The River of Dancing Gods (3 page)

"Yeah," he replied and felt for his revolver.

The interstate road went right into the exit, allowing no choice. There was a slight downgrade to a standard stop sign and a set of small signs. To the left, they said, were Ruddygore and the impossible ferry. To the right was—Oblivion.

"I never heard of any town named Oblivion, either," he muttered, "but it sounds right for these parts. Still, all the signs said only Ruddygore, so that's got to be the bigger and closer place. Any place they build an interstate spur to at a few million 13 JACK L. CHALKER bucks a mile has to have something open even this time of night. Besides," he added, "I'm damned curious to see that ferry in the middle of the desert..

He put on his signals, then made the turn onto a modest two-lane road. He passed under the highway and noted glumly that there wasn't any apparent way of getting back on. Well, he told himself, he'd find it later.

Up ahead in the distance he saw, not the town lights he'd expected, but an odd, circular, lighted area. It was particularly unusual in that it looked something like the kind of throw a huge spotlight, pointed straight down, might give—but there were no signs of lights anywhere. Fingering the pistol, he proceeded on, knowing that the road was leading him to that lighted area.

And it was bright when he reached it, although no source was apparent. The road, too, seemed to vanish into it, and the entire surface appeared as smooth as glass. Damnedest thing he'd ever seen, maybe a thousand yards across. He stopped at the edge of it, and both he and the woman strained to see where the light was coming from, but the sky remained black—blacker than usual, since the reflected glow blotted out all but the brightest stars.

"Now, what the hell... ?" he mused aloud.

"Hey! Look! Up ahead there, almost in the middle. Isn't that a man?" She pointed through the windshield.

He squinted and nodded. "Yeah. Sure looks like somebody.

I don't like this, though. Not at all. There's some very funny game being played here." Again he reached in and felt the comfort of the .38 in his pocket. He put the truck back in gear and moved slowly forward, one eye on the strange figure ahead and the other warily on the woman, whom he no longer trusted.

It was a great sob story, but this craziness had started only after she came aboard.

He drove straight for the lone figure standing there in the Page 11 Chalker, Jack L - The River of the Dancing Gods center of the lighted area at about five miles per hour, applying the hissing air brakes when he was almost on top of the stranger and could see him clearly.

The woman gasped. "He looks like a vampire Santa Claus!.

Her nervous surprise seemed genuine. Certainly her description of the man who stood looking back at them fitted him perfectly. Very tall—six-five or better, he guessed—and very 14 THE RIVER OF DANCING GODS large. "Portly" would be too kind a word. The man had a reddish face, twinkling eyes with laugh lines etched around them, and a huge, full white beard—the very image of Santa Claus on all those Christmas cards. But he was not dressed in any furry red suit, but rather in formal wear—striped pants, morning coat, red velvet vest and cummerbund, even a top hat, and he was also wearing a red-velvet-lined opera cape.

The strange man made no gestures or moves, and finally the driver said, "Look, you wait in the truck. I'm going to find out what the hell this is about..

"I'm coming with you..

'Wo!" He hesitated a moment, then nervously cleared his throat. "Look, first of all, if there's any danger I don't want you between me and who I might have to shoot—understand.

And second, forgive me, but I can't one hundred percent trust that you're not in on whatever this is..

That last seemed to shock her, but she nodded and sighed and said no more.

He opened the door, got down, and put one hand in his pocket, right on the trigger. Only then did he walk forward toward the odd figure who stood there, to stop a few feet from the man. The stranger said nothing, but the driver could feel those eyes following his every move and gesture.

"Good morning," he opened. What else was there to say to start things off.

The man in the top hat didn't reply immediately, but seemed to examine him from head to toe as an appraiser might look at a diamond ring. "Oh, yes, you'll do nicely, I think," he said in a pleasant, mellow voice with a hint of a British accent. He looked up at the woman, still in the cab, seemingly oblivious to the glare of the truck lights. "She, too, I suspect, although I really wasn't expecting her. A pleasant bonus..

