“What if I hate it?”
Jak had grinned. “Then send word. Shout loud and we hear. Might take time, but we’ll hear. And come.”
There had been a final round of hugs and handshakes, then Dean had scrambled up into the bed of the ramshackle wag, followed by his father.
A crack of the whip and a stream of curses in Spanish, and they were off, driving up the long road that ran south and eastward from Glenwood Springs.
Ryan had agreed with Krysty and J.B. to meet up somewhere around the little ville of Fairplay in two or three days.
Now he waved with his son until the little group of friends had finally blurred into the distance.
DEAN FINISHED EATING a ripe peach, chucking the stone out of the back of the rig into the rutted track. He had the resilience of youth and was in good spirits now, an hour out of the ville.
“Will there be lots of boys in the school, Dad?”
“Probably.”
“No stupe girls?”
“Don’t know.”
Ryan raised his voice above the rattling of the wag and the clattering of the ironbound wheels. “Lemuel?”
“Yo?”
“There girls at the Brody school?”
“Wouldn’t know. It’s set off the main trail a distance. Believe they got their own gardens and farm and crops. Keep themselves to themselves.” He spit a stream of tobacco juice off to the left, smothering a tiny cluster of Deathlands daisies. “Heard Brody had been ill, but that was a good few weeks ago. Probably fine by now. Whoa up, you bastards,” Lemuel shouted, lashing the lead mule with the long whip.
“He’s good with that whip, isn’t he, Dad?”
Lemuel heard Dean and laughed. “Take the balls off a skeeter at twenty paces with it.”
“Can I try?”
He laughed louder. “I think not, young man. Likely pluck your own eye out with it.” He paused. “Then you’d look even more like your father.”
“DAD?”
“Yeah.”
They had eaten the rest of the fruit that they’d stolen from Ma’s Place before it burned down, though they’d left the lion’s share of it with the others, down in the ville.
The sun was sinking beyond the snowcapped peaks away to their right.
“I was with Rona once at some frontier pesthole where they was showing some old vids. Real triple old in flickery black and white. Know the kind of show I mean? On a sheet strung off the rear of a wag.”
“Yeah. We used to come across them back in the war wag days with Trader.”
“You ever see one of the vids about a couple of pre-dark comics?”
“Don’t know.”
“One was real fat and the other was real thin. There was no sound with it. No talkin’ at all. Only they had to deliver a piano like this one, up this triple-steep flight of steps. And it kept breaking away and clattering all the way down again. They had funny kind of round hats on.” Dean laughed. “Hot pipe! It was one of the funniest things I think I ever saw. Rona laughed a lot at it, as well.”
The description rang a small bell in Ryan’s memory, but he couldn’t put a name to the twosome. “Have to ask Doc or Mildred,” he said thoughtlessly.
The boy looked at him, his eyes widening, his mouth beginning to tremble. “I’ll have to wait a long time to ask them, won’t I, Dad? Real long time.”
“Yeah. But I reckon there might be one of the teachers up at the Brody school that’ll know the answer.”
“Will they know everything, Dad?”
“Most everything that’s worth knowing.”
“When will we get there?”
Ryan shook his head. “Don’t know precisely. We had to get around that landslip an hour back. Slowed us down some. Lemuel? When do we get close to the school?”
“Tomorrow evening, if we make good progress. Next morning on if we get slowed again.”
“DID YOU REALLY LOVE my mother?”
The sun had vanished and a cold norther had sprung up, bringing a dusting of snow for a half hour. Lemuel had unharnessed the mules, helped by Ryan and Dean, and succeeded in getting them feed and water. The animals were notably ill-tempered, and both father and son took several painful kicks.