L. Neil Smith - North American Confederacy 02 (11 page)

“Sounds good t’me. Be a lot fewer dust-ups if the guys’t started ’em hadda go an’ get shot at.”

“Indeed. That was the idea.” He opened his saddle-horn again, made a few surprisingly minute adjustments with those giant hands of his. “Well, my boy, you were well advised burying that damaged timepiece of yours. You see the blip, here? That’s where you’ll find it, and, by extension, your ship as well.”

Standin’ on legs made shaky an’ unreliable by three hours in the saddle, I rooted around in the saddlebags while Bella made things interesting by tryin’ t’step on my foot. The inseams of my jeans felt like they were on fire. Horseper-sonship—you can have it!

Bravely: “I’m ready for all contingencies, Olongo. Think this is enough lead foil? I’d hate t’give up that watch. An’ speakin’ of gettin’ shot at
—stand still, Bella
!—I wanna point out that this is my flight now. Don’t want any of you nice folks hurt on my account.”

I loosened up my war-Colt in its scabbard.

“Why
Bernie!"
uttered a scandalized Koko. She swung off her Ciydesdale, shaking the ground. The chimps’d ridden out on the flanks a few yards, triangulatin’ on my violated Nukatron warranty, an’ were cornin’ back now.

“Quite right, my dear. Captain Gruenblum, we would be remiss in the extreme abandoning you at this juncture. There are certain
standards
in the Confederacy, particularly regarding courtesy to guests.” He dismounted with surprising grace.

Wasn’t anything I could say. Lefty, Olongo’s point-man, kneed his pony up beside me, showing fangs in a manner hardly meant t’convey amusement.

“Ever now an’ agin, Cap’n, we get some grief from Hamiltonians.” He pulled a heavy Dardick-style pistol from his holster, testing both magazine an’ cylinder t’make sure they were fulla ivory-colored triangular plastic cartridges. “Don’t see as it makes no nevermind whether they’re domestic or imported, right, Dex?”

The other chimpanzee, Dexter, reached back to his saddlebags for a telescoping shoulder-stock which he slid into the backstrap of his Mauser automatic, substituting an enormous drum for the smaller box magazine. He pulled the bolt back a fraction of an inch, assuring himself there was a thumb-sized cartridge in the chamber, let it clack forward again, an’ grinned savagely.

“Dex’s daddy fought in Uganda,” supplied Lefty, thinking that explained everything. The other cowboy never said a word, but simply rested that long-barreled pistol-carbine across his leather-clad leg an’ showed his teeth.

“Bernie, you know the tactical situation better than we.” The President carried something called a Webley Electric— .17 caliber, ultrahigh velocity. Inside, a nylon rotor lifted wire projectiles from the hundred-round magazine to the acceleration coils. I’d seen him test it this momin’ on a cottonwood stump. The sawdust’d
steamed
for twenty minutes afterward.

Koko carried the . 11-caliber version, two-hundred to the clip.

“Right,” I answered, thinkin’ hard. “Far’s I know, I ruined Cromney’s only real weapon, but
Georgie
's got facilities for fabricatin’ practically anything, an’ some pretty scary talents all her own. Theoretically, no offensive armament, but meteor-defense, force-fields...” I yawned an’ blinked, tired, I figgered, from the trail. “Best we sneak aboard ’fore we get spotted in the open.”

There was a pleasant damp an’ woody smell t’my new vantage-point—nose four inches above the turf. I could see a hundred varieties of tiny wild blossoms, none more’n a quarter inch across, takin’ advantage of the temporarily tropical moisture. Come cactus-weather, things’d be different.

The drizzle’d finally let up, but fog clamped down in its place. Even if I’d stood—targetin’ myself immediately to
Georgie
's multispectral senses—I couldn’ta seen more’n two meters. Instead, I crawled along through soaking weeds, tryin’ t’keep my rump down, hopin’ the liquid sunshine’d blanket my IR signature.

We’d agreed t’spread out, gorillas an’ chimps circlin’ through the trees so’s to approach the landin’ site from all directions. I’d waited in the aspens for Olongo, Lefty, Koko, an’ Dexter t’get into position.

There’d been a squabble ’bout the kid.

. and you, my girl, may remain and keep our mounts togeth—”

“But Uncle Olongo, that’s not fair!”

“My dear, the
universe
isn’t fair—it’s simply lawful. Besides, your grandmother would never forgive—”

“Leave her out of this and speak for yourself! I’m three times Dex or Lefty’s size, twice Bernie’s, and a better shot than
you
in my sleep! And I’ve practically memorized this part of the ranch. Ask Austin!”

