people dominated the arts and popular culture; intermarriage was fashionable, psychologists encouraged it; the color bar had quite melted. The Enforced Reforms and Regulated Riots, so stirring to Conner's youth, might never have occurred, to hear Hook talk.
Silently Conner laid the paper and logs and applied a match. He pictured his presence being at last revealed by a triumphant burst of flame. The glossy stock of Sweet Charity burned reluctantly, however, and the dark oily smoke slithering from the air spaces between the logs persisted in curling into the room. After a minute flames were visible and it became clear the chimney would not draw; the flue was closed. In a hurry Conner poked his head into the fireplace, looking for a catch, and as rapidly withdrew it, at the scent of singed hair. The lever must be on the surface of the fireplace. There seemed to be only carved bearheads and scrolls and cherubs dotted all over with highlights. Mistrusting Ms eyes, his hands flittered across the black craggy surface, cold as marble.
"Buchanan, I suppose," Mrs. Mortis said, "was doing a first-rate job, eh John?"
"A ver-y unfairly esti-mated man," Hook slowly replied. "The last of the presidents who truly represented the entire country; after him the southern states were slaves to Boston, as surely as Alaska. Buchanan, you know, had been the ambassador to Russia, and was very well thought-of there."
A small man with broad eyebrows, whose name, Conner believed, was Fuller, came over softly and whispered, "I think this does something." He touched a short chain hanging from the mouth of a bear, and Conner roughly pulled it. For a moment the fire continued sluggish and smoky, then the draft caught; with a jerk the smoke whipped inward, and the dry logs roared. "Birch," Fuller said, "has its own smell don't it?"
"Where is that smoke?" Amy Mortis asked aloud.
"We've built a fire," Fuller said before Conner could himself speak.
Conner wondered if the man knew who he was, that he should presume to protect him. But if he did not know who he was, why come to his rescue with the flue? All the eyes in the circle except Hook's and a blind woman's focused on him. He knew he should speak and took a breath to begin.
Staring at a beam of the ceiling, Hook announced further variations in his argument. "The panic of 1857 and not the Negro lay behind the attack on the south. When the shooting died the Negro became merely a cause for pecu-lation. The administration of Lincoln's man Grant was without a doubt the most crooked the nation had seen until the other Republican, Harding, came to power. Now he was around in my time: a man you would have thought dirt wouldn't cling to, as tall as a church door, and trimmed like Moses...."
"Well you can't blame Lincoln for Grant," Mrs. Mortis said.
Hook's mustache broadened humorously. "They were as close as Baal and Mammon," he said. "Lincoln was no lover of morals. In private practice he was an atheist, you know."
"A Deist, wasn't he?" Conner said. "A Unitarian."
"Is Mr. Conner with us?" Elizabeth Heinemann cried beautifully, turning her head on her slender neck pathetically, as if she could see.
"Yes, dear," Mary Jamiesson said, "he's been building us a fire."
"I heard that someone was. Thank you, Mr. Conner."
"Thank you," Tommy Franklin echoed, and further murmurs sounded.
"You're quite welcome--I, I'm sorry that this rain has delayed the fair."
-end-
Silently Conner laid the paper and logs and applied a match. He pictured his presence being at last revealed by a triumphant burst of flame. The glossy stock of Sweet Charity burned reluctantly, however, and the dark oily smoke slithering from the air spaces between the logs persisted in curling into the room. After a minute flames were visible and it became clear the chimney would not draw; the flue was closed. In a hurry Conner poked his head into the fireplace, looking for a catch, and as rapidly withdrew it, at the scent of singed hair. The lever must be on the surface of the fireplace. There seemed to be only carved bearheads and scrolls and cherubs dotted all over with highlights. Mistrusting Ms eyes, his hands flittered across the black craggy surface, cold as marble.
"Buchanan, I suppose," Mrs. Mortis said, "was doing a first-rate job, eh John?"
"A ver-y unfairly esti-mated man," Hook slowly replied. "The last of the presidents who truly represented the entire country; after him the southern states were slaves to Boston, as surely as Alaska. Buchanan, you know, had been the ambassador to Russia, and was very well thought-of there."
A small man with broad eyebrows, whose name, Conner believed, was Fuller, came over softly and whispered, "I think this does something." He touched a short chain hanging from the mouth of a bear, and Conner roughly pulled it. For a moment the fire continued sluggish and smoky, then the draft caught; with a jerk the smoke whipped inward, and the dry logs roared. "Birch," Fuller said, "has its own smell don't it?"
"Where is that smoke?" Amy Mortis asked aloud.
"We've built a fire," Fuller said before Conner could himself speak.
Conner wondered if the man knew who he was, that he should presume to protect him. But if he did not know who he was, why come to his rescue with the flue? All the eyes in the circle except Hook's and a blind woman's focused on him. He knew he should speak and took a breath to begin.
Staring at a beam of the ceiling, Hook announced further variations in his argument. "The panic of 1857 and not the Negro lay behind the attack on the south. When the shooting died the Negro became merely a cause for pecu-lation. The administration of Lincoln's man Grant was without a doubt the most crooked the nation had seen until the other Republican, Harding, came to power. Now he was around in my time: a man you would have thought dirt wouldn't cling to, as tall as a church door, and trimmed like Moses...."
"Well you can't blame Lincoln for Grant," Mrs. Mortis said.
Hook's mustache broadened humorously. "They were as close as Baal and Mammon," he said. "Lincoln was no lover of morals. In private practice he was an atheist, you know."
"A Deist, wasn't he?" Conner said. "A Unitarian."
"Is Mr. Conner with us?" Elizabeth Heinemann cried beautifully, turning her head on her slender neck pathetically, as if she could see.
"Yes, dear," Mary Jamiesson said, "he's been building us a fire."
"I heard that someone was. Thank you, Mr. Conner."
"Thank you," Tommy Franklin echoed, and further murmurs sounded.
"You're quite welcome--I, I'm sorry that this rain has delayed the fair."
-end-
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