Starvation Ridge: Abide the Fire -- Chapter Twelve

Billee opened her eyes. Some movement had wakened her. She looked up the staircase, blinking. The hindquarters and short tail of the bobcat were just disappearing. It had stayed the night, then. She was pleased.

    She looked up at the open sky, or what she could see of it, between two blackened floor joists that stretched across the spacious cellar. Clouds of smoke still drifted by, but they did not have the hellish pink glow she'd seen when she awakened in the night. Also, there was no sound. In the night the dried grasses of the fields around Lawson's had burned, crackling like thousands of dried seed pots being trampled under the feet of a multitude.

    She wanted to stretch, but realized Wilson was still asleep. She discovered that her head was on his shoulder, and his arm was draped across her. Stiff as she was, she thought she might as well savor the moment. She listened to his heart's slow and steady beat. As she did so, she let her gaze fall on Vernie, to find that he, and also Errol, were smiling at her. She smiled shyly in return. 

    We would have died anywhere but here, she thought. If you're going to show you have feelings, the day after a night like that will do. Betcha.

:::

Karen felt guilty leaving all the pipette work to Deela, but Dr. Mary had been clear on the potential exposures for the baby, and Karen knew she was right. She contented herself with supervising the armory, work she had inherited from Wilson. Ceel Perkins had shown an interest in Ridge matters and Karen had roped her into inventorying, cleaning and lubricating firearms as well as maintaining the "surplus" bows, arrows, crossbows, bolts and, now, spears.

    "What will we do with the spears, ma'am?" asked Ceel. "They don't seem much use against things like these." She waved her hand at the twenty-two rifles stacked along the opposite wall.

    Karen was still unused to the title of "ma'am" and her expression said so, but Ceel missed it. "The thought is that 'idle hands undo Jeeah's work,'" Karen replied, hefting one. "We haves lathes, and grinders, and metal, and people will be cooped up together underground next winter. So we've made these prototypes against that time, though most everyone's busy outside right now. We'll make more of them then, and if we ever run out of ammunition and face a foe that has done the same, we'll have these ready to hand." Karen leaned the spear, a sturdy leaf-bladed design of Errol's with a slender ash shaft, against the wall. She moved on to the twenty-twos. "So we've scoured the whole valley, and what do we have now?"

    "There are eighteen of these, mostly bolt action or sem-something – "
    "Semi-auto."

    " – uh-huh, that. Either with the tubes – "

    "Tubular magazine."

    " – mm-hmm, or the box things."

    "Box ... "

    "Umm, magazine?"

    "Very good. Single-shots will be the most reliable at first."

    "Seven of them, ma'am."

    "It's a start. And over here?"

    "We found twenty-four 'shotguns.' They are single-shot, pump, also one bolt action and one lever action."

    "Lever actions for this ammunition were rare. A twelve?"

    "Yes, ma'am, and most are, though one of them has this on it?" Ceel handed Karen a scrap of paper with a childish drawing of the number '28.'

    Karen recognized the rising inflection at the end of Ceel's sentence as a sound she'd heard only at the Creek. She and Marcee had discussed it, as she'd noticed Marcee doing it when talking with Dr. Tom. They had decided it was a status marker; a girl apparently must question her own perceptions or information so that it might be validated by the person spoken to: any woman in authority or pretty much any man. Karen knew that some men found her lacking in some way without seeming to know exactly what was bothering them; and she knew that the cause was they were subconsciously listening for, and not hearing, deference. She would have to train Ceel out of it, and any other girl she could get hold of; else the Creek could become an all-male club like that of the old world. But, maybe, one thing at a time. First try to make sure there'd be a Creek

down the line. "Twenty-eight gauge, yes. We'll put that one aside for the duration, I think. We could at least use the stock, or maybe convert it to a percussion muzzle-loader. Do you read and write?"

    "Dad would like to teach us; but we're all busy all the time," Ceel said shyly. 

    "We'll try to pick up the pace on that this winter. So, how many sixteens?" 

    "One."

    "Good, set it aside for now, too. Are there shells for it?"

    "Yes, but only one box."

    "They'll be worth it at some point. Twenties?"

    "Eight. And about ten boxes of shells for them, different kinds. Lots of kroz-shun."

    "Corrosion, yes. I'm not too worried. You'd like a twenty; plenty of punch but doesn't bruise your shoulder. So, fourteen twelves. I hoped there would be more twelves."

    "I heard there were some packed away at Wilson's. All the fourteens were there, too. Somebody was going to try to do something with them."

    "Fourteens? Oh, four-tens. Are there shells in that size?"

    "Nine boxes."

