Never before in the history of the World, or so the Caroline's publicists said, had such a multitude been gathered together in any one place for any purpose save war. Thousands upon thousands crowded into the city and camped out on the surrounding slopes. From every village in the land and from many of the Caroline's sister nations they came to hear what some said would be a hoax but what most believed would signal the beginning of the Third World.
Limpkin stood in his office on George Street, looking out upon the vast crowd; the mob started five or six blocks north, in Palace Park, and backed up past the Office of Reconstruction, finally thinning out by the War Office. The throng filled the five other streets that radiated in a semicircle away from Palace Park to a similar degree.
Townsmen and merchants on top of their carriages, cavalry officers, bright in their red and gold uniforms, rough teamsters in what passed for formal dress in that level of society, illiterate shepherds from the Randau Basin and befurred mountain folk from the north, sweating in their heavy cloaks. Prostitutes wiggling through the masses, doing a land office business; drunken brawls causing swirls of color in the ocean of heads and shoulders; the raucous yell of hawkers selling bad water and cut gin. A pity Toriman was not there to see it all.
Limpkin turned from the window and sat down at his desk; he picked up the model of the Victory. He did not go to the Park to hear His Majesty, for he already knew what he would say; Toriman had written the speech.
George would tell the Myth of the Ship with an eloquence that the General's psychologist had figured would not tax the meaner minds present, yet would lift the knowledgeable.
The wild cheering told him that George had appeared; the ghostly silence told him that the ship had been born.