"Hey, look, you!" the driver called angrily, losing patience.

"What the hell is all this?.

"Oh, dear me, forgive my manners!" the stranger responded.

"But, you see, you came here, I didn't come to you. Where do you think you are—and where do you want to be?.

Page 12 Chalker, Jack L - The River of the Dancing Gods Because, the man was right, it put the driver on the defensive.

"Uh, urn, well, I seem to have taken a bum turn back on Interstate 10. I'm just trying to get back to it..

The big man smiled gently. "But you never left that road.

15 JACK L. CHALKER You're still on it. You'll be on it for another nineteen minutes and eighteen seconds..

The driver just shook his head disgustedly. He must be as nutty as he looked, that was for sure. "Look, friend. I got stuck over here by accident in a thunderstorm and followed the road back there to—what was the town? Oh, yeah, Ruddygore. I figure I'll turn around there. Can you just tell me how far it is?.

"Oh, Ruddygore isn't an 'it,' sir," the strange man replied.

"You see, I'm Ruddygore. Throckmorton P. Ruddygore, at your service." He doffed his top hat and made a small bow.

"At least, that's who I am when I'm here..

The driver gave an exasperated sigh. "Okay, that's it. Forget it, buddy. I'll find my own way back..

"The way back is easy, Joe," Ruddygore said casually. "Just follow the road back. But you'll die, Joe—nineteen minutes eighteen seconds after you rejoin your highway. A second storm with hail and a small twister is up there, and it's going to cause you to skid, jackknife, then fall over into a gully. The overturning will break your neck..

He froze, an icy chill going through him. "How did you know my name was Joe?" His hand went back to the .38.

"Oh, it's my business to know these things," the strange man told him. "Recruiting is such a problem with many people, and I must be very limited and very selective for complicated reasons..

Suddenly all of his mother's old legends about conjure men and the demons of death came back from his childhood, where they'd been buried for perhaps forty'years—and the childhood fears that went with them returned as well, although he hated himself for it. "Just who—or what—are you?.

"Ruddygore. Or a thousand other names, none of which you'd recognize, Joe. I'm no superstition and I'm no angel of death, any more than that truck radio of yours is a human mouth. I'm not causing your death. It is preordained. It can not be changed. I only know about it—found out about it, you might say—and am taking advantage of that knowledge. That's the hard pan, Joe. Finding out. It costs me greatly every time I try and might just kill me someday. Compared with that, diverting you here to me was child's play." He looked up at 16 THE RIVER Of DANCING GODS the woman, who was still in the cab, straining to hear. "Shall we let the lady join us?.

Page 13 Chalker, Jack L - The River of the Dancing Gods "Even if I buy what you're saying—which I don't," Joe responded, "how does she fit in? Is she going to die, too?.

The big man shrugged. "I haven't the slightest idea. Certainly she'll be in the accident, unless you throw her out ahead of time. I expected you to be alone, frankly..

Joe pulled the pistol out and pointed it at Ruddy gore. "All right. Enough of this. I think maybe you'll tell me what this all is, really, or I'll put a hole in you. You're pretty hard to miss, you know..

Ruddy gore looked pained. "I'll thank you to keep my weight out of this. As for what's going on—I've just told you..

"You've told me nothing! Let's say what you say is for real, just for the sake of argument. You say I'm not dead yet, and you're no conjure spirit, so you pulled me off the main line of my death for something. What?.

"Oh, I didn't say I wasn't involved in magic. Sorcery, actually. That's what I do for a living. I'm a necromancer. A sorcerer." He shrugged. "It's a living—and it pays better than truck driving..

The pistol didn't waver. "All right. You say I'm gonna die in—I guess fifteen minutes or less now, huh?.

"No. Time has stopped for you. It did the moment you diverted to my road. It will not resume until you return to the Interstate, I think you called it..

"So we just stand here and I live forever, huh?.

