Friday

XVIII

The excursion boat Skip to M'Lou was a real Mark Twainen, much fancier transportation than I had expected-three passenger decks, four Shipstones, two for each of twin screws. But she was loaded to the gunwales and it seemed to me that a stiff breeze would swamp hen. At that we were not the only troopship; the Myrtle T Hanshaw was a few lengths ahead of us, carving the river at an estimated twenty knots. I thought about concealed snags and hoped that their radar/sonar was up to the task.

The Alamo Heroes were in the Myrtle as was Colonel Rachel, commanding both combat teams-and this was all I needed to nail down my suspicions. A bloated brigade is not a palace guard. Colonel Rachel was expecting field action-possibly we would disembark under fire.

We had not yet been issued weapons and recruits were still in mufti; this seemed to indicate that our colonel did not expect action at once and it fitted in with Sergeant Gumm's prediction that we were going upriver at least as far as Saint Louis-and of course the rest of what she said about our becoming bodyguard to the new Chairman indicated that we were going all the way up to the capital-

-if the new Chairman was in fact at the seat of government. -if Mary Gumm knew what she was talking about. -if someone didn't turn the river around while I was not looking. Too many "ifs," Friday, and too little hard data. All I really knew was that this vessel should be crossing into the Imperium about now-in fact I did not know which side of the border we were on or how to tell.

But I did not care greatly because sometime in the next several days, when we were close to Boss's headquarters, I planned to resign informally from Rachel's Raiders-before action, by strong preference. I had had time to size up this outfit and I believed strongly that it could not be combat-ready in less than six weeks of tough field training at the hands of tough and blooded sergeant instructors. Too many recruits, not enough cadre.

The recruits were all supposed to be veterans... but I was certain that some of them were farm girls run away from home and in some cases about fifteen years old. Big for their age, perhaps, and "when they're big enough, they're old enough," as the old saw goes-but it takes more than massing sixty kilos to make a soldier.

To take such troops into action would be suicide. But I did not worry about it. I had a belly full of beans and was settled on the fantail with my back against a spool of cordage, enjoying the sunset and digesting my first meal as a soldier (if that is the word) while contentedly contemplating the fact that, about now, the Skip to M'Lou was crossing into, or had crossed into, the Chicago Imperium.

A voice behind me said, "Hidin' out, trooper?"

I recognized the voice and turned my head. "Why, Sergeant, how could you say such a thing?"

"Easy. I just asked myself, 'Where would I go if I was goldbricking?'-and there you were. Forget it, Jonesie. Have you picked your billet?"

I had not done so because there were many choices, all bad. Most of the troops were quartered in staterooms, four to each double room, three to a single. But our platoon, along with one other, was to sleep in the dining salon. I could see no advantage to being at the Captain's table so I had not engaged in the scramble.

Sergeant Gumm nodded at my answer. "Okay. When you draw your blanket, don't use it to stake out a billet; somebody'll steal it. Pontside aft, abreast the pantry, is the dining-room steward's stateroom-that's mine. It's a single but with a wide bunk. Drop your

blanket there. You'll be a damn sight more comfortable than sleeping on the deck."

"That's mighty nice of you, Sergeant!" (How do I talk my way out of this? Or am I going to have to relax to the inevitable?)

"Call me Sarge. And when we're alone, my name is Mary. What did you say your first name was?"

"Friday."

"Friday. That's kind o' cute, when you stop to think about it. Okay, Friday, I'll see you around taps." We watched the last reddish slice of sun disappear into the bottomland astern of us, the Skip having swung east in one of the river's endless meanders. "Seems like it ought to sizzle and send up steam."

"Sarge, you have the soul of a poet."

"I've often thought I could. Write poetry, I mean. You got the word? About the blackout now?"

"No lights outside, no smoking outside. No lights inside except in spaces fully shuttered. Offenders will be shot at sunrise. Doesn't affect me much, Sarge; I don't smoke."

"Correction. Offenders will not be shot; they'll just wish to God they had been shot. You don't smoke at all, dear? Not even a friendly hit with a friend?"

(Give up, Friday!) "That's not really smoking; that's just friendly."

"That's the way I see it. I don't go around with my head stuffed full of rags, either. But an occasional hit with a friend when you're both in the mood, that's sweet. And so are you." She dropped to the deck by me, slipped an arm around me.

"Sarge! I mean Mary. Please don't. It's not really dank yet. Somebody'll see us."

"Who cares?"

"I do. It makes me self-conscious. Spoils the mood."

"In this outfit you'll get over that. You're a virgin, dear? With girls, I mean."

