The Postman (31 page)

General Macklin snapped his fingers. “Don’t drag this out, Bezoar. I’m busy. Call the jerk in.”

Bezoar nodded quickly and reached back to pull a cord on the wall, leaving Gordon wondering what he had been trying to find in the drawer.

“Anyway, one of our scouting parties did encounter a band of kindred spirits in the Cascades, in a pass north of Crater Lake. There were misunderstandings, most of the poor locals died, I’m afraid. But we did manage to persuade a survivor—”

There were footsteps, then the beaded curtain parted. The svelte blond woman held it open and watched coldly as a battered-looking man with a bandaged head stumbled into the room. He wore a uniform of patched, faded camouflage, a belt knife, and a single, tiny earring. His eyes were downcast. This survivalist was one who seemed less than joyous at being here.

“I would introduce you to our latest recruit, Mr. Inspector,” Bezoar said. “But I believe you two already know each other.”

Gordon shook his head, thoroughly lost. What was going on here? To his knowledge he had never seen this man before in his life!

Bezoar prodded the drooping newcomer, who looked up, then. “I cannot say for certain,” the unsteady Holn recruit said, peering at Gordon. “He might be the one. It was a passing event, really, of so … so little consequence at the time.…”

Gordon’s fists balled suddenly.
That voice
.

“It’s
you
, you bastard!”

The jaunty Alpine cap was gone, but now Gordon recognized the salt-and-pepper sideburns, the sallow complexion.
Roger Septien seemed far less serene than when Gordon had last seen the man—on the slopes of a death-dry mountainside, helping to carry away nearly everything Gordon owned in the world, blithely, sarcastically, leaving him to almost certain death.

Bezoar nodded in satisfaction. “You may go, Private Septien. I believe your officer has suitable duty arranged for you, tonight.”

The former robber and onetime stockbroker nodded wearily. He didn’t even glance again at Gordon, but passed outside without another word.

Gordon realized that he had blundered in reacting so quickly. He should have ignored the man, pretended he didn’t recognize him.

But then, would it have made a difference? Macklin had already seemed so sure.…

“Get on with it,” the General told his aide.

Bezoar reached into the drawer again, and this time drew forth a small, ragged, black notebook. He held it out to Gordon. “Do you recognize this? It has your name in it.”

Gordon blinked. Of course it was his journal, stolen—along with all his goods—by Septien and the other robbers only hours before he stumbled onto the ruined postal van and started down the road to his new career.

At the time he had mourned its loss, for the diary detailed his travels ever since leaving Minnesota, seventeen years ago … his careful observations of life in postholocaust America.

Now, though, the slim volume was the last thing on Earth he would ever have wanted to see. He sat down heavily, suddenly weary, aware of how completely the devils had been toying with him. The lie had caught up with him, at last.

In all the pages of that little journal, there wasn’t a single word about postmen, or recovery, or any “Restored United States.”

There was only the truth.

Gordon slammed the book facedown on the ground beside the straw tick. How could anyone have read crap like this, let alone published it?

It was still light enough to read after the evening meal, and the sun was out for the first time in days. Nevertheless, a crawling chill ran up and down his back as the mad dialectic echoed within his head.

That evil genius, Benjamin Franklin …

Nathan Holn did make a good case that “Poor Richard” had been much more than a clever printer-philosopher, who played ambassador in between scientific experiments and wenching. If even a small fraction of Holn’s citations were correct, Franklin certainly
was
at the center of unusual events. Something odd did happen after the Revolutionary War, something that somehow thwarted the men like Aaron Burr, and brought about the nation Gordon had known.

But beyond that, Gordon was impressed mostly with the magnitude of Nathan Holn’s madness. Bezoar and Macklin had to be completely crazy if they thought these ravings would convert him to their plans!

The book had, in fact, just the opposite effect. If a volcano were to go off right here in Agness, he felt it would be worth it to know this nest of snakes would go to Hell along with him.

Not far away, a baby was crying. Gordon looked up but could barely make out shabby figures moving beyond the nearby copse of alders. New captives had been brought in last night. They moaned and huddled close around the small fire they had been allowed, not rating even the shelter of a roofed pen.

Gordon and Johnny could be joining those miserable serfs soon if Macklin did not get the answer he wanted. The “General” was losing patience. After all, from Macklin’s point of view his offer to Gordon must have seemed quite reasonable.

Gordon had only a little while left in which to make up his mind. The Holnist offensive would begin again with the first thaw, with or without his compromised cooperation.

He did not see where he had much choice.

Unbidden, a memory of Dena came to mind. He found himself missing her, wondering if she was still alive, wishing he could touch her and be with her … pestering questions and all.

By now, of course, it was probably too late to stop whatever crazy scheme she and her followers had dreamed up. Gordon frankly wondered why Macklin had not already
gloated to him, over yet another disaster to the hapless Army of the Willamette.

