The Year's Best SF 08 # 1990

by Gardner Dozois (ed)

  “I want to tell the story as I see it,” I said.

  “Then you’ll have to tell it to me,” he said, and turned briefly to an aide. He dictated in a low, staccato voice, not losing his place in our conversation, simply loosing a burst of thought. “‘Let us be frank. Before I showed an interest you were ready to sell the ship for scrap iron. This is not an era for supertankers. They are dead tech, smokestack-era garbage. Reconsider my offer.’” The secretary pounded keys. Boston looked at me again, returning the searchlight of his attention.

  “You plan to buy a supertanker?” I said.

  “I wanted an aircraft carrier,” he said, smiling.

  “They’re all in mothballs, but the Feds frown on selling nuke power plants to private citizens.”

  “We will make the tanker into a floating stadium,” Plisetskaya put in. She sat slumped in a padded chair, wearing satin lounge pajamas. A half-filled ashtray on the chair’s arm reeked of strong tobacco.

  “Ever been inside a tanker?” Boston said. “Huge. Great acoustics.” He sat suddenly on the sprawling bed and pulled off his snakeskin boots. “So, Sayyid. Tell me this story of yours.”

  “You graduated magna cum laude from Rutgers with a doctorate in political science,” I said. “In five years.”

  “That doesn’t count,” Boston said, yawning behind his hand. “That was before rock and roll beat my brains out.”

  “You ran for state office in Massachusetts,” I said. “You lost a close race. Two years later you were touring with your first band—Swamp Fox. You were an immediate success. You became involved in political fund-raising, recruiting your friends in the music industry. You started your own record label. You helped organize Rock for Detente, where you met your wife-to-be. Your romance was front-page news on both continents. Record sales soared.”

  “You left out the first time I got shot at,” Boston said. “That’s more interesting; Val and I are old hat by now.”

  He paused, then burst out at the second secretary. “‘I urge you once again not to go public. You will find yourselves vulnerable to a leveraged buyout. I’ve told you that Evans is an agent of Marubeni. If he brings your precious plant down around your ears, don’t come crying to me.’”

  “February 1998,” I said. “An anti-communist zealot fired on your bus.”

  “You’re a big fan, Sayyid.”

  “Why are you afraid of multinationals?” I said. “That was the American preference, wasn’t it? Global trade, global economics?”

  “We screwed up,” Boston said. “Things got out of hand.”

  “Out of American hands, you mean?”

  “We used our companies as tools for development,” Boston said, with the patience of a man instructing a child. “But then our lovely friends in South America refused to pay their debts. And our staunch allies in Europe and Japan signed the Geneva Economic Agreement and decided to crash the dollar. And our friends in the Arab countries decided not to be countries any more, but one almighty Caliphate, and, just for good measure, they pulled all their oil money out of our banks and into Islamic ones. How could we compete? They were holy banks, and our banks pay interest, which is a sin, I understand.” He paused, his eyes glittering, and fluffed curls from his neck. “And all that time, we were already in hock to our fucking ears to pay for being the world’s policeman.”

  “So the world betrayed your country,” I said. “Why?”

  He shook his head. “Isn’t it obvious? Who needs St. George when the dragon is dead? Some Afghani fanatics scraped together enough plutonium for a Big One, and they blew the dragon’s fucking head off. And the rest of the body is still convulsing, ten years later. We bled ourselves white competing against Russia, which was stupid, but we’d won. With two giants, the world trembles. One giant, and the midgets can drag it down. So that’s what happened. They took us out, that’s all. They own us.”

  “It sounds very simple,” I said.

  He showed annoyance for the first time. “Valya says you’ve read our newspapers. I’m not telling you anything new. Should I lie about it? Look at the figures, for Christ’s sake. The EEC and Japanese use their companies for money pumps, they’re sucking us dry, deliberately. You don’t look stupid, Sayyid. You know very well what’s happening to us, anyone in the Third World does.”

  “You mentioned Christ,” I said. “You believe in Him?”

  Boston rocked back onto his elbows and grinned. “Do you?”

  “Of course. He is one of our Prophets. We call Him Isa.”