    "Drat. Well, anyway, we will have to learn to load for these things. I think we'll have to use fulminate of mercury for the primers; it's going to be tricky. But we need it for the black powder weapons already in use; we're almost out of percussion caps. If we can make enough for the four-tens as well, perhaps they'll be useful as mines or trip-wire traps or something. Or find something to use as slugs."

    "I'm not sure I followed all that, ma'am."

    "Love that honesty; you'll 'go far'. I was talking about two things at once." Karen mused for a moment. "Farmers, being a conservative lot, would not all have traded in all their old thermometers for the newer kinds; go down to the Savage Mary's stores and see if you can find any. And ask Deela or Mary if there are any other sources."

    "Yes, ma'am." Ceel turned on her heel, skipped away three steps and then swung around.
    "What do thurmters look like?"

    "Oh, They'll know."

    "'K." Ceel nearly collided with Billee in the doorway. "Woops."

    "Woops y'self," returned Billee amiably.

    "Billee!" Karen whooped.

    "What's up?" Billee leaned her rifle and bow against the wall and shucked her quiver and fanny pack.
    "You're alive; that's what. And the others?" Karen knew the news must be good; Billee would be drooping in every feather if it were not.

    "We holed up at Lawson's. Wilson thought of that. It burned around us late at night and we all got owies from sparks but that was all. Oh, and Vernie is pretty beat, but Krall found us and she had Tomma with her and we brought Vernie in on the horse. Oh, and a bobcat spent the whole night with us!"

    "A bobcat?"

    "It slept at the top of the cellar steps. Oh, and I think I'm gonna get married."

    "Hah. I told you he's just slow."

    "They're all slow."

    "It seems like that to us around here, but, you know, people used to not get married till they were in their twenties or even their thirties."

    "Whoa, old. Who would marry in their thirties? With their whole life behind them. Wilson's kinda an old maid himself as it is. Oh, and do ya want your monocular back?"

    Karen turned and dropped the scrap of paper on the Armory desk, smiling to herself. "No, you should keep it. You get out a lot more than I do."

    "Sorry 'bout that. The last coupla days, though, I think some of us got out a little more than was good for us."

    Karen looked back. "You know, if we had lost you guys, I dunno, the Creek might have just folded its tents and slunk away."

    "Funny talk, but I think I know whatcha mean. Anything need doin'?"

    "Sure; the 'chamberpots' in here are overflowing and have to get to the garderobe pronto. Things stink more with the air filters clogging up so much. Won't you take two buckets, and I'll take one."

    The pots, gallon-sized galvanized pails with lids, stood in the darkened barracks between the Armory and the Infirmary. They could hear Marcee on the job next door: "Stay off this for a few days and you'll be ... " 

    Returning to the bright lights in the small Armory, they blinked and started forward with their buckets.

    Karen set hers down suddenly in the middle of the floor. "Billee, your butt-pack's been moved?" It was at least six inches nearer the door than she remembered seeing it set down.

    "It has!" 

    Billee set down her buckets and both women ran for the door. Billee sprinted to the right and Karen to the left. There were doors at each end of the hallway, with stairwells behind them. In a few moments, Karen, who had found an empty stairwell, re-entered the hallway, to find Billee doing the same. Karen gestured, palm up. Billee shook her head. Karen pointed to the doors nearest her, and Billee nodded her comprehension. They worked towards each other, looking into each compartment as they went. Karen came to the first on her right, which was open. Avery Murchison looked up from his desk, where he was poring over inventories, brows furrowed.

    "Did anyone run by here?" she asked.

    "Only you, just now." His expressive brows shifted to interrogative.

    "I'll be back." She moved to the Infirmary. Marcee stood beside the examination table, on which sat Vernie. Tomma occupied a chair near the wall, holding a pair of crutches. At his feet sat Krall. They all looked blankly at Karen, except Krall, who stood up and barked once. What was that, some kind of greeting?

    "Hello, Vernie, welcome home. Did anyone come through here?" Karen directed her question to Marcee.

    "No-o-o, don't think so."

    "Great. Vernie, can we borrow Tomma?"

    Vernie nodded, a bit morosely.

    "Sure thing, Karen," said Tomma, setting aside the crutches and standing up.

    The two of them stepped into the hall, with the big dog at Tomma's heels.

    "What do you have in mind?" asked Tomma.

    "Don't know yet. Here comes Billee."

    "Nothing?" asked Karen. 

    "Nobody." Billee was holding her fanny pack in one hand, and something clenched in the other. "They were fast."

    "Who?" asked Tomma.

    "That's what we'd like to know," replied Karen. "We had our backs turned for like five seconds and Billee's bag moved toward the door."

    "In the Armory?"

    "Anything missing?"

