Harry Turtledove - Drive to the East

All in all, the Joint Committee on the Conduct of the War had plenty to do. She would rather it didn’t.

And there were other distractions. Her secretary stuck her head into the inner office and said, “Miss Clemens is here to speak with you, Congresswoman.”

“Thank you.” Flora meant anything but. Some things couldn’t be helped, though. “Send her in.”

In marched the reporter. Ophelia Clemens had to be fifteen years older than Flora, but still looked like someone who took no guff from anybody. There, at least, the two women had something in common. “Hello, Congresswoman. Mind if I smoke?” she said, and had a cigarette going before Flora could say yes or no. That done, she held out the pack. “Care for a coffin nail yourself?”

“No, thanks. I never got the habit,” Flora said, and then, “That’s a Confederate brand, though, isn’t it?”

“You betcha. If you’re gonna go, go first class,” Ophelia Clemens said. Flora didn’t know how to answer that, so she didn’t try. The reporter came straight to the point: “How many soldiers are we going to have to send up to Canada to help the Frenchies keep the lid on?”

“I don’t have a number for that,” Flora said cautiously. “You might do better asking at the War Department.”

“Yeah, and I might not, ” Ophelia Clemens said with a scornful toss of the head. “Those people were born lying, and you know it as well as I do.”

Since Flora did, she didn’t bother contradicting the correspondent. “I’m afraid I still don’t have the answer. Even if it’s just one, it’ll be more than we can afford.”

Scritch, scritch. Clemens’ pencil raced across a notebook page. “That’s the truth-and it’s a good quote. How come the Confederates can advance whenever they want to, but we keep dropping the ball?”

“If I knew that, I’d belong on the General Staff, not here,” Flora said. Ophelia Clemens laughed, though she hadn’t been joking. She continued, “The Joint Committee is doing its best to find out.”

“Do you think keeping our generals on a red-hot grill will make them perform better?” the reporter asked.

“I hope we don’t do that,” Flora said.

“ I hope you do,” Ophelia Clemens said. “They’d better be more afraid of us than they are of the enemy.” She waited to see if Flora would rise to the barb. When Flora didn’t, she tried another question: “Is our publicity making the Confederates treat their Negroes any different-any better, I should say?”

That, Flora was ready to comment on. “Not one bit,” she said angrily. “They’re as disgraceful as ever, and as proud of it as ever, too.”

The pencil flew over the page. “Too bad,” the correspondent said. “I’ve heard the same thing from other people, but it’s still too damn bad.”

“Nice to know someone thinks so.” Flora held up a hand. “This is off the record.” She waited. Ophelia Clemens nodded. Flora went on, “Too many people on this side of the border just don’t care, or else they say, ‘The damn niggers have it coming to them.’ ”

“Yes, I’ve seen that, too,” Clemens said. “All depends on whose ox is being gored. If the Freedom Party were going after Irishmen or Jews, they’d be squealing like a pig stuck in a fence.” She threw back her head and let out a sudden, startling noise. She knew what a stuck pig sounded like, all right. And then, raising an eyebrow, she added, “No offense.”

Flora had wondered if the older woman remembered she was Jewish. That answered that. She said what she had to say: “None taken.”

“Good. Some people can get stuffy about the strangest things. Where was I?” That last seemed aimed more at herself than at Flora. Flipping pages in the notebook, Ophelia Clemens found what she was looking for. “Oh, yeah. That.” She looked up at Flora. “Have you noticed there’s something funny in the budget?”

“There’s always something funny in the budget,” Flora answered. “We’re in a war. That just makes it funnier than usual.”

Ophelia Clemens sent her an impatient look. “This has to do with funny business in…” She checked her notes again. “In Washington, that’s where. Washington State, I mean. The government is spending money hand over fist out there, and I’ll be damned if I can figure out why.”

“Oh. That.” With those two words, Flora realized she’d admitted to knowing what that was. She hadn’t wanted to, but didn’t see that she had much choice. Sighing, she said, “Miss Clemens, I don’t know all the details about that, but I have been persuaded that keeping it secret is in the best interests of the United States. The less said about it, especially in the newspapers, the better.”

“ You’ve been persuaded?” The correspondent raised a gingery eyebrow. “I thought you were hard to persuade about such things.”

“I am. I hope I am, anyway,” Flora said. “This is one of those times, though. Have you spoken with Mr. Roosevelt about this business?”

“No. Should I? Would he tell me anything?” Ophelia Clemens wasn’t writing now.

Flora took that for an encouraging sign. “I don’t know whether he would or not. I’m inclined to doubt it,” she said. “But I think he might have more to say than I would about why you shouldn’t publish.”

“Well, I’ll try him.” Clemens got to her feet. “I’ll try him right now, as a matter of fact.” She sent Flora a wry grin. “But you’ll be on the telephone before I can get over there, won’t you?”

“Yes.” Flora didn’t waste time with denials. “He needs to know. I told you-I do think this is that important.”

“All right. Fair enough, I suppose. Nice chatting with you-turned out more interesting than I figured it would.” With no more farewell than that, Ophelia Clemens swept out of the office.

No sooner had the door closed behind her than Flora was on the telephone to the War Department. Before long, she had the Assistant Secretary of War on the line. “Hello, Flora. To what do I owe the pleasure of this call?” Franklin Roosevelt inquired, jaunty as usual.

“Ophelia Clemens is on her way to see you,” Flora answered without preamble. “Somehow or other, she’s got wind of what’s going on in Washington.”

“Oh, dear. That doesn’t sound so good,” Roosevelt said. “I wonder how it happened.”

“I don’t know. I doubt she’d tell you,” Flora said. “But I thought you ought to know.”

“Thank you. She’s a chip off the old block, all right,” Roosevelt said. Flora made a questioning noise. Roosevelt explained: “Her father was a reporter out in San Francisco for a million years. He had a nasty sense of humor-funny, but nasty-and he spent most of it on the Democrats. If I remember straight, he died not long before the Great War started. Stan Clemens, his name was, or maybe Sam. Stan, I think.”

“You could ask Ophelia when she gets there,” Flora said. “She’s on her way now, and she’s not the kind of person who wastes a lot of time.”

Franklin Roosevelt laughed. “Well, I’m sure you’re right about that. I wonder what sort of cock-and-bull story I’ll have to tell her.”

“She knows at least some of the truth,” Flora warned, remembering how little of the truth she really knew herself. “If what she hears from you doesn’t match what she already knows, that will be worse than if you didn’t tell her anything at all. Think of the headlines.”

“ ‘Boondoggle to end all boondoggles!’ ” Roosevelt seemed to be quoting one. He also seemed to be enjoying himself while he did it. He went on, “Where did that word come from, anyway? It sounds like it ought to be something a Confederate would say.”