R.W. III - The Dark Design

by Philip José Farmer

  Before succumbing to her sorrow, however, Jill had put an arrow into each of Fatima's murderers. They were not going to rise elsewhere either.

  Years later, she had heard rumors of the great dirigible that was being built up-River. She did hot know if they were true or not, but there was only one way to find out.

  So here she was, though it had taken a long time to get here.

  Chapter 11

  * * *

  From The Daily Leak, a five-page newspaper. owner and owner and publisher: the state of Parolando. Editor: S.C. Bagg. In the upper left-hand corner above the headline is the standard notice:

  CAVEAT LECTOR

  By law, the reader must place this journal in a public recycling barrel the day after receipt. In case of emergency, it may be used for toilet paper. We recommend the Letters to the Editor page as most appropriate for this purpose. First offense: a public reprimand. Second: confiscation of all booze, tobacco, and dreamgum for a week. Third: permanent exile.

  Prominent in the Newcomers section:

  JILL GULBIRRA

  We welcome, in spite of the advice of many, our latest female candidate for citizenship. On Sunday last, this tall drink of water appeared out of the predawn fog and accosted four of our leading public figures. Despite their certain state of inebriation and possibly lecherous thoughts, two conditions leading to mental fogginess, the quartet finally comprehended that their unexpected guest had traveled approximately 32,180 kilometers (or 20,000 miles, for you dummies and dodos). She had done this alone and in a canoe (and not been raped or dunked once) and all this odyssey was performed just to make sure that our airship project proceeds on proper lines. While not exactly demanding that she be appointed commander of the dirigible when it is commissioned, she did intimate that it would be to everybody's good if she did obtain this post.

  After a few snorts of the divine product of Caledonia, the quartet partially recovered from this onslaught. (One witness thus describes her appearance: "Amazonly, with a demeanor of sheer brass nerves and ironclad guts, unseemly in any woman worthy of the name.")

  The famous four inquired as to her credentials. She furnished these, which, if valid, are impressive indeed. A prominent citizen interviewed on the subject by our intrepid reporter, Roger "Nellie" Bligh, affirms that she is indeed what she claims to be. Though never having met her in his Terrestrial existence, he did read about her in various periodicals and once viewed her on television (a mid – twentieth-century invention which your editor did not live long enough to see and from all accounts was fortunate to have missed).

  It seems that, unless this woman bears a remarkable physical resemblance to the genuine Jill Gulbirra, she is not one of the numerous phonies that have plagued this Rivervalley for far too long a time.

  The Office of Vital (some say Deadly) Statistics has furnished us with the following information. Gulbirra, Jill (no middle name). Female. Natal name: Johnetta Georgette Redd. Born February 12, 1953, Toowoomba, Queensland, Australia. Father: John George Redd. Mother: Marie Bronze Redd. Heredity: Scotch-Irish, French (Jewish), Australian aborigine. Unmarried on Earth. Attended schools in Canberra and Melbourne. Graduated 1973 from Massachusetts Institute of Technology, master's degree in aeronautical engineering. Commercial aviator's license, four-motor. Free balloonist's license. Engineer-navigator on West German freighter blimp serving Nigerian government, 1977-78. Blimp pilot for Goodyear, United States, 1979. Blimp pilot for the Sheik of Kuwait, 1980-81. Blimp instructor for British Airways Systems, 1982. Became in 1983 the only qualified woman airship captain in the Western world. Logged 8342 hours airship flight time.

  Died April 1, 1983 A.D., automobile accident near Howden, England, just before assuming command of the newly commissioned rigid airship Willows-Goodens.

  Profession: obvious from above.

  Skills: flute, archery, fencing, kendo, quarterstaff, martial arts, badmouthing.

