The Angel & the Brown-eyed Boy (23 page)

Rupert waited silently, letting his father consider what he had said. He chewed his lip, trying to think of the best way to introduce his second topic.

“Yore chewin’ like ye meant to eat yerself. Whut mo’, Ru?”

“Sunthin’ mo’, Da. Oldsters say a hant is in the woo’s. Childrin see ‘im.”

“A hant in the woods? Always sayin’ a hant. Whut hant?”

“Come w’em.” He tossed his head in the direction of the mansion. “Is a terr’ble thing. Teeth so big.” He indicated two feet with his hands. “Mor’un that. Covers th’ woods, watchin’. Mos’ly, th’ hant is watchin’ her with the hoofs. Is a dawg, a snoopy dawg, w’ lotsa hair. People are scared. Think she bring th’ hant.”

Sam thought on this. The last part was pure nonsense. Someone always saw a haunt somewhere. A hairy, ferocious dog in the forest and
guarding that little girl was a new one. Some of the stories of haunts scared him, but he mostly didn’t believe in them. A hairy dog haunt?

“Any those growed up an’ not on the punk weed see the hairy dawg?”

“Nah, Da. Kids and the ol’ stick man tell.”

Sam knew that old bag of bones was so bunged up on the punk weed, he couldn’t tell a haunt from his ass. He barked, “F’gitabou’it, Ru. Don’t tell me hog shit like that.”

But the machines? After his first visit, Sam hadn’t gone back to Jamayuh. He’d lost himself in his “cover,” spending days and nights dallying and drinking. Had he been so gone in the hooch that he hadn’t done his job? Horror ran through him. He’d heard the stories of more machines coming to life and rising up out of the ground since the first one poked clear of the dirt. But except for the one in Jamayuh, they were always in the distance.

Snake men and runners half jiggered on weed brought the news of the faraway things. The runners had drunk so much bad hooch, they saw boogies on every tree. The machines were a new source of terror, but the snake men were always saying some nonsense or other was going to kill them.

He knew the snake men were in an uproar, waving their snakes until the creatures hung limp, waving the Book, saying it was all in there. The end of the world. They made Sam want to puke. No one could read. How did they know what the Book said?

But the machine coming up out of the earth in Jamayuh, just two long hills over? What was wrong with him? He should have gone back again and again to see if the thing had changed. And he’d forgotten about Rupert’s skills. Rupert couldn’t read, but he could copy.

“Ru, run to Jamayuh on ma horse. Take Oned, th’ fast one. Run there ‘n’ back. Take a paper an’ pen an’ draw all ye see on th’ bugger. Draw ‘er clear. You show me, an’ no’ un’ else, what y’ copy. Do ‘er fast, Ru. May be somethin’ to this.”

After his son had left, Sam thought about what was going on in the village and about the current visit to the mansion. Jeremy came out often, always with Arthur driving him, and usually with the old Afroman, too.

Jeremy was a smart little fellow. He made sure they knew he could shoot them out of the water, and so could the old man and Arthur. That was what kept them from jumping them when they were at the mansion and sacking the place when they were not. That, and the fact that the little bugger had electrified it so that, if anyone touched it, they’d not touch anything else again.

Sam smiled. Smart little bugger. He’d let Jeremy live in the village, if it came to that.

He’d never come before with so many people. Now he had a couple of jolly boys, the Afro’s wife, and the girl.

Sam shivered when he thought of her with the hooves. He’d held her hands and felt himself flow through her. He knew her better than he knew his wives and children, and she knew him like that as well. No one, headman or villager or anyone else, was like her. Pure as a bee’s wing humming over a flower. She was all good inside, and here to do something, which concerned Jeremy directly, but which might concern all of them. He loved her before he touched her hands. Now he’d do anything to protect her. He might have to.

She had hooves. Thank the fathers that they weren’t split, like a cow’s or a goat’s. The snake men would be all over, saying she’s a witch. The village would rise and he wouldn’t be able to stop them. They’d torture and kill her as soon as darkness arrived.

But she had regular hooves, like a horse. He could hold them down over those. Sure, every man and woman in the village knew about her by now, after she had pranced all over the lawn. Everyone knew that Jeremy was here with more people than usual. They knew something was up.

He stood tall and stretched out his arms to their fullest, making sure every man jack spying on him could see them. His arms spanned almost seven feet. His chest was as big as the barrel by the well. He stood as tall as the door to the meeting room. He could outfight and outshoot any man in the Hamptons. Even so, he’d had to brawl to keep on top. He had killed as many people as the years in his life, all when Mrs. Egerton wasn’t there. He was a sweet lamb when she was
home, but, the rest of the time, he held the village down any way he needed to.

Always talk. Why should they stay out in the stables when the house was right there? She had jewels in there, and silver. Gold. More guns, new guns. She gave them her father’s old guns so they could fight the marauders, but the best were in her house. All the best was there. Money. The most beautiful things.

She fed ‘em and gave ‘em all they needed to make a real town. Mostly, she made ‘em get off their asses and learn to farm and grow something. She was working on ‘em for somethin’. Some plan of her own that none could see now.

He knew the lady was lost the first time she came out with the general. He was a hard man, the kind called by her softness. He taught her how to shoot guns that tore up the pastures for miles. Set up a range for her and Jeremy and his soldiers. The hard men that came with the general fanned out in the woods, spying on everything. The lady was lost.

He thought of her at night. More’n once. Weren’t no use to think on: he could see her traipsing around the village in her silks and furs, standing at the well with his other wives. She didn’t fit in his world any more than he could go into the big house. What would he say to the kings and such she had to dinner? “What do ye think of sheep, yer majesty?” He was lost, too.

