To his surprise, Slattery burst out laughing. "Oh, them!" he said. "My brother took a look at those fellows, but he didn't want any part of 'em. By what Horace told me, there's only four or five of'em, and they run the whole party out of a shoebox."

"But they've got posters and everything," Jake protested, startled to find how disappointed he was. "Not good posters, mind you, but posters."

"Only reason they do is that one of 'em's a printer," the other veteran told him. "They meet in this little dive on Seventh near Canal, most of the way toward the Tredegar Steel Works. You want to waste your time, pal, go see 'em for yourself."

"Maybe I will," Featherston said. Hubert Slattery laughed again, but that just made him more determined. "By God, maybe I will."

Congresswoman Flora Hamburger clapped her hands together in delight. Dr. Hanrahan's smile was broader than a lot of those seen at the Pennsylvania Hospital. And David Hamburger, intense concentration on his face, brought his cane forward and then took another step on his artificial leg.

"How does it feel?" Flora asked her younger brother.

"Stump's not too sore," he answered, panting a little. "But it's harder work than I thought it would be "

"You haven't been upright since you lost your leg," Dr. Han-rahan reminded him. "Come on. Give me another step. You can do it." David did, and nearly fell. Hanrahan steadied him before Flora could. "You've got to swing the prosthesis out, so the knee joint locks and takes your weight when you straighten up on it," the doctor said. "You don't learn that, the leg won't work. That's why everybody with an amputation above the knee walks like a sailor who hasn't touched land in a couple of years."