  She is pretty good with her dukes, too, having slammed a distinguished citizen, Cyrano "Schnozzola" de Bergerac in the breadbasket, following with a knee to the jaw, rendering him hors de combat and speechless. This phenomenon occurred as a result of his having laid hands (without permission) upon her teat. Normally, the fiery Frenchman would have challenged anyone who handled him so savagely to a duel to the death (across the Parolando boundary, of course, since dueling is illegal in our fair state). But he is so old-fashioned that he would feel, as he put it "comme un imbécile," if he were to fight a woman. Moreover, he feels that he was in the wrong for having made advances without invitation "verbal" or "ocular."

  An hour after suppertime yesterday, your enterprising intrepid appeared at the door of Gulbirra's hut and knocked. There were some grunts and then a querulous voice called. "What in hell do you want?" Apparently, the would-be interviewee didn't give a hoot about the identity of her caller.

  "Miss Gulbirra, I'm Roger Bligh, reporter for The Daily Leak. I'd like to interview you."

  "Well, you'll have to wait. I'm on the pot."

  Your journalist lit up a cigar to pass the time. He also planned to use its burning tip later to clear out the fumes in the hut. After some time, during which he heard splashing of water in a basin, he heard, "Come on in. But leave the door open."

  "Gladly," said your dauntless.

  He found the subject seated at a chair by the table and smoking a joint. What with the cigar and maryjane and residue of the subject's recent occupation and the smoke from several fish wax candles, neither visibility nor olfactoriness were at an optimum.

  "Miss Gulbirra?"

  "No. Miz."

  "What does the title mean?"

  "Are you asking just to get my views or don't you really know? There are plenty of people of my time around. Surely, you've encountered Miz before?"

  Your reporter confessed his ignorance.

  Instead of enlightening Mr. Bligh, the subject said, "What is the position of women in Parolando?"

  "In the daytime or at night?" Mr. Bligh said.

  "Don't get smart with me," Miz Gulbirra said. "Let me put it simply so your mind can grasp exactly what I'm talking about. Legally, that is, theoretically, women have equal rights here. But in practice, in reality, what is the male attitude toward females?"

  "Mainly lecherous, I'm afraid," the intrepid replied.

  "I'll give you one more chance,'' the subject said. "Then it'll be a question of chance and gravity which strikes the ground first outside the door, your ass or your stinking cigar."

  "My apologies," the intrepid said. "But, after all, I am here to interview you, not vice versa. Why don't you ask our female citizens what they think of the male attitude toward them? Anyway, are you here to conduct a suffragette crusade or to build and to man (if I may use the word) the proposed dirigible?"

  "Are you making fun of me?"

  "The farthest thing from my mind," the dauntless said hastily. "We are quite modern here, even though the late-twentieth-centurians constitute only a small percentage of the population. The state is dedicated to the construction of the airship. To that goal, strict discipline during working hours is maintained. But a citizen may do what he damn well pleases on his hours off, as long as he doesn't hurt anybody else. So, let's get down to business. What is a Miz, not to be confused with amiss?"

  "You aren't putting me on?"

  "I'd swear by a stack of Bibles, if any existed."

  "Briefly, it's a title which the members of the women's liberation movement in the sixties adopted. Miss and Mrs. were too indicative of male sexual attitudes. To be a Miss was to be unmarried, which automatically evoked contempt, consciously or unconsciously, on the part of the male, if the Miss were past marriageable age. It implied that something was lacking in the woman, and also that the Miss must be dying to be referred to as Mrs. That is, without an identity of her own, regarded as an appendage to her husband, a second-class citizen. Why should a Miss, for that matter, be known by her father's name? Why not her mother's?"

  "In the latter case,"
our intrepid replied, "the name would still be a man's, the woman's father's name."

  "Exactly. That is why I changed my name from Johnetta Georgette Redd – you'll notice that both my so-called Christian names are feminizations of masculine names – I changed it to Jill Gulbirra. My father raised hell about that, even my mother protested strongly. But she was a typical Aunt Dora – brainwashed."

  ''Interesting," Mr. Bligh said. "Gulbirra? What kind of a name is that? Slavic? And why did you choose it?"

  "No, it's Australian aborigine, you dummy. A gulbirra is a kangaroo that catches dogs and eats them."

