An exhalation. Then after a long pause, a rapping on metal: SOS.
'Got it. If you'd rather trust me than those cocksuckers behind your ear, tell 'em you're going into a sewer or something and come down from there with your hands clean.'
He tried to hear Ethridge's mutters, but a loud-hailer on the patrol boat was making too much noise. He stood out of its view, weapon at his side, and watched Kent Ethridge's lithe descent.
The loud-hailer finished its spiel two hundred meters down the pier, burbled nearer, started over.
'Commander Niles, your Mr. Fairbanks has been shot while resisting arrest. You are surrounded. Come out unarmed. Mr. Conrad of Eureka: you are among friends; please do not show yourself or fire on your rescuers.' The crew of the patrol boat took no chances and kept out of sight as they moved on to repeat the message. Obviously they didn't know the exact position of the men under the pier, but now it was only a question of time.
Ethridge's eyes flickered around him as he dropped to the catwalk — perhaps looking for an escape route just in case. His hands were not as high as Quantrill would have liked, but no matter. They both knew whose draw was quickest. Quantrill stuck the H & K into his sodden trousers. 'Don't forget Control; use sign talk,' he said to Ethridge who nodded, hands trembling.
'You're commander Niles?'
Nod.
'Who's Fairbanks?'
Manually: ' Cross.'
'Good; they bagged his ass. Any other teams?'
'Later; we've gotta find a safe hole for you. Those customs dudes on the level?'
Elaborate shrug. Then, wincing:
'Don't answer. Take off those white pants, they make too good a target if those guys come down here after you. I'm going up. Keep that chiller; if I come barreling back down, for God's sake don't snuff me.'
Quantrill eased past the gymnast, squeezed his arm in passing. 'You and I together can make Control regret Sanger,' he added, trotting toward the stairs.
He emerged slowly into the light calling, 'I'm Conrad! Take it easy! Send me one man, unarmed, to the stairwell; you can understand my caution.'
He could hear men talking; a rattle of their equipment. He winced, reached inside his shirt, felt a lump between skin and pectoral muscle. The little explosive slug popped into his hand like a pea from a pod, still a live round. A half-meter of Corpus Christi Bay had made all the difference.
The man who slid into view kept his hands out and, beaming, explained that no customs men were anywhere near the pier. The men in borrowed uniforms were rebels; a welcoming party of picked men.
CHAPTER 59
Even when he spotted two men carrying the body of Cross, Quantrill was not absolutely certain of his welcome. He refused to move into the open until the blocky prewar Mercedes rolled onto the pier.
Flanked by towering bodyguards made taller by stetson hats, the old man who stepped from the rear seat carried an odd-looking piece of headgear. He was an unforgettable figure to anyone old enough to recall earlier Presidential elections. The paunch, the rolling gait of an old man with bad hips the compressed features on a big bald head with its halo of gray hair: Ex-Governor James Street of Texas.
Quantrill grinned, placed his automatic on the pier, strode to meet the Indy leader.
'Here, put this on first,' said Street in introduction, taking the helmet from under his arm. He turned it over and a cascade of metal mesh fell out. It would form a cape reaching half-way to the wearer's waist.
Quantrill accepted the thing, shook the proffered hand. 'I'm Ted Quantrill, Governor. What's this thing for?'
'We know who you are, boy,' the old man said in a friendly growl. 'We've had unimpeachable reports that you're still wearin' a gawddam bomb in your head, and reports just as insistent that it's gone. If it isn't, put on the gawddam helmet, it's somethin' they call a Faraday cage with its own signal generator. If that tells you a lot, then
But Quantrill was already sprinting back to the stairwell. 'I've got a friend down here who needs this,' he shouted, and started down the stairwell talking as he went.
Moments later he returned with a very cautious Kent Ethridge who made an arresting picture in helmet, briefs, socks, and a silvery metal drape that covered his upper body. Ethridge still refused to speak aloud, full of mistrust for the helmet; but his hands spoke often to Quantrill in rover dialogue.
Quantrill made the introductions. 'You'll excuse Ethridge, Governor. He doesn't have much faith in that helmet, and I don't blame him. What he wants is a nice deep cave as long as that critic's in his head.'
Along the pier men were running, changing clothes, speeding off in cars and on hovercycles. One of the stetsoned giants leaned over to murmur into the Governor's ear. 'You're right, Tom,' Street nodded, and turned to Quantrill with a squint-eyed grin. 'This little switcheroo took some doing, and the real customs folks want to get back on the job before the gawddam media come flockin' down here. You boys ride up front,' he added, and moved in the painful flatfooted gait of a tired old warrior toward his chariot.
CHAPTER 60
It was not a genuine death-dealing icy wind, the kind that could sweep down from blue-black October skies to justify the local label, 'blue norther', but it made Sandy Grange glad she'd rebuilt this half-submerged old soddy instead of moving into an ordinary cabin. Gusts slapped at her big window near the fireplace and Childe gave a delicious shiver in response to the moaning at the eaves. 'Tell me a scary,' she wheedled, twirling the great Ember.
'Not now, hon,' said Sandy, playing with the holo channel selector. 'And quit diddling with that awful thing. Remember last week?'
Last week Childe had been idly toying with the amulet, watching its smoky gleam reflect the firelight, when it began to issue a terrible odor of long-forgotten eggs. It had taken Sandy awhile to track the stench to its source, but only ten seconds to throw the amulet outside. And there, on the grassy verge of a South Texas soddy, the only functioning synthesizer on Earth had spent the night, its glitter challenging the stars.
Now, Sandy window-shopped between two channels. The FBN channel offered its usual sitcoms. The Mexican channel was for all practical purposes an American channel with expatriate yanquis like sultry Ynga Lindermann whose talk show reached well into Streamlined America. Secretly, Sandy enjoyed the Lindermann show because at times her guests said and did things that went far beyond the legal limits.
But after all, it was only a Mex station. Nobody had to watch.
But tonight Sandy chose FBN's electronic pabulum because it promised a special cameo appearance by a personal friend, the Reverend Ora McCarty. Apparently the Federalists did not yet suspect that McCarty might have rebel connections. So, for the best of reasons, Sandy missed Lindermann's talk with an old guest star, Governor Jim Street. And a new guest, Ted Quantrill.
Boren Mills would have missed it as well but for a priority call from Salter. Since his return from the utter ruin in the San Rafael Desert, Mills could usually be found either in his office or his adjoining spacious apartment, trying to buttress his tottering empire. The Israelis were dragging their heels on the ECM deal, and Young's complaints of outlaw media became daily more threatening. The two teams of innocent S & R regulars had found no trace of Eve Simpson's amulet at the Schreiner place, and while the desert lab had yielded many small fragments of synthesizers, Mills entertained little hope that a working specimen could ever be reconstructed from them. Other members of IEE's directorship were asking pointed questions about the failure of the (nonexistent) sea-water extraction facility near Eureka, and now Young had reneged on the licensing of the LOS site near Wild Country.
