As a morale-boosting exercise, FDR was visiting the shipyards and war industries in Oregon. Nancy, part of the Democrat support team, moved with the parade, saw the President smile and wave from his open-topped limousine, cloak flung back from his shoulders. The sun glittered on his spectacles, masking his eyes. What was he thinking? He was a world figure now, meeting other world figures at summit conferences. They inhabited an exclusive universe, these people, the air around them filtered, their bodies guarded, protected from the tribulations of unimportant individuals; monarchs in all but name. ‘We have nothing to fear but fear itself !’ he had declared once, giving new hope, a new deal to desperate people, Nancy among them. Great days. A great man. But times change and men with them, and she was less easily persuaded by politicians today. He had earned their trust, then. Now he smiled and waved but not all of his loyal subjects were sheltered by his paternal wing: some were rounded up and shipped out to bleak corners of the land to languish behind barbed wire.