  "A carnivorous kangaroo? I thought they were all vegetarians.”

  "Well, actually, it may not have existed. But the abos claimed that it did exist in the outlands. It may have been mythical, but what's the difference? It's the symbolism that counts."

  "So you identify with the gulbirra? I can imagine what the dogs symbolize."

  At this point, Miz Gulbirra smiled so terrifyingly that your correspondent felt compelled to down a snort of the Dutch courage he always carries in his shoulder-bag.

  "Not that I chose that name because I identify with, or sympathize with, blackfellow culture," the Miz said. "I am one-quarter abo, but so what? It was a male chauvinist culture through and through, women were mere objects, subject to slavery, they did all the hard work and they were often beaten by their fathers and husbands. A lot of Caucasian males have sentimentalized about the destruction of abo society, but I personally thought it was a good thing. Of course, I deplore the suffering that went along with its disintegration."

  "Deploration, unlike defloration, is usually managed without pain," Mr. Bligh said.

  "Virginity! That's another male myth, invented solely to aggrandize the male ego and enforce his opinions about his property rights," Miz Gulbirra said bitterly. "Fortunately, that attitude changed considerably during my lifetime. But there are still plenty of pigs around, fossil boars, I called them, who . . ."

  "That's all very interesting," the dauntless dared to interrupt. "But you can reserve your opinions for the Letters to the Editor page. Mr. Bagg will print anything you say, no matter how scurrilous. Our readers just now would like to know what your professional plans are. Just how do you see yourself as contributing to Project Airship, as it's officially called? Just where do you think you'll fit into the hierarchy?"

  By now, the heavy acrid fumes of marijuana overrode all others. A wild, fierce light glittered in her drug-expanded pupils. Your correspondent felt it necessary to expand his rapidly shrinking dauntless state with another pull on the divine bottle.

  "By all logic and by right of superior knowledge, experience, and capability,'' she said slowly but loudly, "I should be in charge of the project. And I should be captain of the airship! I've checked out everybody's qualifications, and there's no doubt at all that I am by far the best qualified.

  "So why am I not put in charge of the construction? Why am I not even considered as a candidate for the captaincy? Why?"

  "Don't tell me," your intrepid answered. Possibly he was overly emboldened by the liquid lava coursing through his veins and dulling his otherwise fine sensibilities. "Don't tell me. Let me hazard a guess. Could it be, I'm just groping for an explanation, mind you, could it be that you are relegated to an inferior position because you are only a woman?"

  The subject stared at your correspondent, took another puff, drew it deep into her lungs, causing a slight lifting of slight breasts, and finally, face bluish with lack of oxygen, discharged the tag-ends of fumes through her nostrils. Your intrepid was reminded of pictures of dragons he had seen during his Terrestrial existence. He, however, thought of the better part of valor and did not remark upon the similarity.

  "You've got it," she said. "Maybe you're not so dense after all."

  Then, gripping the edge of the table as if she'd squeeze the wood, she sat up straight. "But just what do you mean by only a woman?"

  "Oh, that's only my verbalization of your thoughts," the intrepid said hastily. "I was being ironic. Or whatever . . ."

  "If I were a man," she said, "which, thank God I am not, I'd have been made at least first mate on the spot. And you wouldn't be sitting there sneering at me."

  "Oh, you're mistaken about that," our dauntless said. "I am not sneering at you. However, there is a point that you may have overlooked. It wouldn't make any difference what your sex is; you could have the biggest balls for 40,000 kilometers around, and you still wouldn't be put in charge.

  "Long before the Riverboat was built – the second one, I mean, not the one King John stole – it was agreed that Firebrass would be in charge of the airship project. It's even in the Parolando constitution, which you must know, since he himself recited it chapter and verse to you. You were aware of that and by taking the oath you accepted that. So, tell me, why all the bitching?"

  "You don't understand after all, do you, you clown?" she said. "The point is that that rule, that arrogantly imperious law, should never have been made."

