Mathew stopped at the hilltop and surveyed the scene before him. The last time he had walked there it had been beautiful, a quiet meadow – dotted with flowers and carpeted in fresh green grass. Children had played there. But that was a week ago, before the two armies clashed, using the meadow as a battleground. The fight had lasted only a few hours, too small to warrant mention in any scholarly text. And yet so much had happened. People had died here. Sacrificed their future, for what? To be left moldering on a ruined meadow, forgotten except for a sentence published in the newspaper to alert their families. Families that would never see them again. Mathew sighed audibly. In his studio, he had photographed many people who were now dead. It was easy to memorialize them, politicians and lawyers who could pay for it. But how could he save these images, how could he show America the innumerable acts of heroism which were left unnoticed? Pictures? They were, and it seemed, always would be an amusement. Something to save an enjoyable moment or person. There was nothing amusing in this. Mathew peered over his wire rimmed spectacles to survey the field again. It was piled with carnage. He could scarcely stand to look at it. Uneasy, he turned away promptly tripping over a piece of cloth. Fearing the worst, he pulled himself up and looked at the fragment. It was a flag, ripped and burned but just recognizable. A broken fragment representing the strongest nation on earth. Mathew stared at it for a long moment, then began to scramble up the hillock as quickly as his cane allowed.
It was late, the grandfather clock had just tolled out eleven and three quarters. Mathew’s whole face sagged with the need for sleep, but his eyes were alert as he pulled the photographs from a pot of chemicals. There were three. Two showed the battle field just as it was. The other showed the fragment of flag. Three tiny snapshots, showcasing the true glory and beauty of a nation. They were no longer an amusement – they were a way to honor and shape an entire country.