Five.
HOMEWARD BOUND...
The column rolled all the rest of that day and all that night, stopping only to fuel the vehicles. They angled south at Bethany and entered Kansas between St. Joseph and Kansas City. Kansas City had taken a small nuclear pop and would be "hot" for many centuries.
They wanted to avoid as much of Nebraska as possible, for that state had taken several strikes back in "88, and, like Kansas City, was hot.
They kept rolling, hitting heavier snow, and Ben kept pushing them westward.
They picked up Highway 36 and stayed with it until Ben finally called a halt in central Kansas. They had rolled almost five hundred miles and had not seen one living human being.
It was eerie.
The men and women were exhausted, for they had been forced to stop many times to push abandoned vehicles out of the road, to clear small bridges, and to backtrack when the road became impossible.
At a small motel complex, just large enough to accommodate them all-if they doubled and tripled up in the rooms-the tired band of survivors sprayed and boiled and washed and disinfected the area. They went to sleep without even eating.
When they awakened the next morning, after having slept a full twelve hours, they found themselves snowed in tight.
Ben was, as usual, the first one up and out of bed on the morning the silent snow locked them in. Blizzard or not, Ben knew a patrol had to be sent into town for kerosene to keep the heaters going.
Either that or freeze.
Before opening the motel door, to face the bitter cold and blowing snow and winds, Ben looked back at the sleeping beauty of Rosita.
Not much more than a child, he thought. A deadly child, he reminded himself, or Dan Gray would never have sent her out on her own, but still very young.
Bitter thoughts of his own age came to him. He shook them off. Thompson in hand, he stepped from the room, quietly closing the door behind him.
A sentry turned at the soft bootsteps in the snow. "Sir?"
"Get someone to put chains on my truck. I"m going into town."
"Alone, sir!"
Ben looked at the young man for a moment. "Yes," he said impetuously, suddenly weary of being constantly bird-dogged and watched and guarded.
G.o.dd.a.m.n it, he had wandered this nation alone, traveling thousands of miles alone, back in "88 and "89.
He didn"t need a nursemaid now.
Fifteen minutes later he was driving into the small town of Phillipsburg. He found a service station and pulled in. There, he found a half dozen 55-gallon drums of kerosene. He wondered how old they were.
He pried the cap off one and stuck a rag into the liquid. Away from the drums, he lit the rag. The flame danced in the blowing snow.
He radioed back to the motel, telling the radioman where to find the kerosene and to send people in to get it. And to leave him alone.
He knew he was behaving foolishly; but Ben suddenly needed s.p.a.ce-time alone. He drove slowly into the town, stopping on the main street and parking the truck. He got out and began walking.
The town was dead. Lifeless. Like all the others the convoy had rolled through. Dead dots on a once busy map.
He knew it had not always been so. For this was farming and ranching country, and he recalled back in "89 when he traveled through Kansas, telling people of President Hilton Logan"s plan to relocate the people. The people of this area, as well as most other farming areas, had simply refused to leave.
But now they had left.
At least their spirits had.
He pushed open the door of a drug store and stepped inside. He smiled as he noticed an old-fashioned soda fountain and counter. He sat down on a stool and looked at his reflection in the mirror. Memories came rushing back to him-forty-year-old memories. Cherry c.o.kes and Elvis Presley; peppermint lipstick and sock hops; young kisses, all full of pa.s.sion and wanting-to-do-IT, but so afraid. Of drive-in movies and seeing entertainers performing on the tops of the concession stands. Narvel Felts and Joe Keene and Dale Hawkins...
and that special girl.
What was her name?
My G.o.d! what an injustice-I can"t even remember her name.
Ben looked at his deeply tanned and lined face; the gray in his hair. Memories came in a rush, flooding and filling him.
"Let the Good Times Roll" sang Shirley & Lee.
But they will never roll again, Ben thought. Not for me.
I am growing old. But Rosita says I have fifty more years.
He shook his head.
I hope not.
Why? a silent voice asked. Why do you say that? Don"t you want to see this nation rebuilt and restore itself?
"It won"t," Ben muttered. "No matter what I do-it will not happen."
