American Empire: Blood and Iron - By Harry Turtledove Page 0,32

and Stripes Forever” and photographic flashes went off like artillery rounds. “I trust you will do me the honor of riding with me at the head of the Remembrance Day parade tomorrow.”

Dowling could not remember the last time he had seen George Custer speechless, but Custer was speechless now, speechless for half a minute. Then, at last, he took Roosevelt’s hand in his and huskily whispered, “Thank you, Mr. President.” Beside him, Libbie (who thought even less of Roosevelt than he did) dropped the president a curtsy.

And Abner Dowling felt something that might almost have been a tear in his eye. Roosevelt had done Custer honor, not the other way round. President Blaine had instituted Remembrance Day at the close of the Second Mexican War as a memorial to the humiliation of the United States by their foes. It had always been a day of mourning and lamentation and looking ahead to fights unwon.

And now the fight was over, and it had been won. Instead of lying prostrate in defeat, the United States stood triumphant. With Remembrance Day come round again, the country could see that all the sacrifices its citizens had made for so many years were not in vain. Flags wouldn’t fly upside down in distress any more.

Custer asked, “Mr. President, where will you seat my wife? That I have come to this moment is in no small measure due to her.”

“Thank you, Autie,” Libbie said. Dowling thought Custer dead right in his assessment. He hadn’t thought Custer perceptive enough to realize the truth in what he said. Every once in a while, the old boy could be surprising. Trouble was, so many of the surprises proved alarming.

“I had in mind placing her in the motorcar directly behind ours,” Roosevelt answered, “and putting your adjutant with her, if that be satisfactory to you all. Lieutenant Colonel Dowling has given his country no small service.”

Dowling came to stiff attention and saluted. “Thank you very much, sir!” His heart felt about to burst with pride.

“The people will want to look at the general and the president, so I am perfectly content to ride behind,” Libbie said. In public, she always put Custer and his career ahead of his own desires. In private, as Dowling had seen, she kept a wary eye on Custer because his own eye, even at his advanced age, had a tendency to wander.

“Good. That’s settled.” Roosevelt liked having things settled, especially his way. “We’ll put you folks up for the night, and then tomorrow morning…tomorrow morning, General—”

Custer presumed to interrupt his commander-in-chief: “Tomorrow morning, Mr. President, we celebrate our revenge on the world!” It was a typically grandiose Custerian phrase, the one difference being that Custer, this time, was inarguably right. Theodore Roosevelt laughed and nodded and clapped his hands with glee. The victory the United States had won looked to be big enough to help heal even this longtime estrangement.

Up until the war, the Hindenburg Hotel had been called the Lafayette. Whatever you called it, it was luxury beyond any Dowling had ever known, surpassing the train on which he’d come to Philadelphia to the same degree the train surpassed a typical wartime billet. He feasted on lobster, drank champagne, bathed in a tub with golden faucets, plucked a fine Habana from a humidor on the dresser, and slept on smooth linen and soft down. There were, he reflected as he drifted toward that splendid sleep, people who lived this life all the time. It was enough to make a man wish he were one of the elect—either that, or to make him a Socialist.

The next morning, he was whisked along with the Custers on a whirlwind inspection of the units that would take part in the parade. He endured rather than enjoying most of the inspection: he’d seen his share of soldiers. But some of the barrels and their crews were from the First Army brigade Colonel Morrell had assembled and commanded. They greeted Custer and Dowling with lusty cheers.

Dowling thought those cheers lusty, at any rate, till the parade began and he heard the Philadelphians. Their roar was like nothing he had ever imagined. It was as if they were exorcising more than half a century of shame and disgrace and defeat—Lee had occupied Philadelphia at the end of the War of Secession—in this grandest of all grand moments.

Some women in the crowd looked fierce as they waved their flags—thirty-five stars, now that Kentucky was back in the USA, and the new state