He jerked the car away from the curb so fast he almost tore out the aged rear end. Her feelings hurt, Gertie sniveled audibly until they'd crossed the George Washington Bridge. Then, having suffered in comparative silence as long as she could, she said, "Ya didn't need to bite my head off, Ephraim. And on our honeymoon, too. All I done was ast ya a question." "Did," Ephraim corrected her. "Did what?" Gertie asked. Ephraim turned his head to explain the difference between the past tense and the participle "have done" and Gertie screamed as he almost collided head on with a car going the other way. Mr. Gorgeous yelped and bit Ephraim on the arm. Then, both cars and excitement being new to the twelve week old puppy, he was most inconveniently sick. On their way again, Ephraim apologized. "I'm sorry I was cross." He was. None of this was Gertie's fault. She couldn't help it if he'd been a fool. There was no need of spoiling her honeymoon. The few hundred in his pockets would cover their immediate needs. And he'd work this out somehow. Things had looked black at Valley Forge, too. Gertie snuggled closer to him. "Ya do love me, don't ya?" "Devotedly," Ephraim assured her. He tried to put his arm around her. Still suspicious, Mr. Gorgeous bit him again. Mr. Gorgeous, Ephraim could see, was going to be a problem. His mind continued to probe the situation as he drove. Things had come to a pretty pass when a nation this size was insolvent, when out-go and deficit spending so far exceeded current revenue, taxes had become confiscatory. There was mismanagement somewhere. There were too many feet under the table. Too many were eating too high off the hog. Perhaps what Congress needed was some of the spirit of '76 and '89. A possible solution of his own need for a job occurred to him. "How," he asked Gertie, "would you like to be the wife of a Congressman?" "I think we have a flat tire," she answered. "Either that, honey, or one of the wheels isn't quite round on the bottom." * * * * * She walked Mr. Gorgeous while he changed the tire. It was drizzling by the time they got back in the car. Both the cowl and the top leaked. A few miles past Bear Mountain, it rained. It was like riding in a portable needle-shower. All human habitation blotted out by the rain, the rugged landscape was familiar to Ephraim. He'd camped under that great oak when it had been a young tree. He'd fought on the crest of that hill over-looking the river. But what in the name of time had he been fighting for? He felt a new wave of tenderness for Gertie. This was the only world the child had ever known. A world of video and installment payments, of automobiles and war, of atom bombs and double-talk and meaningless jumbles of figures. A world of confused little men and puzzled, barren, women. "I love you, Gertie," he told her.