Out of the Ashes (21 page)

“Yeah. That's what I heard. Logan's shuffling the remaining citizens around. And he's collecting all the guns; .22 rifles and 410 shotguns is all he's letting the people keep.”

“Son of a bitch!” Ben swore.

“Yeah,” Mitch agreed. “I never was in favor of gun control. But I guess I'm lucky to have a job doing what I've been doing for ten years. Although I wouldn't want it to get out that I've been talking with the leader of the Rebel army. Logan's put a bounty on their heads.” He spoke the last softly.

“And mine?”

“No.” The trooper shook his head. “He hasn't.”

“You knew who I was all along?”

“Yeah.”

“Why didn't you ... arrest me, or whatever?”

“To tell you the truth, Mr. Raines, in my way of thinking, the Rebs haven't done anything to warrant arrest or killing. There's been a lot of accusations thrown at them, but no proof to back it up. And ... well ...” He trailed it off into silence.

“You're not real sure you approve of all Logan's doing?” Ben finished it.

“Yeah,” he said heavily. “I guess that's it. It worries me more than a little. I'm afraid he might—will—go too far with this thing. I ... just don't believe he has the right to tell people where to live, what to do. But ... until the people start bristling up and snarling about it, I guess I'll go along with it.”

“And when they do that?”

The big trooper met Ben's eyes. “I know where a contingent of Rebs is hiding.”

Ben didn't press that. “What are we using for currency now?”

“Plain old greenbacks. The storage area where the emergency currency was held took a direct hit—or one of them did, at least. Be a lot of millionaires around for a time, but new emergency currency will be printed as soon as a new mint is established and plates are made.”

An idea, actually several ideas at once, all jumbled, popped into Ben's head. “Want to do me a favor, Mitch?”

“Probably. Name it.”

“Pass the word down the law-enforcement line that I'm dead.”

A thin smile passed briefly over the trooper's tanned face. “You got it ... General,”

He turned and walked away.

“I'll get new ID,” Ben called after him.

“Be a good idea. You're gonna be a wanted man pretty damned quick, I'm thinking.” He paused at his car and stood looking at Ben.

“How do you figure that?”

“I read that book of yours, Mr. Raines—the one that caused all the controversy. I liked it. And I'm thinking you're gonna pull something pretty quick. I might decide to join you. See ya 'round.”

Ben drove to the top of a high mountain and turned on his military radio, preset to 39.2. He tried for several minutes to raise someone, but received no reply. He drove into the nearest town and began driving up and down the street to look for a ham operator's antenna. On his final pass through the town, he found one. He prowled several stores before finding a big enough portable gasoline generator to drive the equipment. It was after ten o'clock before he finally got the equipment hooked up and humming. It was another half-hour before he managed to locate a Rebel unit. During that time he had spoken to people in Nigeria, Burma, Australia, and to some ships at sea.

“I won't ask you where you are,” Ben said. “Just listen to me. How many people and how much equipment have been moved west?”

“Quite a lot, sir. But we don't know what the hell we're doing it for.”

“Just continue with the movement. Now then; I want you and all your people to begin searching the towns and cities. Pick up every ounce of gold and silver you can find. Also all the precious stones. Move it west to the holding areas. Be careful, there are bounties on your heads.”

“Yes, sir, we know. Sir? A new land, sir? That what you're planning?”

“Maybe. I don't like what Logan is doing.”

“Neither do we, sir. When will you be in touch again?”

“I ... don't know. I don't think I will until we can set up a different frequency. Just carry on.”

“Yes, sir.”

 

Ben holed up for a few days, trying to straighten out his thoughts, telling himself if he was going to lead the Rebels, then goddamn it, he should do it, and quit assing around about it. But he couldn't convince himself to stop his journal and do it. There was time, he finally concluded. He had time.

But deep down, he doubted that.

 

He finally pulled out, angling gently southward, recording all that the Virginia trooper had told him, including the trooper's own doubts, but leaving out the trooper's name. He also recorded all he knew about the first lady (which was plenty), but discreetly left out the fact that during their nights together she had licked his pecker like it had been made of peppermint candy.

Some things are personal. Ben grinned.

He turned west, picking up Interstate 40. At Crossville, he began seeing vehicles pass him, on the other side of the median, all heading east. And he picked up some interesting CB chatter.

“Wonder who that ol' boy is, headin' west?” The question popped out of the speaker.