"What won"t?" a voice jarred him out of his reverie.
Ben almost ruptured himself spinning off the stool, the Thompson coming up, finger tightening on the trigger.
"Whoa!" the man shouted. "I"m harmless."
The man looked to be in his mid to late sixties. A pleasant-appearing man.
"Who in the h.e.l.l are you?" Ben asked, his heart slamming in his chest.
"My G.o.d!" the man whispered. "It"s President Raines."
"No more," Ben sat back on the stool. He continued holding the Thompson, the muzzle pointing at the floor. "The government has been dissolved."
"So I heard," the man replied. He smiled. "Relax, Mister Raines. I own this drug store. I"m a pharmacist.
I don"t have the plague, I a.s.sure you. What drugs are you taking?"
Ben told him.
"Don"t overdo it; too much can kill as well as cure. The disease is tapering off now; but it will come back with a vengeance this spring or summer. Save what medications you have left until then."
"I was hoping it had run its course."
"Itis a good way of describing the disease, Mister Raines. I have never heard of any disease moving quite as fast as this one did-or be so unresponsive to proper medication."
"You"re the first living soul I"ve seen in seven hundred miles."
The man smiled. "There are survivors, sir. Let me warn you of that. The thugs and hoodlums and filth are out and moving-doing what people of that particular ilk do. The decent folks are hiding, quietly getting together at night. You are alone-why?"
"I"m not alone," Ben told him. "I"ve got a full company of troops staying at the motel. Are you the only survivor in this town?"
"No. There are about fifteen others."
"You have plans?"
Again, that smile. "Of course. To live out our lives in peace and solitude and die quietly of old age."
"Nothing more than that?"
The man shook his head. "Very little. Plant gardens in the spring, can the foods, and stay low, attracting no attention."
"That"s what I was muttering. This nation will never climb out of the ashes-not wholly."
"I"m afraid you"re right, sir. But," he shrugged, "who knows. You did it once. Don"t you think you can do it again?"
"I don"t know. I intend to try."
"Good luck."
"Would you like to come with us?" Ben offered.
The man shook his head. "No. But I thank you for the offer."
"Just give up, eh?" Ben needled the man.
"No, sir-that"s not it entirely. I ... think I should like to live ... well, free, I suppose is the right choice of words. I don"t have to lecture you as to the faults of big government."
"But big government doesn"t necessarily have to be a bad government, uncaring and unfeeling."
"This is true. But they almost always turn into that. Right?"
"That is true. But without some sort of organized society, a government, if you will, how can this nation ever become what it once was? Or even a semblance of what it once was?"
"It can"t, sir. But perhaps it"s time for that to occur. Have you given that any thought?"
"Quite a lot, I"m afraid."
"And your conclusion?"
"I have to try." Ben rose from the stool, turning toward the door just as several pickup trucks rattled to a tire-chained halt in front of the drug store.
The owner smiled.
"Why are you smiling?" Ben asked.
"Your people are fearful of you deserting them, Mister Raines."
Ben walked out of the store without looking back. He faced a half dozen of his troops.
"Can"t I get off by myself every now and then?" Ben asked, his tone harsh.
"With all due respect, sir," Captain Seymour said. "We"d rather you wouldn"t."
"I don"t need a nanny, Captain."
"No, sir," the captain agreed. But neither he nor any of his people made any move to leave Ben alone.
"I see," Ben said quietly, the words almost torn from his mouth by the cold winds that whipped down the littered main street.
Ben turned back to the storeowner, standing in the door of the drug store. "How"d you rid yourself of the rat problem?"
The man opened the door. "We didn"t. They just went away."
"Where?"
The man shrugged his reply.
"Have you observed any other ... well, things out of the ordinary?"
"I don"t follow you, sir."
"Creatures," Ben spoke the word.
The man shook his head. "Only those big rats. That"s creature enough for one lifetime, wouldn"t you agree?"
"Yes," Ben said. "I wish you luck."
"The same to you."
The Rebels spent three days at the motel, waiting for a break in the weather. On the morning of the fourth day, the sun broke through the clouds and the temperature warmed, melting much of the snow and ice by mid-morning.