The Land Across (38 page)

I won and I was not sorry, but Martya started in on Kleon. No, she did not like him, but it was not right to kill him. Besides, he wanted her to help him but she would not even if he was her husband because she had not wanted to marry him anyway. And they were going to shoot him if they found him and they would shoot her, too, if they knew she had brought him that ham when he had been hiding in the empty building but had only brought it because he made her. He would have beaten her and he needed to find work here in the capital and she had found one he could do because he could weld, but …

And so on and so forth all the way to headquarters. When we got out there Naala told her to shut up, she would fix things for Kleon if I could ever catch him. And of course that started Martya off again, only trying to be really careful so Russ, Rosalee, and Aliz would not hear anything, particularly Aliz.

I guess it gave us something to do. We must have waited about two hours, and I kept thinking that I had a lot of money now, and why was it I did not have a watch? The answer, of course, was that I had busted the one Naala had bought for me and had not had time to shop for another one. I wanted a good one, not flashy, that would stand up to a lot of knocking around. And I knew that even in the capital that was going to take some real looking.

Baldy came in person to fetch us, saying nothing, just motioning for us to follow him. We went through a corridor and down a flight of stairs, then along another corridor, and came out into trees and shrubs that looked like they were not getting a whole lot of care. I suppose that was the back of the building, although nobody said so. A stretch limo that would have reached from the pitcher’s mound to home plate was parked and waiting for us. It had a bunch of doors, and they were all open.

All of us got in including Baldy, who sat up front with the driver regulation or no regulation. I was on one of the side benches, facing Rosalee on the other side. Russ was on one side of her, naturally, and Aliz on the other. Martya was on my left and Naala on my right. Martya and Aliz had the backseat, so they faced forward. None of this stuff is important, it is just that I remember the ride so well.

Our driver took it slow and seemed to be trying to avoid the main streets. I asked Naala about that, but she just shook her head. I decided the limo was bugged, and the JAKA knew it. Very likely JAKA had put in the bugs.

Pretty soon we were out of the city and on a road that could not have been much smoother if it had been a black silk ribbon. After a while I caught onto the fact that it was always climbing. Not steeply, but we kept getting a little bit higher. We were taking it slow, considering how good that road was and that there was hardly any traffic on it. By and by Naala whispered, “Soon we stop for ices?” She was grinning.

I was looking out the windows and seeing mountains off in the distance, big ones with white peaks. Closer to the city there had been farmhouses at first, with barns and fields and trees. We kept going and there were more and more trees and fewer houses, barns, and fields.

Then there were none, just trees, big ones, oaks at first, later some kind of spruce. Trees that always had dark green needles, summer or winter.

After quite a bit of those, sunlight and a log cabin on steroids. I could not see it well until I got out of the limo, but it was really worth seeing, four stories in places, with wings sticking out in every direction. I do not think there was a log in it that was less than four feet thick.

Nobody told me who lived there, but nobody had to. I could guess pretty easily, and I was right.

There were guards in uniforms I had never seen before, all bottle green and black, with caps that must have been designed about eighteen ten. They had bigger pistols than mine. Some had assault rifles, too.

Baldy led the way into one of the wings, and walking through the doorway cut through those big logs was almost like walking through a tunnel. The room we went into was a sort of lounge, wide and roomy and bright. The brightness came from three skylights in the roof and from the floor lamps and table lamps that were scattered all over. Every one of them was turned on. Also from the furniture and rugs, pretty much all earth tones, yellow and brown and red. There were wolf pelts scattered around, and the skin of a white bear in front of the fireplace.

Baldy told everybody to sit down and relax, so we did. We also used the restrooms. Eventually, I think everybody there used them. There was some talk (I remember that Aliz and Naala talked about soccer) but not a lot. Russ and Rosalee whispered and necked like newlyweds. I tried not to look at them and pretended not to know that Martya was trying to get me to sit next to her on one of the couches. Also I got up and wandered around quite a bit. Peeking through doorways and looking out windows at the forest.

