The Center Cannot Hold ae-2

by Harry Turtledove

  Anne sighed. Kimball had been loyal to Jake Featherston come hell or high water. Anne was loyal to nobody but herself, not like that. She'd thought Featherston was a loser, and she'd broken her ties to the Freedom Party. That was the biggest reason she and Roger had broken up, the biggest reason she hadn't given herself to him, the biggest reason he'd tried to take her by force.

  And now here she was, back in Charleston, back in the Freedom Party. She tasted the irony there. Had Roger been right all along? Anne shook her head. She didn't care to admit that, even to herself. After she'd walked away from Featherston, the country had changed. That was what had brought her back.

  Still, she granted herself the luxury of another sigh. It was too bad. She'd never found anybody who could match Roger Kimball in bed.

  A glance in the mirror on the dresser told her she probably never would. A good start on a double chin, lines on her face no powder could hide, the harshness of dye to hold gray at bay… She wasn't a young beauty any more. Now she had to get her way with brains, which wasn't so easy and took longer.

  "What can't be cured…" she said, and deliberately turned away from the mirror. The only alternative to getting older was not getting older. The Yankees had gassed her younger brother, Jacob. They'd gassed him, and the Negroes on the Marshlands plantation had murdered him in the uprising of 1915. He'd never had a chance. She'd taken some revenge on them after the war. More still waited. She'd never disagreed with the Freedom Party about that.

  She unpacked her own suitcase. Once upon a time, she'd have had a colored maid to do it for her. The last one she'd had came much too close to murdering her in the long aftermath of the uprising. No more.

  Once everything was put away, she went downstairs. A man sitting on an overstuffed chair in the lobby, a chair whose upholstery had seen better days, got to his feet and took off his hat. "Evening, Miss Colleton!" he said. "Freedom!"

  "Good evening, Mr. Henderson," Anne answered. A beat slower than she should have, she added, "Freedom!" herself. The Party greeting still struck her as foolish. But she'd made the bargain, and she had to go through with it.

  "Hope you had a pleasant drive down," James Henderson said. He held out his hand. She briskly shook it. His eyes widened slightly. He hadn't expected so firm a grip. He was a few years younger than Anne- everyone is a few years younger than I am these days, she thought unhappily-lean as a lath, with a face so bony, it might have come off the label of an iodine bottle. He wore the ribbon for the Purple Heart on his lapel.

  "It was all right," Anne said. "Some people drive for the sport of it. I drive to get where I'm going."

  "Sensible," Henderson said. Men said that to her a lot these days, as they'd once said, Beautiful. She missed the other. This would have to do. Beauty didn't last. Brains did. She'd realized that a long time ago. She'd had brains even then, though men had done their best not to notice. Henderson went on, "Shall we eat some supper? We can talk then, and figure out where to go from there."

  "All right," Anne said. Not so many years earlier, he would have wanted to go back to her room and take her to bed. Now he probably didn't. That made doing business simpler. Most of the time, she appreciated it because it did. Every once in a while, she found herself pining for days gone by.

  "Hotel restaurant suit you, or would you rather go somewhere else?" Henderson was doing his best to be polite. A fair number of Freedom Party men either didn't bother or didn't know how.

  "The hotel restaurant is fine," she answered.

  She ordered crab cakes; she took advantage of Charleston seafood whenever she came down to the coast. Henderson chose fried chicken. They both ordered cocktails. The colored waiter who took their orders went back to the kitchen without writing them down; odds were he couldn't write. James Henderson's eyes followed him. "Wonder where he was in 1915, and what he did."

  "He looks too young to have done anything much," Anne said. "Of course, you never can tell."

  "Sure can't." Henderson scowled. He needed a visible effort to draw himself back to the business at hand. "Let's talk about Congress and the Legislature."

  "Right," Anne said briskly. Henderson might be skinny enough to dive through a soda straw without hitting the sides, but he came to the point. She liked that. She went on, "We can figure that Jake Featherston is probably going to win this state."

  "Doesn't mean we won't campaign for him here," Henderson said.