    "I'm not sure," said Billee, tears in her eyes. She held out her hand; it gleamed with copper and brass. "I checked out twenty rounds; now I have nineteen. But I ran and fell down and ran for, like two days and a night. I could have lost one."

    Tomma put his hand on her shoulder. "Do you really believe that?" he smiled.

    "No."

    Avery rolled up to them in his chair. Karen opened her mouth, but he raised his hand. "I got the gist. Who do we actually know of that was last in the hall?"

    Karen was aghast. "Ceel," she said reluctantly.

    "Then we'll find her immediately. No, Karen, don't be so miserable; I don't suspect her either. But we must eliminate her as a possibility if we can, as well as get her report of anything she might have seen. I'll stay here and lock the Armory from both ends. We've had a failure of operational security." He looked again at Karen. "Not your fault. It's seldom been locked. Along with any other room down here, except the power room, of course. My bad; after that odd business at the festival I should have known better. Now, hop!"

    Karen went left. Billee, Tomma and the dog went right, to descend the stairwells to the Common Room. As they reached the doors, Karen could hear Billee's voice, which carried the length of the corridor: "So, how come you get the dog?"

:::

On the fire line, a weary cheer went up as the strange little machine crossed a slimy stretch of the Creek and chugged up to them. Bolo, though he had not slept in two days, jumped down from the seat and unhooked the trailer. A man from Roundhouse gave him the tribal salute, right hands grasping right forearms, then led Deerie, with a bleary-eyed Jorj at the controls, toward the head of the line. A small, powerfully built man leaped over the rolling tracks onto the vacant side of the Cat seat and settled beside him. "It is amazing and gratifying that you are here."

    "Thank you, sir," Jorj croaked. "Water?"

    The man, who seemed to be the one in charge, crooked his finger at a younger man who looked very much like him – his son? – and made the universal drinking sign, thumb to his lips and small finger extended. The youth unshipped a damp-looking skin bag from his shoulder and handed it into the cage. 

    "Drink well, there is much. My name is Emilio. What we are doing is to make a fire lane around the fields on both sides of the valley. Then, if there had been time, to make one around Ridge. But there is already fire on the mountain." 

    They both looked toward Starvation Ridge, which loomed above them. Smoke boiled up from the unseen slopes of the south side and disappeared into the brown pall that covered the sky.
    "Not much steam in that d- ... that smoke," observed Jorj.

    "It is mostly poison oak and other scrub that is burning there," agreed Emilio. "It will reach the crest in a hand or less." Emilio extended his hand, fingers together at a right angle to his arm, toward the presumed location of the sun.

    "And throw sparks into the tall stuff on this side. Pretty dry up there?"

    "Yes, five percent moisture even in the shade."

    "Okay, there's no saving it. Y'gonna backfire?"

    "As soon as possible."

    "Okay. Deerie here is old and cranky but game, I think, and she's hungry. Can we have firewood – lots of firewood – chunked small, if we can get it?" Jorj released the levers for a moment and gestured with his hands held about six inches apart.

    "We will do that."

    "Great. Pleased to meet ya." 

    But Emilio had already leaped away to confer with the younger man. The Roundhouseman climbed aboard. "The Lord greet you, Jorj."

    "The Lord greet you. Where to?"

    "The line is up to the next farm on the right. We have four farms to go on this side of the valley. You can see they each have a cluster of buildings. We have cut through all the fences for you, and it is a matter of having clean dirt, six feet wide."

    "We're here. I'll make a shallow Cat road; ask folks to clean burnables out of the berms and roadbed as best they can. Crank down the hoist for me and we'll start pushing."

    "Yes, Jorj."

    Men, and several women, with axes, were widening a gap in a hedge for the lane. They scrambled aside as Deerie's blade bit the earth, tearing away blackberries and hawthorns with startling ease. Another cheer went up. Two lines of firefighters formed up behind the tractor, and as Deerie forged ahead along the fields on the other side, the people chopped and scooped away duff and brush with axes, adzes, picks, shovels, rakes, and hayforks. Whenever Deerie moved up a few feet, the people did likewise, leaving whatever they'd been doing for the next person to finish.

    Those who had exhausted themselves earlier in the day sat in shade, drinking water, talking quietly among themselves. 

    Emilio dispatched Raoul for the fuel wood, and then walked over to the resting group. "It is better in the shade, even with these evil clouds, yes?"

    Heads nodded. Among them was David, Raoul's brother. "Sir, it would be too hot to work at all in full sun."

