The Visitors (v1.0)

53. DE SOTO, WISCONSIN

The South Dakotan who had nursed his dilapidated ear for more than five hundred miles, the machine rattling and banging, coughing and gasping, every wheeze threatening to be its last, pulled into the small town of De Soto, a wide place in the road hemmed in between bluff and river. He tried to find a place to park, but there was no place left in the town to park. The one long street was jammed with cars and people, and there seemed to be much angry shouting and running about, and the frightening, sobering thought crossed his mind that possibly all the people here had also come for cars.

Finally, he was able to pull his ear over to the side of an indifferent gravel road that ran eastward up a coulee out of town. Many other ears had been pulled off the same road. He did not find a place to park until he was a good half-mile beyond the last house in the village. He got out of the car and stretched in an attempt to ease his aching muscles. Not only did his muscles ache; he was tired to the very bone, almost to exhaustion. He was tired and hungry and he needed sleep and food, but not until he got his ear. Once he got his car, he could take the time to sleep and eat.

Just how to go about getting a ear he had no idea. All he knew was that there was an island across the river from this town and that the cars were on the island. Perhaps, he thought again, he should have driven to Dick's Landing in Iowa, but the map had shown what looked to be small secondary roads leading to the landing. He had decided that he could make better time if he drove to this Wisconsin town that lay opposite Dick's Landing. Somehow, he knew, he had to get across the river to reach the island. Perhaps he could rent a boat. He wondered how much the renting of a boat might cost and hoped it would not be too exorbitant. He was carrying little cash. Maybe, he thought, he could swim the river, although he was not too certain that he could. He was a fairly decent swimmer, but from what he had seen of the river on his long drive down the valley, the Mississippi was wide and the current was strong.

He plodded down the road, skirting potholes, the loose gravel sliding underneath his feet. Ahead of him, several men were walking down the road, but he made no attempt to catch up with them, for now that he was here, he found himself surprisingly abashed. Maybe he shouldn't have come, but, at the time, the idea had seemed simple and flawless. God knows, he needed a ear and here was a way to get one. Not for a moment had it occurred to him that others would come up with the same idea. He could not know, of course, but he suspected that the others in the town had come on the self-same errand. There was one consolation, however: There should be plenty of ears to go around. The story he had heard on TV said that at the time the visitors on the island had been found, they had made more than a hundred cars. It was reasonable to suppose that since the report, they had kept on making them, so there would be more than the hundred now. Maybe a couple of hundred. Maybe more than that. There were a lot of people in town, but surely with more than two hundred cars sitting there and waiting, there'd be plenty to go around. The big problem would be to find how to cross the river, but he'd deal with that when the time came.

He came to the outskirts of the village and continued trudging toward the business district, which fronted on the river. Perhaps there, he could find someone who would tell him what to do. By this time, some sort of procedure might have been worked out for picking up a car.

A knot of people stood on the sidewalk in front of a bar and he drifted over to them. Three highway patrol cars were standing across the street, but there was no sign of the troopers who had been in them. A line of men were standing on the far side of the railroad track that arrowed between the town and river. All their backs were turned toward the town, as if they were watching something on the river.

The South Dakota man plunked apologetically at the sleeve of a man standing on the sidewalk. "Has there been an accident?" he asked, motioning at the patrol ears.

"There ain't been no accident," said the man. "One earlier in the day, but not within the last few hours."

"Well, what are the troopers doing here?"

"You must have just pulled in," said the man.

"That's right. Drove all the way from South Dakota. Rapid City—well, not really Rapid City, but a little town just east of Rapid City. Made it all in one run; only stopped for gas."

"Sounds like you were in a hurry."

"Well, you see, I wanted to get here before all the cars were gone."

"There ain't none of them gone," said the man. "They're all over on the island."

"So I'm still in time."

"Still in time for what?"

"Still in time to pick up a ear."

"You ain't going to pick up no car. There ain't no one going to pick up a car. State troopers, they got the river sealed off. Some word has it they may be sending in the guard. They're out in boats patrolling on the river so no traffic can come up or down the stream."

"But why? The TV said.

"We all know what the TV said. And the papers, too. Free cars for everyone. But you can't get across the river to the island."

"That the island over there?"

"Somewhere over there. I don't know just where. There are a lot of islands over there."

"But what happened? Why did the troopers.

"Bunch of damn fools piled into a boat. More of them than the boat would carry, but they kept on piling in. The boat swamped out in midstream. Most of the damn fools drowned."

"But someone could set up some kind of system, some safe way to get across and.

"Sure, they could," said the other man, "but no matter what you did, it wouldn't work. No one here has got a lick of sense. Everyone has got his heart set on one of the cars. The police are right. They can't let no one near the river. If they did, more people would get killed."

"But don't you want a car?"

"Sure, I want a car. But there's no chance to get one now. Maybe, later on.

"But I have to have a car right now," said the man from South Dakota. "I just got to have one. I don't think that heap of mine will last to get me home."

He ran across the street and up the embankment to the railroad track. He reached the line of men who stood on the far edge of the track, pushing his way through them, shoving them aside. One foot hit the downslope of the embankment. Skidding on sliding gravel, he lost his balance. He fell and rolled down the slope, stopping just short of the water's edge. Lying there, he saw a huge man in uniform towering over him.

The trooper asked, almost gently, "Where do you think you're going, son?"

"I got to have a car," said the man from South Dakota.

The officer shook his head.

"I can swim," said the South Dakotan. "I can swim it easy. Let me have a chance. Let me take a chance."

The officer reached down a hand, jerked him to his feet.

"Now, you listen to me," he said. "I'm giving you a break. Get your tail up over that track. If I so much as catch sight of you again, I'll toss you in the cage."

The South Dakotan hastily clambered up the embankment. The crowd jeered kindly at him.