Perhaps it’s only a matter of time
, he thought gloomily.

Johnny finished rinsing out the nub-worn toothbrush that was their sole common possession. He sat next to Gordon and picked up the Burr biography. The youth read for a while, then looked up, clearly puzzled.

“I know our school at Cottage Grove wasn’t much by prewar standards, Gordon, but Grandfather used to give me lots to read, and talked to me a lot about history and stuff. Even I know this guy Holn is making up half this junk.

“How did he get away with pushing a book like this? How is it anyone ever believed him?”

Gordon shrugged. “It was called ‘the Big Lie’ technique, Johnny. Just
sound
like you know what you’re talking about—as if you’re citing real facts. Talk very fast. Weave your lies into the shape of a conspiracy theory and repeat your assertions over and over again. Those who want an excuse to hate or blame—those with big but weak egos—will leap at a simple, neat explanation for the way the world is. Those types will never call you on the facts.

“Hitler did it brilliantly. So did the Mystic of Leningrad. Holn was just another master of the Big Lie.”

And what about you?
Gordon asked himself. Did he, inventor of the fable of the “Restored United States,” collaborator in the hoax of Cyclops, have any right to cast stones?

Johnny read on for a few minutes more. Then he tapped the book again. “Who was this Cincinnatus guy, then? Did Holn make him up too?”

Gordon lay back on the straw. His eyes closed. “No. If I remember right, he was a great general of ancient Rome, back in the days of the Republic. According to the legend, he got sick of fighting one day, and retired from the army to farm his land in peace.

“One day though, emissaries came out from the city to see him. Rome’s armies were in rout; their leaders had proven incompetent. Disaster seemed inevitable.

“The delegation approached Cincinnatus—they found him behind his plow—and they pleaded with him to take command of the last defense.”

“What did Cincinnatus tell the guys from Rome?”

“Oh, well,” Gordon yawned. “He agreed all right. Reluctantly. He rallied the Romans, beat the invaders, and drove them all the way back to their own city. It was a great victory.”

“I’ll bet they made him king or something,” Johnny suggested.

Gordon shook his head. “The army wanted to. The people, also.… But Cincinnatus told them all they could go chase themselves. He returned to his farm, and never left it again.”

Johnny scratched his head. “But … why did he do that? I don’t get it.”

Gordon did though. He understood the story completely, now that he thought about it. He had had the reasons explained to him, not so very long ago, and he would never forget.

“Gordon?”

He did not answer. Instead he turned over at a faint sound from outside. Looking through the slats, he saw a party of men approaching up the trail from the river docks. A boat had just come ashore.

Johnny seemed not to have noticed yet. He persisted in his questions, as he had ever since they had recovered from their capture. Like Dena, the youth never seemed willing to lose any opportunity to try to improve his education.

“Rome was a long time before the American Revolution wasn’t it, Gordon? Well then, what was this—” He picked up the book again. “—this
Order of Cincinnatus
Holn talks about here?”

Gordon watched the procession approach the jail pen. Two serfs labored with a stretcher, guarded by khaki-clad survivalist soldiers.

“George Washington founded the Order of the Cincinnati after the Revolutionary War,” he said absently. “His former officers were the chief members—”

He stopped as their guard stepped over and unlocked the gate. They both watched as the serfs entered and laid their burden on the straw. They and their escorts turned and left without another word.

“He’s hurt pretty bad,” Johnny said when they hurried over to examine the injured man. “This compress hasn’t been changed in days.”

Gordon had seen plenty of wounded men in the years since his sophomore class had been drafted into the militia. He had learned a lot of bush diagnosis while serving with Lieutenant Van’s platoon. A glance told him that this fellow’s bullet wounds might have healed, eventually, with proper treatment. But the smell of death now hung over the still figure. It rose from limbs suppurated with marks of torture.

“I hope he lied to them,” Johnny muttered as he labored to make the dying prisoner comfortable. Gordon helped fit their blankets around him. He was puzzled over where the fellow had come from. He did not look like a Willametter. And unlike most Camas and Roseburg men, he had obviously been clean shaven until recently. In spite of his ill treatment, there was too much meat on his bones for him to have been a serf.

Gordon stopped suddenly, rocking back on his haunches. His eyes closed and opened. He stared. “Johnny, look here. Is this what I think it is?”

Johnny peered where he pointed, then pulled back the blankets for a better view. “Well I’ll be … Gordon, this looks like a
uniform!
”

Gordon nodded. A uniform … and clearly one of
postwar
making. It was colored and cut totally unlike anything the Holnists wore, or for that matter, anything either of them had ever seen in Oregon before.

On one shoulder, the dying man wore a patch embroidered with a symbol Gordon recognized from long ago … a brown grizzly bear striding upon a red stripe … all against a field of gold.

•  •  •

A while later word arrived that Gordon was wanted again. The usual escort came for him by torchlight. “That man in there is dying,” he told the head guard.