“Don't know. But he better be careful if he's headin' into Nashville. Logan's people will sure turn him around and point him in the right direction.”

“Yeah,” a female voice said. “After they take all his guns and shake him down like he was a criminal. At first those guys came around asking nice-like. Then they started getting hard-nosed about it. Oh well,”—she waxed philosophical—“South Carolina is probably nice. It's just I don't like being forced to do something I don't want to do.”

“How many times have you said—back when the nation was whole—that people out of work should be forced to work?” The voice of the questioner was unmistakably black.

“Maybe I was wrong in saying that,” she admitted. “The shoe sure is on the other foot now, isn't it?”

“But we're all in the same boat,” the black man said. “And I don't like it either.”

Ben pulled off the interstate at the first open exit and headed south. Forcing people out of their homes, he thought. The son of a bitch is really forcing people to relocate and retrain, against their will.

But it always looked good on paper, he reminded himself. Also reminding himself that he had written it ... several times.

“Logan,” he said aloud, “I just flat out don't like you.”

 

Ben kept to the little-traveled county roads, being very careful as he went under the overpasses of the interstates. He spent the night just inside the Alabama line and was up and moving at first light, heading back to Louisiana, but planning several stops along the way.

He found a group of men working on farm equipment outside of Cullman. They were shocked at what Ben told them.

“Forcing people to resettle?” a black man said. “But that's not constitutional.”

“I don't think we have a constitution,” Ben replied. “I'll wager, with the coming of martial law, it's been suspended. The government can do anything it wants to do with the muscle it has.”

“We've been out of touch for months,” a man admitted. “Busy working, trying to restore a way of life.”

“You haven't heard about the trouble in Chicago between the races?”

No one had.

Ben told them what he knew and also about the plans for a New Africa and what the government planned to do with that idea.

The black man was very explicit with his views. “Fuck a New Africa. I'm not an African; I'm an American. This is my home—our home.” He waved at the group, a mixture of blacks and whites. “We're all friends, working together—root hog, or die. And no son of a bitch is going to run me off what is mine.”

All agreed with him.

Another area where the problems between races had been solved.

At least temporarily; Ben added a disclaimer. But it was a start.

“You'd better get some radios and start keeping in touch with what's happening. I think it's going to get nasty.”

Ben pulled out, heading to where Ike said he'd be, making the run in only a few hours. For a time, it was old home week; then Ike got serious.

“I think, Ben, things are gonna turn to shit, real quick. You know about the bounties on the Rebs' heads?”

Ben nodded.

“Word is being passed up and down the line about your death. I told Conger and Voltan and some of the others to hang loose, I didn't believe it.”

“I thought it best.”

Ike agreed. “Good idea. Well,”—he sighed—“we been tryin' to get this land in shape—do some truck farmin'. People gotta eat. But ... Logan's gonna move in here sooner or later. I don't know what to do.”

“Where are Tatter and June-Bug?”

“Oh,”—Ike's face brightened, losing its tension—“they found themselves a couple of ol' boys and got married. Whatever me and Megan decide to do ... they're with us.”

Ben looked at Megan. “You haven't had any trouble with the rednecks?”

She shook her head. “Only one incident.”

“Trashy bastard came around here,” Ike said. “Runnin' off at his mouth. I remembered him from high school. Son of a bitch didn't get out of the ninth grade—so stupid he quit—and he's talkin' about me marryin' a low-down nigger.”

“What happened?” Ben asked, although he hardly had to ask, knowing Ike's volatile temper.

“I killed him,” the ex-SEAL said calmly. “Took his body into town and dumped it on the courthouse square. Folks been right friendly since then.”

Despite the awfulness of the statement, Ben had to smile. “If you can't educate them to mind their own business, kill them—right?”

Ike shrugged. “I don't have the time or the inclination to educate folks, ol' buddy. Way I figure it, we're back to the days of the old West. You do your thing and I'll do mine. Think whatever in the hell you wanna think—I got no right to restrict you there—but don't insult me or mine; don't steal from me or mine; don't try to hurt me or mine; and don't manhandle me or mine. Just live and let live. You get in trouble, I'll help you, but by God, if I get in trouble, you'd better help me.”

“Ike, what do you think about the West? Where I've sent some of the Rebels.”

“Idaho and Montana?”

“Yes.”

