

I stuffed the paper into my pocket. "See you around," I said to Jesus.

"Repent, Walter," he replied.

The plaza slowly filled. I was impressed by the number of people who had showed up, but I had a feeling that a moderate shower would scatter most of them in no time. I made my way to the front of the crowd and saw Major Fenneman, who was standing next to the roped-off section where the dignitaries would sit. He was listening with a glum expression on his face to someone communicating with him through bursts of static on a walkie-talkie. I figured maybe I should let him see me, in case there was any question about me fulfilling my professional obligations.

"Can't anyone talk her out of it?" Fenneman demanded as I approached. "Christ, we've got enough to worry about without her pulling something like this." He saw me and glared. "What do you want?" he said to me.

"Just to say hi. I'm here if you need me."

Apparently I was the last thing he needed at the moment. He dismissed me with a quick gesture and went back to his conversation on the walkie-talkie. I wandered away—to the edge of the plaza this time—wondering what Fenneman wanted her talked out of; I figured I knew who he was talking about. I stood on a little stone bench to get a better view of the proceedings.

In a few minutes I saw flashing blue lights in the distance, and then the president and her entourage came into sight—jeeps and shiny cars and motorcycles, with the president waving from the back seat of a convertible. The motorcade circled around the edge of the plaza, coming within ten feet of me. The president brightened when she saw the familiar face and gave me a special wave. I didn't wave back.

"Did you see the bracelets on her?" a kerchiefed woman standing next to me on the bench said to her friend. "I wonder how much she gets paid."

"Too much," her friend replied.

The motorcade pulled up behind the platform, and the martial music stopped. President Kramer appeared on the platform, along with Bolton and Cowens and a bunch of officials. More waving, and then Bolton approached the microphone and spoke. "My fellow citizens, it has been a long time since we in New England have been honored as we are today, by the presence of the chief executive of our great nation. Far too long. This is a day that will live in our memories. It is a turning point in our history...." And so on.

"I've never trusted that one," the kerchiefed woman said.

"I've never trusted any of them," her friend replied.

Bolton's introductory remarks were, as usual, irreproachable yet unconvincing. The crowd responded in kind, with tepid applause at all the right points, but without ever showing any real excitement. Finally he finished, and the moment had arrived. President Kramer stepped up to the microphone; the applause was somewhat more enthusiastic now.

"She is pretty, though, you've got to give her that."

"We could be pretty, if we had her money."

"Do you think she dyes her hair?"

"The hair's phony. The tan's phony. It's all phony, every piece of her. A phony president and a phony election."

She's not going to win, I thought suddenly. She can't convince me, and she can't convince Charlie DePaso or Jesus Christ or these women. It's over.

"Thank you, Governor Bolton, for those kind words," the president said. "My friends, I am here today to ask you to support the government of the United States of America in the referendum next week. I recognize that you may not find this support easy to give. I understand the issues you have with the American government. But I'm asking you to have faith. Faith in the government. Faith in the future. And faith in me. Of course, it's difficult for you to have such faith unless you know me. So let me first take a few minutes to tell you about myself...."

And she launched into the story of her life, with which I was already familiar. Much of what she said after that was familiar as well. Oh, she changed an emphasis here and there, and sometimes she anticipated objections I had made. But basically she was repeating her performance of the night before.

But if I had been the test case, the dress rehearsal, why did she think this approach would succeed? If she couldn't manage to convince me, how was she going to convince Charlie DePaso and the two women next to me? She couldn't exactly go around massaging everyone's neck and shoulders. And we weren't in a beautiful pre-War apartment, listening to music and sipping wine. We were huddled under leaden skies, cold and suspicious. What did we care about her experiences in Atlanta? What did Lincoln matter to us? Could we see the world that President Kramer saw? Not today, I'm afraid.

But then she went further. This was the part that I hadn't wanted to stay and hear in her apartment, too afraid that I would succumb to her the way Marva had succumbed to Flynn Dobler. "All of this is nothing but words, I admit," the president said. "Perhaps some of you have heard too many words over the years, and seen too little improvement in your lives. Perhaps some of you think the referendum is pointless, because it won't put more food on your table or give you better health care. Well, let me tell you here that I am prepared to stake the future of the Federal presence in New England on the results of the referendum.

"If you give us your support, we will immediately take steps to institute direct election of all local officials, up to and including governor, by vote of the entire adult population, not just taxpayers. Individual state legislatures will be re-established, and New England will return to being six separate states once again. As they did before the War, the new state governments will control policies and laws within their borders, and the Federal government will handle interstate issues. Federal troops will stay in the states at least until the elections are over; after that, the new governments will decide individually what role, if any, they want these troops to play within their states.

"Now I must be honest and tell you that not everything will change. Conscription will continue, as will Federal taxation and restrictions on interstate travel—we can't allow unlimited exit visas to the South. But what we are proposing is, I believe, a major step toward giving the brave people of New England what they need and deserve: a chance to determine their own future within the framework of a system that will preserve and extend our great American ideals."

The president paused, and people applauded—rather warmly, I think. "That seems like a good idea," the woman next to me said.

"I'll believe it when it happens," her friend replied.

"What if you lose?" someone shouted.

The president waited for silence. "If we lose," she said softly, "we leave. It's as simple as that. The reduction of the Federal presence will be gradual, in an attempt to prevent chaos, but within two years we will be gone. We hope the two-year time period will be sufficient to allow some sort of peaceful evolution of new political entities to take place—and we will do our best to help that process—but ultimately you will be on your own—your own borders, your own soldiers, your own laws. New England will no longer be part of the United States of America."

There was no applause at this, only a kind of buzzing silence as people tried to come to terms with this new prospect. No one had believed that anything would change if the referendum lost; the Feds would just continue with business as usual. But on the other hand...

"Why should we trust you?" someone else shouted.

"We recognize that the results of the referendum will only be valid if people think they are valid," the president said. "Therefore we have asked well-known opposition groups to join with us in supervising the balloting. We renew that request today. Now if, under those circumstances, the government—win or lose—subsequently reneges on any of the commitments I have made here today, do any of you seriously believe that we could continue to govern? Any credibility we have with you, any respect we have from you, would be gone, and this whole effort would have been worse than useless. No, this is for real, my friends. You have your future in your hands, and I pray that you make the right decision.