Mission: Earth "Black Genesis" (16 page)

BIRTHS AND DEATHS, WAIT IN LINE PLEASE

I hoped the old (bleepard) was properly in line himself. He would be dead in about five minutes.

Heller walked up to the counter and dropped his bags.

The old man raised his half-bald, gray head. "You th' boy?"

"Tha's what they say," said Heller.

"Ah wondered if it would evuh come to this," said

the old man, cryptically. He came over and looked at Heller closely. "So you be Delbert John Rockecenter, Junior?"

"Tha's what they say," said Heller.

"That be two hundrud dollahs," said the old man, pushing a birth certificate forward but holding on to it.

Hah, I thought. America is crooked as always. He'd upped the price a hundred.

Heller reached into his pocket. You could see the money was strange-looking to him. He turned some of the bills over.

The old man reached across and plucked two hundreds off the roll and pocketed them.

Heller picked up the birth certificate. It gave his name, said he was blond, said he'd been born at home. It had a seal on it and the clerk's signature. The date of birth made Heller just seventeen! Heller put it in his pocket.

"Much obliged," said Heller.

He picked up the bags, turned and limped back down the curving courthouse steps. He pushed through the front door and walked down into the street.

I turned the audio volume down, knowing what was coming.

With a roar and flame and a splintering crash, the upper windows of the building blew out!

Standard procedure.

Good-bye, you old cheating (bleepard), I said. Always give a prayer for the dead. It brings luck.

Flame was starting to gush out through one of the windows. When Terb bombs something, he really bombs it. He's fond of exaggeration. And he always uses locally obtained explosives, too, avoiding any Space Code break. A master!

Wait! What in the name of Gods was Heller doing!

That blast would attract attention even on this deserted hill. Fire engines existed even in Virginia. In fact, they are so proud of their fire engines, they're always having rallies of volunteer fire companies for miles around!

Any trained man would have understood. And he would have started running. Fast!

Not Heller! He dropped his suitcases. He streaked through the main door. He raced up those stairs. He bashed his way into Births and Deaths!

The place was on fire! It was filled with smoke!

Even the counter was blown over! Heller was down, right at floor level. He snaked ahead, feeling through the churning fury.

He found a hand, a sleeve. He yanked. A body was in view.

There was a carpet on the floor. Heller snapped the ends to him. He wrapped it around the old man with two quick jerks.

He went backwards, dragging the wrapped body with him.

He got to the stairs and threw the carpeted body over his shoulder and went down five steps at a time.

He burst into the open air. He stepped sideways to a strip of lawn.

Oh, well, I thought. Not too bad. They always arrest everybody in sight when there's a bomb explosion. That's why you have to get away from them quick. And Heller was staying right there, the idiot.

He unwrapped the old man. He beat out some bits of smoldering cloth.

The old man opened his eyes, "What... what in hell was that?"

"You all raht?" said Heller.

The old man felt around. "Ah be purty bruised up but she don' look like nothin' broke. It's that (bleeped)

stove. I tol' 'em t' shut it off las' spring! She blew up befo'. Th' pilot light goes aht and she fills with gas...."

The old man's eyes were staring at the building. Heller looked. The windows were all blown out and part of the roof and the flames were starting to roar up with lashing tongues into the sky.

It was just now sinking in what had happened to him. He was staring at Heller, his eyes going round. "Jesus Christ, kid," he said with awe. "You risk yoah neck somethin' awful draggin' me aht o' there!" He shook his head as though to clear his eyes. He looked at Heller much more intensely. "You saved mah life, youngster!"

Heller was making sure the old man was all right. He was trying to get him to flex his fingers.

Over on the other side of town, what was probably a volunteer fire department was getting busy. A summons bell was clanging, shattering the night.

"Shouldn' Ah call somebody or somethin'?" said Heller. "An ambeoolance?"

"Kid, look. Ah jus' thought. Jesus Christ, you bettuh git aht o' heah! There'll be fiahmen and repohtahs ahl ovah this place in about one minute. Ah'll be ahl raht, youngster. Ah'll nevah fohget you. But with a name lahk yoahs, you bettuh run lahk hell, quick!"

