Z for Zachariah (22 page)
Authors: Robert C. O'Brien
Tags: #Juvenile Fiction, #Action & Adventure, #Magic, #Survival Stories, #Fantasy, #Science Fiction
I was stunned. I knew that I should run and get the cart, but I still could not believe that he was really gone. For almost five minutes I lay still in the grass, trembling. I looked to the south: he was walking fast, and was almost out of sight. I did not think he would turn back. I stood up and began to run.
I ran through the field and across the road to the wagon. It looked smaller than I had remembered, and the rain had caused the paint to warp and peel. I lifted the green plastic covering and looked inside. Everything I needed was there: the safe-suit, the packages of food, the air tank, even the Geiger counters. In a short time my life would depend on them; the wagon, and everything it held, would sustain me in a strange world. I went to the front of the cart and stood between the shafts, and picked them up. They were not as heavy as I had imagined. I pulled forward, and the wheels rolled easily over the thick grass of the lawn and on to the road.
I passed the house. Visions moved behind my eyes, and I saw the house as I had seen it as a child: climbing the front steps on the way to supper, or sitting on the porch at night, watching the fireflies. My grandfather rocked me on the swing, and I remembered someone singing. Later I had sat on the swing at night weaving long, romantic dreams about my life to come; then, the war. I felt
the
weight of the cart behind me and walked on.
I walked on up the road. The wheels of the wagon made a dry hissing sound on the tarmac. A breeze moved the grass and leaves; sand blew against my face. With each step I seemed to move further away from my own life, as it had been; yet everything I saw tied me closer to the valley. I
passed remnants of an old treehouse. What had I hoped for as a child? I strained to remember; but it seemed to me that nothing in my childhood had prepared me for this.
I turned and looked behind me. The road was still. I wondered where Mr Loomis was, if he were still waiting by the rock for me to come. I imagined his fury when he discovered that the cart was missing, that he had been tricked. I was nervous, so that it was hard for me to turn around and walk on. I tried to think of the dream: the schoolhouse, the faces of the children; but it was hard to fix the vision in my mind.
I was walking towards the deadness. The creek flowed past the roadside, coming from outside, crossing, perhaps, paths that I would follow. The water was as clear as it had always been, and the sound of the stream moving on the rocks was beautiful to me. Yet everything it touched was dead. I thought of Faro, and tears came to my eyes.
I thought again of Mr Loomis. Soon I would see him for the last time. There was now a chance that I could leave without seeing him at all. I wanted to do that; yet there was something inside me that resisted the idea. It pulled against me like a weight, like the burden of the cart as I climbed the hill. I remembered his face when he was sick, and my sadness when I thought that he would die. The cow lowed in the pasture below me, as if she knew that I was leaving, or already gone.
And if I saw him, what would I say then? He would be mad with rage, and ready to kill. He would do anything to keep me from leaving. He would say anything. He would tell me of the horrors of the deadness, of the loneliness of silent roads and fields. He would speak of bodies in the houses and in cars; he would say he
knew
there was no other place: surely he had searched long enough. He would say, come back to the house, come back, come back: this time I will leave you to yourself.
For the last minutes, labouring hard under the cart's weight on the uphill slope, I did not think at all. Trees began to appear beside me, right and left, and then the shadow of woods. I kept my eyes down. The road curved slightly and then levelled out, and there was a patch of dense underbrush to my right. I dropped the shafts and found the place where my supplies were hidden, and uncovered the sack. I put it and the bottle of water inside the wagon, pulled the wagon right to the border of the deadness. I took out the safe-suit and put it on, and strapped the airtank on my back. Then I rolled the cart quickly downhill towards Ogdentown. I came back with this notebook, and the gun.
The sun is high over the east ridge now and the valley is beautiful in the morning light. I do not know what has happened to Mr Loomis, or where he is; but I will wait for him. He is bound to come and I must speak to him. His may be the last human voice that I will ever hear.
Mr Loomis is coming. I can see him on the tractor. I am glad to have told my story.
