The shot continued: several seconds that showed the edge of the trench, the tips of the ladders, the gray sky. At first, there was anticipation: what would happen next? But then it was apparent there was no “next,” just the pitiless clouds, the emotionless dirt. It was quiet as a poem.

Then—a dissolve. There was a shot of the nurse, sitting in a chair, head down, her ringlets of blond hair covering her face. A major of the French army was handing her a necklace: the finger puppets! She took it meekly; he looked embarrassed, waved his hand abruptly, and left the frame. The music dropped down, faded until it was not even a whisper. You could hear the sounds of sobs being stifled. All was vanity.

The words THE END came up. Lee quickly wiped away tears. He was thinking that he had to remember what had caused him to weep, how he could try to recall it and use it when asked, how he would weep when jilted by his bonnie belle, or kneeling by his father’s grave: here was exactly the emotion to feel. And then he remembered that he had just trod across his father’s grave, and he tried to feel sad about that, but it was like trying to carry water cupped between his hands. He could not think of a single reason to live. Every ambition was swallowed by the grave.

As the newsreel ended, all through the audience people were shaking their heads, an air of depression having settled upon them. But then the spotlight found the huge clock face that stood by the apron. There was a drumroll from the orchestra pit, and the hands of the clock, of their own volition, sprang forward exactly one minute. The clock went forward another minute, and the audience caught on, yelling in a cacophony of voices, “Two!” Another minute forward, and there was more agreement, “Three!” Then, finally, the fourth minute, and the whole audience to a person yelled out, knowing it was the conclusion, “Four!”

Out came the men. In their suits of fine blue wool, in their white-and-red pinstriped shirts and their blue silk ties, the Four Minute Men. There were four of them today.

Lee eyed them, and he cracked his knuckles one by one.

They had started in 1916 in Chicago, where a local man with strong opinions had fumed at how it took four long minutes to change reels. So he was inspired to get up from the crowd and declare that he would speak on the need for fighting Germany. Given that the United States was not yet at war, and Chicago was shoulder to shoulder with Germans, his remarks were controversial, but his style was grand, and there was applause.