  Your correspondent swallowed some more of the stuff that encourages – and stupefies – and said, "The point is that it was made. And if a man came along twice as qualified as you, he'd still have to accept the fact that he could never be higher than second. He could be Captain Firebrass' chief construction assistant and first mate on the ship. But that's all."

  "There isn't any such creature as twice as qualified as me," she said, "unless an officer from the Graf Zeppelin should show up. Listen, I'm getting tired of this."

  "It is rather hot and smoky in here," your correspondent said, wiping the sweat off his brow. "However, I would like to get more of your background, details of your earthly life, you know, human interest stuff. And also the story of what happened to you right after Resurrection Day. And . . ."

  "Are you hoping I'll get turned on by this joint and by your overwhelming male charm and virility?" she said. "Are you getting ready to make a pass at me?"

  "God forbid," I said. "This is a strictly professional visit. Besides . . ."

  "Besides," she said, and she was the one sneering now, "you're scared of me, aren't you? You're all alike. You have to be dominant, the superior. If you meet a woman with more brains, one who is able to handle you in a fight, who is clearly the superior, then the hot air whistles out of you like a pricked balloon. A balloon with a prick."

  "Now, really, Miz Gulbirra," your dauntless said, feeling his face heat up.

  "Bug off, little man," the subject said.

  Your correspondent thought it was wise to obey this imperative. The interview, though not complete from our viewpoint, was terminated.

  Chapter 12

  * * *

  Jill picked up the next evening's Leak from the distribution shack outside the press building. Some people who obviously had already read the news snickered or grinned at her. She opened the paper to the Newcomers page, suspecting what she would find there, angry before reading it.

  The pages rattled in her shaking hands. The interview was bad enough, though she should have known that a late-nineteenth-century man like Bagg would print such rot. What had he been, editor of some crummy yellow rag of some frontier town in the Arizona Territory? Yes, that was it. Tombstone. Firebrass had told her something about him.

  What really enraged her was the photograph. She hadn't been aware of it, but someone in the crowd her first morning here had snapped her picture. There she was, caught in a silly-looking, almost obscene, posture. Naked, bending over, her breasts hanging straight down like a cow's udders, the towel in one hand behind her and one before as she sawed it, drying her crotch. She was looking up, her mouth open, and she seemed all nose and buckteeth.

  Surely, the cameraman had taken other shots. But Bagg had chosen this one just to make her a laughingstock.

  She was so furious she almost forgot to pick up her grail. Swinging it from one hand, thinking how she was going to brain Bagg with it, the newspaper clutched in the other – it was also going to be
jammed all the way up – she stormed toward the building. But when she got to the door, she stopped.

  "Come on, Jill!" she told herself. "You're reacting just as he hoped you would, just as they all hope you will. Play it cool; don't be a knee-jerk. Sure, it'd make you feel great to slam him around his office a little. But it might ruin everything. You've endured worse, and you've come out on top."

  She walked slowly homeward, the handle of the grail looped over one arm. In the fading light, she read the rest of the paper. She wasn't the only one Bagg had libeled, slandered, and mocked. Firebrass himself, though treated gently in the write-up on her, was severely criticized elsewhere and not only by Bagg. The vox pop page contained a number of signed letters from citizens outraged by Firebrass' policies.

  As she left the plain and started her winding way through the hills, she was softly hailed. Turning, she saw Piscator. He smiled as he walked toward her and said in an Oxford accent, "Good evening, citizen. May I accompany you? We will be happier in each other's company than alone? Or perhaps not?"

  Jill had to smile. He spoke so gravely, almost in a seventeenth-century style. This impression was strengthened by his hat, a tall cylinder sloping inward to the top and with a wide circular brim. It reminded her of the hats of the New England Pilgrims. It was made of dark-red leather from the scale-less redfish. Several aluminum alloy flies were snagged in its brim. A black cloth was over his shoulders, held together at the throat. A dark-green cloth served as a kilt, and his sandals were of redfish leather.