Two maids came in pushing carts, one with food and one with glasses and bottles. I ate (it was far and away the best food I ever got in that country), and drank club soda over ice. Baldy had vodka and tonic, I noticed, and everybody else drank wine. Russ’s eyes opened wide when he tasted the wine, and after that he just took tiny little sips, rolling them around in his mouth.

I am not sure what I should call the person who came in about an hour after we had finished eating. They call him “the Leader.” Mostly I have been calling him the third border guard. You could not pronounce his name at all. I could pronounce it, but it would not be exactly right. He looks like my father. That was the first thing I noticed about him when I saw him on the train, and it is the thing that still sticks with me. He is about the same height, which is maybe four inches shorter than I am. His features are about like my dad’s, especially the eyes and the nose. Also the black mustache. He looks older than his pictures on the posters, and his hair is getting gray and thin.

He was wearing a blue suit, pretty dark, that most people would not realize had cost at least a thousand bucks. White shirt open at the collar. No tie. He came striding in with a couple of generals in uniform trailing him. When he saw me his face lit up. “My young friend!” He has a great smile. “How wonderful that I should see you here!”

First thing I knew, I was getting hugged. I hugged him back, and I have always been glad I did. Okay, I have hugged a dictator. How could I not have hugged him back, when he looked so much like my dad?

“Something I have that you will most like,” he told me, “a little gift, also.”

Then he was shaking hands with Baldy, still smiling only not so wide. He said something I could not hear and Baldy said something back, then turned around and started introductions. Naala was first, and you could see she was proud enough to bust, standing very, very straight and looking very, very serious. The Leader shook her hand and put his arm around her for a moment. Then he turned to one of the generals who was carrying a flat black-leather box. The general opened his box, and the Leader got out a medal. It was on a long ribbon. (They all were.) After he had put it on her neck he said something to her and she said something to him and stepped back.

Aliz was next. She shook hands with the Leader, too, and they talked a little, but she did not get a medal. Russ was after Aliz, and he got one. It was not the same as Naala’s, but it was silver like hers.

Then Rosalee, and she was crying. The Leader put his arm around her and stood there telling her everything was all right and she should calm down, there was nothing to cry about. Still crying, she told him she had to cry. She was so happy she could not help it. I thought sure he was going to turn her over to Aliz, but he did not. He stood there with her and motioned for Russ to come over. The two of them stayed with her, sort of petting her and talking to her until she finally stopped. I could not believe what I was seeing, but that was how it was.

Martya was next. She went down on her knees to beg for a pardon for Kleon, which surprised the hell out of me. The Leader called Baldy over and they talked, the Leader wanting to know what was going on and Baldy telling him he did not know. I would have gone over, too, if I had not known they would get to me in a minute or two, which they did. I explained to the Leader and told them Naala had already promised to fix it. He smiled and told her she had his authority to do it.

Then it was Baldy’s turn. He got a medal, too. He saluted the Leader, and the Leader returned his salute. Later I found out that was a big deal.

I thought I was finished, and the gift was something somebody would deliver later. That turned out to be wrong. (And I had them turned around anyway.) I was called up, the general opened his box, and the Leader got out a gold medal. Somebody behind me gasped, but I do not know who that was. When the Leader hung it on me I stepped back and saluted the way Baldy had.

The Leader returned my salute and raised his voice enough for everybody to hear. “You do not understand why he should receive this.” That was what he said, only I knew that Naala knew. Then he said, “It is a confidential matter.”

I had sense enough to nod, but then I started to go back to where I had been standing before he had motioned for me to come forward again.

“This is yours.” The Leader (maybe I ought to call him the third border guard here) reached into his suit coat and pulled out a dark blue booklet. He handed it to me, and for a minute or two I could not believe it. Generally I do not stammer much, but I stammered then.

It was my passport.

