TWENTY
“Let’s go home now, Carol Ann,” her husband said, taking her by the arm.
“You better turn me loose, boy,” she warned him.
“Carol Ann, I found us a nice little place down clost to home. You fetch the kids and come on now. The house needs cleanin’ up.”
“Clean it up your own damn self!”
“Girl, don’t talk to me lak ’at. Took me three days to find you. What happened to yore hair!”
“Me and the others had it cut some and done up. You don’t like it, that’s tough!”
The others were having the same problems with their wives. They just couldn’t get used to the change in them. The girls seemed different; kind of tough-actin’. And they wasn’t takin’ no orders worth a damn.
“Misty,” B.M. pleaded. “Whut the hale’s come over you? I ain’t never seen you act lak this here ’fore.”
“You got us a new home all picked out, B.M.?”
“Shore. Nice one. Just a-waitin’ for you to come clean it up.”
“Your arms broke, boy?”
“Haw?”
“You ain’t . . . don’t have a damn thing to do, B.M. Now you want me to come back to you, you en-roll in school. You join up. We’ll take the trainin’ together and the housework we’ll divvy up fifty/fifty.”
“Hit ain’t fittin’ for a man to do a woman’s work, Misty.”
“Then carry your ass, boy!”
“Misty, you cain’t mean ’at! I done said I was gonna do rat. Right. Whut more do you want from me?”
“Respect, B.M. The two of us pullin’ together, not apart. The kids goin’ to school and learnin’ right from wrong and how to get along with other people. That and a whole lot more, B.M. Now, me and Jenny Sue and Carol Ann and Laura June and Billie Jo talked it over. That’s the way it’s gonna be, B.M. This place here, B.M., why it’s a whole new way of life that I didn’t even know was there. There ain’t no hate here, B.M. I never seen, saw, anything like it. Everybody has a job, and they do it. Nobody steals, lies, breaks the law. Nobody is all off to themselves, thinking they’re better than other folks. I like it, B.M. I’m stayin’. If you wanna stay . . . well, I’d like that. But if you don’t think you can cut it, then you best haul ass, boy. ’Cause the first time you spout off some crack about somebody of another race or color or whatever, some of these ol’ boys around here is gonna kill you, B.M. And I’d grieve if that’d happen. But I got to think that you’re a grown man, and what happens, well, you brung, brought it on yourself. Now I’m through talkin’. You gonna stay, or go?”
He looked at her for a long time, then slowly smiled. “You learned how to write your name yet, Misty?”
“Want to see me?”
“Yeah!”
With a stub of a pencil and a scrap of paper, she printed: MISTY. Then she printed: LOVES B.M.
“What do it say, Misty?”
She told him.
“Well, I think I’ll give it a whirl, Misty. Think you can write something, something else?”
“What?”
He told her.
She printed: B.M. LOVES MISTY.
TWENTY-ONE
Ben, Ike, Tina, and Cecil, accompanied by a company of Rebels, heavily armed, drove up Highway 9 to Perth Amboy and crossed over to Staten Island. They drove to the far north end of the island. They saw no one.
“Used to be able to take a ferry from this point,” Ben said, showing them the half-submerged ferry.
It was just breaking dawn, the mist still clinging to the bay.
“I can’t see it!” Tina said impatiently.
All turned at the sound of vehicles. Dan and a platoon of Scouts had been lagging behind, keeping a close watch.
Dan shook his head. “Nothing. And not a sign of anyone’s ever having lived on the island.”
Chase had ridden out with Dan. “Let’s check out Sea View Hospital today,” he suggested. “It would be closer and this is as good a jumping-off place as any. You agree, Ben?”
“Good as any, Lamar.”
The mist was gradually lifting.
The silence was vast around them; only a few sea birds soared and called.
“I wonder why that is?” Lamar said, his eyes watching the birds.
“Survivors probably hunted them and ate them,” Ike said.
Lamar muttered something terribly vulgar under his breath. “Why didn’t the city people leave and head out into country?”
“Perhaps they couldn’t,” Ben told them all. “Besides, they don’t know any other life. The mist is lifting.”
Everybody was straining their eyes, to be the first to catch a glimpse of the Lady with the torch of welcome.
Then the sun burst free, burning off the mist, and there she stood in the harbor.
Everyone was touched. Most of the Rebels had tears streaming down their face. Lamar Chase garumped a couple of times and cleared his throat. Dan honked his nose into a handkerchief. Cecil was openly, unashamedly, weeping. Tina was crying so hard she could hardly see the lady in the harbor.
Ike said, “‘Give me your tired, your poor, Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free. . . .’ You know the rest of it, Ben?”
“‘The wretched refuse of your teeming shore, Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed, to me: I lift my lamp beside the golden door.’”
Little Jersey was standing on the cab of a truck, so she could see over the heads of the Rebels crowding the dock. “That’s beautiful, general; did you write that?”
“No, Jersey,” Ben smiled. “Emma Lazarus wrote that. It’s from the ‘New Colossus.’ That’s the inscription for the Statue of Liberty.”
“You ever been up close to it, general?” a Rebel called out.
“Oh, yes. Just before the Great War. It’s quite a sight to see.”
“I don’t think Emma had the Night People in mind when those words were written,” Ike said.
“No.” Ben shifted his Thompson. “I don’t either. So let’s go make sure that the next ship of people seeking freedom really finds that freedom.”
The Rebels mounted up. Behind them, the sounds of many Rebels’ vehicles, including the rattle of tanks could be heard.
Ben stood up in his Jeep and waved his hand. “Scouts out! Let’s go!”
Fire in the Ashes—Zebra
Anarchy in the Ashes — Zebra
Alone in the Ashes — Zebra
Fire in the Ashes — Zebra
All rights reserved, including without limitation the right to reproduce this ebook or any portion thereof in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of the publisher.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, events, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 1988 by William W. Johnstone
Cover design by Open Road Integrated Media
ISBN 978-1-4976-2450-4
This edition published in 2014 by Open Road Integrated Media, Inc.
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Danger in the Ashes Page 27
