Mission: Earth "Black Genesis" (21 page)

He had picked up a sweet roll, a container of milk and another of coffee while I was in my other room praying. He gently tried to wake up Mary Schmeck. She fought him off, trying to go back to sleep. I could see her pupils were contracted. She wanted nothing to do with the roll or the milk or coffee.

"We've got to leave," said Heller.

This got to her. "Washington," she said.

"Yes, we'll be going through Washington, D.C.," Heller replied.

She muttered, "There's sure to be some junk in Washington. There always is. It's full of it. Get me there, for Christ's sakes." She tried to get up. Then she screamed, "Oh, my God! My legs!" They were drawing up in knots. She fell back whimpering.

He picked up all the luggage, went out and put it in the back seat. Then he returned and carried Mary Schmeck out and put her in the front seat. He laid her shoes on the floorboards. He put the milk, coffee and the roll in the drink tray.

He had the key in his hand and didn't know what to do with it, didn't realize you just left it in the door

and slipped away. There was a cleaning woman, an old black woman, coming out of the room next door.

Oh, my Gods! He walked up to her and handed her the key! Drawing attention to himself. You NEVER do that! And then he compounded the felony. He said, "You know what road to take to Washington?"

She had not only seen him now, she knew where he was going! And the first thing police do when they're searching for a criminal is check the motels! She said, "You jus' follah Yew S. 29. Charlottesville, Culpeper, Arlington and cross the Potomac and there you is. Mah sister, she lives in Washington and I don't know what the hell I'm doin' down heah in Virginia wheah we is still slaves!" I thought to myself, I doubt she'd dare say that to an adult Virginian. Slavery has its points! I almost drifted off thinking about Utanc and then something else happened that recalled me firmly and nervously to duty.

Heller backed out the car, leaned out the window and said, "Thank you, miss, foh a very nahce stay." And the woman smiled, stood there leaning on the broom and in a moment I could see, in the rearview mirror, that she was staring after the car. And more. I saw the newspaper which hid the license plate blowing off in the car's wake. For sure she would remember that car. (Bleep) Heller!

No, no, I mustn't (bleep) him! I must pray he would get through!

He had no trouble whatever in finding U.S. 29 to Charlottesville. He tooled along the four-lane through the lovely Virginia morning, admiring the view. The Cadillac was purring, surprisingly smooth, especially on this smooth road.

It was promising to be a very hot August day and he began to fool with the air conditioning. He set it at seventy-three degrees on the dial, got it functioning on

automatic and after a bit, when apparently the hot air had blown out of the car, closed the windows. It was amazingly quiet!

A white board fence fled by. A big sign:

JACKSON HORSE RANCH

Beyond it were some animals in the field, leaping and prancing about. Apparently he added something up. He laughed. "So those are horses!" Then for some idiotic reason, he patted the Cadillac panel ledge. He said, "Never mind, you chemical-engine Cadillac Brougham Coupe d'Elegance. I like you even if you don't have any of those things under your hood."

I will never understand Fleet guys. Compared to a Voltar airbus, an Earth vehicle is a farce. And he knew it! Then I had it. Toys. Anything was a toy to Fleet officers, from landing craft to battleships to planets. They just have no respect for force! No. Then I really had it: fetish worship.

He found he could drive with one knee and leaned back, arms spread out along the top of the seat. It made me nervous until I realized I was 105 degrees of longitude away.

But another shock was in store. He glanced at the speedometer and it was doing SIXTY-FIVE! The speed limit is fifty-five and all those roads have signs that say they are radar patrolled!

I saw he was not driving by the speedometer: he was running with the traffic—some big trucks and passenger cars—and by and large was doing sixty-five. But cops love to pick one car out of such a clump and arrest it. I went and got some more sira.

He got through Charlottesville all right. And then

Mary Schmeck, who had been in a twitchy, comatose state, woke up.

"Oh, I feel awful!" she moaned. "My legs are killing me! I ache in every joint!" She was thrashing about, obviously in a bad state. "How far are we from Washington?"

