Half Past Midnight

asset during that time, the tattoo may be surgically removed, and Mr. Worecski shall be allowed to take his place in our society.”

I think Ken was as shocked as Worecski. “Your Honor!” he sputtered. “You can’t… that is, I can’t take this kind of responsibility. You’re making him into a slave.”

“The only alternative I have is to pass a sentence of death, Mr. Simms. Would you prefer that?”

And so, Ken acquired a slave. Many would view it as a bit of poetic justice, a black man getting a white slave. Not Ken. Worecski was his on paper only.

As soon as Billy got his tattoo and they delivered him to our door, Ken made his position clear. “I’m going to tell you this one time, and one time only. Leeland and I argued out there for some time about whether or not we should finish you off. Leeland won that argument, and that’s the only reason you’re standing here right now. I was ready to slit your throat.” He glared for a moment, making sure he was getting his point across. “So I’m going to give you the only order I’ll ever give you.”

He pointed at me. “You do anything Leeland Dawcett tells you to do, when he says to do it, and better than he wants it done, or I’ll do what I should have done then.”

Then he had stalked out of the room, leaving my slave and I equally dumbfounded.

“Sensei?” Billy jarred me back from my reverie. My eyes were drawn to the large black encircled “7-34” on his forehead representing the month and year he would be eligible for freedom. If his review was not favorable, the date would be tattooed over leaving a solid black circle, and he would spend the rest of his life as a slave.

In the time since Billy’s sentence, Rejas had had six more instances of marauder bands attacking some of the outlying homesteads and dozens of individual pilferers. The town had lost seven more people to the gangs, among them Rene’s unfortunate husband. But we had acquired thirty-eight more slaves. Two of them had been shot when they fought against the tattooist. The others had spread the word among themselves, and we hadn’t had any further trouble. Since the death of her husband, Rene hated them all.

“Sorry, Billy. Who is it?”

“Mayor Kelland. He’s waiting in the house.”

“Thanks.” He nodded and turned back to the house. I turned the group over to Eric and went over to where Megan was sparring. “Megan, I’m going inside. Finish up out here.”

I watched as she swept one opponent off of his feet and locked his arm over one knee, under the other as she knelt over him, evading a strike from the other opponent. She grabbed the second attacker’s arm and twisted her wrist in a way that Mother Nature never intended it to bend, bringing that opponent to the ground with an awkward thud. Then she held both in place for a moment to show that she was in full control of the situation before releasing them.

She stood and turned to me. “No problem, Dad.”

I grinned as I headed back to the house.

The mayor looked up as I entered. “Somethin’ funny?”

“I was just remembering how frustrating it can be to be beaten so soundly by someone half your size.”

He shook his head, obviously having no idea what I was talking about, and just as obviously not caring. He paced the room with a worried look on his face.

That bothered me. As I said before, my feelings for James Kelland had changed a lot since I’d first met him. He had gone from someone I couldn’t stand to a man whom I genuinely respected and trusted, liked even. “What’s the problem, Jim?”

He stopped his pacing and sat on the sofa. Stress still lined his brow. “The trucking crew got in today- without the trucks.”

That got my attention. The tanker trucks were part of the key to this town’s long-term survival. They were our only means of transporting the fuel we had staked out across the southern United States. Now Jim was telling me we had just lost half of them.

He continued in a subdued voice, and his tone worried me as much as what he had to say. “They brought a bit o’ news back with them.”

I took a seat in the easy chair across from him. To say that Jim had a talent for understatement was… well, an understatement. “I’ll bet they did. I take it that it wasn’t good news.”

He shook his head. “You know, I ain’t exactly sure.” Mayor Kelland was just full of surprises this morning.

“How do you mean?”

“Todd Waitfield was the lead driver.”

“I know him,” I said. “He’s one of our part-time students.”

The mayor shrugged. “Who ain’t, nowadays?”

That was true. Since we’d had so much trouble with freebooters in the more recent months, I had literally hundreds of students. On top of that, many of the senior students had begun teaching even more people at other locations around town.

“Anyway, he said they came up on a roadblock just this side of San Marcos, a roadblock manned by the U.S. Army. They had a tank sittin’ smack dab in the middle of the road! Confiscated the fuel in the name of the U.S. Reconstruction and Distribution effort and questioned the hell out o’ the drivin’ crew. Wanted to know what kind of condition we were in. Waitfield said as far as he knew, all of the men stuck to the drill. The only difference was that they had to tell them where they were heading, since they were depending on them for a ride.”

All of the drivers had been coached in what to say if questioned about where they were headed with the fuel if they ever ran across any organized groups. Part of the story was that they were members of a group based in Shreveport, Louisiana. They were to emphasize what a hard time their group was having, and how tough things were for them.

Jim continued, “’Course he couldn’t be a hunnerd percent sure, since they were all questioned separately, but he talked to his team afterward, and they all told him they’d played down the town’s resources and played up the problems we’ve all had. He trusts his team completely. Said he was willing to stake his life on their word.”

I nodded. “Makes sense, I guess. They’ve had to trust each other in some rough situations.”

“Yeah, but now he’s staking our lives on their word.” Jim took a deep breath before continuing, “Anyway, the army boys took the trucks and sent the crew back in a personnel vehicle. Waitfield said they told him they’re gonna be out this way later this week to discuss our contribution to the ’Reconstruction Effort.’ You believe that shit?” He laughed wryly. “The hell of it is, I don’t know whether or not to be happy about it.”

“How so?”

“Well, it looks like the government’s startin’ to get back on its feet, which to my way of thinkin’ is a good thing. But the first thing they do is start confiscatin’ our goods.” He stood and resumed his pacing. “And that, to my way of thinkin’, ain’t such a good thing at all.”

“Well, what do you expect, Jim? Compared to us, the rest of the country probably hasn’t got squat. We’ve got freshwater springs all over these parts. Crops are in. The closest hot spot is Houston, a hundred and eighty miles away. We haven’t had any hot winds in nearly six months. Hell, compared to what the majority of the country’s probably going through, we’re living in a freaking garden!”

“And we worked damn hard to get here!” he exclaimed bitterly. “So why should we just up and give it away?” He forced himself back to a calmer state, the effort plainly visible. “I got a lot of people depending on me to make decisions right now. The right decisions, Leeland, and I’m not sure what to do.” I could see how much the admission hurt him, and I sympathized. I had once been forced to make some similar decisions. Ironically, it had been Jim who had forced them on me.

I remembered the feeling well. He was torn by the necessity of the choices he had to make. He could turn the town’s hard-earned supplies over to the Army, or defy them and chance the retaliation of the military.

He sat back down. “I need some advice, or at least someone to discuss this with. The bitch of it is that there aren’t very many people I can talk to about this.”

“I’m flattered,” I replied, “but I don’t know if I’m the one you should be talking to.”

He raised his eyebrows. “Maybe you don’t realize just how many people look up to you nowadays. You’re an example to them. You and Ken and Megan.”