"Uh... please don't quiz me, Mary. And do let me go. I'm sorry but it does make me nervous. Here, I mean. Why, anybody could walk around the corner of that deckhouse."

She grabbed a feel, then started to stand up. "Kind o' cute, you

bein' so shy. All right, I've got some mellow Omaha Black I've been saving for a special-"

The sky lit up with a dazzling light; on top of it came a tremendous karoom! and where the Myrtle had been the sky was filled with junk.

"Jesus Christ!"

"Mary, can you swim?"

"Huh? No."

"Jump in after me and I'll keep you afloat." I went over the port side in as long a dive as I could manage, took a dozen hard strokes to get well clear, turned over onto my back. Mary Gumm's head was silhouetted against the sky.

That was the last I saw of her as the Skip to M'Lou blew up.

In that stretch of the Mississippi there are bluffs on the east. The western limit of the river is simply higher land, not as clearly marked, ten or fifteen kilometers away. Between these two sides the location of the river can be a matter of opinion-often of legal opinion because the river shifts channels and chews up property rights.

The river runs in all directions and is almost as likely to run north as to nun south. Well, half as likely. It had been flowing west at sundown; the Skip, headed upriver, had the sunset behind her. But while the sun was setting the boat had swung left as the channel turned north; I had noticed the red-and-orange display of sunset swinging to portside.

That's why I went over the side to port. When I hit the water, my immediate purpose was to get clear; my next purpose was to see if Mary followed me in. I did not really expect her to because (I've noticed!) most people, human people, don't make up their minds that fast.

I saw her, still aboard; she was staring at me. Then the second explosion took place and it was too late. I felt a brief burst of sorrow-in hen own rutty, slightly dishonest way Many was a good sort-then I wiped her out of my mind; I had other problems.

My first problem was not to be hit by debris; I surface-dived and stayed under. I can hold my breath and exercise almost ten mm-

utes, although I don't like it at all. This time I stretched it almost to bursting before surfacing.

Long enough: It was dark but I seemed to be clear of floating debris.

Perhaps there were survivors in the water but I did not hear any and did not feel impelled to try to find any (other than Mary and no way to find her) as I was not well equipped to rescue anyone, even myself.

I looked around, spotted what was left of the loom of sunset, swam toward it. After a while I lost it, turned over on my back, searched the sky. Broken clouds and no moon. I spotted Arcturus, then both the Bears and Polaris, and I had north. I then corrected my course so that I was swimming west. I stayed on my back because, if you take it easy, you can swim forever and two years past, on your back. Never any problem to breathe and if you get a touch weary, you can just hold still and twiddle your fingers a trifle until you are rested. I wasn't in any hurry; I just wanted to reach the Impenium on the Arkansas side.

But of crash-priority importance I did not want to drift back down into Texas.

Problem: to navigate correctly at night with no map on a river a couple of kilometers wide, when your object is to reach a west bank you can't see... without giving any southing as you go.

Impossible?-the way the Mississippi winds around, like a snake with a broken back? But "impossible" is not a word one should use concerning the Mississippi River. There is one place where it is possible to make three short pontages totaling less than ninety meters, float down the river in two bights totaling about thirty kilometers

and end up more than one hundred kilometers up the river.

No map, no sight of my destination-I knew only that I must go west and that I must not go south. So that is what I did. I stayed on my back and kept checking the stars to hold course west. I had no way of telling how much I might be losing to the south through the current, save for the certainty that, if and when the river turned south, my own progress west through the water would fetch me up on the bank on the Arkansas side.

And it did. An hour later-two hours later?-a lot of water later

and Vega was high in the east but still far short of meridian, I realized that the bank was looming over me on my left side. I checked and corrected course west and kept on swimming. Shoftly I bumped my head on a snag, reached behind me and grabbed it, pulled myself up, then pulled my way through endless snags to the bank.

Scrambling up on the bank was no problem as it was only half a meter high, about, at that point. The only hazard was that the mud was thick and loose underfoot. I managed it, stopped, and took stock.

Still inky-black all around with stars the only light. I could tell the smooth black of the water from the thick black of the brush behind me only by the faint glint of starlight on the water. Directions? Polaris was now blocked by cloud but the Big Dipper told me where it had to be and this was confirmed by Spica blazing in the south and Antares in the southeast.

This orientation by the stars told me that west sliced straight into that thick black brush.

My only alternative was to get back into the water, stick with the river... and wind up sometime tomorrow in Vicksburg.

No, thanks. I headed into the bush.

I'm going to skip rapidly over the next several hours. It may not have been the longest night of my life but it was surely the dullest. I am sure that there must be thicker and more dangerous jungles on Earth than the brush on the bottomland of the lower Mississippi. But I do not want to tackle them, especially without a machete (not even a Scout knife!).