"Glad Ah could help aht," said Heller. And he moved off.

"If'n Ah can evuh be moah help t' you," the old man called after him, "you jus' yell fo' Stonewall Biggs!"

Heller walked down the hill, carrying his bags. The ground was bathed with the fiercely burning courthouse fire.

He was on the street sidewalk when the fire engine passed. He looked back, then stood waiting. The whole top of the hill was being crowned in flames. There went

a Virginia landmark. Probably, I thought, George Washington had slept there.

Shortly, an ambulance went by.

Heller hefted his bags and limped onward toward the bus station.

He stopped suddenly. He got out a notebook. He wrote: They can't make stoves.

A black man was standing at the door of the bus station, broom in hand, an old hat on the back of his head. He was looking up the street to the fire on the hill. I hoped he would wake up and notice there was a stranger in town and connect him with the fire.

"When is the next bus?" said Heller.

"Hoo-ee," said the black. "Now, ain't that some fiah! Y'all evuh see a fiah that big?"

I imagine Heller, as a Fleet combat engineer, had seen whole cities on fire. He had probably set some himself that would make that courthouse fire look like a stray spark.

"Tha's purty big," said Heller. He went in and put down his bags.

It was a very dingy bus station: ripped-up plastic seats, discarded newspapers on the floor. There was a ticket wicket at the far end.

The black came in, shaking his head. He put down the broom, went into the wicket and took off his hat. With a flourish, he opened the front of the wicket.

"Wheah you goin'?" he called. "Richmun', Washin'ton, New Yahk, Mahami? O' maybe Atlanta?"

"Atlanta?" said Heller, walking over to the counter. I thought, here we go again! More Manco! More Prince Caucalsia!

"Oh, tha's a fahn town," the black said. "Plenty white ladies, yallah ladies, black ladies. Any coluh you got a wishin' fo'. A real fahn town. Or maybe you'd lahk Buhmin'ham. Now that is the fahnes' town you evuh hope to see, man."

"Ah'm goin' to New Yahk," said Heller.

"Oh, ah'm real sorry 'bout that. This bus line only go to Lynchburg." The black man had come down out of his daydream about wondrous places to visit. "This ol' dumb town o' Fair Oakes ain't real well connected. But y'all c'n change at Lynchburg. Ah c'n sell you a ticket to theah, tho'."

"That'll be real fahn," said Heller.

The black got busy and very efficiently issued the ticket. "Tha's two dollahs an' fohty cents. Next bus comin' thoo heah 'bout midnight. Tha's 'bout an hour an' a half y'all gotta wait. Heah is yoah ticket, heah is yoah change. We ain' got no entertainment, 'less you wanna go watch the co'thouse fiah. No? Well, you jus' make yo'self t' home. Now Ah's the janitor ag'in."

He put his hat back on, closed the wicket and picked up his broom. But he went outside to watch the fire on the hill.

Heller sat down with a suitcase on either side of him. He started reading the various travel signs that told about the joys of Paris, the glories of ancient Greece and one that advised that there was going to be a fried chicken supper at the local high school last September.

I thought I might hear the crackle of flames in the distance so I turned up the gain. I didn't hear flames,

only some distant commotion. Wouldn't anybody notice there was a stranger in town? Where were the police? Fine lot of police they were! When there's a bombing or big fire, the first thing you do is look for strangers. I was quite put out. There sat Heller, comfortable as could be. The black started to do some sweeping. He began to sing:

Hark to the story of Willie the Weeper,

Willie the Weeper was a chimney sweeper.

He had the hop habit and he had it bad.

Oh, listen while I tell you 'bout the dream he had!

He wanted to sweep under Heller's right foot, so Heller, accommodatingly, lifted his right foot.

He went to the hop joint the other night, When he knew that the lights would be burnin' bright.

I guess he smoked a dozen pills or more. When he woke up he wuz on a foreign shore.

He had finished the right foot area. He wanted to sweep under Heller's left foot. Heller accommodatingly raised it.

Queen o' Bulgaria was the first in his net.

She called him her darlin' an' her lovin' pet.

She promised him a pretty Ford automobile,

With a diamond headlight and a silver steerin' wheel.