  Boston looked cautious. “I never stand between a man and his God.” He paused. “We have a lot of respect for the Arabs, truly. What they’ve accomplished. Breaking free from the world economic system, returning to authentic local tradition.… You see the parallels.”

  “Yes,” I said. I smiled sleepily, and covered my mouth as I yawned. “Jet lag. Your pardon, please. These are only questions my editors would want me to ask. If I were not an admirer, a fan as you say, I would not have this assignment.”

  He smiled and looked at his wife. Plisetskaya lit another cigarette and leaned back, looking skeptical. Boston grinned. “So the sparring’s over, Charlie?”

  “I have every record you’ve made,” I said. “This is not a job for hatchets.” I paused, weighing my words. “I still believe that our Caliph is a great man. I support the Islamic Resurgence. I am Muslim. But I think, like many others, that we have gone a bit too far in closing every window to the West. Rock and roll is a Third World music at heart. Don’t you agree?”

  “Sure,” Boston said, closing his eyes. “Do you know the first words spoken in independent Zimbabwe? Right after they ran up the flag.”

  “No.”

  He spoke out blindly, savoring the words. “Ladies and gentlemen. Bob Marley. And the Wailers.”

  “You admire him.”

  “Comes with the territory,” said Boston, flipping a coil of hair.

  “He had a black mother, a white father. And you?”

  “Oh, both my parents were shameless mongrels like myself,” Boston said. “I’m a second-generation nothing-in-particular. An American.” He sat up, knotting his hands, looking tired. “You going to stay with the tour a while, Charlie?” He spoke to a secretary. “Get me a kleenex.” The woman rose.

  “Till Philadelphia,” I said. “Like Marjory Cale.”

  Plisetskaya blew smoke, frowning. “You spoke to that woman?”

  “Of course. About the concert.”

  “What did the bitch say?” Boston asked lazily. His aide handed him tissues and cold cream. Boston dabbed the kleenex and smeared make-up from his face.

  “She asked me what I thought. I said it was too loud,” I said.

  Plisetskaya laughed once, sharply. I smiled. “It was quite amusing. She said that you were in good form. She said that I should not be so tight-arsed.”

  “‘Tight-arsed’?” Boston said, raising his brows. Fine wrinkles had appeared beneath the greasepaint. “She said that?”

  “She said we Muslims were afraid of modern life. Of new experience. Of course I told her that this wasn’t true. Then she gave me this.” I reached into one of the pockets of my vest and pulled out a flat packet of aluminum foil.

  “Marjory Cale gave you cocaine?” Boston asked.

  “Wyoming Flake,” I said. “She said she has friends who grow it in the Rocky Mountains.” I opened the packet, exposing a little mound of white powder. “I saw her use some. I think it will help my jet lag.” I pulled my chair closer to the bedside phone-table. I shook the packet out, with much care, upon the shining mahogany surface. The tiny crystals glittered. It was finely chopped.

  I opened my wallet and removed a crisp thousand-dollar bill. The actor-president smiled benignly. “Would this be appropriate?”

  “Tom does not do drugs,” said Plisetskaya, too quickly.

  “Ever do coke before?” Boston asked. He threw a wadded tissue to the floor.

  “I hope I’m not offending you,” I said.
“This is Miami, isn’t it? This is America.” I began rolling the bill, clumsily.

  “We are not impressed,” said Plisetskaya sternly. She ground out her cigarette. “You are being a rube, Charlie. A hick from the NIC’s.”

  “There is a lot of it,” I said, allowing doubt to creep into my voice. I reached in my pocket, then divided the pile in half with the sharp edge of a developed slide. I arranged the lines neatly. They were several centimeters long.

  I sat back in the chair. “You think it’s a bad idea? I admit, this is new to me.” I paused. “I have drunk wine several times, though the Koran forbids it.”

  One of the secretaries laughed. “Sorry,” she said. “He drinks wine. That’s cute.”

  I sat and watched temptation dig into Boston. Plisetskaya shook her head.

  “Cale’s cocaine,” Boston mused. “Man.”

  We watched the lines together for several seconds, he and I. “I did not mean to be trouble,” I said. “I can throw it away.”

