L. Neil Smith - North American Confederacy 02 (9 page)

There in the valley under the moonglow and the Milky Way, not five hundred lousy meters from my damp, dark, miserable campsite, Uncle Olongo’s Cabin lay in a broad, warm pool of buttery electric light.

7 Zootier than Thou

Olongo Featherstone-Haugh, America’s twenty-fifth President (not countin’ Gallatin’s final term an’ “None-of-the-Above”), was an Everest of flesh in an avalanche of reddish-black shag carpet. Only it
wasn’t
the United States, but the “North American Confederacy”—and the list of former Chief Execs included four women, two Indians, a black guy, an’ a French-Canadian Chinese.

But I’m gettin’ aheada myself.

Havin’ seen my little fire extinguished carefully, Koko shepherded us aliens down to a rambling three-story mansion she honestly regarded as a modest working ranch-house. A whitewashed timber fence separated lawn from pasture; the usual moron’d lined up head-sized rocks along the graveled pathway an’ painted ’em—incandescent pink. Freenies musta thought it was a ticket queue.

Maybe it only
seemed
like a three-mile hike around back. Even this late, somebody was stirrin’ in the hangarous kitchen, a graying female Koko addressed as “Grandma Goldilocks,” who plied us all with fresh hot biscuits, more butter’n I’d ever seen collected outside a USDA warehouse, scrambled eggs, an’ heaps of tiny, oddly-flavored, thin-sliced steaklets. My companions appreciated the gallons of steaming coffee. So did I. Never keeps me awake when I don’t want it to—I can take a cup t’bed with me like warm milk.

Before very long, I was seein’ double; too much food, too little sleep. My fuzzy hostesses frog-marched me, the seemingly tireless Freenies taggin’ along, to a guest-room down a half-kilometer of corridor. Kept thinkin’ about the Yankee who fell into a Texas swimmin’ pool an’ went down hollerin’, “Don’t flush it!” Exceptin’ for that Roman REM extravaganza ’bout an hour later, I hit the pillow an’ didn’t return to the land of the livin’ until three o’clock next afternoon—naked as a jaybird.

Well, if it hadn’t embarrassed the simiennes, it wasn’t gonna embarrass me.

The fat quilted coverlet was gaily printed with cattle brands an’ cactuses. The bed-frame, constructed outa Conestoga wagon wheels, matched another one hung horizontal from the ceiling mounting half a dozen chimneyed lamps. The walls were spongy, weathered mesquite, an’ the throwing on the floor mighta once been a gorilla itself, except for the baling-hook claws at its comers an’ a nasty
Ursus horribilis
snarl I damn near shoved my foot into gettin’ outa bed.

Found my clothing, crisp an’ spotless, in a mock saloondoored closet, courteously left open. A momentary panic subsided when I noticed the field-density frammis lying with my other pocketry on a beer-barrel dresser, in a lamp rigged out t’look like a tiny hand-pumped horse-trough. Without thinkin’, I began climbing back into Academy greens, but somethin’ rebellious started me riffling through the other outfits left for me t’choose from.

Trousers here were sturdy, baggy, flared, with extra-wide belt-loops, as if everybody lifted weights in their off-hours an’ needed kidney support. There were tunics of a military cut (overlookin’ the almost Yamaguchian patterns and colors), a sorta Nehru-necked sportscoat the Shah of Egypt mighta liked, whose bottom edging swept the terracotta floor, an’ right beside it, three regular no-foolin’ kilts, complete with sporran, two of ’em honest plaid—an’ one
paisley,
for Ochskahrt’s sake! Also a couple hooded numbers halfway between a cape and a
serape.

I kept my Airborne Rangers in preference to the pointy-toed monstrosities at the bottom of the closet, selecting a pair of pleated orange pants—the most conservative at hand—and an epauleted robin’s-egg blouse. I was prepared t’get laughed at for what I was throwin’ together—after all, nobody trained Mrs. Gruenblum’s little boy for
this
mission—-an’ make corrections later. Under one of those cloak-things, silver-gray an’ tossed back rakishly, I strapped my blood-stained pistol rig; made me feel better in unknown territory, an’ last night I’d noticed even Grandma Goldilocks was heeled—a semitrusive four-barreled derringer of about .60 caliber, which, with a locket on a golden chain, had constituted her entire wardrobe.

“When in Rome,” I shuddered, recalling the dream, “say hello to the table.”

It was lightly overcast an’ drizzlin’ outside, the sun an anemic brassy disc. The window opened out on a meadow edged with evergreen almost black in the fine mist. At the limit of vision grazed several dozen quadrupedal blobs, supervised by a hazy figure on horseback.

