“She is very beautiful, is Sister Wroth,” he said so quietly that only Ryan heard him. “Such a shame that… It could, with Jesus’ will, have been different” A small smile played on the cold lips. “But we have little choice in the road that we walk, Brother Cawdor. So little choice.”
“That’s bullshit, Wolfe. We all have choice. All the time. You pick the road to walk, because that’s the one you want to travel along.”
Wolfe shook his head and walked away, leaving the friends together.
The community resumed its normal morning life, with cooking and washing going on, the mongrel dogs snapping at one another in the dust, the double-armed sec men patrolling, all of them on triple alert.
And there was still no news of the escaped Doc Tanner.
J.B. stood by the window, glancing down at his wrist chron. “My guess would have put them alongside him an hour or so back. Unless he’s gone to earth and they missed him.”
“The old fool wouldn’t have the sense to conceal himself,” Mildred commented, her voice hiding her concern and the depths of her love for their friend. “Probably completely forgotten by now that he’s supposed to be running and hiding.” She shook her head. “God help him.”
THE SMELL OF KEROSENE and burned wood still hung in among the pines, overlaid with the sweet-sour scent of roasting meat. Doc tried to breathe in and out through his mouth to avoid inhaling it, knowing that he was now coming very close to his destination.
The wind was rising, and the sky had grown dark in the past twenty minutes. Clouds swept in from over the Cific in the west, blackening like old pewter, banking with silvered edges, forming a solid mass that drowned out the cheerful sunlight, killing all of the shadows.
Doc shuddered, turned up his collar and looked back behind him along a section of the winding trail that ran straight for a quarter mile or so. There was no sign of the pursuit that he knew would inexorably be coming after him. A coughing fit hit him, making him double over, hawking spittle on the side of the path. He noticed that it was still flecked with bright crimson blood from the straining.
As Doc stood, fighting for breath, he suddenly saw a strange apparition. A large white Persian cat padded along the roadway toward him, emerging from the undergrowth. What was odd was that it wore a neat red silken ribbon around its fluffy throat, decorated with a tiny pair of silver bells that tinkled softly as it closed in on the old man.
“Hello, puss.” He knew he should be moving, though it had momentarily slipped his mind quite why. He had to be somewhere for some reason or other. But the cat was singularly beautiful, reminding him of a kitten that he and Emily had once owned.
What had its name been?
“Ozymandias,” he said, smiling broadly, showing the animal his set of excellent teeth. For a moment it hesitated, then walked right up to him, rubbing its arched back against the stained knee boots.
He stooped and stroked the Persian, feeling oddly pleased as it purred and pushed harder against him, its golden eyes closing in delight.
“You’re a beauty, you are, indeed, Ozymandias,” he said, totally forgetting that he was a man on the run. “A truly fine fellow!”
The woman’s voice startled him and made him jump. “He is a she, and her name is Lucretia. And I wonder what your name is, my fine fellow?”
Chapter Thirty-Two
Owsley was breathing hard, like a hound dog on a hot trail, urging his companions to a fast run through the forest.
“Come on! Got to track down the old fucker, quick as we can. Get back with him.”
“Brother Wolfe said dead or alive,” one of the sec men panted. “Dead be easier.”
“Less sport.”
Another of them, trailing, laughed wheezily. “Could have some good sport with the redhead bitch.”
They were very close to the ruins of the abandoned eatery, near to where a narrow side trail forked sharply to the left up the hillside, meandering off among some particularly tall trees.