The Center Cannot Hold ae-2

by Harry Turtledove

  Van der Waal looked him over, then nodded to himself. "No, you wouldn't be one to complain about going way north, would you? You've got your reasons."

  "You bet I do, sir." Sam nodded. "But what's the scuttlebutt about the change in plans? What's going on off British Columbia?"

  "We'll be flying combat air patrol, keeping an eye out for the Japs and giving 'em hell if we catch any of 'em in the neighborhood," Commander van der Waal replied. "I don't know this for a fact, but I hear they've been trying to stir up the Canucks, get 'em to rebel again."

  "Bastards," Carsten said without much rancor. Having gone to Ireland during the Great War, he knew that was how you played the game. But, frowning, he asked, "Why us, sir? They've got to have other aeroplane carriers closer to Canada than we were when we set out. Why not use one of them? We're going the long way round, seems like."

  "Yes, there are other carriers closer," van der Waal agreed. "They're purpose-built ships, not a converted battle cruiser like the Remembrance. They carry more aeroplanes than we do. And they're all going to the Sandwich Islands. So is a lot of the rest of the fleet-whatever we don't leave behind in the Atlantic to keep an eye on the Confederates and the limeys."

  And the Germans, Sam thought. He lit a cigarette. "If they want the first team in Honolulu," he said slowly, "then they think there really might be trouble with the Japs."

  "That's the way it looks to me, too," van der Waal said. "And that means we're going to have to pay special attention to torpedo-damage drills on our way north. Nobody knows what the Japs have operating off the Canadian coast. It may be nothing. It may be a destroyer or two. Or it may be more, including submersibles. And destroyers can launch torpedoes, too-that's their best hope against bigger ships, in fact."

  "Yes, sir." Sam hoped he didn't sound too resigned. It wasn't that torpedo-damage control wasn't important. He knew it was. He'd seen how important it was aboard the Dakota. Important or not, though, it wasn't what he wanted to be doing. He'd come to the carrier hoping to work with aeroplanes or, that failing, to stay in gunnery, his specialty as a petty officer before he got promoted. Of course, what he wanted to do and what the Navy wanted him to do were two different beasts.

  Van der Waal knew he was reluctant. He said, "This duty is vital to the ship's security, Ensign-vital, I tell you."

  "Yes, sir," Carsten said again. "I know that, sir." He stifled a sigh. "I'll do what ever you need, sir."

  "I'm sure you will. I appreciate it," van der Waal said. "You make a solid officer, Carsten, and I'm pleased to have you under me. If you'd gone to Annapolis instead of taking the mustang's route, I wouldn't be surprised if you'd made captain by now."

  "Thank you very much, sir," Sam said. "I do appreciate that, believe you me I do." A lot of what he was doing these days amounted to showing people what he might have done if he'd had better chances when he was younger. He shrugged. Those were the breaks. He hadn't even thought about becoming an officer till years after the war. But I passed my exams very first try, he thought proudly. Some veteran CPOs had been trying for years, with no luck at all.

  He went out on deck. This wasn't Cape Horn, not any more. The air was warm. The sea was blue and calm. The sun shone bright. Sam sighed. You couldn't have everything. He reached for the zinc-oxide ointment.

  B erlin, Ontario, didn't boast a whole lot of fancy saloons. The best one, as far as Jonathan Moss was concerned, was the Pig and Whistle, not far from the courthouse. He found himself having a couple of drinks with Major Sam Lopat, the military prosecutor. They weren't sparring with each other in court today. They'd both ducked in to get warm; though the calendar declared it was April, a new blizzard had just left Berlin eight more inches of snow.

  Hoisting a glass, Moss said, "Mud in your eye."

  "Same to you," the U.S. officer said, and drank. "Of course, all the mud around here's frozen into a cheap grade of cement."

  "Isn't that the sad and sorry truth?" Moss drank, too. "Nobody in his right mind would come here for the weather, that's for sure."

  "Nope. Nobody in his right mind would come here at all." But then Lopat paused and shook his head. "I take that back, damned if I don't. You're here for a reason-you can't very well practice occupation law in the USA. Two reasons, matter of fact, because you married that Canadian gal, too."

