"Who gives a shit?"

Dead silence. Rebecca never used that kind of "Ha! As I said-children."

At that moment, the door opened and Frank Jackson entered the room. Behind him came Gretchen.

Rebecca pointed dramatically at the new arrivals.

"Ask them!" she commanded. "Go ahead!"

After the issue was explained, Frank spoke first. "Don't much care," he said, shrugging. "Six of one, half dozen of the other. So I figure since Mike'll be running the show-he's got my vote anyway-let him have what he wants."

Gretchen was terser still. "Vat he says," she stated, pointing at Frank.

Gretchen and Frank's remarks, combined with Rebecca's profanity, had produced a sharp break in the room's tension. The members of the committee stared at each other, for a moment. Then, collectively, they heaved a sigh and relaxed.

Mike cleared his throat. "Look, I'm not trying to make pronouncements about abstract political principles. I'm just trying to give us a political system that does the best job for our current needs. We can always hold another constitutional convention later, when circumstances change. Remember what I said. We're at the equivalent of 1776, not 1789. The Constitution which our old United States adopted came out of years of experience and discussion. After the revolution, not at the start of it. So let's give ourselves the same breathing room. For now, I want to keep our eyes focused on the struggle ahead of us. Today. Right now."

Mike nodded toward Gretchen. At Frank's quiet insistence, the young German woman had taken a seat at the table. "The reason I asked Gretchen to sit in-which I plan on making a permanent thing, by the way-is because later on in the meeting I want you all to hear her report. As far as I'm concerned, the work that Gretchen's started is going to be a lot more important, in the long run, than any victories we win on a battlefield. Or whether we register people to vote at-large or by residence."

He almost laughed, seeing the simultaneous looks of discomfort which came over the faces of Melissa and Quentin. Each in their different ways, both people were a bit aghast at the way Mike and Rebecca were shaping Melissa's original proposal. Melissa was upset because practice was proving to be a lot messier than theory. And, she already understood, was going to be a lot bloodier. Her semiromantic idealism about the "underground" was now in the firm grip of a woman who had no romanticism about it at all. Just a determination to win, driven by an iron will.

Quentin, of course, had never been fond of the theory in the first place. He found himself in the peculiar position of helping to lead a revolution-a task for which, temperamentally, he had no sympathy at all. By nature and habit, Quentin Underwood was a man of the establishment.

Mike turned his eyes upon him. Quentin and Melissa formed the poles of the committee. Both of them were often unhappy with the way Mike drove things forward. But Melissa's support, at least for the moment, was a given. If nothing else, she had no alternative. Quentin, on the other hand Underwood heaved a sigh. "Oh, hell. All right, Mike. I'll go along with at-large elections, much as it rubs me the wrong way."

The victory was only half won. Mike gave Underwood his own sharp eye. "Not good enough, Quentin. Not good enough by half. 'Going along' is one thing. Standing up and being counted is another. We've already decided to call for new elections for delegates to a constitutional convention, since that voice-vote 'election' a few days after the Ring of Fire was too casual and too far back. You're bound to be elected one of those delegates, Quentin. But how are you going to run?" Mike pointed to the proposed constitution in front of him. "Based on that platform? Or someone else's?"

He didn't bother to specify the "someone else." There was no need.

Underwood returned Mike's stare with his own. Everyone else in the room found themselves holding their breath. They had reached a decisive moment, they suddenly realized, without anyone other than Mike-and maybe Rebecca-seeing it coming. For months, the group of people in that room had worked together as a team. But In the universe they had left behind, Quentin Underwood-capable, narrow-minded, intelligent, stubborn, energetic, hard-driving manager that he was-would have been a natural ally of John Simpson. Establishment. Tory through and through. Would he break ranks now?

"Cut it out, Mike," growled Underwood. "Do I look like an idiot? If Simpson was running this show, we'd have been dead by now."

Suddenly, he grinned. That cheerful expression was not seen often on Quentin's face.

"So. You thought up a name yet?"

Mike's face was blank. Quentin's grin widened. "For our political party, dope. Gotta have one, if you want to be president of a revolution-in-progress. None of that above-the-fray Washington business for you, young man!"

Blank.

"What a genius," chuckled Underwood. "Leave it to a UMWA mi-li-tant." The chuckle grew into a soft laugh. "This calls for managerial skills. I think we oughta call ourselves the Fourth of July Party."

"Fourth of July Movement," came Melissa's immediate riposte.

And that, of course, startled another wrangle. But Rebecca wasn't reduced to quoting verses. The argument was sharp, short-and ended in an overwhelming victory. Everything else against Melissa.

Fourth of July Party it was. The announcement was made the following morning, along with the declaration that the constitutional convention was to go into session.

Simpson protested immediately, even though he had been calling for the convention for weeks. "To bridle the Stearns military dictatorship," as he had often put it.

No matter. The iron heel of democracy was on Grantville's neck. The victim of that tyranny reacted as could be expected.

Politicking! Whoopee!

Chapter 41

"Americans ae a daft breed," stated Lennox. Firmly, he drained his mug; and, just as firmly, set it down on the table. "No daft enough, howe'er, t'keep brewin' they sorry excuse f'r beer. So I will make allowances."

The man sitting across from him at the large table, Moses Abrabanel, ignored the remarks. He was gazing about the main room of the recently opened and jampacked Thuringen Gardens. He seemed in a bit of a daze. So did the man sitting next to him, his distant cousin Samuel. For all their relative youth-both men were still short of thirty-they were experienced negotiators and men of affairs, accustomed to navigating the corridors of power in Vienna and Italy. At the moment, however, they seemed like country rubes.

Smiling, Lennox glanced to his left. Balthazar returned the smile with one of his own. Clearly enough, the two "old America hands" were enjoying the discomfiture of the newcomers. Moses and Samuel had arrived only a few days earlier, and were still in a state of semi-shock.

Some of that was caused by their own folk. The small number of Jews who had settled in Grantville over the past months had acclimatized with a vengeance. To a degree, that was expected. The Jews were all Sephardim who, unlike the Ashkenazim of eastern Europe, had a long tradition of cosmopolitanism. The saw "When in Rome…" might have been invented by them.

Still It was hard to know what startled Samuel and Moses the most. Perhaps the open manner in which Grantville's practicing Jews were overseeing the construction of their new synagogue. The temple was being built in the rehabilitated shell of an abandoned building right in the middle of town. Perhaps. But The night before, Michael Stearns had spent hours in Balthazar's living room, engaged in a frank and freewheeling discussion with the two Abrabanel representatives as well as Balthazar himself. This, of course, was as it should be. But Rebecca had spent the hours with them-and participated just as fully as anyone else.