    "Yes; the fire is terrible and the smoke, if it ran low, could not well be breathed. And yet it offers us some respite. So it is with everything. Even a great terror may have something to offer." Emilio looked up at the big hill. "When the fire comes across, it will draw up this lovely air toward itself. Then we will make fire here. We have piled brush at each farm. Let us have torchbearers go to each station." He pointed to each of them in turn. You will go to Bridge. You, Hall. Bledsoe, Russell, Wendler. Schnieder, Gulick, Hisey. I will fire the pile here at Peacher's. The signal will be three shots from Ball Butte."

    "Mr. Emilio?" It was a young shepherd from Beeman's. "What about Reymer's? And Ellin's and Holyrood's  – and Wilson's?"

    Emilio shook his head. "Ah, there it is. The fire is very big, and we are few."

:::

    Young Neel, almost reluctantly, handed the binoculars back to Ellen. "Those are so nice."

    "They'd be even better with straight prisms." She brought the eyepieces up and scanned Ridge. No flames yet; just the eternal smoke, rising, rising. "These things will become harder and harder to find as time goes by. There were many houses – whole towns – that will have vanished in this fire, and in others like it. Places we at the Creek never had the time to explore and utilize. Any binoculars that remained in those closets and cabinets are gone forever, and who knows when we will make such things again?" She lowered the little device, examined it ruefully, and smiled at Neel. "This is a 'cheap' model, too, a brand I would never have considered owning, once upon a time. Now they're priceless. Never drop them. Come to think of it, never drop anything. It all represents a fading past, but possibly also, a future. Such things, if we can hand them on in some way, could serve as models to guide a people to make new ones. Someday."
 
    Ellen raised the glasses again and swept Ridge. There! A tongue of flame in the Saddle. Oh-h, not good. She could see that the fire crews were only two-thirds of the way there. If the fire advanced at the east end first, it could race down to the forests beyond Old Ames and flank everyone. There! More! Tall fir trees near the crest of Ridge began weaving back and forth in the winds the flames were creating. One tree burst into a dull orange fireball, showering burning twigs into the dark growth on the near slope. 

    She turned and looked around the room. Elberd, undoubtedly very tired, had taken the opportunity to stretch himself out on the stone shelf that had sometimes served as a bunk bed, and, nodding off to the droning of Ellen's climate lecture, had fallen fast asleep. She stepped across and gently shook his shoulder. He sat up, almost bumping his head on the basalt ceiling, and blinked at her sheepishly.
    Ellen drew her Navy revolver – when did it get so heavy? – and held it up, handle forward, by the long barrel. "Young man, would you like to go out and fire this thing three times for me? They're blanks, it's fine."
    "Me, ma'am?" He looked at the big revolver. "Umm, what are blanks?"
    "You. They have powder but no bullet. If you get a misfire try again. I'm going to be on the horn to Ridge to shut down their ventilation, if they haven't already. It's getting nasty over there."

:::

    Along two miles of valley floor, at the angle of repose between farms and Ridge, men and women waited; when the three shots rang out, they bent to their tasks. Emilio knelt, shielding his work out of habit, though there was little wind as yet. He would prefer to use his hand lens, but thick, gritty brown clouds hung between him and the sun; he extracted a match from a grease-coated packet in his sweaty tunic and struck it on a handy river-rounded stone. It hissed and produced a faint uric-acid whiff. He reached the tiny flame through a gap in the dry, sharp-spined pile of splintered blackberry canes, to hold it beneath an abandoned junco's nest that had been found and placed for tinder, with a ball of dry grass. The tinder barely steamed, but began to produce a hot blue smoke, and the searing heat of an almost invisible flame forced him to retract his hand precipitately, catching himself among the blackberries. The pile seemed to cling to him as it caught alight, and by the time he stood clear, watching the flames shoot up to his own height, he had thoroughly scratched both his arms in his efforts to escape. That was not pretty, he thought. But it is sufficient.

    As his own station was in the angle of the line, he had a commanding view. Emilio stepped back across the fresh track of the fire road, sipped water, and looked to his left and right, to see smokes rising all along the edge of the woods. Some had had trouble getting theirs started, and he could see the torchbearer racing to their assistance. Before long, all were able to cross the fire trail, take up their tools, and wait.

    The fires licked at the forest edge, tentatively crept about among the dry ferns and nettles, and discovered the drought-wasted blackberry and vinca patches. Here and there a hazel flared like a Roman candle, its browned leaves blackening and detaching themselves from the slender, already-burning suckers to drift, by ones, two, and fives, into the lower branches of the firs. As the firs and maples caught fire, everyone was forced to step back into the fields. The hot wind began, tentatively at first, then increased.

    The young man from Beeman's –what was his name? – came over from Emilio's left. "What now?"
 
    "It is as Doctor Mary told us. We will each watch for sparks or flaming twigs to cross the line and make trouble. The we beat them out or bury them with our shovels and hoes. If this monster comes between us and the Creek, we may lose everything."