  "No, of course not," Anne agreed. "We don't want any nasty surprises. But the rest of the ticket has to run well, too. Freedom Party Congressmen will help Jake get his laws through. The state legislators need to back us, too-and they're the ones who choose C.S. Senators. We're still weak in the Senate, because we didn't start getting a lot of people elected to state legislatures till 1929."

  James Henderson nodded. He began to say something more, but the waiter came back with drinks, and then with dinner. The fellow started to give Anne the chicken; she pointed to her companion to show where it should go. "Sorry, ma'am," the colored man said. He set things right, then withdrew.

  Henderson looked around to make sure he was out of earshot before resuming. "Can't trust 'em," the Freedom Party man said. Anne couldn't quarrel with him there. Henderson continued, "Anything they hear, the Rad Libs know tomorrow and the Whigs the day after."

  Anne wasn't so sure about that, but didn't care to argue with it, either. All she said was, "They know they have to try to stop us any way they can. They know, but I don't think they can do it."

  "Have to make sure they don't. We have to make sure any way we need to." Henderson let her draw her own pictures.

  She had no trouble doing just that. "We don't want to go too far," she said. "If we do, it'll only hurt us, cost us votes. The average law-abiding Confederate has to think we're the right answer, not the wrong one. We've shot ourselves in the foot before when we pushed too hard. We need to pick our spots."

  The skeletal man across the table from her nodded. "See who's really dangerous," he said, and bared a lot of teeth in a grin. "Won't be so dangerous once we run over 'em with barrels a few times."

  Anne thought that was a figure of speech. She wasn't quite sure, though, and didn't care to ask. Theoretically, the armistice with the USA banned barrels from the CSA. The government had never admitted to having any-nor could it, without risking Yankee wrath. If a couple of them should suddenly clatter down a street with Freedom Party men inside… If that happened, Anne wouldn't have been astonished.

  She said, "Looks to me like we're thinking along the same lines, Mr. Henderson… Do you want to get some more chicken?" He'd reduced half a bird to bones in nothing flat.

  "Don't mind if I do." Henderson waved for the waiter. As the Negro took the request back to the kitchen, Henderson gave a half apologetic smile. "Always been scrawny, no matter how much I eat."

  "I wish I could say that." Corsets had been out of fashion for a good many years now, but Anne was tempted to get back into one to help her remind the world she did still have a waist. She wished she could wear a corset under her jaw, too, to fight the sagging flesh there. In fact, there were such things, intended to be put on at night. Three different doctors, though, had assured her they did no good.

  The waiter returned with another whole chicken leg. Henderson devoured it. He patted his pale lips with his napkin. "Hit the spot."

  "Good." Even if she envied him at the same time, Anne couldn't help liking a man who put away his food like that. She went on, "We have to hit the spot in November, too. We have to. If we lose this time, I don't think we'll ever get another chance."

  After Grady Calkins assassinated President Hampton, after the Confederate currency stabilized when the USA eased back on reparations, the Freedom Party had sunk like a stone, and had stayed down though almost all the 1920s. If it failed again, she was sure it wouldn't revive. She couldn't stand the idea of trying to make peace with the Whigs once more. This run had to reach the top.

  "Don't you worry about that, ma'am," James H
enderson said. "Jake Featherston, he isn't about to lose." So, four hundred years before, a Spanish soldier seeing the might and wealth of the Inca Empire might have spoken of Pizarro. The Spaniard would have been right. Anne thought the Freedom Party man was, too, even if that ma'am rankled. Henderson wasn't so very much younger than she was.

  She said, "It's not just Jake, remember. We want to grab with both hands."

  "Think you're right," Henderson said. "Legislators, Congressmen-every place where we can win, we'll fight like the devil."

  "That's right. Mayors and county commissioners and sheriffs, too. Some of those people can appoint judges, and the more judges on our side, the better. Same with sheriffs. A lot of them-and city policemen, too-have been on our side for a long time."

  "Better be," Henderson said, nodding. The waiter came up with a coffeepot. After he'd filled cups for Anne and Henderson, he retreated once more. Henderson waited, poured in lots of cream and sugar, tasted, added more sugar yet, and then continued, "By the time we're done, we'll have this state sewed up tight, you bet."