“Wild and beautiful. Everything a man could ask for. Grow good crops and raise fat cattle. Cold as a witch's tit in the winter.”

“Beats being told where to live.”

“And being told what kind of job to do and what time to get up and go to sleep and all that happy crap. Yeah, it sure does beat it.” He rose from Megan's side. “I'll be right back, Ben. Hang on.”

Megan looked at Ben. “We're going to have a lot of trouble with Logan, aren't we, Ben?”

“Yes. And when it comes, it's going to come very quickly.”

“Logan scares me. I didn't trust him fully; a lot of my people didn't. What is that line about the ‘man who would be king'?”

“Yes. That's the way I see it. I think he's unbalanced.”

Ike returned with a large suitcase-looking container, metal, with electronic inputs on the front and a collapsible antenna on the side. “This is a very high-frequency radio, Ben. I borrowed a couple of them from Keesler on the way up. Built in scrambler, the whole bit. This thing will transmit three thousand miles and receive world-wide.” He showed Ben how to adjust the band. “This is if you wanna contact the Rebs. This one is for me.”

“If I decide to head west, Ike—”

“Hell, you've already made up your mind to go. I know you well enough to see that.”

“... Lots of high mountains out there.”

“So get on top of one of the mothers, General.”

“Ike? You be careful—you hear me?”

The stocky Navy man laughed. “Lord, General, you worry more than an old mother hen. Come on, let's get something to eat. We got a lot of jawin' to do before you pull out.”

Ben changed his mind about going to Louisiana, knowing the only reason for the visit was to see Salina. So he crossed the river at Helena, south of Memphis, and headed across Arkansas, making good time, staying on the secondary roads. He skirted Little Rock, not daring to go any further north. For from Fort Smith in Arkansas all the way up to just a few miles south of Kansas City, everything was gone; that area had taken both types of warheads. He spent a night by a lake in the mountains, fishing in the late afternoon sunlight. He caught more fish than he could possibly eat and was cleaning them, preparing to fry them on his portable Coleman stove when Juno growled low in his chest.

“We're friendly.” The voice came out of the brush. “I have some children with me.”

“Come on in,” Ben said, keeping one hand on the butt of his pistol.

A black man and woman, with several kids in tow walked up to the cabin porch. The man stuck out his hand. “Pal Elliot.” He smiled his introduction. “This is Valerie. And these,” he said, pointing to the children, “in order, starting with the oldest, are Bruce, Linda, Sue, and Paul.”

Two blacks, one Oriental, one Indian.

Ben shook the offered hands and smiled at the kids. “Ben Raines,” he said. He sat down on the porch and motioned for the others to do the same. “You folks live around here?”

Pal smiled. “No, just passing through. Like a lot of other people. I was an airline pilot, based in L.A. Valerie was a model in New York City. We met about seven months ago, I think it was.”

“Six months ago,” she corrected him with a smile. “We picked up the kids along the way. Found them wandering.”

“No children of your own?” Ben asked.

“No. But he did.” She looked at Pal. “Lost his whole family. You?”

Ben shook his head. “I was—am—a bachelor. Lost my brothers and sisters and parents.” He grimaced in the fading light.

“Memories still painful?” Pal asked.

“No, not really. One brother made it out—up in Chicago. Suburbs, actually. We met ... had a falling out.”

“Carl Raines?” Pal asked.

“That's the man.”

“We passed through that area,” Valerie said. “Very quickly. It was ... unpleasant.”

“Well, folks ...” Ben stood up, rubbing his hands together. “How about staying for dinner? I have plenty y of fish.”

“We'd like that,” they said.

 

“I knew I'd heard that name somewhere,” Pal said. It was evening in the mountains. The air was soft with warmth, the lake shimmering silver in the moonlight. The children played Rook in the den of the cabin; the adults sat on the porch, smoking and talking and drinking beer. “ 'Way you write, hard law and order, I had to think you were a racist—at first. Then you did some other books that had me confused about your ... reasoning. What is your political philosophy, Ben? If you don't mind my asking, that is.”

“No, I don't mind. I ... think I was rapidly becoming very apolitical, Pal; pretty damned fed up with the whole system. I did a couple of books about it. I was fed up with the goddamned unions asking for more money than they were worth—trying, in many instances, to dictate policy to the government. I was very weary of crime with no punishment, sick of the ACLU sticking their noses into everybody else's business. Oh ... don't get me started, Pal. Besides, as a young lady once told me, not too long ago, it's all moot now, anyway.”

