“Ask.”
“What has become of I Corps?”
The general did not translate.
His face fell.
His mouth opened.
His shoulders slumped.
He seemed suddenly older.
The general shook his head to himself as if finishing an argument he’d started long ago and lost many times since. Then he looked at the Boy.
“They are no more.” And, “I know that for certain.”
There was no pride in his voice. No triumph. No satisfaction.
But there was guilt.
There was shame.
“When I was young I thought it would be different,” said the Chinese general very plainly. “I thought only of victory.”
The general sighed heavily.
“I know differently now.” He looked at the Boy, maybe beyond the Boy. “I am responsible.”
“You were there?” asked the Boy. “At the end of I Corps?”
The general whispered, “Yes.”
“If the man who brought me here,” the Boy indicated the troop leader, “would return to my things and bring me the bearskin I wear… I have something for you.”
Orders were given and the discussion among the Chinese renewed. All the while, the general watched the Boy and waited for the return of the requested bearskin.
I have given away all my intel, Sergeant. I know that is not what you taught me to do. But what good is it to anyone, now that all of you are dead?
There was no reply.
The bearskin arrived and the Boy laid it out and retrieved the map from inside the hidden pouch.
Sergeant, I’m doing this so that maybe they’ll trust me. I’m doing this so they’ll be ready for MacRaven when he comes. I remember what we both saw outside Oklahoma City.
The Boy stood.
He raised his right arm and saluted the Chinese general.
He held out the map.
“There’s nothing left,” said the Boy.
Chapter 39
The night air felt cool and dried the sweat on the Boy’s face as he was led back from the meeting beyond the gate. The wind had picked up from off the bay. It would be a long, cold night. The shantytown was quiet and only a single candle burned in the odd window they passed along its lanes.
In the shack it was warm from the heat given off by the brazier, its glow a dull orange. Inside, Horse raised a sleepy eye then returned to his rest and dreams. The troop leader left and came back with more hay. He said something in Chinese, a farewell perhaps, then closed the door to the shack behind him as he left.
The Boy took off the sweaty gear they had given him and went out the back door.
He walked to the end of the narrow two-plank dock and lowered himself into the freezing dark water of the bay.
It was cold.
Maybe the coldest water he’d ever felt.
He thought of the girl as he floated in the darkness.
Back inside the shack he put his clothes on and, as though he had known all along what he would do next, he took up the carved piece of charcoal once more.
He made a line. The outline of her hair. Long and straight. A curve over the top of her head.
Then another line for her delicate chin.
And a line falling away from the chin for her neck.
They’ll see this.
He put the charcoal back in its pouch and sat by the glowing coals of the brazier, watching the simple lines he had drawn.
The lines were enough to remember her by.
IN THE MORNING it was the troop leader who appeared once more. They both took Horse out into the mist and walked him along the bay’s edge, following a winding muddy street. Fishing boats lay motionless in the calm waters of the fog-shrouded bay.
They crossed into a ruined section of the shantytown.
Ruins from Before.
Buildings with chunks of concrete and whole sections missing. Buildings where the plaster facade had fallen away long ago. Buildings from which metal girders twisted wickedly upward. Buildings that had fallen into little more than piles from which rusty strands of rebar sprung like wild hair.
A work crew hovered over the ruins of a building, testing it with their crowbars and the occasional shovel. Other men moved piles of rubble in wheelbarrows.
They are removing the town that was here Before, Sergeant.
They came to a building. It was in better shape than most.
Inside they found the Chinese general.
He hobbled forward, his big frame leaning heavily on a bent cane.
“I have studied the map you gave me.” After a pause the general continued breathily, “Can you tell me about all those places? What is there now? That’s what we wish to know. Our outpost was our farthest settlement. We cannot go south due to the nature of contamination in that area, so it seems we must know what lies to the east. If we could go over the map together, you might tell me a little bit about each place. If that would be acceptable to you?”
The Boy thought of the girl.
He thought of leaving this place.
He had left every place he had ever been.
He wondered if he might see her here.
If he left he would never see her again.
“Yes.”
“Good,” said the general and led him to a large desk. The map lay spread out across its expanse. The floor that surrounded the desk was a sea upon which books rose like sudden and angry waves. Leaning against the walls were all manner of things. Tools, ancient rifles from Before, many things the Boy had no name for.
“So we know you came through Reno. What were your experiences there?”
The Boy thought for a moment. How did one describe the fear of an unknown mad animal lying in wait in the dark? How did one describe that laughing terror and the single leering face seen as a shadow through dirty glass for even just the part of a moment?
“Reno is like a hole where an animal lives.” He thought of the bear cave. “Where something that isn’t human makes its home now.”
The general laid his finger on the map over Reno.
“Colonel Juk was their commander. I have always wondered, over the years, what became of his unit and
