The older man nodded. “I did, didn’t I, Ryan? Damn right that I did. Well, we better get a move on, hadn’t we?”
SINCE THERE WAS NO SIGN that the mob from Seattle had any form of transport, there was no great hurry. They allowed the team to draw the hearse on at a steady pace, with the packhorses tied behind. The friends took turns to drive the rig into the surrounding hills, with Trader stretched out at ease in the back, recovering from his injuries.
The weather had turned much more mild, with a gentle breeze from the southeast caressing their faces.
They stopped only once before evening for everyone to relieve himself, J.B. stopping the hearse at the crest of a steepish hill to give the team a break.
Trader’s wounds had stiffened during the ride, and he had to be helped down. He cursed as he stumbled and nearly fell, hanging on to Abe’s arm.
“Bitching bastard!” He spit in the dirt. “I’ll be hung, quartered and dried for the crows! There’s times I wished I’d died before I got to be old.”
He steadied himself against the smooth trunk of an elegant silver birch while he urinated.
There was the roofless remains of a brick shelter near where they’d stopped, and Ryan wandered over to take a look, finding faded graffiti on one wall that had been protected from the harsh prevailing winds.
Two different hands had written it. The first in crimson had been sprayed on. “We shall drive a tunnel of hope through the mountain of despair,” was followed by the initials MLK.
Underneath in white, less elegantly daubed, was “The mountain of despair fucking fell in on our tunnel.”
“HOW FAR DO YOU RECKON we are from the ville?” Abe asked, lying on his back by the fire, aims crossed under his head, staring at the star-spangled banner of the sky.
“Twenty miles,” Ryan replied.
“Nearer twenty-five.” J.B. polished his glasses, angling them to the flames to check for smears.
Trader was changing the dressing on the knife wound, peering down at it. “Look healthy to you, Ryan?” he asked.
“Too early to be sure. Can’t see any redness spreading away from it. How’s it feel? You must’ve had enough cuts in your life to be able to figure if it’s healing.”
“Yeah. Times it feels bad. Times it feels worse. When you get past the big five-oh, Ryan, you discover everything takes a lot longer than it used to.”
Abe laughed. “I found that happened when I passed the big three-oh, Trader.” He sat up. “Takes me all night to do what I used to do all night.”
“Nice one, Cohn.”
Abe looked at Trader. “Not Cohn.”
“I know you’re not! You’re Abe, aren’t you? What do you mean saying I called you Cohn? He was one of the navigators. And communications. Think I don’t know that?”
Nobody spoke.
Ryan reached out and helped himself to another hunk of bread, spreading it with the sweet orange preserve that they’d liberated from the ranch.
Trader was smiling again, seeming to have instantly forgotten his sudden fit of red anger. “Meant to ask you boys something.”
“What?” Ryan wiped crumbs from his stubbled chin.
“You heard any word of a gang come into Deathlands from some other place?”
“Russkies?” J.B. asked. “Over the narrows up by Alaska? Had a run in with them once.”
“No, not the fuckin’ Russkies!”
“Who?”
“Chinese or Japanese. Nobody seems to know for sure. But they’re yellow as gold, with slitty eyes. Heard word of them every now and again, when I was traveling way up north.”
“Orientals?” Ryan queried. “I come across them a lot. Specially out the West Coast, inland from what used to be California, and around some of the ruins of the big villes, east.”
Trader shook his head, massaging his bruised leg with both hands, bending and flexing the knee. “They got a name. Word like ‘Sam an’ I.’ Real weird name.”
“Samurai?” J. B. said. “Was that the name you heard, Trader?”
The smile broadened. “That was it! By God, J.B., but you got brains where other people just have hard white bone. That was it. Samurai.”