24

BACK TO PURAUSTAYS

Russ and Rosalee came around in a couple of days to ask what flight I was on. When I told them I had not booked, they wanted me to go to Germany with them. Russ had gotten his car back, a big blue Mercedes. I had to explain in all the different ways I could come up with that there were things I had to take care of before I could leave. Then Russ wanted me to tell him, and when I would not, Rosalee said I had a girl on the string. As it turned out, that was a little truer than I thought at the time.

After I found a watch that satisfied me and paid for it, I did not have a whole lot of money left. I went down to the docks and looked around, and when I found a guy who had a neat little boat I was able to talk him into taking me to Puraustays at the far end of the lake. We went to the market then and he bought enough food for four days and four bottles of wine. I helped him carry it back to his boat and felt guilty as all hell, because he had spent just about all the money I had given him on food for the two of us. Only I knew I was going to need what I had. Need that much and more, most likely.

Our sail on the lake was a lot nicer than the one I took as a prisoner of the Legion of the Light. I was not tied up, I had a bunk to sleep in, and the food was better. The big thing, though, was that this was pretty much your average summer sailing. The weather was warm and friendly. That first time we had gotten hit by a couple of storms. Wind gusts of sixty or seventy miles an hour are no joke when you are out on the water.

We got to Puraustays in good shape and I paid the guy who had brought me what I had promised, with a little extra for not bitching about how much I ate and just being nice in general. He usually took out fishermen, so much for a morning, so much for an afternoon. His boat only slept two, but he said he had as many as six onboard sometimes.

I went to the Willows first, figuring I knew the place well enough to get in without a key, which was right. I stashed my sports jacket there, with the hand still in the pocket. I stashed my gun there, too, and my badge, not just leaving them but hiding them.

Then I walked to Kleon’s.

When I knocked on the door I remembered how the boss border guard had knocked with the barrel of his pistol. That’s when I decided for sure that I would not write the travel book yet. That I would write this book you are holding instead, and get started just as soon as I got back to the States.

Martya opened the door. I was not sure she would be back, even though I had waited a few days so she would have a head start. But there she was, and she opened the door wide so I could come in. She motioned to me, and we went back into the kitchen. “You are hungry. I will make you something.”

I said, “Sure,” and sat down. “How did you know I was hungry?”

“Always you are hungry. Something else, too.” She made a gesture I know my editor will not let me describe. “We cannot. It is late and Kleon will be home soon.”

That gave me the opening I had wanted. I said, “I wouldn’t do it anyway, Martya. You’re Kleon’s wife.”

“You no longer think me beautiful!” She looked ready to spit. “I feed you, yes! But poison!” She got out a couple of big sausages, threw them into a dirty pan, and put them on the stove.

I did not say anything.

“This you see?” It was a big black thing shaped like a mug that I knew darned well was her pepper shaker. “It is poison!” She shook pepper over our sausages.

I said, “You’re beautiful and I could go for you in a big way. But it would be wrong and I knew it would be wrong when you got down on your knees and begged the Leader to save Kleon. What we did before—”

“You would not sit with me! You humiliate me before all the rest! I pat the seat beside me, over and over I pat, but you will not sit!”

“With Naala right there watching? She’d have cut my throat.” I decided not to say anything about Martya’s begging Naala to help Kleon in the car going up.

“You are strong.” She came over and felt the muscle in my arm.

“Not as strong as Kleon.”

“Stronger!” She sat on my lap. “Is harmless, you see? He come home soon. When I hear door open I jump up.” She gave me a big kiss and went off to apply more lipstick.

Cut to the chase. Kleon came home and you can imagine how he felt about me being there. I told him I did not want a fight, which was probably a mistake. I tried to explain why I had come back, and he swung at me.

He did not even try to hide it, just took a short step toward me and swung a roundhouse right. I ducked a little and rolled a little, and moved in.

I will not even try to give you the whole thing. I do not remember it well enough for that, just to start with. My guess is it lasted less than two minutes, although I do not really know. He landed a couple of punches while I worked over his belly and chest. Pretty soon he went down and I stepped back to give him a chance to stand up. He did and he wanted more, which I had not really expected. That was one tough little man.