Amongst the swish of the broom, which didn't seem to really be doing much but raise dust, I thought I heard the distant chortle of a police car. It seemed to be approaching the bus station.

Willie landed in New York one evenin' late.

He asked his sugar for an afterdate. Willie he got funny. She began to shout, 'Bim bam boo!'—an' the dope gave out.

It was a police car! It came to a stop with a squeal of tires and a dying chortle. Right outside the bus station!

Aha, I thought with gratification, the local police aren't so inefficient after all. They're checking the bus station for strangers! Well, untrained, amateur Heller, you are about to get it! And he wasn't even looking at the door!

The sharp yelp of someone being hurt. Heller's head whipped around.

Two enormous policemen were barging into the room. They were dressed in black vinyl short jackets. They were girded around with handcuffs and guns. They had billy clubs ready in their hands.

Between them they were dragging a small, young woman! Tears were pouring out of her eyes. She was fighting like a wild thing.

"Let me go! You God (bleeped) (bleepards)!" she was shouting. "Let me go!"

The cops sent her hurtling forward. She collided with a vinyl chair. One of the cops was at her at once, spinning her about and making her sit down.

The other cop got a battered suitcase out of the police car, sent it skidding across the floor at the girl and it hit her in the legs. Then he walked over to the ticket wicket, shouting, "Open this up, you black (bleepard)!"

The cop hulking over the girl had her pinned to the chair.

"You got no right to do this!" she was yelling at him.

"We gaht all the raht in the worl'!" said the cop. "If'n the chief says Horsey Mary Schmeck goes aht of

town tonight, then aht of town goes Horsey Mary Schmeck and heah you is!"

Tears were cascading down her cheeks. Perspiration beaded her forehead. She was probably only about twenty-five but she looked thirty-five—deep bags under her eyes. Except for that, she was not unpretty. Her brown hair was over part of her face and she swept it away. She was trying to get up.

She renewed the verbal attack. "Your (bleeped) chief wasn't talking that way when he got out of my bed last week! He said I could work this town as long as I wanted."

"Tha' was las' week," said the cop, pinning her down to the chair again. "This's this week!"

She tried to claw at his face. "You (bleeped) two-bit (bleepard)! You yourself sold me a nickel bag last Monday!"

"Tha' was las' Monday," said the cop. He had her pinned. "You know an' Ah know what this is all about. Tha' God (bleeped) new Fed narco moved in on th' dis-tric'. Nobody knew it'd been changed. Nobody give him his split so he's cleanin' the whole place up. And y'all is the kind of trash tha's bein' swept out."

She was crying again. "Oh, Joe. Please sell me a nickel bag. Look, I'll go. I'll get on the bus. But I got to have a fix, Joe. Please! I can't take it, Joe! Just one little fix and I'll go!"

The other cop had come back from the ticket window. "Shut up, Mary. You 'n all of us know the distric' is total empty of big H now. Joe, did th' chief give you bus fare fo' this (bleepch)?"

The girl was collapsed. Tears streamed from red eyes. Sweat beaded her head. I knew what was wrong. She was a dope addict that was moving into the withdrawal symptoms. It would get worse before it got any

better. As she scrubbed at her eyes, one could see the needle scars inside her arm. A girl trying to keep up with the expensive habit by selling her body. Ordinary situation. And they were moving her out of town. Ordinary handling. But maybe she'd infected the chief with something. Venereal disease goes right along with drugs and prostitution. It was such a common scene that I had no hope Heller would get himself in trouble over it.

"Well, Ah ain' forkin' ovah none of mah own cash t' get her aht o' town," said the cop who had gone to the ticket wicket.

Joe grabbed the girl's purse. She made a frantic effort to retain it and got a punch in the jaw in return. She fell to the floor, crying.

The two cops went over to the ticket window. Joe began to rummage through the purse. "Hey, would you look at this!" he said. He pulled out a roll of bills and started counting. "A hunnad an' thutty-two dallahs!"

"That'll buy a lot of white mule!" said the other cop.

They both laughed. They split the roll and put it into their pockets.

Suddenly the two cops and the wicket were huge in my screen!