  “Never mind Val,” Boston said. “Russians chain-smoke.” He slid across the bed.

  I bent quickly and sniffed. I leaned back, touching my nose. The cocaine quickly numbed it. I handed the paper tube to Boston. It was done in a moment. We sat back, our eyes watering.

  “Oh,” I said, drug seeping through tissue. “Oh, this is excellent.”

  “It’s good toot,” Boston agreed. “Looks like you get an extended interview.”

  We talked through the rest of the night, he and I.

  * * *

  My story is almost over. From where I sit to write this, I can hear the sound of Boston’s music, pouring from the crude speakers of a tape pirate in the bazaar. There is no doubt in my mind that Boston is a great man.

  I accompanied the tour to Philadelphia. I spoke to Boston several times during the tour, though never again with the first fine rapport of the drug. We parted as friends, and I spoke well of him in my article for Al-Ahram. I did not hide what he was, I did not hide his threat. But I did not malign him. We see things differently. But he is a man, a child of God like all of us.

  His music even saw a brief flurry of popularity in Cairo, after the article. Children listen to it, and then turn to other things, as children will. They like the sound, they dance, but the words mean nothing to them. The thoughts, the feelings, are alien.

  This is the dar-al-harb, the land of peace. We have peeled the hands of the West from our throat, we draw breath again, under God’s sky. Our Caliph is a good man, and I am proud to serve him. He reigns, he does not rule. Learned men debate in the Majlis, not squabbling like politicians, but seeking truth in dignity. We have the world’s respect.

  We have earned it, for we paid the martyr’s price. We Muslims are one in five in all the world, and as long as ignorance of God persists, there will always be the struggle, the jihad. It is a proud thing to be one of the Caliph’s Mujihadeen. It is not that we value our lives lightly. But that we value God more.

  Some call us backward, reactionary. I laughed at that when I carried the powder. It had the subtlest of poisons: a living virus. It is a tiny thing, bred in secret labs, and in itself does no harm. But it spreads throughout the body, and it bleeds out a chemical, a faint but potent trace that carries the rot of cancer.

  The West can do much with cancer these days, and a wealthy man like Boston can buy much treatment. They may cure the first attack, or the second. But within five years he will surely be dead. People will mourn his loss. Perhaps they will put his image on a stamp, as they did for Bob Marley. Marley, who also died of systemic cancer; whether by the hand of God or man, only Allah knows.

  I have taken the life of a great man; in trapping him I took my own life as well, but that means nothing. I am no one. I am not even Sayyid Qutb, the Martyr and theorist of Resurgence, though I took that great man’s name as cover. I meant only respect, and believe I have not shamed his memory.

  I do not plan to wait for the disease. The struggle continues in the Muslim lands of what was once the Soviet Union. There the Believers ride in Holy Jihad, freeing their ancient lands from the talons of Marxist atheism. Secretly, we send them carbines, rockets, mortars, and nameless men. I shall be one of them; when I meet death, my grave will be nameless also. But nothing is nameless to God.

  God is Great; men are mortal, and err. If I have done wrong, let the Judge of Men decide. Before His Will, as always, I submit.

  KATE WILHELM

  And the Angels Sing

  Kate Wilhelm began publishing in 1956, and by now is widely regarded as one of the best of today’s writers—outside the genre as well as in it, for her work has never been limited to the strict boundaries of the field, and she has published mysteries, mainstream thrillers, and comic novels as well as science fiction. Wilhelm won a Nebula Award in 1968 for her short story “The Planners,” took a Hugo in 1976 for her well-known novel Where Late the Sweet Birds Sang, added another Nebula to her collection in 1987 with a win for her story “The Girl Who Fell Into the Sky,” and won yet another Nebula the following year for her story “Forever Yours, Anna,” which was in our Fifth Annual Collection. Her many books include the novels Margaret and I, Fault Lines, The Clewiston Test, Juniper Time, Welcome, Chaos, Oh, Susannah!, and Huysman’s Pets, and the collections The Downstairs Room, Somerset Dreams, The Infinity Box, and Listen, Listen. Her most recent books are the collection Children of the Wind, the fantasy novel Cambio Bay, and the mystery novel Sweet, Sweet Poison. Coming up is a new novel, Death Qualified: A Mystery of Chaos. Wilhelm and her husband, writer Damon Knight, ran the Milford Writer’s Conference for many years, and both are still deeply involved in the operation of the Clarion workshop for new young writers. She lives with her family in Eugene, Oregon.

