Ozark Trilogy 2: The Grand Jubilee (33 page)

They assured him that they did, until he was satisfied.

“Now,” he said, “you see the Outward Deeps there, off to the east of Marktwain? We don’t know anything much about the Outward Deeps. But to the south of Marktwain is the continent of Oklahomah, settled in twenty-one twenty-seven jointly with Arkansaw. That is, an expedition moved from Marktwain in two parties; one to Arkansaw, one to Oklahomah, at the same time. That is called a
joint expedition. You
will remember that.

“On Oklahomah,” he went on, “there are three Families. Two of them are democratic republics-the Kingdoms of Clark and Airy. One, Smith Kingdom, is a monarchy, which means that it has-”

“A King! A King!”

“Good. A King. And finally, we come to”-he swept the pointer around to the bottom left-hand corner of the map with a flourish, and the boys cried-
”Tinaseehl”

“Settled in-”

“Twenty-three forty-nine!”

“Good boys! Tinaseeh is the largest of all the continents, and it is the only one to have an inland body of water large enough to be called a sea. That is our
Midland
Sea. And its government is?”

“A
Holy
Republic!”

“So it is. And do we have a King?”

 
_“No
!”

“Why not? Why don’t we have a King?”

“The Holy One is our leader!”

“And the Holy One’s representative on this continent, that interprets the laws and says how we must behave?”

“Jacob Jeremiah Traveller, Master of Castle Traveller! Hurrah!”

Cheers from all directions; the Tutor allowed that for a minute or two. They were, after all, very young. And enthusiasm for Jacob Jeremiah Traveller was a sentiment to be encouraged. “Now, are we through?” he asked finally, quieting them.

“Yes!”

“No; no, we are not. First, there is a very important question. Remember that there are six”-he held up six fingers-”
six
Kingdoms on Ozark that call themselves democratic republics. Those six-Brightwater, McDaniels, Clark, Airy, Lewis, and Motley-are joined as the Alliance of Democratic Republics. You will remember that. Now-does anybody know what the important question is?”

He didn’t expect them to know, so he did not wait, but went right on. “What,” he asked, “is the difference between a
democratic
republic and a
Holy
republic? Well?”

Silence. The Tutor tapped the pointer. Tap. Tap. Tap.

“Think!” he said. “Think how they are ruled; isn’t that what we’ve been talking about all morning? How the Kingdoms are ruled? Now,
repeat after me. A
democratic republic is ruled by a man, but the Holy Republic is ruled by the Holy One! All together, now. . :”

He made them say it three times.

It didn’t matter how many girls there were to a Granny School; a Granny took as many as happened to be there. And since, on all of Tinaseeh, the only Granny was Granny Leeward, it was a large group of little girls she faced that same day. But she had no more concern about what they must be taught than the Tutors did for the boys, and she needed no book to keep it straight in her head.

“Men,” she was saying, “are of but two kinds: splendid, and pitiful. The splendid ones are rare, and if you chance on one you’ll know it. What I tell you now has to do with the
rest
of ‘em-as my Granny told me, and her Granny told her before that, and so back as far as time will take you . . . ‘