by Tom DeMarco
“Yes, thank you Mr. Provost,” Chandler intervened. “Thank you for opening up this dialogue. Which needed to be opened, I believe. I think in his most estimable way, Provost Suzikaya has put his finger directly on the point that needed to be addressed when he referred to ‘our little nation.’ For too long, I believe, we have thought of ourselves as merely Baracoa, a village. But now that is no longer true at all. We have taken possession of the entire eastern third of the Cuban landmass, and we hold sway over the rest. No other nation, ladies and gentlemen, will be allowed to establish itself on any of the rest of the island. I say this without fear of contradiction. We could think of that as a modern Monroe Doctrine, perhaps the Hopkins Doctrine, if I could characterize it that way. So our community is the entire island.
“But now, I call to your attention a distressing paradox. It was suggested to me by my daughter Stacey, just this week. She said, ‘Daddy, who are we? Are we to begin thinking of ourselves as Cubans?’ There is the question. I lay it before you on the table. This new nation needs a name. It needs a name that can go on to live in history, as we fulfill the destiny that Provost Suzikaya has sketched out so persuasively for us. It would be a charming gesture, one supposes, to adopt the name given to this place by its previous residents, now, most of them, unfortunately deceased. But with that name come connotations that do not befit our image well at all. Connotations of banana republic, of thorn in the side of progressive culture, of militaristic adventurism…”
“Cuba was not ever an enlightened nation,” Chancellor Brill interjected.
“Precisely. Thank you for that observation, Mr. Chancellor. Precisely. And we, as the Provost has pointed out, are. Enlightened, that is. No, I think the name Cuba is not for us. I think not. Instead, we yearn for a name that can characterize us as the force of culture and progressive leadership that we have become. A name like Great Britain, for example…”
“That one happens to be in use at the moment,” Edward pointed out. Chandler glared at him.
“I don’t know that I can agree with any of this,” Dean Sawyer offered. “I rather fancy the name Cuba. It has the flavor of romance and music and nightlife. I like that image. We could do worse than have a name that stood for good cheer, for simple earthy pleasures…”
“Earthy indeed,” said Chandler with distaste. “That is the problem.”
Loren had his hand up. “I don’t know if that exactly is the problem, but something is wrong with Cuba as the name for our country. Cuba is and always will be Spanish. And we just aren’t. I mean I am, but our country isn’t. Cuba is and always will be Spanish, catholic, communistic, third world. We are none of those things. Our language is English, our culture is western European, our religion is science, our politics are, or seem to be, oriented toward individualism and opportunity. The name of our country ought to speak up for those things, or at least not conflict with them.”
“Everything is a symbol,” Kelly said.
“It is,” Loren agreed. “The name is a symbol. So far none of us have had to die for our community, but it will come to that. We can’t hope to remain forever ahead of the rest of the world. And when it comes to dying, or being willing to, we need a symbol.”
“So what should the name be?” Chandler asked him directly.
“I don’t know. We owe our presence here to one man, Homer Layton. Perhaps it ought to be something derived from his name. I’m not good at clever names, but something like Laytonia, maybe.” Even to his own ear, it lacked poetry.
Claymore perked up at the suggestion. “I rather like that,” he said.
“Homericus, or maybe Homerica?” Albert Tomkis offered.
Unfocused eyes around the table as they thought about other possibilities.
Peter Chan rose at his place. “With deference toward my respected friend and colleague, Dr. Layton,” he said, nodding toward Homer’s slumbering form, “I suggest that it wasn’t he who gave the sense of nation to us. I have come to feel fiercely loyal to this community, but it has little to do with our scientific accomplishments. It has more to do with the way we used them. We have stood up to evil. That’s what we’re all about, isn’t it. We looked evil square in the eye, and sent it packing. It sends a thrill through my body even now to think of turning off a war as we did last May, or repulsing those two powerful fleets that came here to murder our gentle people. We stood for something better than our enemies could ever understand. And we were victorious. Somewhere in there is the symbol.”