He waited for his son to return with drawings he could show to Jeremy, of the marks on the thing. Jeremy had built a city under the big house, working on it for years. The village thought he was crazy, but Sam knew the boy better than that. He knew about the things coming up, Sam was sure of that. Were those atomics coming out of the ground? Did Jeremy build something that could save them?

When they were building that thing under the mansion and the fields by it, Sam had watched from start to finish, as much as they’d allowed him to see, anyway.

He knew they were building a shelter against the fire that the snake men said was coming. The killing fire and the waste that would
last almost forever. Was that the atomics? If Jeremy was here with strangers, did that mean the fire was really coming?

A terrible thought entered his mind. Had Jeremy made the shelter big enough for the village folk, too? Or was he going to leave them outside, to be roasted like animals? Was that what kind of friend he was?

But he wasn’t a friend, Sam knew that.

C
harged up by the president’s command that she take down Veronica Edgarton’s terrorist cell in the Hamptons, Val hopped the elevator and went down to the vehicle bay in the basement. She felt weird, seeing it empty of people. No matter, the cars were there and their keys were on the door of the attendant’s booth. She pulled out the biggest SUV, making sure she had a duo—a vehicle that was both a hover car and equipped with off-road wheels. She could take it anywhere.

Val filled both tanks, and then filled the back with five-gallon containers of gas. Getting caught up-country without fuel was dangerous. She had no problem loading the gas cans and strapping them down. Her back might be shrieking, but a combat pack would cover any pain. She checked her bag again, making sure the metal container was there. A smile lit her face. She tore out of the garage.

Driving out of New York City was weird. How long had it been since she’d been out of the city? Years. Voluntary abstinence. If the country needed them to save fuel, she’d save twice as much as anyone. She’d forgotten how high the dams were around the city. It was like driving out of a very large soup bowl.

For some reason, the sea rose after the Second Revolution. They had built the levees to protect New York City. It was a huge population center, and then there was the investment in infrastructure and the historical value of the five boroughs. So the government went the distance and built the dikes.

Why the ocean rose was a mystery. The sea rising was sort of like the forests on the north and south poles. She’d seen photos that were supposed to show Earth with ice caps on the poles. She thought it was trick photography; the north and south poles had been the world’s greatest sources of timber as long as anyone could remember.

She drove up and out of Manhattan, heading north along the Connecticut shore. As a federal agent, she was privy to certain information not available to the public. The fact that something called “Long Island” had once existed and was the site of the original Hamptons, for instance. She understood the need to keep disturbing information from the public. Why stir a pot that was almost boiling? If she hadn’t known the secret, she never would have suspected.

To her right, a few dead tree branches sticking out of the ocean were all that was left of Long Island. The original Hamptons had been there. When the sea rose, the government couldn’t afford to build levees around both Long Island and New York City. So the playground of the rich and famous was underwater. Tough titty. Val had no use for the rich. Her adopted father had been rich. Look what it had done for him.

She drove along the Connecticut shore. The shoreline and hundreds of miles inland were now known as the Hamptons. Made sense. The wealthy were used to vacationing in the Hamptons. They rebuilt their mansions in the new Hamptons and took up where they’d left off.

After driving through fields filled with ruined industrial plants, she passed a number of large concrete bowls sunk into the ground. Rocket-shaped things stuck out of them, pointed skyward. She passed a lot of them. Val felt edgy. She had never seen a missile installation, but if she were going to imagine one, that’s what it would look like.
Why were there missiles in the Connecticut countryside? Also, why was this farm country? It was supposed to be pretty developed. She saw bombed-out ruins of houses and shopping malls here and there, with bulldozers standing idle next to them. It looked like the dozers had been plowing the wreckage under, but no one was working now. It was only 4 p.m. The workday didn’t end until 6.

Stranger and stranger. She found herself driving through a forest. Trees flourished on both sides of the road. She didn’t remember trees like this in Connecticut. This close to the city should have been suburbs. She thought. She couldn’t really remember Connecticut much.

“Something is going on here,” she said, delighted to see the first checkpoint. She pulled into the central station, wanting some answers before she went on. No one was on the road, and none of the staff was out to check travelers. More weirdness. She parked the SUV where everyone could see the Anti-Terrorism Unit insignia.

Val looked at her face in the rearview mirror before going in, grimacing at what she saw. She pulled the splint off of her nose and arranged her hair to cover what she could of the rest of the damage. That was the best she could do. She hopped out of the SUV and entered the building.

“Lieutenant Valerie Zanner here,” she barked. The reception area and booking desk were vacant. “Federal agent Valerie Zanner here! Anti-Terrorism Unit!” She drew her pistol and began to reconnoiter. The station seemed as empty as the headquarters building in the city had been. She began stalking silently, creeping along close to the wall, peering around corners with a mirror.

They were in the back of the building in the bunkroom/living area, clustered around a table on which their weapons were lying. A screen on the wall shone bright blue, with white static playing across its surface. The troopers spoke in hushed whispers, huddled together. She cleared her throat loudly before stepping around the corner.

The men sprang to their feet and grabbed their weapons. Six guns pointed at her.

“I’m a federal agent!” she shouted. Making a fast scan of the uniforms, she spoke to the officer in command. “My badge is on my holster.” She turned so he could see it.

“Stand down, men,” the captain said. He holstered his gun and the others followed suit.

“Captain, what is going on here?” she said. “There’s no one on duty outside. What are you doing in here?”

“We’ve had a disturbance, Lieutenant. I ordered the men into the headquarters.”

“What disturbance? What about guarding the road?”

“Lieutenant, no one’s on the road. Did you notice that? We don’t have anything to guard.”

“What kind of disturbance?” She thought it might be related to Mrs. Edgarton’s exodus.