Checking my pistol chamber, I took a final gander in the portion of the wall adjusted to nonreversing mirrorhood, turned one way, then the other, an’ waggled my eyebrows. “Reet!”

When the door got outa my way politely, I discovered Color waiting for me, sucking on a tea-bag. “The trousers are properly worn tucked into the boot-tops, O Lord.” Hopping on one leg while making adjustments to the other, I followed this fifteen-inch fluorescent arbiter-of-fashion as he trundled down the hall—the string an’ tag of the teabag trailing out from underneath his shell.

They were gathered in the living room, and I’d guessed right about the gunbelt, at least. Olongo Featherstone-Haugh couldn’t tuck his trousers in; the pair of denim Bermuda shorts he was wearing, complete with leather tag and copper rivets, missed the'scallops of his sixteen-inch red, white, and gold-eagled mule-ears by a mile. The Tony Lamas matched a heavy leather pistol rig. The shorts matched a monogrammed vest with copper buttons. Parked across the room on the back of a massive roll-top desk was enough pearl-gray Stetson to hold revival-meetings in. Koko sat beside him in a squaw-dress with a concho belt and thirty pounds of turquoise jewelry. The President looked just like a giant furry Dallas Cowboy cheerleader.

It wouldn’ta been
too
crazy t’start lookin’ for
Georgie
right here in this room. Plenty of space between its leather-paneled walls. Both gorillas occupied a two-tone calfskin sofa only slightly smaller than the
San Francisco Palace,
Koko with a cup of coffee on her knee, Olongo with a cooler in his hand that put me in minda that Texican swim-min’ pool again. He waved me to a similar settee across an acre of slab-rock coffee table, little trilobites an’ petrified seaweed peekin’ up through plate-glass. Lunch was steaming in the middle, plus a stand of Cuban cigars. Badly torn, I evaded the issue by takin’ a better look around.

First thing when I woke up that momin’, I’d triggered memory-cues I had on twentieth century history—data implanted during Academy days, supplemented regularly since, via DreamCap. Wasn’t sure what good it’d do in this instance: just sittin’ in this room generated dissonances enough t’send me to the migraine ward.

It was like the bedroom, piled higher and deeper: brick-tile floor; black iron chandelier and wall-sconces, both with pseudokerosene fixtures; more wagon wheels an’ empty grizzly bears; deer, elk, an’ moose-antennae everywhere y’looked. The couch I sat on was draped with a cougar hide.

In one corner, a glassed-in case displayed three dozen deadly-looking hand-weapons, most of which, by rights, shouldn’ta been invented yet. Perhaps oddest of all, over the arched adobe walk-in fireplace hung a portrait of the 1900’s most-respected flatto idol, John Wayne, enigmatically inscribed:
“To Olongo, warmest re-gards, Mike."

“My dear Captain Gruenblum!” The west-of-the-Pecos ambience suffered immediately for Olongo’s Oxford accent. “Do please make yourself comfortable, old man. It isn’t often we’ve the pleasure to entertain a certifiably Mysterious Stranger.”

He gestured with a broad hand toward the soup an’ sandwiches a modestly-attired Goldilocks was arranging on the table, filled his own gigantic glass halfway with tomato juice, and upended a plastic can of beer into it. It fizzed.

I looked at Koko, wondering how much she’d told him. “Don’t mind if I do, Your Presidency. I see m’friends’re taken care of; if introductions’re still in order, say hello t’Color, Charm, an’ Spin.” The aliens bobbed their eyes politely.

“I suppose,” the President observed, “that we all have our little quarks."

The Yamaguchians perched on a divan upholstered with an Indian blanket an’ pulled up to the table. Coffee an’ salad were the order of the day for the essentially vegetarian critters. I followed their example, adding a square foot of sirloin, thought about the beer—got vetoed by my stomach—an’ settled back.

“And this grim- visaged fellow”—my host nodded toward a figure standing by the floor-to-ceiling picture-window— “is Austin Clintwood, my foreman. Koko leads me to understand his services may be of some use to you.”

Clintwood was tall for his height, dressed in faded blue-jeans, leather chaps an’ vest, a brightly colored shirt that clashed with his bandanna, and the ubiquitous broad gun-belt, well-used. His feet were bare. At his hip an age-grayed automatic hung, and from a pocket of his vest, the tag-end of a Bull-Durham sack. Hat and spurs he held politely in one hand, but he seemed impatient t’be out an’ doin’ whatever cowboys go out an’ do. A shame, ’cause he was the first Confederate I’d met who wasn’t a gorilla.

He was a chimpanzee.