Chandler looked around the table. He certainly had their attention. It wasn’t even necessary to consider what name he himself would like to have with so much brainpower engaged. “Proctor Pinkham?”
“Victoria.”
A long silence as they considered.
Dean Sawyer raised the one objection: “But that has such a martial sound, Ted. So warlike.”
“But we are a martial people, aren’t we, Maria?” Kelly stepped in. “Look at us here today. Every one except Homer dressed in blues. These are not just innocent blue jumpsuits, remember. These are the uniforms of our navy. Look at yourself, Maria, not only in uniform but wearing military rank.” She indicated the captain’s bars that had been presented to Dean Sawyer at the conclusion of the scholastic year. “It was only partially humorous that the dean of our schools was elevated to only one rank below Van Hooten himself. And the fact that you’ve worn the bars ever since, shows that you understood what they meant to this community.”
“My father, Judge Sawyer, the pacifist, would have been appalled.”
“We have fought two great sea battles,” Kelly went on, “and a major attack on the enemy’s capital. Loren said that no one has died for our land, but he himself has been terribly wounded twice. Terribly.” Her voice quavered. “He spilled so much blood into the little dinghy that he and Mr. Pease escaped in that our own brave D.D. Pease almost fainted to look into the bilge. And Danny McCree in the Bahama Channel battle was almost out for the count. When he fell at my feet with an arrow deep in his body, I thought we had lost him. I was thinking already of what we would have to say to Gina and the girls.
“We are a martial people. We are a people at war. The zealots who have gained control to the north are not going to quit just because we have handed them a few defeats. They will keep hammering away at us, unmindful of their losses. That’s what it means to be a zealot. We are going to be at war with them for a long time. The advantage we have is a temporary one, as Loren suggests. In the long run we are up against a terrifying reality: There are hundreds of us and millions of them. In spite of our airships and lasers, we are the underdog. We need a symbol to help us focus ourselves. Symbols can’t be too subtle, they have to work right at the gut level. Victoria does that. It says something about what we are, the people of Victoria Island.”
Senator Hopkins was delighted with the result of the vote. It catered not only to his latent anglophilia, but to another matter that was dear to his heart. He pressed his advantage forthwith:
“The name Victoria, of course, stands not only for victory, but for an attitude of respect for the greatest propriety…”
There was a chorus of groans around the table. This was a recurrent theme of Chandler’s, and not a very popular one.
“You may groan. And object. I see that you are objecting. But I persist in this matter, for your own good. There is some social engineering required as we set out to design a new culture for Victoria. We would be letting history down if indeed we did not pay attention to the dire consequences brought on by a general permissiveness, a permissiveness that, I for one, albeit with a certain reluctance, I must take steps now, even steps that seem a trifle repressive, though of course they are not, to rectify that which, if left entirely unimpeded, though, of course, we can have no intention of so leaving it, but if so left which would…which would….” He had lost his way.
Chancellor Brill leapt to the Senator’s support. “A courageous stand, Mr. President. We are the designers of a great new society.
And in designing it, we need to take urgent steps to protect Victoria’s youth. Today, nearly half the population of Victoria is under the age of sixteen. It’s worse than that: nearly half the population is tottering on the brink of puberty. The village is positively thick with hormones. The example set by our adult citizens must be not only decorous, but positively prudish. Anything else will be simply playing with fire. It hardly behooves us to concentrate on science or defense or the arts or our cultural impact on the rest of the world, as the Provost has suggested, if our own nation is to erupt into an adolescent orgy. We must move now to prevent that, to impose Victorianism on Victoria.” He paused, thinking to go on, but then realizing he was not likely to come up with a better line than that, he sat down abruptly.
“The Chancellor has hit the nail, I believe, squarely on the head.” Chandler bowed toward Brill with positive fondness.
Elgar Klipstein looked dubious. “And what form is this new Victorianism likely to take on, if I may ask?”
