The Victorious opposition

"Death is never dignified." O'Doull spoke with a doctor's certainty. "Never. Dignity in death is something we invent afterwards to make the living feel better."

"I would have felt better if it had happened while Papa was in the barn," Nicole said. "Whether he-" She broke off, not soon enough, and burst into tears. " 'Osti! Do you see? Even I'm starting to make jokes about it. And if I do, what's everyone else doing?"

"The same thing, probably," O'Doull said. "People are like that."

"It's not right!" Nicole said. "He wouldn't have wanted to be remembered- this way." She cried harder than ever.

Although Leonard held her and patted her and did his best to comfort her, he was far from sure she was right. He'd known his father-in-law for a quarter of a century. Wouldn't Lucien Galtier have taken a certain wry pride in the reputation that grew out of his end? Lucien might even have taken a pride that wasn't so ordinary. Any number of ways to go. To how many, though, was it given to go like a man?

Which brought him back to the question Nicole had asked. What about Йloise? She was wounded, no doubt about it, and Lucien wouldn't have wanted that. He'd cared for her, even if he hadn't necessarily loved her. But would things have been any easier for her if he'd dropped dead while they were dancing, not after they'd gone back to her farmhouse? Maybe a little. Maybe a little, yes, but not much.

One of these days, O'Doull told himself, yes, one of these days, I'll have to pour a few drinks into Georges and find out what he really thinks about this. The time wasn't ripe yet. He knew that. But it would come. A lot of things for which the time hadn't been ripe looked to be coming. Most of them were a lot less appetizing than lying down with a nice woman and being unlucky enough not to get up again.

That evening, the newscaster on the wireless gave an account of a speech President Smith had made at Camp Hill, Pe

Al Smith finally seemed to have decided he couldn't trust Jake Featherston. As far as O'Doull could see, the U.S. president had taken longer than he might have to figure that out. He had it down now, though. More than what he'd said, where he'd made the speech spoke volumes. Almost eighty years ago now, Robert E. Lee's Army of Northern Virginia had crushed McClellan's Army of the Potomac at Camp Hill, ensuring that the Confederate States would triumph in the War of Secession. No president of the United States would have anything to do with the place these days unless he wanted to tell his own people, We're in trouble again.

Nicole didn't understand any of that. Neither did little Lucien, who was anything but little these days. O'Doull found himself envying his wife and son for being so thoroughly Quebecois. He also found himself reminded that, no matter how long he'd lived here, he was at bottom an American. He'd sometimes wondered about that. He didn't any more.

When he went to his office the next morning, newsboys were hawking papers by shouting about President Smith's speech. Papers in Quebec always seemed to back the USA to the hilt: more royalist than the king, more Catholic than the Pope. Again, why not? The Great War had touched lightly here, which it hadn't anywhere else between Alaska and the Empire of Mexico.

O'Doull's receptionist was already at the office when he got there. She smiled at him and said, "Bonjour, monsieur. Зa va?"

"Pas pire, merci," he answered, which made her smile. Nobody who spoke Parisian French would have said, Not bad, thanks, like that. O'Doull had put down deep roots here, and he knew it. He went on, "When is the first appointment?"

"Half an hour, Doctor," she said.

"Good. I'll see what I can catch up on till then." He went into his private office to skim through medical journals. He wished he had time to do more than skim. He had never known-had never imagined-such an exciting age in medicine. Back when he was a boy, immunization and sanitation had begun to cut into death rates, which had kept on falling ever since. Now, though, some of the new drugs on the market were doing what quack nostrums had promised since the begi

And here was an article about some new medicine that was said to be-even more effective than the sulfonamides, which had been the last word for the past year or two. Drugs that killed germs without poisoning people were, to him, far more exciting than fighters that flew twenty miles an hour faster and five thousand feet higher than previous models.

Not everybody thought so, though, which meant new models of fighters came out more often and got more fanfare than new drugs did. They were liable to be used, too, which worried him.

"Madness," he muttered, and went back to reading about this fungus with what seemed a miraculous ability to murder microbes.

His first patient was a pregnant woman due in about six weeks. He'd always liked working with women who were going to have babies. Their condition was obvious, and usually had a happy outcome. He only wished the rest of what he did were as easy and rewarding.

Then he saw a child with mumps. He couldn't do anything about that despite the new drugs in the medical journal. The little boy was very unhappy, but he would get better in a few days.

A man with a bad back came in next. "I'm sorry, Monsieur Papineau," he said, "but aspirins and liniment and rest are the most I have to offer you."

"Tabernac!" Papineau said. "Can't you cure it? If you could put me under the knife for it, I would go in a minute. I can't pick up my children or make love to my wife without feeling I'm breaking in two."

Dr. O'Doull considered. Papineau was younger than he was, and might not be shocked at a suggestion. On the other hand, he might. Riviиre-du-Loup was a straitlaced place in a lot of ways. Still, worth a try… "Since you mention it, monsieur, it could be that you might have less pain during intimacy if your wife were to assume the, ah, superior position."

There. That sounded properly medical. Was it too medical for Papineau to understand? Evidently not, for he turned red. "What? You mean her on top? Calisse!"

"I didn't mean to offend," O'Doull said hastily. "I offered the suggestion only for reasons of health and comfort. You were the one who mentioned the, ah, difficulty, after all."

"Well, so I did." His patient looked thoughtful. "For reasons of health, maybe. I wonder what Louise would say." Papineau left the office rubbing his chin. O'Doull managed to hold in a snort of laughter till he was gone. Then it came out.

He was still smiling when his next patient, a little old lady with arthritis, came in. "What's fu

"Nothing to do with you, Madame Villehardouin," he assured her. "I was just… remembering a joke I heard last night." She gave him a fishy stare, but couldn't prove he was lying. He had only aspirins and liniment to offer her, too. As far as things had come in the past few years, they still had at least as far to go.