Judith's
alma mater, where she had been Sealed to the Prophet.
Magdalene (Maggie) Andrews
A Holy
Virgin who helped arrange a rendezvous between John
Lyle and Judith.
A member of the Cabal, she
recruited John and Zebadiah
Jones, arranged for John and Judith's escapes from the Palace,
and ultimately joined the military staff of the Revolution as a staff
sergeant. She was Zeb's mistress for a while, but married John just before the
coup. Within the Cabal she was also known as Sgt. Andy.
West
Point slang, meaning unspecified. It was used by John
Lyle's seat mate on the Comet; John suspected it was intended to lure him
into revealing himself as a fugitive.
Secret organization that resisted the rule of the Prophet.
It seems to have been similar to Freemasonry. It was allied with other
underground "sects", such as the Mormons and the Catholics.
A tool used to measure the emotional impact of a word or phrase: a
"complex variable function depending on context, age and sex and occupation of
the listener, the locale and a dozen other things." Psychologists used the
index to gauge the effectiveness of propaganda.
Code name for a regional headquarters of the Cabal.
I. M. Dumbjohn
Alias that John
Lyle took to scrawling on routine papers when commanding officers were too
busy to bother with them. He gave "Dumbjohn" the rank of "Wing General, Acting
Commander."
The Prophet's
army, more an internal police force than an army.
Federation
International organization, probably a successor to the United Nations.
Canada, Great Britain, the North
African Confederacy, and Brazil are mentioned as members, but the United
States definitely is not.
The government after the overthrow of the Prophet.
It was modeled after the original United States of America, but instead of the
Constitution it was based on the Covenant.
Just as many clauses in the Constitution were a direct reaction to Great
Britain's treatment of the American Colonies, much of the Covenant was a
reaction to the repression and intolerance of the Prophets.
Women who provided sexual as well as domestic services for the Prophet.
The novices apparently were kept unaware of the sexual aspects of their duties
until they were chosen to attend the Prophet.
Huxley (no first name)
Head of the Department of Applied Miracles at West
Point when John
Lyle was a cadet. He became the commanding general of the Cabal's
revolutionary army, and chose John as his personal aide to help train the
militia.
During the Interregnum, the Office of the Inquisition enforced orthodoxy
and obedience by severely punishing anyone accused of deviance.
Interregnum (or Interregnum of the
Prophets)
Theocratic and totalitarian government that prevailed in the United States
around the end of the 20th century, until overthrown by the Cabal. It
was founded by the demagogue Nehemiah
Scudder and perpetuated by successors who were more self-serving
politicians than religious fanatics, but who used religion to keep the
populace under control.
Original name of the base used for the Prophet's
proctors
in St. Louis. It was taken over by the Cabal and
restored to this name when a temporary capital was set up there.
Bishop Jennings (no first name)
[mentioned in passing] Religious authority in Minneapolis.
Treaty negotiated at the end of World War III. By inference, it banned the
construction of nuclear weapons.
Zebadiah Jones
John
Lyle's roommate, who joined the Cabal with
John, working for Psych and Propaganda with the rank of major; he very shortly
became a colonel and acting head of Propaganda.
Sister Judith (no last name)
Young Holy
Virgin appointed to serve the Prophet.
John
Lyle fell in love with her, and when she was traumatized to learn what
"service" was required, he joined the Cabal to
help rescue her from her fate. She was smuggled into Mexico, but instead of
being reunited with John after he went underground, she married a man she met
in Mexico.
Timothy Klyce
Senior legate and brevet captain in the Prophet's
guard, also a member of the Cabal. He
guided John
Lyle and Zebadiah
Jones to their first meeting.
Lodge
Secret society within the Cabal.
They repudiated all official connections between them and the Free
United States after the Revolt. (Possibly a reference to the Society of
Freemasons.)
Member of the Prophet's
personal guard who fell in love with a Holy
Virgin, Judith,
and joined the Cabal to
help her escape from the Prophet's service. He was eventually sent to the
Cabal headquarters, progressing quickly from legate to the commanding
officer's personal aide, ending with the rank of Colonel. He held a key role
in the overthrow of the Prophet. After learning that Judith had married
someone else, he married Magdalene
Andrews.
[mentioned in passing] Settlements on Mars and Venus were
abandoned when the Prophet
banned space travel. (Or more likely, other countries on Earth maintained
contact, but as far as the people under the Prophet's control were concerned,
the settlements were abandoned.
Annual event staged to reinforce the people's belief that the Prophet
ruled by direct authority of God. The current ruler took on the appearance of
the First Prophet,
Nehemiah
Scudder (thanks to modern broadcast technology) and confirmed the validity
of the government.
A "heretic" who did not accept any part of the Church of the Prophet.
Pariahs were herded into ghettos and persecuted, sometimes stoned to death
with official approval. There are suggestions that "pariahs" are almost always
Jewish.
[mentioned in passing] Suborbital passenger rocket that
served New
Jerusalem.
Prophet
Leader of the theocracy that controlled the United States during the Interregnum.
The First Prophet was demagogue Nehemiah
Scudder; his successors were also known as the Prophet Incarnate.
Cabal
group that released overtly respectful articles, etc., designed to create
doubts about the Prophet.
After the successful coup, it debated "counter-brainwashing" citizens to
remove them from the Prophet's influence.
Adam Reeves
Commercial traveler in textiles, whom John
Lyle impersonated to travel to the Cabal's
headquarters. After his cover was blown, Reeves became a sergeant in the Free
United States Army.
Sanchez (no first name)
Cabal
member in Phoenix, Arizona, who escorted John
Lyle to Headquarters; he was a pastor's handyman.
Nehemiah Scudder
Religious demagogue whose followers overthrew the United States government
and instituted a theocracy. This dictatorship controlled the country for
several generations until it was itself overthrown by resistance movements.
His followers included Venus colonials,
but the movement apparently was dominant only in the United States. He is also
called the Prophet.
The Constitutional government was overthrown by religious fanatics, and
the territory was isolated from the rest of the world. When the Second
American Revolution restored democracy, U.S. Constitution was replaced by
the Covenant.
The military academy for the Interregnum.
[Presumably the original United States Military Academy, converted to the Prophet's
purposes after he established his theocracy.]
Winters (no first name)
Free
United States Army member from Vermont who objected to Stokes'
brainwashing project. He died immediately after giving an impassioned speech
for freedom of thought.
World War III
[mentioned in passing] Occurring before Nehemiah
Scudder took control of the United States government, it ended with a
treaty that banned nuclear weapons.
The Heinlein
Society was founded by Virginia Heinlein on behalf of her husband, science
fiction author Robert Anson Heinlein, to "pay forward" the legacy of Robert A. Heinlein to future generations of "Heinlein's Children."