  "Yeah." Moss didn't mention that he'd gone into occupation law not least because even then he hadn't been able to get Laura Secord out of his mind.

  Lopat's train of thought went down a different track, which was probably just as well. He said, "And everything's going to hell all over the world, but you're a civilian with a steady job. That's nothing to sneeze at, either, not these days it's not."

  "Ain't it the truth?" Moss said, without grammar but with great sincerity. "I don't know when it's going to turn around. I don't know if it's ever going to turn around."

  "Tell you one thing." The military prosecutor spoke with a glee unfueled as yet by whiskey. "Come November, old man Blackford can head back to Dakota, and nobody'll miss him a bit. And with a Democrat in Powel House, things here in Canada will tighten up-and about time, too. You see if they don't, Jonathan my boy."

  "If they tighten up any more, you won't bother trying Canucks at all," Moss said. "You'll just give 'em a blindfold and a cigarette, the way it worked during the war."

  "What a liar!" Lopat said. "Some of the fast ones you've pulled off in military court, and you're boo-hooing for the Canucks? Give me a break, for crying out loud!"

  "Your trouble, Major, is that you think people spell prosecute and convict the same way," Moss said. "That's not how it works. Even in military court, a defendant's entitled to a fair shake."

  "Most of the ones who come up before the court deserve to be shaken, all right," Lopat said. "One of these days, you're going to be sorry for getting so many of 'em off. You may be turning another Arthur McGregor loose on the world."

  "McGregor never went to court," Moss snapped. "And there's not a lawyer in the world who doesn't have some clients he wishes he didn't. But what can you do, for Christ's sake? If you don't give everybody as good a defense as you can, everybody's rights go down the drain."

  "Some people deserve to be locked up, and to have the jailer lose the key," Lopat insisted. "Or worse. How many people did McGregor end up killing? And a lot of 'em were just Canucks in the wrong place at the wrong time."

  "McGregor deserved whatever happened to him-after he had his day in court," Moss said. "Till you have a trial, you just don't know. You people have tried to railroad a few Canadians in your time, and don't try to tell me any different."

  Lopat snorted. "You'd say that, wouldn't you? I've got news for you, though. Just because you say it doesn't make it so." He picked up his glass of whiskey, poured it down, and signaled for a refill.

  "If you don't admit that…" Moss threw his hands in the air. Of course Sam Lopat wouldn't admit it. He was a lawyer, too. Expecting a lawyer to admit anything damaging to the point of view he was presenting was like wishing the Easter Bunny would hop across your lawn. You could do it, but it wouldn't do you any good, and you'd spend a long time waiting.

  Lopat underscored the point, grinning and saying, "I don't admit one damn thing, Counselor. Not one damned thing."

  Moss finished his own drink, then got to his feet. "Fine. Don't admit anything. I'm still going to whale the stuffing out of you when we go back to court tomorrow morning. For now, I'm heading home. See you in the morning." He plucked his hat off the rack, stuck it on his head, and strode out of the Pig and Whistle in more than a little annoyance. How could you have a civilized discussion with a man who wouldn't admit one damned thing and was proud of it?

  That Lopat might think the same of him never crossed his mind.

  His Bucephalus started reluctantly. He let out a sigh of relief when it did start. The battery was going, no doubt about it. Pretty soon he'd have to get a new one. Pretty soon he'd have to get a new, or at least a newer, auto, too. Too many things on
the Bucephalus were breaking down. And the company had gone out of business in 1929, so parts were hard to come by and ever more expensive.

  He parked it outside his block of flats and hoped it would fire up again in the morning. If it didn't… If it doesn't, I'll walk in, he thought, and reminded himself to set the alarm clock half an hour earlier than usual to give him time to walk if he had to.

  His key turned in the lock. "I'm home!" he called as he stepped in the door. He wondered how glad Laura would be to see him. She'd been happy enough to marry him, but neither of them had been particularly happy since. Moss listened. Silence. "I'm home, honey," he said again, wondering what sort of trouble he was in.

  But it turned out not to be that kind of silence. A moment later, noise came from the bathroom: the unmistakable sound of someone being sick. A moment after that, the water closet flushed.