  Here she gives us a bittersweet story concerned, like much of her best work, with the making of some very hard choices.…

  And the Angels Sing

  KATE WILHELM

  Eddie never left the office until one or even two in the morning on Sundays, Tuesdays, and Thursdays. The North Coast News came out three times a week, and it seemed to him that no one could publish a paper unless someone in charge was on hand until the press run. He knew that the publisher, Stuart Winkle, didn’t particularly care, as long as the advertising was in place, but it wasn’t right, Eddie thought. What if something came up, something went wrong? Even out here at the end of the world there could be a late-breaking story that required someone to write it, to see that it got placed. Actually, Eddie’s hopes for that event, high six years ago, had diminished to the point of needing conscious effort to recall. In fact, he liked to see his editorials before he packed it in.

  This night, Thursday, he read his own words and then bellowed, “Where is she?” She was Ruthie Jenson, and she had spelled frequency with one e and an a. Eddie stormed through the deserted outer office, looking for her, and caught her at the door just as she was wrapping her vampire cloak about her thin shoulders. She was thin, her hair was cut too short, too close to her head, and she was too frightened of him. And, he thought with bitterness, she was crazy, or she would not wait around three nights a week for him to catch her at the door and give her hell.

  “Why don’t you use the goddamn dictionary? Why do you correct my copy? I told you I’d wring your neck if you touched my copy again!”

  She made a whimpering noise and looked past him in terror, down the hallway, into the office.

  “I … I’m sorry. I didn’t mean…” Fast as quicksilver then, she fled out into the storm that was still howling. He hoped the goddamn wind would carry her to Australia or beyond.

  The wind screamed as it poured through the outer office, scattering a few papers, setting a light adance on a chain. Eddie slammed the door against it and surveyed the space around him, detesting every inch of it at the moment. Three desks, the fluttering papers that Mrs. Rondale would heave out because anything on the floor got heaved out. Except dirt; she seemed never to see quite all of it. Next door the presses were running
; people were doing things, but the staff that put the paper together had left now. Ruthie was always next to last to go, and then Eddie. He kicked a chair on his way back to his own cubicle, clutching the ink-wet paper in his hand, well aware that the ink was smearing onto skin.

  He knew that the door to the pressroom had opened and softly closed again. In there they would be saying Fat Eddie was in a rage. He knew they called him Fat Eddie, or even worse, behind his back, and he knew that no one on Earth cared if the North Coast News was a mess except him. He sat at his desk, scowling at the editorial—one of his better ones, he thought—and the word frequancy leaped off the page at him; nothing else registered. What he had written was “At this time of year the storms bear down onshore with such regularity, such frequency, that it’s as if the sea and air are engaged in the final battle.” It got better, but he put it aside and listened to the wind. All evening he had listened to reports from up and down the coast, expecting storm damage, light outages, wrecks, something. At midnight he had decided it was just another Pacific storm and had wrapped up the paper. Just the usual: Highway 101 under water here and there, a tree down here and there, a head-on, no deaths.…

  The wind screamed and let up, caught its breath and screamed again. Like a kid having a tantrum. And up and down the coast the people were like parents who had seen too many kids having too many tantrums. Ignore it until it goes away and then get on about your business, that was their attitude. Eddie was from Indianapolis, where a storm with eighty-mile-per-hour winds made news. Six years on the coast had not changed that. A storm like this, by God, should make news!

  Still scowling, he pulled on his own raincoat, a great black waterproof garment that covered him to the floor. He added his black, wide-brimmed hat and was ready for the weather. He knew that behind his back they called him Mountain Man, when they weren’t calling him Fat Eddie. He secretly thought that he looked more like The Shadow than not.

  He drove to Connally’s Tavern and had a couple of drinks, sitting alone in glum silence, and then offered to drive Truman Cox home when the bar closed at two.