“Is it, Ben?” Pal asked. “What about Logan?”

Ben chuckled. “Our president-we-didn't-elect? Yeah, I know. I gather you folks aren't responding to his orders to relocate?”

“Logan can take his orders and stick them up his nose,” Valerie said. “I never did like that man; didn't trust him.”

Megan's words.

“I shall live,” she continued, “where I damned well choose to live.”

Ben told them about Ike and Megan; of New Africa and what the government planned to do. And then he told them, just touching on it, of the idea that was in his mind—to get their reactions.

They both were excited. “Are you serious with this, Ben?” Pal inquired, leaning forward.

“Yes, I suppose I am. I know I am. I've been resisting it for months. I didn't believe Americans would follow Logan's orders, falling in line like lemmings on the way to the sea, blindly following orders. You two have witnessed it?”

Pal nodded. “Yes. Several times during the past few months. People are being forced to relocate, many of them against their will.”

“You were going to tour the country, write about it?” Valerie asked.

“Was,” he said. “You people?”

“The kids have to have schooling,” Pal said. “And I'm told a man named Cecil Jeffrey and his wife, Lila, are really doing some fantastic things down in Louisiana.”

“I just told you what Logan planned to do about New Africa,” Ben reminded them.

“Maybe it won't happen.”

“You can't believe that.”

“No,” Pal said quietly. “I suppose not. White people have always been fearful of an all-black nation, whether you will admit it, or not. But I suppose we have to try. I have a master's in science; Valerie, a master's in business. They are going to need teachers.”

“But I just told you—”

“I know—I know.” Pal waved him silent. “But after all that has happened ... all the horror, I thought perhaps the government would ... let us alone, let us rebuild.”

“You know they won't.”

Pal and Valerie said nothing in rebuttal.

Ben told them of Kasim, ending with, “I intend to kill that man if I ever see him again.”

“Why, Ben?” Valerie asked. “You seem a fair man. But even in you, there is hate. Why?”

“Because ... he is not what you people need, any more than my people need the KKK. What we both need is understanding. Always have. I'd meet Kasim halfway, try to work it out, but he doesn't want that. With him, it's whole hog or nothing. If you go to New Africa, if Logan lets it exist—which he won‘t—you, both of you, will be attempting to teach truth and knowledge and fact, in a western manner. Kasim will be teaching hate without reason ... in robe and turban. You'll be pulling against each other. It won't work. I'd like to see a nation—a state, if you will—where we teach truth, as supported by fact; the arts, the sciences, English, other languages, fine music—the whole bag. I have this theory—very controversial—that we are, should have to start from scratch. Gather up a group of people who are color-blind and as free of hates and prejudices as possible, and say All right, folks, here it is; we, all of us, are going to wash everything clean and begin anew. Here will be our laws, as we choose them. We will live by these laws, and they will be enforced
to the letter
... equally. Always. This is what we will teach in our schools—and
only
this. This is what will happen when a student gets out of line. Everything will be in plain, simple English, easy to understand and, I would hope, easy to follow.' The speech would have to end with this: ‘Those of you who feel you can live in a society such as we advocate, please stay. Work with us in eradicating prejudices, hatred, hunger, bad housing, bad laws, crime, etc. But those of you who don't feel you could live under such a system of open fairness—then get the hell out!' ”

Both Pal and Valerie were silent for a few seconds after Ben finished. Pal finally said, “That, my friend, would be some society, if it would work.”

“It would work.” Ben defended his theory. “If the government—the central government—would leave the people alone. It would work because everyone in the system would be working toward that goal. There would be no dissension.”

“Don't you feel that concept rather idealistic?” Valerie asked.

“No, Valerie, I don't. But I will say it would take a lot of bending and adjusting for the people who chose to live in that type of society.”

“Ben Raines?” Pal looked at him. “Let's keep in touch.”

 

As he drove away the next morning, Ben thought: Now there are the types of people I'd like to have for neighbors, friends. Good people, educated people, knowledgeable people, with dreams and hopes and an eye toward the future.

He waved good-by as he headed for the highway that would take him into Oklahoma. On the second day, he headed for Oklahoma City. He had installed a scanner in the truck, depending on the people to warn him of any upcoming meeting with Logan's military or other unfriendly types.