  Laura came out a minute or so afterwards. She looked distinctly green. "What happened, hon?" Moss asked. "Are you all right?"

  "Better now," she said, and made a face, probably at the nasty taste in her mouth. "In about eight months, we'll know if it's a boy or a girl."

  For a moment, that seemed a complete non sequitur. Then Moss' jaw dropped. "You mean we're-?"

  She nodded. "Doesn't seem to be much room for doubt any more. I've missed a month, and I've got morning sickness, even if it isn't morning right now. We're going to have a baby, sure enough."

  "That's… wonderful," Moss said. A good attorney was never supposed to be caught speechless. He went on, "But… how did it happen?"

  His wife's mouth quirked in a wry grin. "Very much in the usual way, I'm sure. It hasn't happened any other way since the days of our Lord."

  He made a face at her. "I didn't mean that. What I meant was, it's a surprise." He couldn't think of the last time he hadn't worn a safe when they made love.

  "Those things aren't perfect," Laura said.

  "Evidently not." Moss shrugged and laughed. "If it's a boy, we can call him Broken Rubber Moss. That has a ring to it, don't you think? Or how about Prophylactina for a girl?"

  "What I think-" Laura Moss didn't, couldn't, go on. What ever she'd been about to say, a giggle swallowed it. She tried again: "What I think, Jonathan, is that you're dangerously insane."

  He bowed. "Your servant, ma'am. You've known that for a long time, I'm sure."

  "I certainly have." She nodded. "There I was, with this mad Yank who kept coming to the farm. I didn't want any mad Yanks coming to the farm."

  "I should hope not," Moss said gravely. "You get into all sorts of trouble if you let those people anywhere near you. You might even end up married to one of them if you're not careful, and after that anything can happen. Obviously."

  "Obviously," Laura echoed. She set one hand on her belly, though the pregnancy didn't show and wouldn't for months. "This was as much a surprise to me as it was to you, you know. I didn't much want a child. Now… Now we'll just have to make the best of it, won't we?"

  "I don't know what else we can do." Moss kissed her on the cheek.

  When he tried to kiss her on the mouth, too, she pulled away, saying, "You don't want to do that. I haven't properly cleaned my teeth yet."

  "Oh." Jonathan nodded. "Well, why don't you, then?" While Laura went back to the bathroom, he hurried to the kitchen. The occasion really called for champagne, but they didn't have any. Whiskey over ice would do the job well enough. He had the drinks ready by the time Laura came out again.

  She took one. They solemnly clinked glasses and drank. Then Moss did kiss her. Her mouth tasted of liquor and toothpaste. She said, "I hope this won't make me sick again." After seeming to listen to something internal, she shook her head in relief. "No, I think it will be all right." As if to prove it, she took another sip. "That's good."

  "It is, isn't it?" Jonathan drank some more, too. He raised his glass. "Here's to us, and to… whom it may concern."

  "That's pretty good. I like it a lot better than… what you said before." Laura wouldn't dignify it by repeating it.

  "All right." Moss made his drink disappear in a hurry. Along with what he'd had at the Pig and Whistle, it left him owlishly serious. He took his wife's hands in his and said, "I do love you, you know. I always have."

  "You always called it love, anyhow," she said. "I think for a long time it was just what any man feels when he's been away from women for too long."

  Since she was bound to be right, he didn't dignify that with a direct reply. Instead, he said, "Well, you can't very well accuse me of that now." As if to prove as much, he kissed her again. His hands resting on the swell of her hips, he continued, "And, since you can't accuse me of that…" He kissed her once more, his lips hard against hers. One of his hands slid to her behind, to press her to him. Her own arms tightened around his back. As the kiss went on, she made a little wordless sound, almost a growl, in the back of her throat.

  He lifted her off her feet. She let out a startled squawk: "Put me down! You'll hurt your back!" She had a reasonable chance of being right; she wasn't a small woman, and he was pushing forty. He ignored her all the same, carrying her off to the bedroom. "What are you doing?" she demanded.

