Silovitz nodded approval. "That's a good yarn. Stick to it. The wife of the judge you'll probably draw is an ardent D.A.R. But if I were you I'd move my war record up a bit and remove a few more cousins between myself and Nathan." He smoked in silence a minute. "Boy. It must have been nice to live back in those days. A good meal for a dime. Whiskey, five cents a drink. No sales or income or surtax. No corporate or excise profits tax. No unions, no John L., no check-off. No tax on diapers and coffins. No closed shops. No subsidies. No paying farmers for cotton they didn't plant or for the too many potatoes they did. No forty-two billion dollar budget." "I beg your pardon?" Ephraim said. "Ya heard me." Swept by a nostalgia for something he'd never known, Silovitz continued. "No two hundred and sixty-five billion national debt. No trying to spend ourselves out of the poor house. No hunting or fishing or driving or occupational license. No supporting three-fourths of Europe and Asia. No atom bomb. No Molotov. No Joe Stalin. No alimony. No Frankie Sinatra. No video. No be-bop." His eyes shone. "No New Dealers, Fair Dealers, Democrats, Jeffersonian Democrats, Republicans, State's Righters, Communists, Socialists, Socialist-Labor, Farmer-Labor, American-Labor, Liberals, Progressives and Prohibitionists and W.C.T.U.ers. Congress united and fighting to make this a nation." He quoted the elderly gentleman from Pennsylvania. "'We must all hang together, or assuredly we shall all hang separately.' Ah. Those were the days." Ephraim cracked his knuckles. It was a pretty picture but, according to his recollection, not exactly correct. The boys had hung together pretty well during the first few weeks after the signing of the Declaration Of Independence. But from there on in it had been a dog fight. No two delegates had been able to agree on even the basic articles of confederation. The Constitution itself was a patch work affair and compromise drafted originally as a preamble and seven Articles by delegates from twelve of the thirteen states at the May '87 convention in Philadelphia. And as for the boys hanging together, the first Congress had convened on March 4th and it had been April 6th before a quorum had been present. Silovitz sighed. "Still, it's the little things that get ya. If only Bessie hadn't insisted on listening to 'When A Girl Marries' when I wanted to hear the B-Bar-B Riders. And if only I hadn't made that one bad mistake." "What was that?" Ephraim asked. Silovitz told him. "I snuck up to the Catskills to hide out on the court order. And what happens? A game warden picks me up because I forgot to buy a two dollar fishing license!" * * * * *