I spent most of my time backing out, having decided, No, not through there-now how can I go around?-No, not on its south side!-how can I get around it to the north? My track was as contorted as the path of the river itself and my progress was possibly one kilometer per hour-or perhaps I exaggerate; it could have been less. Much of the time was spent reorienting, a necessity every few meters.

Flies, mosquitoes, gnats, crawly things I never saw, twice snakes underfoot that may have been water moccasins but I did not wait to find out, endless disturbed birds with a dozen different sorts of cries-birds that often flew up almost in my face to our mutual dis

tress. My footing was usually mud and always included something to trip over, ankle-high, shin-high, or both.

Three times (four times?) I came to open water. Each time I held course west and when the water was deep enough I swam. Stagnant bayou mostly, but one stretch seemed to have a current and may have been a minor channel of the Mississippi. Once there was something large swimming by me. Giant catfish? Aren't they supposed to stay on the bottom? Alligator? But there aren't supposed to be any there at all. Perhaps it was the Loch Ness monster on tour; I never saw it, simply felt it-and levitated right out of the water through sheer fright.

About eight hundred years after the sinking of the Skip and the Myrtle came the dawn.

West of me about a kilometer was the high ground of the Arkansas side. I felt triumphant.

I also felt hungry, exhausted, dirty, insect-bitten, disreputable, and almost unbearably thirsty.

Five hours later I was the guest of Mr. Asa Hunter as a passenger in his Studebaker farm wagon hitched to a fine span of mules. We were approaching a small town named Eudora. I still had not had any sleep but I had had the next best and everything but-water, food, a wash-up. Mrs. Hunter had clucked over me, lent me a comb, and given me breakfast: basted fried eggs, home-cured bacon thick and fat, corn bread, butter, sorghum, milk, coffee made in a pot and settled with an eggshell-and to appreciate in fullness Mrs. Hunter's cooking I recommend swimming all night alternated with crawling through the thickets of Old Man River's bottomland mud. Ambrosia

I ate wearing her wrapper as she insisted on rinsing out my bedraggled jump suit. It was dry by the time I was ready to leave, and I looked almost respectable.

I did not offer to pay the Hunters. There are human people who have very little but are rich in dignity and self-respect. Their hospitality is not for sale, nor is their charity. I am slowly learning to recognize this trait in human people who have it. In the Hunters it was unmistakable.

We crossed Macon Bayou and then the road dead-ended into a slightly wider road. Mr. Hunter stopped his mules, got down, came around to my side. "Miss, I'd thank you kindly to get down here."

I accepted his hand, let him hand me down. "Is something wrong, Mr. Hunter? Have I offended you?"

He answered slowly, "No, miss. Not at all." He hesitated. "You told us how your fishing boat was stove in by a snag."

"Yes?"

"Snags in the river are a pesky hazard." He paused. "Yesterday evening come sundown something bad happened on the river. Two explosions, about at Kentucky Bend. Big ones. Could see 'em and hear 'em from the house."

He paused again. I didn't say anything. My explanation of my presence and of my (deplorable) condition had been feeble at best. But the next best explanation was a flying saucer.

Mr. Hunter went on, "Wife and I have never had any words with the Imperial Police. We don't aim to. So, if you don't mind walking a short piece down this road to the left, you'll come to Eudora. And I'll turn my team around and go back to our place."

"I see. Mr. Hunter, I wish there were some way I could repay you and Mrs. Hunter."

"You can."

"Yes?" (Was he going to ask for money? No!)

"Someday you'll find somebody needs a hand. So give him a hand and think of us."

"Oh! I shall! I surely shall!"

"But don't bother to write to us about it. People who get mail get noticed. We don't crave to be noticed."

"I see. But I'll do it and think about you, not once but more than once."

"That's best. Bread cast upon the waters always comes back, miss. Mrs. Hunter told me to tell you that she plans to pray for you."

My eyes watered so quickly that I could not see. "Oh! And please tell her that I will remember her in my prayers. Both of you." (I had never prayed in my life. But I would, for the Hunters.)

"Thank y' kindly. I will tell her. Miss. May I offer you a word of advice and not have you take it amiss?"

"I need advice."

"You don't plan to stop in Eudora?"

"No. I must get north."

"So you said. Eudora's just a police station and a few shops. Lake Village is farther away but the Greyhound APV stops there. That's about twelve kilometers down the road to the right. If you can cover that distance between now and noon, you could catch the midday bus. But it's a dogtrottin' distance and a pretty hot day."

"I can do it. I will."