Chandler rose up tall, suddenly as stern as he could be. “It will take the form, Captain Klipstein, of marriage.” He stared down his suddenly blushing adversary. At the end of the table, Melissa Blake covered her mouth to keep in her giggles.
“Marriage!” Chandler repeated, speaking this time directly to Homer, who was still asleep. “Marriage!” he directed to Maria, at Homer’s side. “Marriage.” He shot this last imperiously toward Adjouan, who happened to be next in line.
“I am a married man, my dear Senator. More married and I would be a bigamist.”
“Quite right, Mr. Elijah. My apologies. You and Ms. Elijah have been a splendid example to our youth. But there are some others at this very table who are pursuing a course that bodes ill for our young nation, and which must be discouraged.” He raised his voice, looking significantly back at Klipstein and Melissa Blake.
“I protest, Senator.” It was Walter Porter. Chandler gestured to him to be silent, but the Professor was already on his feet and beginning: “Are we to begin designing our society in a spirit of repressiveness? I say no. Let us set our ideals higher than that. Let us take the example of Jefferson and Madison and Jay. If we’re going to build a new nation from scratch, for god’s sakes, let’s build one where the individual stands supreme. Where the petty prejudices of the faction are never given the force of law. Let us set out, as Madison did, not by limiting the rights of the individual, but by exalting them. Let’s start with a Bill of Rights. Where else could we even think to begin? And among the other rights whose value we have learned over more than two hundred years, let us add one first suggested by Justice Blackmun, maybe the most important one of all: the right to be let alone.” By the time he was finished, Professor Porter’s face was pink with emotion.
He sat down to silence. Ed Barodin stood up slowly, unfolding all of his six feet of height. It looked like he was going to speak, but he didn’t; he just looked at Walter and began to applaud. Loren was the next to stand and join him, then Dean Sawyer and Dr. Chan and finally most of the room. They applauded long and boisterously.
“Well,” said Chandler when the room was quiet again, “Well. I didn’t, of course, mean to imply…I was just trying to bring some semblance of order to…. Oh, have it your own way,” he finished up petulantly.
“Thank you,” said Edward. “We will.”
The Senator’s lips quivered for an instant and then he said with heartfelt bitterness, “I serve here only as caretaker leader, anyway, as Doctor Layton said.” He turned to Homer who was now awake. “You said that some natural leader would emerge, and I was to be in charge only until then. Well it can’t happen too soon for me. Where is he?” A long moment of uncomfortable silence. Homer looked back at him, without expression. It was possible that he hadn’t followed. “Where is our leader?” Chandler pressed. “Where is he?” The answer in any event didn’t come from Homer, but from Captain Candace Hopkins across the room.
“She,” said Candace.
Chandler looked back at her, perplexed. “My dear?”
“Our leader, Chandler. She made her appearance a long time ago. She had a natural authority, as Homer predicted our leader would have. And we have all come to respect and depend upon it. She is and has been our leader. It’s just a matter now of acknowledging it.”
Loren looked uncertainly toward Dean Sawyer, thinking it was she that Candace had meant. But Maria was smiling toward Kelly. And then everyone was. Kelly looked around at the room, uncomprehending. There was not a single person who wasn’t staring at her. “But I’m not…”
Chandler stood, not just smiling but beaming. He looked toward his wife, catching her eye. Candace encouraged him with a nod. Chandler stepped over to Kelly’s side, took her hand in his own and raised her to her feet. “Ladies and Gentlemen, Citizens of Victoria…I give you our leader.”
This time it was Dr. Armitage who rose and began the applause. Almost immediately they were all on their feet to join in. Then they came by one by one to give Kelly a hug or to shake her hand. Loren was the first. He kissed her and lifted her off her feet with his hug. “It’s true, you know. You are our leader. You are my leader.” She still looked stunned.
When they were quiet again, Chandler led Kelly to the head of the table. Then he sat down in her place and turned to her expectantly, along with everyone else.
“But I don’t want to be President….” Kelly said. “I wouldn’t know how. And Chandler has done so well. I wouldn’t know how to be Chancellor or Provost or Proctor or anything.”