He waggled a broad finger at her. “Argument from authority, Koko. Austin isn’t here any more than Goldilocks. And Dex and Lefty are grownups, whereas you’re merely—”

“What’s
age
got to do with it? It’s a Free System! I’m ;a sapient individual with
rights,
one of which is helping Bernie, if I want!”

Sheepishly, her uncle admitted he’d held the same position on children’s rights next-t’last time Congress’d met. He gimme a helpless look.

“Leave me outa this! I’m justa guilty by-stander!”

Meantime, the chimps were tyin’ their ponies to a branch—either they were sidin’ with the kid or knew her better’n I did. In the end, they had the situation pegged: she fanned out with the rest of us, an’ providin’ things were runnin’ t’schedule, she’d be pantomimin’ a peanut race this minute, just like me.

Couldn’t be much farther. I watched for
Georgie
's bulk t’loom up outa the pea-soup, listenin’ t’dew-drops drippin’ offa sagebrush, my own raggedy chicken-hearted breathin’, not much else.

Oughta be
somewhere
’round here.

I wondered how old Koko really was.

A standup gunfight’d be a relief. Better’n scrabblin’ around in wet landscapin’. Pistol in hand, I crawled another soggy yard.

A piddlin’ little breeze parted the ground-clutter suddenly, an’ there she was, a big gray metal dome, some Eskimo’s idea of a high-rise, three, mebbe four meters away an’ lookin’ just gorgeous t’me. Cromney an’ his minions musta been plumb loco, gettin’ snuck up on thisaway— less’n they figgered t’drygulch us.

I shook my head—goddamned Louis L’Amour atmosphere was gettin’ to me. Tryin’ t’dig a slit-trench with m’belt buckle, I crept toward the saucer. This was gonna be iffy.

She was sealed up tight. Hafta hope her recog patterns hadn’t been tampered with. Once she saw m’face, she’d let me in. I’d skedaddle to the engine-room, turnin’ the thermonuclear tables: be amusin’ t’see how
they
liked bein’ threatened with Failsafe Autodestruct.

I could practically feel the big red lever in m’hand.

Georgie
ain’t a perfect hemisphere; she slants in underneath a ways. I ducked under, got m’fingers on the rain-slippery lip of her circumference, inchin’ into the view-field of one of her outboard monitors.

SWOOOOOSH!!

Ever been in the middle of a twister? One second I had aholda my ship, the next I was Iyin’ all tangled up in a heapa furry arms an’ legs, gunbelts, chaps, an’ Stetson hats, in the center of the ninety-foot circle where there
wasn’t
any
Georgie
anymore.

By some miracle, m’eardrums’d survived the implosion. Barely.

“But Bemie!” complained Koko, extractin’ her left foot outa her uncle’s armpit. “What about that..
.thing
you’ve been carrying around in your pocket? I thought that was supposed to—”

“This frammis?” I removed Dexter’s elbow from my eye while he pulled the muzzle of Lefty’s gun outa his ear. I took the object in question, turned it over in my hand, feelin' stupid. Could be the Freenies were right about my mental processes lately.

“Oh, Cromney an’ his crew’re still around, somewhere within a few hundred klicks. But y’don’t need a field-density equalizer for the Emergency Escape Drive.”

Sunlight broke through the fog, fillin’ the pasture with rainbows an’ diamonds.

They helped me dig m’wristwatch up, cleanin’ their knives in the wet grass an’ checkin’ ’em afterward against Olongo’s educated saddle-horn. I smoothed down the radiation-proof foil.

Bella wasn’t very glad t’see me. We’d thought we were ridda each other. First time I turned m’back, untanglin’ her reins from the bush I’d tied her to, she bit me on the shoul-der-blade.

All of us were more tired an’ discouraged than our exertions accounted for. My friends sorted out their mounts from the vegetation, climbed into the saddle, an’ we started the long trip back.

All I had t’occupy my consciousness was failure—an’ ilie agony which painted itself along the insides of my legs from knee t’crotch.

Halfway there, Aus Clintwood dropped in from the sky, freshly-polished chrome gleamin’ in the sunshine, to deliver a thermos of coffee an’ a bottle of somethin’ labeled “Kinglsey’s Pennsylvania Whiskey—The Drink That Makes You Drunk!”

Even Koko had a swig, without a noise of complaint from Olongo. She deserved it. I wished it’d been morphine.

We rode on.

It was supposed t’be too cold so far this year. It was supposed t’be a couple thousand feet too high. But somehow, not a half-hour from the bunk-house, Bella managed t’step right in the middle of somethin’ fanged an’ scaly.

