“We’re greater than we were,” Alain said. “I feel that very strongly.”
“I do, too,” Cuthbert said. He looked around. “And a fine meeting-place, as well.
Especially for such a ka-tet as ours.”
Roland didn’t smile; repartee had never been his strong suit. “Let’s talk about what’s going on in Hambry,” he said, “and then we’ll talk about the immediate future.”
“We weren’t sent here on a mission, you know,” Alain said to Susan. “We were sent by our fathers to get us out of the way, that’s all. Roland excited the enmity of a man who is likely a cohort of John Parson’s—”
” ‘Excited the enmity of,’ ” Cuthbert said. “That’s a good phrase. Round. I intend to remember it and use it at every opportunity.”
“Control yourself,” Roland said. “I’ve no desire to be here all night.”
“Cry your pardon, O great one,” Cuthbert said, but his eyes danced in a decidedly unrepentant way.
“We came with carrier pigeons for the sending and receiving of messages,” Alain went on, “but I think the pigeons were laid on so our parents could be sure we were all right.”
“Yes,” Cuthbert said. “What Alain’s trying to say is that we’ve been caught by surprise. Roland and I have had … disagreements … about how to go on. He wanted to wait. I didn’t. I now believe he was right.”
“But for the wrong reasons,” Roland said in a dry tone. “In any case, we’ve settled our differences.”
Susan was looking back and forth between them with something like alarm. What her gaze settled upon was the bruise on Roland’s lower left jaw, clearly visible even in the faint light which crept through the half-open sepultura door. “Settled them how?”
“It doesn’t matter,” Roland said. “Farson intends a battle, or perhaps a series of them, in the Shaved Mountains, to the northwest of Gilead. To the forces of the
Affiliation moving toward him, he will seem trapped. In a more ordinary course of things, that might even have been true. Farson intends to engage them, trap them, and destroy them with the weapons of the Old People. These he will drive with oil from Citgo. The oil in the tankers we saw, Susan.”
“Where will it be refined so Farson can use it?”
“Someplace west of here along his route,” Cuthbert said. “We think very likely the Vi Castis. Do you know it? It’s mining country.”
“I’ve heard of it, but I’ve never actually been out of Hambry in my life.” She looked levelly at Roland. “I think that’s to change soon.”
“There’s a good deal of machinery left over from the days of the Old People in those mountains,” Alain said. “Most is up in the draws and canyons, they say.
Robots and killer lights—razor-beams, such are called, because they’ll cut you clean in half if you run into them. The gods know what else. Some of it’s undoubtedly just legend, but where there’s smoke, there’s often fire. In any case, it seems the most likely spot for refining.”
“And then they’d take it on to where Farson’s waiting,” Cuthbert said. “Not that that part matters to us; we’ve got all we can handle right here in Mejis.”
“I’ve been waiting in order to get it all,” Roland said. “Every bit of their damned plunder.”
“In case you haven’t noticed, our friend is just a wee nubbin ambitious,” Cuthbert said, and winked.
Roland paid no attention. He was looking in the direction of Eyebolt Canyon.
There was no noise from there this night; the wind had shifted onto its autumn course and away from town. “If we can fire the oil, the rest will go up with it… and the oil is the most important thing, anyway. I want to destroy it, then I want to get the hell out of here. The four of us.”
“They mean to move on Reaping Day, don’t they?” Susan asked.
“Oh yes, it seems so,” Cuthbert said, then laughed. It was a rich, infectious sound—the laughter of a child—and as he did it, he rocked back and forth and held his stomach as a child would.
Susan looked puzzled. “What? What is it?”
“I can’t tell,” he said, chortling. “It’s too rich for me. I’ll laugh all the way through it, and Roland will be annoyed. You do it, Al. Tell Susan about our visit from Deputy Dave.”
“He came out to see us at the Bar K,” Alain said, smiling himself. “Talked to us like an uncle. Told us Hambry-folk don’t care for outsiders at their Fairs, and we’d best keep right to our place on the day of the full moon.”
“That’s insane!” Susan spoke indignantly, as one is apt to when one hears one’s hometown unjustly maligned. “We welcome strangers to our fairs, so we do, and always have! We’re not a bunch of… of savages!”
“Soft, soft,” Cuthbert said, giggling. “We know that, but Deputy Dave don’t know we know, do he? He knows his wife makes the best white tea for miles around, and after that Dave’s pretty much at sea. Sheriff Herk knows a leetle more, I sh’d judge, but not much.”
“The pains they’ve taken to warn us off means two things,” Roland said. “The first is that they intend to move on Reaping Fair-Day, just as you said, Susan. The second is that they think they can steal Parson’s goods right out from under our noses.”
“And then perhaps blame us for it afterward,” Alain said.
She looked curiously from one to the other, then said: “What have you planned, then?”
“To destroy what they’ve left at Citgo as bait of our own and then to strike them where they gather,” Roland said quietly. “That’s Hanging Rock. At least half the tankers they mean to take west are there already. They’ll have a force of men. As many as two hundred, perhaps, although I think it will turn out to be less. I intend that all these men should die.”
“If they don’t, we will,” Alain said.
“How can the four of us kill two hundred soldiers?”
“We can’t. But if we can start one or two of the clustered tankers burning, we think there’ll be an explosion—mayhap a fearful one. The surviving soldiers will be terrified, and the surviving leaders infuriated. They’ll see us, because we’ll let ourselves be seen …”
Alain and Cuthbert were watching him breathlessly. The rest they had either been told or had guessed, but this part was the counsel Roland had, until now, kept to himself.
“What then?” she asked, frightened. “What then? ”
“I think we can lead them into Eyebolt Canyon,” Roland said. “I think we can lead them into the thinny.”
5
Thunderstruck silence greeted this. Then, not without respect, Susan said:
“You’re mad.”
“No,” Cuthbert said thoughtfully. “He’s not. You’re thinking about that little cut in the canyon wall, aren’t you, Roland? The one just before the jog in the canyon floor.”
Roland nodded. “Four could scramble up that way without too much trouble. At the top, we’ll pile a fair amount of rock. Enough to start a landslide down on any that should try following us.”
“That’s horrible,” Susan said.
“It’s survival,” Alain replied. “If they’re allowed to have the oil and put it to use, they’ll slaughter every Affiliation man that gets in range of their weapons. The Good Man takes no prisoners.”
“I didn’t say wrong, only horrible.”
They were silent for a moment, four children contemplating the murders of two hundred men. Except they wouldn’t all be men; many (perhaps even most) would be boys roughly their own ages.
At last she said, “Those not caught in your rockslide will only ride back out of the canyon again.”
“No, they won’t.” Alain had seen the lay of the land and now understood the matter almost completely. Roland was nodding, and there was a trace of a smile on his mouth.
“Why not?”
“The brush at the front of the canyon. We’re going to set it on fire, aren’t we, Roland? And if the prevailing winds are prevailing that day … the smoke …”
“It’ll drive them the rest of the way in,” Roland agreed. “Into the thinny.”
“How will you set the brush-pile alight?” Susan asked. “I know it’s dry, but surely you won’t have time to use a sulfur match or your flint and steel.”
“You can help us there,” Roland said, “just as you can help us set the tankers alight. We can’t count on touching off the oil with just our guns, you know; crude oil is a lot less volatile than people might think. And Sheemie’s going to help you, I hope.”
“Tell me what you want.”
6
They talked another twenty minutes, refining the plan surprisingly little— all of them seemed to understand that if they planned too much and things changed suddenly, they might freeze. Ka had swept them into this; it was perhaps best that they count on ka— and their own courage—to sweep them back out again.