“You can delegate, Kelly. You don’t have to be everything.” Jared Williams reached out to pat her shoulder.
“Well, I’d like to delegate each of you to be what you are. Could I do that? Would you continue, Chandler to be our president? If I asked you?”
“That or whatever else you ask of me, Kelly.”
She turned to Proctor Pinkham, who nodded happily and to Suzikaya and Brill to receive their agreement as well. “Well, that’s a relief. I can certainly be a figurehead, I guess, as long as it doesn’t involve anything.”
Jared spoke up again. “Not a figurehead, Kelly. That’s not what we’re asking at all. What Candace said was spoken for each of us. You are our leader, our natural authority. We have all come to understand that over the last year. Who in this room has not come to you for guidance, I know I have. You gave us direction. Others can administer for you, but it is you who will be our boss.” She stared uncomfortably down at her hands.
“But what position will Kelly have?” Dean Sawyer put in. “It needs to be something that people can relate to, not just for ourselves but for everyone. We can just think of her as the Boss, but there should be something more formal for the children, and, as our community grows, for the populace. Kelly might lead us for another fifty years and by that time the population of Victoria could be as much as a million. What shall they call her?”
A long quiet moment with many minds considering the same answer. She so looked the part, at least at that moment with her eyes cast downward and her golden hair falling around her shoulders. It was Claymore Layton who put the idea into words: “Couldn’t Kelly be our Princess?”
The council was concocting its own rules. There was no established procedure for making someone a princess, so they invented one: election by acclamation. What was to stop them? They were high on hegemony, anyway. They declared her Princess of Victoria, but that wasn’t so far in their minds from Empress of Everything.
As they would have expected from a demure and lovely princess, Kelly tried to avoid the honor. It just confirmed them in their intent. “But I’m really not the princess type,” she said. “I’m not sure I even approve of such things. I’m an egalitarian. I’m sure I am. Aren’t I?” She looked to Loren for support. He just grinned back, enjoying her discomfiture. “Couldn’t I just be Prom Queen or something like that? Maybe just for a weekend.”
“I would like to have a word here, if I may.” D.D. Pease got to his feet, and looked for Kelly’
s authorization to continue. She nodded to him absently. “When Captain Hopkins chose her words, she did so with great skill. She said that Kelly was our leader, and all that lacked was for us to acknowledge it. And that was true. It was always true. What was also true was that she has been our symbol as well. When I was chosen by Dr. Martine to be part of the Ft. Belvoir adventure, I was scared—excuse me—simply shitless. I was. I needed something to think about that would represent what I was going to risk my life for. The thing I hit upon was Kelly. She stood for Baracoa in my mind. And now she is going to stand for all of Victoria. Everything is a symbol, Kelly. You said that. When I risk my life again, I want it to be for Princess Kelly. You are our symbol. You are our princess. We have only to acknowledge it. We need to do that, my dear, in order to go on and do other great things. We’ve been pretending that we could get you to serve, by forcing our will upon you. But that’s not really what it takes. What it takes is your consent. We have to ask. I ask you, on behalf of all here, to let us do this thing. Will you consent to be our princess?”
Kelly waited a long moment and then nodded, still looking downward.
Pease smiled. “Now the hardest part: You have led us without thinking about it for so long. Now you have to do it on purpose. We take our orders from you.”
Kelly nodded again. As Pease took his seat, she raised her eyes. She seemed at first bewildered, and then less so. She settled on Walter Porter and said in a small voice that gained strength as she spoke, “Professor Porter, could I ask you to form a group to begin making our Bill of Rights?”
“I would be honored.”
She turned to Chandler. “And President Hopkins, I would ask you to do something special too.”
“Of course.”
“Please sketch out for me your plans for implementing a new Victorianism. Of course, it has got to be an attitude we instill, not a repression with the force of law. But I believe for the reasons you have expressed here that we can best grow strong with some self-discipline and pride rather than casual permissiveness. I shall look to you to know how we shall accomplish that without repression.”