The diamondback hissed an’ rattled. Bella screamed an’ reared. Snatching at the saddle-hom too late, I catapulted over her neck, crashing not an arm’s length from the coiled infuriated snake. With no consciousness of drawing it, my .45 was in my hand, sights lined up, just as the reptile struck.

click

9 Green Blooms the Gumshoe

ZZZZAP!

The kewpie-doll belonged t’Koko. Her snap shot took the rattler’s head off, leavin’ the resta the critter twistin’ an’ writhin’ in the freshly dampened lap of a badly shaken time-traveler. My own hammer’d fallen without effect; the old reliable Gold Cup National Match, the rod an’ staff that’d comforted me for decades, lay inert an’ useless in my tremblin’ hand.

“Bemie! Are you all right?” The President and Koko echoed one another, fightin’ t’get their horses back under control.

“I’ll live.” I glanced at my own mount, flailin’ on her side an’ makin’ horrible noises. “Better look t’Bella, though.”

“Uncle Olongo!” Koko cried. “You’ve got to
do
something!”

The good news was the mare’d broken her leg.

The bad news was that, no, they
don’t
shoot horses. The Confederacy’s got some sorta electromagnetic band-aid; knits bones together ten times faster’n they’ll heal on their own. Bella’d be up an’ around in a week, makin’ some other dude’s life miserable.

I hoped she’d blow a fuse.

“But you’ve fed me, put me up, put up
with
me, an’ saved m’life! I can’t let you do this!”

Olongo leaned on the fender—make that “skirt”—of the metallic-blue Tucker ground-effect machine, lookin’ at me through the opened plastic bubble. “Balderdash, dear boy.

I simply won’t hear any further objections.”

He handed in a pistol, a “loaner” t’pinch-hit for the useless .45 folded into its gunbelt on my lap. It was a .375 high-pressure Magnum, manufactured by a Browning Company in Nauvoo, Illinois.

Funny, the way I remembered it; the Browning family’d gotten burned out with the resta the Midwest Mormons an’ moved t’Utah.

Weren’t any front or rear sights on the .375. Underneath the muzzle-crown, doin’ double duty as a recoil-spring plunger, was a minuscule tubular laser. Haul up on the trigger-slack, it’d put a bright red dot where bullets’d follow if you kept on tightenin’ your finger.

I’d field-stripped my .45 immediately on the trail. The firing-pin an’ its little spring were rusted in their tunnel through the slide as solid as if they’d been welded. Blood had started the process, back aboard
Georgie,
an’ the steady rain’d done the rest. What I couldn’t figger was why I hadn’t thought t’clean it before the damage was done.

Mormons still in Illinois? I yawned, a sudden unaccountable fatigue settlin’ over me, an’ shoved the Browning in a pocket of my coveralls where it
clinked.
Olongo’s hospitality hadn’t stopped at loanin’ me a gun. Keepin’ company with the pistol was enough gold coinage t’get me arrested for profiteerin’, smugglin’, hoardin’, tamperin’ with the currency, or any other euphemism for seekin’ independence from government counterfeitin’ in practically any culture I’d ever visited.

I was gonna
need
that gold. So far. I’d met chimpanzees, gorillas, an’ one horse more’n I’d ever wanted to. Earlier this afternoon. I’d even met a herda unicorns.

You ever hearda unicorns?

Now I was gonna meet a real, live Bear.

I’d been sittin’ on a fence, talkin’ to the Featherstone-Haughs, gawkin’ at a flock of critters who aren’t s’posed to exist, an’ tryin’ t’forget the numerous aches, pains, scars.

an’ bruises Bella’d inflicted on me that mornin’. A siesta thee Freenies’d insisted I take seemed to’ve ironed all the injuries in permanently.

“What do you think of my uncle’s new corral, Bernie?”

“It’s okay.” I took a drag of my cigar t’kill my sense of smell.

“That’s exactly what Wyatt Earp said!” She started gigglin’.

“‘Earp’ is the correct expression.” Olongo groaned, changin’ the subject. “Really, old man, I can’t imagine why I didn’t hit on this scheme straightaway.” He drew on his own cigar, lettin’ blue smoke trickle around his fangs.

Koko nodded, unrepentant. “He’s a good man, Bernie. Olongo’s told me so many stories, I—”

“Look, friends,
nothin’s
simple about any parta this.” I pointed into the paddock where forty or fifty four-legged office-spindles were millin’ around, decidin’ who was gonna be bull of the woods. “Who’da believed even
this?”

In popular mythology, a unicorn’s a
horse
—probably a snow-white Arabian—with this one little difference. But it ain’t so. Check any medieval tapestry. They’re smaller, meaner, a
whole
lot smellier, basically goats, with chin-whiskers an’ catty-corner pupils. I’d been wonderin’ what in Ochskahrt’s name they were good for.