"We're almost to Culpeper," he said.

"Oh," she moaned. "It's still a long way yet!"

"Only about an hour," said Heller.

"Jesus, I hurt! Turn on some music. Maybe it will redirect my focus intensity."

Heller fiddled with the radio and finally got some jazz. A song came on:

As I passed by the Saint James infirmary,

I saw my sweetheart there.

Stretched out on a long white table,

So pale, so cold, so bare.

Mary moaned, "Oh, my legs!"

Went up to see the doctor.

"She's very low," he said.

Went back to see my woman.

Good God, she's lying there dead!

SHE'S DEAD!

"Oh, my God," said Mary.

Sixteen coal-black horses,

All hitched to a rubber-tired hack,

Carried seven girls to the graveyard.

Only six of them comin' back!

"Turn that off!" Mary shrieked.

Heller turned it off. I was very sorry he did so. It

was the first pleasant thing I had heard for days!

Mary was covered with goose pimples. "I'm freezing!" she cried out, writhing.

Heller quickly turned the thermostat up to eighty.

Long before it could have warmed up, Mary said, "I'm roasting hot!"

Heller turned the thermostat down again.

She kept it up, thrashing about. It was obvious to me what was wrong with her. She was in the third stage of withdrawal symptoms. People sure do complain about them.

"I can't get my breath," she was panting now. Well, that's normal, too, for somebody who has a bad heart. But still, respiratory failure is the usual cause of death in morphine addiction and it would be no different for its derivative, heroin. The lung muscles cease to function. And in her case, since she'd been complaining of a bad heart, I wondered idly whether she would die in the car or in the next motel.

Then it was I who almost had respiratory failure. What if Heller had a dead prostitute dope addict on his hands! With his assumed name!

Oh, Gods! He'd be front page in every tabloid dirt sheet in America! And what Rockecenter would do was awful!

I couldn't count on Heller to do the right thing. In espionage, he simply would have known enough to haul up out of sight and dump her in a ditch and leave her quick. But no, here he was, doing the wrong things as usual! He was trying to help her!

They were through Culpeper. Suddenly, the girl said, "You got to find a toilet! Look, that service station ahead! Stop there! Quick!"

Fourth stage. The diarrhea had hit her!

Heller zoomed into an unfrequented service station

and Mary was out of the car like a shot, racing to the women's room. I prayed they wouldn't stay there long, exposed to view from traffic.

Heller told the gawky country boy attendant to "fill up the chemical repository" and the lonely boy made out that Heller meant gas. The usually idle boy then figured out for himself that Heller's early education had been neglected.

With careful instruction, Heller got taught to service the car: steering fluid, brake fluid, transmission fluid, correct radiator coolant, windshield wiper water with Windex in it, oil and the right and wrong kinds of oil, gas and the right and wrong kinds of gas. Apparently nobody in his whole life had ever listened to this country boy before and he really went flat out to educate a "younger Virginia kid," even though he seemed disappointed to find that Heller hadn't stolen the car.

The kid exhausted the subject of tires and then got bright. He said the car needed a grease job and the differential checked. He said it would only take a short while to grease it up. And onto the rack he drove it and up into the air the car went. Sure enough, the differential was half empty. And sure enough it needed grease and the airhose and greasegun pumped away. Heller marked where all the fittings were. And then he got worried about the girl and went to find her.

Mary was crumpled up on a toilet seat, passed out. Somehow, Heller roused her and got her to straighten herself up.

Then voices outside. Heller peeked through a window.

A cop car! Virginia State Police!

I turned up the gain. The cop was saying, ". . . man and a woman. They went up this road someplace last night."

"What kind of a car?" said the gawky country boy.

The officer consulted his sheet. "Cadillac. Same color as that one you got on the rack."

I went white. There went Heller and no platen!

"Could be that they passed when I was off shift," said the country boy.

"Well, you let me know iff'n you do see'm, Bedford," said the state policeman. "They're wanted awful bad!"

"Always willin' to oblige, Nathan," said the gawky country boy. And when the cop drove off, going back down the road toward Culpeper, the boy added, "You cocky son of a (bleepch)."