"Greyhound'll take you to Pine Bluff, even to Little Rock. Urn. Bus costs money."

"Mr. Hunter, you've been more than kind. I have my credit card with me; I can pay for the bus." I had not come through the swim and the mud in very good shape but my credit cards, IDs, passport, and cash money had all been in that waterproof money belt Janet had given me so many light-years ago; all had come through untouched. Someday I would tell her.

"Good. Thought I'd better ask. One more thing. Folks around here mind their own business, mostly. If you just go straight aboard the Greyhound, the few nosy ones won't have any excuse to bother you. Better so, maybe. Well, good-bye and good luck."

I told him good-bye and got moving. I wanted to kiss him good-bye but strange women do not take liberties with such as Mr. Hunter.

I caught the noon APV and was in Little Rock at 12:52. An express capsule north was loading as I reached the tube station; I was in Saint Louis twenty-one minutes later. From a terminal booth in the tube station I called Boss's contact code to arrange for transportation to headquarters.

A voice answered, "The call code you have used is not in service. Remain in circuit and an operator-" I slapped the disconnect and got out fast.

I stayed in the underground city several minutes, walking at random and pretending to window-shop but putting distance between me and the tube station.

I found a public terminal in a shopping mall some distance away and tried the fallback call code. When the voice reached: "The call

-where I, bold as brass, used my Imperial Bank of Saint Louiscode you have used is not-" I slapped the disconnect but the voice failed to cut off. I ducked my head, dropped to my knees, got out of that booth, cutting to the right and being conspicLous, which I hate, but possibly avoiding being photographed through the terminal, which could be disaster.

I spent minutes mixing with the crowd. When I felt reasonably sure that no one was following me, I dropped down one level, entered the city's local tube system and went to East Saint Louis. I had one more top-emergency fallback call code, but I did not intend to use it without preparation.

Boss's new underground headquarters was just sixty minutes from anywhere but I did not know where it was. I mean to say that, when I left its infirmary to take a refresher course, the APV trip had taken exactly sixty minutes. When I returned it had taken sixty minutes. When I went on leave and asked to be placed to catch a capsule for Winnipeg, I had been dropped in Kansas City in exactly sixty minutes. And there was no way for a passenger to see out of an APV used for this.

By geometry, geography, and simplest knowledge of what an APV can do, Boss's new headquarters had to be someplace more or less around Des Moines-but in this case "more or less" meant a radius of at least a hundred kilometers. I did not conjecture. Nor did I conjecture as to which ones of us actually knew the location of HQ. It was a "need-to-know" and trying to guess how Boss decided such things was a waste of time.

In East Saint Louis I bought a light cloak with a hood, then a latex mask in a novelty shop, picking one that was not grotesque. Then I took careful pains to randomize my choice of terminal. I was of strong but not conclusive opinion that Boss had been hit again and this time smeared, and the only reason that I had not panicked was that I am trained not to panic until after the emergency.

Masked and hooded, I punched the last-resort call code. Same result and again the terminal could not be switched off. I turned my back on the pickup, pulled off that mask and dropped it on the floor, got out of there slow-march, around a corner, shed that cloak as I walked, folded it, shoved it into a trash can, went back to Saint Louis-

credit card to pay my tube fare to Kansas City. An hour earlier in Little Rock I had used it without hesitation but at that time I had had no suspicion that anything had happened to Boss-in fact I held a "religious" conviction that nothing could happen to Boss. ("Religious" "absolute belief without proof.")

But now I was forced to operate on the assumption that something had indeed happened to Boss, which included the assumption that my Saint Louis MasterCard (based on Boss's credit, not my own) could drop dead on me at any moment. I might stick it into a slot to pay for something and have it burned out by a destruction bolt when the machine recognized the number.

So four hundred kilometers and fifteen minutes later I was in Kansas City. I never left the tube station. I made a free call at the information desk about service on the KC-Omaha-Sioux Falls- Fargo-Winnipeg tube and was told that there was full service to Pembina at the border, none beyond. Fifty-six minutes later I was at the British Canadian border directly south of Winnipeg. It was still early afternoon. Ten hours earlier I had been climbing up out of the bottomland of the Mississippi and wondering light-headedly whether I was in the Imperium or if I had floated back into Texas.

Now I was even more overpoweringly anxious to get out of the Imperium than I had been to get in. So far I had managed to stay one flea-hop ahead of the Imperial Police but there was no longer any doubt in my mind that they wanted to talk to me. I did not want to talk to them because I had heard tales about how they conducted an investigation. The laddies who had questioned me earlier this year had been moderately rough... but the Imperial Police were reputed to burn out a victim's brain.