His William S. Hart get-up was spoiled just a mite by the banana he was munchin’ on, but the voice slipped outa his wrist-talker low an’ steady, almost a whisper. “Howdy.” He was an ape of few words, strong and silent.

“Howdy yerself,” I answered. “Seen any spaceships lately? ’Bout twenty-five meters, round an’ shiny?” I gestured with my hands.

Clintwood gave his boss a sour look, as if t’say
this
is what you dragged me in here for?

“I assure you, Austin, the gentleman’s quite serious.” Olongo gestured toward the Freenies. “And truthful, if these little fellows are any—great Albert’s ghost, how very condescending! For all I know, the three of you could be... sincerest apologies, dear friends, I—”

“My fault, Mr. President,” I cut in when Olongo finished arguin’ with himself. I nodded toward the chimpanzee. “Don’t blame your ramrod none, either, for bein’ skeptical.” I fought down the depressing mental image of Ochskahrt’s pylon. “Guess I’m gonna hafta tell the whole blamed story over again. How much do they know, Koko?”

I stretched for one of the Havanas on the table.

She sipped her coffee delicately. “Only that I found you wandering around out there, looking for your ‘flying saucer’.” She winked. “And that the Freenies are from Ganymede.”

“You didn’t mention I’m a—”

“Gosh, Bernie, I didn’t think you wanted me to!” “Discretion. If I weighed another three hundred kilos”— I looked down, grinning at my skinny frame—“think I’d askya t’marry me, Miss Featherstone-Haugh. Olongo, Austin, Grandma Goldilocks, you’re lookin’ at a Man-from-the-Future...”

Never trust a Gruenblum t’make a long story short. Every scrap of food vanished from the coffee table, bite by bite; we clear-cut Olongo’s grove of cigars; he had t’send out for liquid reinforcements.

Mumbling indistinct obscenities about the past week’s constant drizzle, Clintwood had his pistol disassembled, parts scattered all over the tabletop, an’ was cleanin’ it. Fella
never
left off workin’. Only when the thing was dry, spotless, an’ back together in his holster did he obey his boss’s direct order to relax, aided by a brace of double bourbons.

Somethin’ labeled Old Lysander. Smelled just like the solvent he’d used t’clean his autopistol, t’me.

I had a tough time gettin’ the story past Nagasaki.

“Did I hear you correctly, young man?” Grandma Goldilocks thumbed up the volume on her hearing-aid. She’d turned out t’be Koko’s real grandmother; the young gorilla had “divorced” her parents—Cinderella and B’wana—

Olongo’s brother. Never did get it straight whether Goldilocks was Cinderella’s mom or Olongo’s.

“Yeah," came Clintwood’s sibilant voice, “I don’t savvy why they dropped
the first
uranium bomb on the Nipponese, let alone the second.”

“Plutonium, Austin. An’ y’got me, friend. Always thought they shouida
demonstrated
the damn thing to the Japs— woulda scared ’em right outa their kimonos, an’ they was on their last legs, anyway.

“The second bomb? That was just plain downright meanness. I hear tell it was originally intended for Berlin. Story is that Roosevelt made a deal with the Russians—you followin’ this?—not t’keep a spare bomb around, so the Truman Administration hadda find a way t’use it up.”

“And several tens of thousands of sapient beings with it—after which they prosecuted the
Germans
for mass murder! This is beginning to sound distressingly familiar, Ber-nie,” the President shuddered. “Pray finish as quickly as you can.”

I didn't stop t’wonder, then, how Olongo knew about World War II. I simply brought everbody up t’where I’d almost taken his niece for a grizzly an’ put her concertina outa its obvious misery.

“So y’see, it ain’t just gettin’ back t’2285. Find
Georgie,
that’ll take care of itself. Trouble is, I ain’t sure what
kinda
twenty-third century’s up there waitin’ for us. ’Thall due respect, you folks ain’t parta any continuity I recognize.” “Oh dear!” cried Koko, a stunned look on her fur-fringed puss. “And I thought I had everything figured out! Uncle Olongo, what’s going
on
here?”

The President stared out at the gathering darkness, puffing his cigar. “Captain Gruenblum—”

“Bernie.”

“Very well, Bernie: what you’ve told us is exactly
perpendicular
to any referential frame we’re prepared to deal with. Journeys into the past and future? There are imaginative stories ... what’s that writer’s name—Proxmire, something like that. However, Koko’s surmises related to a phenomenon, albeit not a whit less fantastic, yet demonstrably real: accidental transposition across the lines of probability.”

I stared at my host. “How’s that again?”

“Bernie, the universe is broader than
anyone
might have suspected only a decade ago. There are... ‘places’ where, for terrible example, George Washington and Alexander Hamilton
won
the Whiskey Rebellion, or—”