He stopped often, talking with people. Yes, they had heard of the new president, and of his orders to relocate the people. But no, they didn't think they'd go along with that. This was their home, and here was where they intended to stay.

“What if he sends people in here to move you forcibly?” Ben asked.

They didn't know what they'd do.

At the University of Oklahoma, he met a group of young people and spent two nights there, talking with them.

“Some of us were in the original group from Chapel Hill,” a young woman told him. “I don't believe there are many of us left.”

“Run into trouble?” Ben asked.

The young woman patted Juno for a moment, rubbing his head for a time before answering. “We weren't ready for what came at us,” she admitted. “We didn't—most of us—have guns. All in my group were
city
-born and -reared. I'd never fired a gun in my life. We thought people would want help in getting organized again. You know, planting gardens ... all that. And we did find a few old people who really appreciated what we did. But all over the country, people are setting up their own little governments....”

So his idea was not novel; he didn't expect it was.

“... And man, some of those people didn't want us around—at all! We found religious nuts—and I mean
nuts—
Jonestown types, survivalists, kooks, crazies, drunks, maniacs. You name it, we found it.

“A lot of our people went into the cities.” She shook her head. “They never came out. Then we started getting smart; rigged up our cars and Jeeps and pickups with CBs—and boy, did we get wary. We finally got it through our heads that if we were going to survive, we'd damned well better get with the program; get ourselves some guns and learn how to use them.” She waved her hand. “You see those two hundred-odd kids here, Mr. Raines? This is it. With the exception of one small group, this is all that's left out of about thirty-five hundred young people who left Chapel Hill. This is it! I never knew what that expression about it being a jungle out there really meant ... until we ... went out to save the world.” Her laugh was bitter, and not suited to the young woman.

Ben looked around him at the beaten-down, disillusioned young people. He thought: all your fancy cars and pretty clothes and gold throat jewelry and extravagant allowances from overindulgent parents didn't prepare you for this, did it, kids? All the fancy words from college professors didn't do a damned thing to help you cope with hard reality. But when he spoke it was, “So now what, kids? All of you just going to give up?”

Two dozen pairs of eyes shifted to him. Hostile, hurt eyes. Ben grinned, knowing he had hit a tender spot.

“What's it to you, man?” a boy asked.

Ben shrugged. “Maybe nothing. Maybe I should just move on. Losers never appealed to me.”

“Hey!” The spokeswoman almost shouted the word at him. “What do you want from us, mister? Huh? We tried to do what we felt was right. So O.K.... maybe we blew it this time around; that doesn't mean we're not going to try again. So why don't you just get off our case, O.K.?”

“And what are you young people going to do when your favorite liberal hotshot-turned-two-bit-dictator sends his troops in here to move you out to a relocation center? Just be herded like stupid cattle?”

“We talked about him. O.K., so he wasn't what he appeared to be. But he was a damned sight better than Nixon, wasn't he?”

“No,” Ben said. “He damned sure wasn't—isn't. And what the hell do you people know about President Nixon? You were babies when Watergate went down. All you know is what you've read, written by biased newspeople, and what you've been force-fed by feather-headed college professors who are so far out of touch with reality they should be forced to wear earphones, plugged into the vibrations of history.” He sighed, grinned, and said, “I didn't mean to lecture you, kids.”

“It's all right, Mr. Raines,” a young man said, a grin on his face. “I kinda enjoyed it. Anyway ... we don't know what we're going to do. You got a plan of some sort?”

“Yes. You might like it, you might not.” He was thoughtful for a moment. Committing yourself, Ben? he asked himself. Maybe, came the reply. “But first let me ask you this: was there no group that fought back from the outset? Fought against the slime and the scum and the looters and such?” He had mentioned nothing of Jerre.

“There was one person,” the young woman replied, choosing her words carefully. “She came into Chapel Hill with a pistol belted around her. She ignored the laughing from a lot of us—me included. She went around talking to bunches of people, like she was choosing her group very carefully. She picked about twenty-five-thirty people, then they split; didn't even stay for the speeches. Which were a bunch of shit,” she said with a grimace. “I heard later the girl made all her group get guns and practice with them. She ran it like a military unit. She was the boss—no doubt about it. Blond girl, real pretty.”

Ben smiled.

“Name was ... Sarah ... no! Jerre, that was it.”