I looked at Nance. "Leave 'em their sheets," I pleaded. "We don't need the sheets."
She nodded and I turned to see Stays standing behind me holding a fire cube on a green stick. I tried to walk past and he held out his green stick across my path. "Where're you going?" he demanded.
"Wherever the hell I want. Rule 2, remember?"
"Yeah. You still have those capsules?"
I looked down and opened my hand. The black and whites were in the center of my palm. I looked up at him and held out my hands toward the jury. "I didn't want this. You know that. I was ready to die."
"Your jury already did that," he answered.
"I mean die for the Law."
"That's what I meant, too." He looked up at the stars, took a deep breath, and let it out in a big sigh. "Bando, everybody's willing to die for the law. You have the guts to live for the law? Your jury just bought you your ticket."
"If that's what they were going to do, they only needed a majority."
"If you were on that jury, Bando, how would you pick who would live and who would die? They did it the way it had to be done."
I turned around, saw that the RCs had stripped half the bodies, and turned back, sick to my stomach. Hell, I couldn't even figure out why Kegel's bodyguards gave their lives for Gutty and his monster. Did they die for me, or for the law?"
"Stays, the Law can't depend on me or anyone else. It can't depend on the life of any single person. Nobody's that dependable. Nobody's worth that."
Stays lifted an arm and pointed toward the bodies. "I have thirteen witnesses who disagree."
"Chief?" It was Marantha's voice. I turned and saw her standing behind me.
"What?"
"I know who shot you."
"Who?"
"It was Deadeye." She smiled sadly and held out a small folded piece of paper. "Nothin' but top flight police work."
I took the piece of paper and began opening it as Marantha walked over to Nance with another note. I read Deadeye's scrawl.
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Chief,
I'm the one who shot you. I reviewed my notes. I think I figured out what planet my ass is on.
Jay Ostrow.
▫
Rapid fire I began discounting his gesture, Deadeye was only feeling guilty about shooting me. And Grahl. He'd been nothing but a husk since he wasted the twelve year old girl. Suicide was no big price for him. And Mercy Jane, well, she couldn't live with the horror of her memories. Deadeye and the cockroach worked off their guilt, and Mercy Jane was at peace. As for the other ten, I never knew them. I only had to explain away the ones I knew.
Still, ten men and women I didn't know bit the zebra to keep Bando Nicos alive. Who could even guess about their reasons? I was guessing, though. I shook my head. It was a gift. I just couldn't accept it.
There was the sound of the RC wagon pulling up. Marietta and the others began loading the bodies into the wagon. "Can't bury 'em here," Marietta declared. "No dirt. You want 'em buried, don't you?"
I went over to the wagon and sat on the steps. "Marietta, I don't know what to do."
"You're just like the rest of us, down 'n brown. Somebody says 'I love you,' 'n you think he's a fool. Somebody says you're a good man, 'n you spit on him. How many sharks gotta die for you? Give me a number, Pancho, an' I'll start linin' 'em up."
I got to my feet and began walking away from everybody. As I walked by him, Stays blocked my path as he held out a batch of paper slips. "Don't forget your mail, Chief."
I paused, glanced at the papers, then looked up at Stays.
"Yeah," he said. "I know."
I took them and stuffed them in my pocket.
▫
I climbed back beyond the rock walls to the columns where Ratt and I had huddled together beneath that storm of bullets. On top of the column, just as the sky was beginning to lighten, I could see the Razai filling the valley around the island. There was still celebrating going on down there, the sounds of guitars, flutes, and singing on the night air. A large column was moving west. From the colors I could see it was Ow Dao leading them. The column had close to a hundred wagons, which meant maybe two hundred thousand soldiers. They were going south to help Jak Edge, Bloody Sarah, and Cap Brady against the Tommy Spanish gang.
I looked down and I still had the zebras in my right hand. I kept them in my palm as I reached into my pocket for the pieces of paper that Stays had given me. I pulled one out and read it in the half light. Words are nothing, it said. Look at what I do. The name was illegible.
The next note was from a daughter addressed to her mother on Oromasdes. It read, in part, I never did much to make you proud. Please be proud of me now.
Another read simply, Remember me. It was signed Ky Rubin. I fought to remember who Ky Rubin was, then I remembered the voice in the dark that one night on the wagon. The squat from Duat who wanted to shake the hand of Bando Nicos. "Hokay," he used to say.
Hokay.
There were more. Letters to loved ones that I swore I would deliver personally if I was ever able. There were other notes to me. One of them was from Lewis Grahl. It said simply, Keep the Law.
"Bando?"
I turned and it was Margo on the path behind me. She looked afraid. "What?"
"We're ready to leave. You want to help bury the jury?"
I nodded. "Yes." It came out as a whisper.
She walked over to me and put her arms around me, trapping my arms within hers. A million evils drained from me. She looked up into my eyes and her eyes were wet. "Here. You forgot this." I looked down and in her hand was my star. I must have stared at it for half a minute before I took it and pinned it to my sheet.
Later that morning, after we buried the jury at the base of the cliffs, there was some housekeeping to do. Margo and Lauris wanted to stay with me, so I left Marantha to settle the Hand perps and run cops for Stays as he and the majority of the army took on the tremendous task of bringing the Law to the Hand and to Iron Lee's territory. Herb Ollick, of course, stayed with Marantha. Stays just shook my hand, then embraced me.
"You'll hear from us."
▫
I turned west to follow Nance and Colonel Indimi. With me I had Margo, Marietta, Lauris, and Ratt. The Spanish gang was next, and there were still more gangs after that. Where it would go, I didn't know. It wasn't up to me.
Just as we were about to go beneath a rise, cutting off our view of Rock island, I turned on the back of my critter and waited until the others had passed. I looked back toward the island and took the vidcam out of my kit bag. When I zoomed in on where we had buried the jury, I could see the RC wagon we had left over them as a temporary monument. On the side of the wagon were three words chalked in letters a meter high.
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KEEP THE LAW
▫
It was heavy. So heavy. But somewhere there was cops to do. Margo was waiting for me. I put the vidcam away, urged my critter forward, and reached into my shirt pocket. Without looking I tossed the zebras into the grass and joined her. We rode west, our backs warmed by the rising sun.
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—Also by Barry B. Longyear:
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Enchanteds Kindle Editions
Enemy Mine, the Author's Cut
The Tomorrow Testament
The Last Enemy
The Enemy Papers
Infinity Hold
Kill All The Lawyers
Keep The Law
Butterfly and the Witch Boy
Silent Her
Saint Mary Blue
Dark Corners
The Write Stuff
Alten Kamaraden
Sea of Glass
Bifrost Crossing
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Novels & Collections
The Change
Circus World
City of Baraboo
Dark Corners
Elephant Song
Enemy Mine
The Enemy Papers
The Homecoming
Infinity Hold
Infinity Hold3
It Came From Schenectady
The Last Enemy
Kill All The Lawyers
Manifest Destiny
Naked Came The Robot
Saint Mary Blue
Slag Like Me
The Tomorrow Testament
Sea of Glass
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Non-fiction
Science Fiction Writer's Workshop-I
Yesterday's Tomorrow
The Write Stuff
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INFINITY HOLD3 Page 74