Chapter Twenty-six
August 8th
From the start the interview did not go as I had planned. Mr Loomis came on the tractor at top speed, with the gun across his lap. I shouted to him to
Stop
, to
Halt;
but he did not even slow the tractor. Instead, he came on. I thought perhaps he could not hear me over the sound of the engine and in desperation I fired my rifle into the air, but if he heard the shot he ignored it. He drove the tractor to the very top of Burden Hill, just opposite my hiding place. He jumped down and began to scan the road towards Ogdentown.
My heart was pounding and I did not know what to do. His back was towards me, but I could not shoot. I was not even sure I could speak, but I tried and my voice came out reasonably firm.
"Drop your gun," I said.
Instantly he whirled and fired in the direction of my voice. He had not yet seen me but I was no more than 25 feet away. I knew it was the end. I was sixteen and I had worked so hard to keep things going and now I was going to die. A wave of disappointment swept over me, disappointment so bitter it wiped out even my fear. I stood up and faced him. I do not know why he did not shoot me. Instead he saw the safe-suit and began to shout:
"It's
mine
. You know it's mine. Take it off!"
"No," I said, "I won't."
He aimed the gun at me. I stood still. I could not think what to do, so that when words came from my mouth even I was surprised and not conscious of having thought. I realize now they probably saved my life.
"Yes," I said, "you can kill me… the way you killed Edward."
He stared at me. Then he shook his head, as if he had heard it wrong, or not heard the words at all. Yet he lowered the gun and stepped back.
"No," he said, "you don't know that…" His voice was weak.
"You told me when you were sick." I said. "You told me how you shot him in the chest. You had to patch the bullet holes in the suit."
Now Mr Loomis turned away from me. For a moment he just stood there; I was not sure but I thought that his shoulders were trembling. After a time he spoke quietly.
''He tried to steal the suit… the way you are stealing it now."
"I have no choice," I said. "I didn't want to die, and you wouldn't give me anything. During the winter I would have starved on the hillside. I don't want to live with you hunting me as if I were an animal, and I will never agree to be your prisoner." I felt reassured by my own voice and talked on:
"I'll search for a place where there are other people, people who will welcome me. To stop me you will have to kill me, too."
"It's wrong," he said, but he knew that I meant it, and his tone was frightened and bewildered. I thought he was going to cry.
"Don't go," he said. "Don't leave me. Don't leave me here alone."
I spoke carefully:
"If you shoot me you will really be alone. You searched for months and found no one else. There may not be anyone else. But if I should find people I will tell them about you, and they may come. In the meantime you have food. You have the tractor and the store. You have the valley."
There was bitterness in my voice. And suddenly, feeling near tears myself,
"You didn't even thank me for taking care of you when you were sick."
So my last words were childish.
That was all. I adjusted the mask so that it fitted tightly over my face, and cool air from the tank flowed into my mouth. I turned my back on him. I waited for the jar and the sharp pain of a bullet, but it did not come. I went into the deadness. I heard Mr Loomis calling after me, but the mask covered my ears, so that his voice seemed garbled and far away, and I could not understand. I walked on. Yet suddenly his voice came clearly to me, and I realized he was calling my name. There was something in his tone that made me stop and look back up the hill. He was standing at the very edge of the deadness. He was pointing to the west and he seemed to shout the same thing over and over. Then I heard him.
"Birds," he said, "I saw birds… west of here… circling. They went away and I couldn't find the place. I saw them."
I raised my hand to him to let him know that I had understood. Then I forced myself to turn and walk away.
Now it is morning. I do not know where I am. I walked all afternoon and almost all night until I was so tired I could not go on. Then I did not bother to put up the tent, just spread my blanket by the roadside and lay down. While I was sleeping the dream came, and in the dream I walked until I found the schoolroom and the children. When I awoke the sun was high in the sky. A stream was flowing through the brown grass, winding west. The dream was gone, yet I knew which way to go. As I walk I search the horizon for a trace of green. I am hopeful.
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