  "Oh, yes," Anne said softly. "And not just South Carolina, either. By the time we're done, we'll have the whole country sewn up tight."

  "That's the idea," Henderson said.

  Anne wondered if Jake Featherston had thought he could come within arm's reach of ruling the Confederate States when he first joined the Freedom Party. What would he say if she asked him? And would what he said be true? Would he really recall here in 1933 what he'd thought and hoped and dreamt back in 1917? Even if he did, would he admit it? She had her doubts.

  The waiter returned again. "Dessert, folks? Apple pie is mighty fine today, or we've got cherry or lemon meringue or pecan, too."

  "Apple," Henderson said at once. "Slap some ice cream on top, too."

  "Yes, suh." The waiter looked to Anne. "Anything for you, ma'am?"

  She shook her head. "I couldn't possibly."

  James Henderson could, and did. He had a second cup of coffee to go with the pie a la mode, too, and doctored it as thoroughly as he had the first. With a sigh of regret, he pushed away the empty plate. "Yeah, that hit the spot."

  "If we do as well in November as you did at the supper table here, the Whigs are in even more trouble than I thought," Anne said.

  He grinned. "We'll clean 'em up and wash 'em down the drain. Just what they've got coming." Anne nodded. She felt victory in the air, too.

  When Scipio walked into Erasmus' fish store and cafe, he knew right away something was wrong. His boss looked like a man whose best friend had just died. Without preamble, Erasmus said, "I gwine shut her down, Xerxes."

  "Do Jesus!" Scipio said. He'd spent a lot of time here; he'd thought the place would go on forever-or at least as long as Erasmus did, which had looked as if it might be the same thing. "Why for you do dat?" he demanded.

  "You recollect how once upon a time them Freedom Party bastards come by here?" Erasmus said. "They was gonna take money from me so nothin' happen to the store."

  "I recollects, uh-huh," Scipio said. "Then the Freedom Party go down de drain, an' dey don't come back no mo'."

  "They's back." All of a sudden, Erasmus looked old. He looked beaten. And he looked afraid. "Can't rightly tell if they's the same bastards as all them years ago, but they's the same kind o' bastards, an' that's what counts. They say I don't pay 'em what they want, I git bad luck like you don't believe. I ain't no fool, Xerxes. You don't got to draw me no pictures. I know what that means."

  "How much they want?" Scipio asked.

  "Too much," his boss answered. "Too damn much. Cut my profit down to nothin'. Down to less'n nothin'. I try an' tell 'em that. Way they look at me, it's That's your worry, nigger. We don't care, long as we gits ours. So I's shuttin' down, like I say. Sell this place, live off what I gits. I'm an old man now. Reckon the money'll last me."

  "This here's blackmail," Scipio said. "You ought to go to the po lice."

  Erasmus shook his head. "Ain't no use. It's like it was back the las' time. Some o' these fuckers, they is the po lice."

  Scipio had never heard the older man use an obscenity like that. "Got to be somebody kin he'p you."

  "If I was white…" But Erasmus shook his head. "Mebbe even that don't do no good, not now. These Freedom Party buckra, it's like they got everything goin' their way, and nobody else got the nerve to stand up to 'em. They win the 'lection, they's top dogs for six years, an' everybody reckon they gwine win."

  "I knows it. I's scared, and dat de trut'," Scipio said. "What kin a nigger do? Can't do nothin'. Can't even vote. Can't run, neither-ain't nowhere to run to. USA don't want nothin' to do wid we. An' if we fights-"

  "We loses," Erasmus finished for him. "Dumb Reds done showed dat durin' the war. Never shoulda riz up then, on account of they shoulda knowed they lose."

  I thought the same thing. I told Cassius the same thing. He wouldn't listen to me. He was sure the revolution would carry everything before it. He was sure, and he was wrong, and now he's dead. Scipio couldn't say a word of that. He had a new name here. He had a new life here. Remembering things he'd done long ago, in another state and in another state of mind… What point to it? None he could see, especially since time-yellowed, creased wanted posters still proclaimed his other self fugitive from what South Carolina called justice.