He got the Cadillac down off the hoist and Heller came out, carrying Mary. He put her in the front seat.

The gawky country boy was all smiles. "I knew you stole it!" He looked Heller up and down admiringly. Then he said, "I was going to remove and grease the wheels but that can wait. I got an idea you better be goin'."

The Cadillac had only taken ten gallons of gas. I was amazed. Then I realized it had just been a clever psychological ploy on the part of the girl to call it a gas hog.

The bill, in fact, was not all that great. And Heller paid it with a twenty-dollar tip. Count on Heller! He'd be broke soon which was another hurdle I'd have to cross. I couldn't just have Raht or Terb walk up to him and hand him money. They must be somewhere on this road but I couldn't contact them when they were moving.

Mary had to go to the can again and the boy instructed Heller how to wash windows: Never use a grease rag, only paper. Never use a wax glass cleaner. Amazing, he'd already been tipped!

Heller got the girl straightened out and back in the car once more.

"Next tahm you come by," said the gawky country boy, "stop off and I'll show you how to tune the engine."

Heller really thanked him and when they drove away, there was the boy by the pump, waving. Heller blew the horn twice and they were on their way to Washington.

And Washington, I groaned to myself, was just about the most over-policed city in the world!

I wondered if I should start writing a will. I had several things: the gold coming, the hospital kickback due and Utanc. Trouble was, I'd nobody to leave them to.

I never felt more alone and prey to the winds of fate than I did as I watched the road through Heller's eyes to Washington.

Following the complex signs, Heller negotiated the various confusions the traffic departments of that area planned in order to prevent Americans from ever getting to their seat of government. He refused invitations to use State Highway 236, to go over to U.S. 66, to take State 123 and wind up in the Potomac River. He ignored directions to take U.S. 495—which is really U.S. 95 and bypasses Washington entirely. He even defeated the conspiracy to confuse the public on U.S. 29 to believe they were on U.S. 50. He steadfastly rolled along on U.S. 29, even untangled the parkways alongside the Potomac River without winding up at the Pentagon—as most unsuspecting public do—and presently was rolling over

the Memorial Bridge. A masterpiece of navigation that he shouldn't be doing any part of!

The Potomac River was a beautiful blue. The bridge a beautiful white. The Lincoln Memorial at its end, an impressive piece of Greek architecture glowing white in the afternoon sun.

And Heller had trouble. Mary was flailing about to a point where it was almost impossible to drive. She was bending over with cramps. She was letting out small screams. She was striking out with her arms. And she was saying over and over, "Oh, God, my heart!" alternated with "Oh, Jesus, I've got to have a fix!" And neither prayer was getting any attention whatever from the deities of that planet.

Heller was watching her and trying to hold her down more than he was watching traffic. The giddy and foolhardy spin of cars and trucks around the Memorial circle may not disturb the calm majesty of Lincoln's huge statue inside, but it is designed to shatter less immortal nerves.

It was evidently plain to him that the combination of Mary and the traffic was a lot too much to cope with just now. He spotted a turnoff into the park which lies to the southeast of the Lincoln Memorial itself.

It is a very beautiful park: an unfrequented road and a pleasant pedestrian walk stretch out beside the Potomac River, separated from it by a wide expanse of lawn. It is one of the most quiet and lovely spots in Washington. The only trouble with it is the CIA uses it to try out their agent recruits in hidden sleuthing!

I freaked! Heller was stopping! I mourned my fate to be handling somebody without the slightest training in espionage. He should have known that Voltar agents have orders never to go near that park!

He had seen the drinking fountains which are paced every few hundred feet along the walk. He had probably

sensed the false peace imparted by the beautiful willow-like trees between the path and water's edge. He may have been attracted by the abundance of parking places. It must have been a hot day in Washington but the lawns were deserted here.

He stopped. Mary was in a momentary coma. He got out and went to the drinking fountain. He had an empty paper coffee cup. He managed to figure out how you turned on the fountain and rinsed and filled the cup.