"Oh, my, no! I have important things to do. I must be on the ferry when it comes. When I leave, you'll be back on that road instantly, deciding you just had a nutty dream—for nineteen minutes eighteen seconds, that is..

Joe thought about it. "And suppose I do a flip, don't keep going west? Or suppose I exit at Fort Stockton? Or pull over to the side for a half hour?.

Ruddygore shrugged. "What difference? You wouldn't know if that storm was going to hit you hard because you were sitting by the side of the. road or because you turned back—you can never be sure. I am. You can't avoid it. Whatever you do will take you to your destiny..

Joe didn't like that. He also didn't like the fact that he was 17 JACK L. CHALKER taking this all so seriously. It was just a funny man in a circle of— "Where does the light come from?.

"I create it. For stuff like this, I like to work in a spotlight.

I'll turn it off if you like. "He snapped his fingers, and suddenly the only lights were the truck headlights and running lights, which still illuminated Ruddygore pretty well.

Suddenly the vast sea of stars that was the west Texas sky Page 14 Chalker, Jack L - The River of the Dancing Gods on a clear night faded in, brilliant and impressive and, somehow, reassuring.

Joe heard the door open and close on the passenger side and knew that the woman was coming despite his cautions. He couldn't really blame her—hell, this was crazy.

"What's going on?" she wanted to know.

Ruddygore turned, bowed low, and said, "Madam, it is a pleasure to meet you, even if you are an unexpected complication.

I am Throckmorton P. Ruddygore..

She stared at him, then over at Joe, half in shadow, and caught sight of the pistol in his hand. "Hey—what's this all about?" she called to him, disturbed.

"The man says I'm dead, honey," Joe told her. "He says I'm about to have a fatal accident. He says he's a conjure man.

Other than that, he's said nothing at all..

Her mouth opened, then closed and she looked confusedly from one man to the other. She was not a small woman, but she felt dwarfed by the two giants. Finally she said to Ruddygore, "Is he right?.

Ruddygore nodded. "I'm afraid so. Unless, of course, he takes me up on my proposition..

"I figured we'd get to the point of all this sooner or later,.

Joe muttered.

"Exactly so," Ruddygore agreed. "I'm a recruiter, you see.

I come from a place that's not all that unfamiliar to people of your world, but which is, in effect, a world of its own. It is a world of men—and others—both very much like and very different from what you know. It is a world both more peaceful and more violent than your Earth. That is, there are no guns, no nuclear missiles, no threats of world holocaust. The violence is more direct, more basic—say medieval. Right now that world is under attack and it needs help. After examining all the factors, I find that help from outside my world might— might—have a slight edge, for various reasons too long to go 18 THE RIVER OF DANCING GODS into here. And so I look for recruits, but not just any recruits.

People with special qualities that will go well over there. People who fit special requirements to do the job. And, of course, people who are about to die and who meet those other requirements are the best recruits. You see?.

"Let me get this straight," the woman put in. "You're from another planet?" She looked up at the stars. "Out there? And you're whisking away people to help you fight a war? And we've got the chance to join up and go—or die?.

"That's about the size of it," Ruddygore admitted. "Although you are not quite right. First of all, I have no idea if you will die. I had no idea you would be in the truck. And, as an honorable man, I must admit that he might be able to save you if, after returning to the road, he lets you off. Might.

He, however, is in the situation you describe. Secondly, I'm no little green man from Mars. The world I speak of is not up Page 15 Chalker, Jack L - The River of the Dancing Gods there, it's—well, somewhere else." He looked thoughtful for a moment.

"Think of it this way," he continued. "Think of opposites.

Nature usually contains opposites. There is even, I hear, a different kind of matter, anti-matter, that's as real as we are yet works so opposite to us that, if it came into contact with us, it would cancel itself and us out. When the Earth was created, my world was also created—a by-product, you might say, of the creation. It's very much like Earth, but it is in many ways an opposite. It runs by different rules. But it's as real a place as any you've been to, and, I think, a better, nicer place than Earth in a number of ways..