  "What do you think?" He set her on the bed and got down beside her. His hand slid under her skirt and up her thigh to the joining of her legs. He rubbed there. Her legs slid apart to make it easier for him. He hiked her skirt up and pulled her underpants down, then went back to what he'd been doing.

  She laughed. "I think you're going to take advantage of me."

  "Damn right I am." Jonathan unbuttoned his own fly. He was also going to take advantage of her being pregnant: if he didn't have to worry about putting on a rubber, he didn't intend to. He certainly liked it better without.

  They both still wore most of their clothes when he went into her. She wasn't quite so wet as he would have wanted, but having to force his way in added to his excitement. She wrapped her legs around him and bucked hard. "Come on!" she said as he squeezed and fondled her breasts through the thin cotton fabric of her blouse. As she kindled, she said a good deal more than that. She was the very model of a lady

  … except in the bedroom, when she was well and truly roused. Then anything could happen, and anything could come out of her mouth.

  It hadn't lately. The two of them had started taking each other for granted since they'd got married. Today, though… Today they thrashed on the bed and clawed at each other as they hadn't done since he would drive up to Arthur and they'd picnic and then fornicate at her farmhouse outside the little town.

  His own building pleasure driving him on, Moss rammed at her, not caring in the heat of the moment if he hurt her a little, too. By the way Laura yowled, she didn't care, either. Suddenly, she arched her back, threw back her head, and let out a long, shuddering moan. At the same time, she squeezed him inside her, so tight that he couldn't help but erupt.

  "You're rumpling me," Laura said a moment later, pushing at him.

  He shook his head and replied with lawyerly precision: "No, sweetheart, I just rumpled you." She made a face when he gave her a kiss. He laughed, his weight still on her. "If I remember right, that has something to do with why we got married."

  "You think so, do you?" She pushed at him again, harder this time. He flopped out of her, which reminded him that, despite the fierce lovemaking they'd just enjoyed, he didn't burn so hot as he had back in his twenties. Then he'd have been ready for a second round as soon as the first was over. Now… Now he'd wait for tomorrow, or maybe the day after. Laura gave him another shove, and twisted under him, too. "Let me up. Let me set myself to rights."

  "Oh, I suppose so," he said. But he couldn't keep wonder from his voice as he went on, "A baby. How about that?"

  "Yes. How about that?" His wife's voice softened, too. "It isn't what I expected, but I'm glad it's happened."

  "So am I." He wondered if he meant it. He decided he did. "About time we put down some roots here."

  " I've already got roots here," Lau
ra said pointedly. She nodded, too, though. "It's about time we were a family."

  "A baby," Moss said again. "I wonder what he'll see by the time he grows up." The baby would be his age in the early 1970s. What would the world be like then?

  A creek ran through the farm on which Mary McGregor and her mother lived. Scrubby oaks and willows grew alongside it. They got some firewood there, which was all to the good. Ducks sometimes nested along it, too, which gave Mary practice with a shotgun and gave her mother and her a tasty dinner every so often. And she would pull trout out of it once in a while, though she seldom had the time to sit and fish.

  The creek and the trees by it also came in handy in other ways. Mary lit a fuse and ducked down behind an oak to wait for the explosion. It came just when she thought it would-a harsh, flat crack! Mallards leaped into the air with a thunder of wings. A couple of crows in a willow flapped away, cawing in alarm. Moments later, quiet returned.

  Mary stepped out from behind the tree trunk to see what the dynamite had done. She nodded to herself. The stump she'd blown up had landed in the creek, just as she'd thought it would. The hole in the ground it left was about the size she'd expected, too.

  She hadn't done anything particularly useful-a stump here wasn't the nuisance it would have been out in the middle of a field. But she'd learned a little more about explosives and fuses, which was knowledge that wouldn't go to waste, either on the farm or…

  Or anywhere else, she thought. She was, after all, Arthur McGregor's daughter. She wondered what had gone through her father's mind while he waged his long one-man war against the Americans who occupied Canada. He'd never talked about it much-but then, he'd never been one to talk about anything much. What had he thought? Her guess was that he'd tried not to think about it except while he was actually busy at it. That would have made it harder for him to give himself away when the Yanks came snooping around, which they had again and again.