  Erasmus went on, "Sorry I got to let you go like this here. I know it ain't right. Times is hard, an' you gots young 'uns. But I can't help it, Xerxes. Can't stay in business no more. You hook on somewheres else, mebbe."

  "Mebbe." Scipio didn't really believe it. How many places were hiring waiters? Even asking the question of himself made him want to laugh.

  But it wasn't funny. It was anything but funny, as a matter of fact. Bathsheba's housekeeping work brought in some money, but not enough. He would have to find something to do, and find it fast.

  I could be the best butler Augusta, Georgia's, ever seen. If he'd passed muster for Anne Colleton, he could pass muster here. True, he had no references, but he was good enough to show what he could do even without them. And rich people always had money. People like that were always looking for good help. When he opened his mouth and showed he could talk like an educated white man…

  He shook his head and shivered, as if coming down with the influenza. When I show that, I put a noose around my neck. He knew what a good servant he made. If he started playing the butler again, word would spread among the rich whites of Augusta. Old So-and-So's got himself a crackerjack new nigger, best damn butler you ever saw. Word wouldn't spread only in Augusta, either. St. Matthews, South Carolina, wasn't that far away. Anne Colleton would hear before too long. And when she did, he was dead.

  She'd gone back to helping the Freedom Party. He'd seen that in the newspapers. She wouldn't have forgotten him. So far as he knew, she hadn't tried very hard to find him after he'd escaped South Carolina for Georgia. But if he did anything to bring himself to her notice, he deserved to die for stupidity's sake.

  Erasmus reached into the cash box and took out two brown twenty-dollar banknotes. He thrust them at Scipio. "Here you is," he said. "Wish it could be more, but I druther give it to you than to them Freedom Party trash."

  Pride told Scipio to refuse. He had no room in his life for pride. "Thank you kindly," he said, and took the money. "God bless you."

  "He done bless me plenty," Erasmus said. "Hope He watch out for you, too."

  Someone else had pressed money on Scipio when he lost a job waiting tables. He snapped his fingers. "Reckon I go see me Mistuh John Oglethorpe. Anybody in this here town got work, reckon he know 'bout it."

  "Good idea." Erasmus nodded. "Not all white folks is Freedom Party bastards."

  These days, Scipio ventured out of the Terry only with trepidation. He didn't like the way white men looked at him when he walked along the streets outside the colored district. They looked at him the way they had to look at possums and squirrels and raccoons when they hunted for the pot.

  Freedom Pa
rty posters and banners and emblems were everywhere. He saw several white men with little enamelwork Freedom Party pins-those reversed-color Confederate battle flags-on their lapels. More than anybody else, they glared at him as if he had no right to exist. He kept his eyes down on the sidewalk. Giving back look for look was the worst thing he could do. If one of those pin-wearing fellows decided he was an uppity nigger, he might not get back to the Terry alive.

  When he walked into Oglethorpe's restaurant, Aurelius was taking care of the breakfast crowd. Whites sat on one side of the room, Negroes on the other. They'd always done that. It wasn't law, but it was unbreakable custom. Scipio perched at a small table. Aurelius nodded when he recognized him.

  "Ain't seen you in a long time," he said. "What kin I git you?"

  "Bacon and eggs over easy and grits and a cup o' coffee," Scipio answered. "I see Mistuh Oglethorpe when things slows down?"

  "I tell him you's here," Aurelius said. "How come you ain't at Erasmus' place?"

  "He shuttin' down," Scipio said, and the other man's eyes widened in astonishment. In a voice not much above a whisper, Scipio explained, "They wants too much money for he to stay open." He didn't explain who they were. Aurelius would know.

  "Hey, Aurelius!" a white man called. "I need some more coffee over here."

  "Comin', Mr. Benson." Aurelius hurried off to take care of the customer, and then another one, and then another one after that.

  He didn't get back to Scipio's table till he set plate and coffee cup in front of him. "Thank you kindly," Scipio said, and dug in. John Oglethorpe was in no way a fancy cook, but few of his kind could match him. The breakfast was easily as good as any Erasmus made: high praise indeed. Scipio hadn't eaten grits in his days as Anne Colleton's privileged servant; he'd thought of them as fieldhands' food. He'd remade their acquaintance since, and found he liked them.