Beggars Ride

by Nancy Kress

  We believe that the ROI opportunities in a GeneModern/Selene partnership are without precedent. Therefore, GeneModern invites your earliest reply.

  Yours very truly,

  Gordon Keller Browne, CEO

  GeneModern, Inc.

  ACKNOWLEDGMENT: None received

  Seven

  Why didn’t you ask me?” Vicki said. “I could have helped you with this just as well as Jackson Aranow!”

  “He’s a donkey,” Lizzie said. She hated it when Vicki was mad at her. Vicki was supposed to be Lizzie’s champion. That was her program.

  “Lizzie, I’m a donkey,” Vicki said.

  “But you don’t live, you, with donkeys. You don’t know anybody anymore. Dr. Aranow knows other donkeys, him.” Lizzie heard her speech sliding back, into Liver, which happened only when she was excited or upset. She rolled over onto her back and crossed her arms on her chest.

  The two women lay under the feeding dome, having a late breakfast. They were alone except for Dirk, sleeping beside them on the warm, dry ground. Four feet above their heads the weak November sun was so magnified by the special plastic of the tent that the new Y-energy cones Dr. Aranow had sent from TenTech hadn’t even been turned on. Sunlight soaked into Lizzie’s skin; it seemed to her she could feel her body absorbing nutrients from the ground, energy from the air. She resented Vicki for interfering with this usually lovely feeling.

  Lizzie said, “I thought Dr. Aranow might know about Harold Winthrop Wayland and Ellie Lester. And he did know.”

  Vicki pushed her hair off her face and frowned. “Okay—what did Jackson say about Wayland? What information that I couldn’t have discovered for you just as competently?”

  “That District Supervisor Wayland was dead, and so—”

  “We already knew that!”

  “—and the person who was supposed to notify the state government was his great-granddaughter. Ellie Lester.”

  “Great-granddaughter? How old was the district supervisor?”

  “I don’t know. But she’s his next-of-kin, and she should have notified the state so that they could arrange a special election to fill his position. And she didn’t.”

  “Well, of course she didn’t,” Vicki said. “Why bother, when nobody votes anymore because the Livers are all moving around like nomads? Nomads don’t have voting addresses. Or district warehouses. No votes, no warehouses, no need for a district supervisor. It was always an entry political office, anyway. It conferred no power among donkeys themselves.”

  Lizzie said stubbornly, “She was still supposed to tell the state capital they needed a special election.”

  Vicki smiled. “I’m perpetually astonished by the rules you think should be honored and the ones you’re willing to break. No hobgoblins in your inconsistent mind.”

  “What?”

  “Never mind. Although…it is strange that the system wasn’t programmed to automatically advise the government of official deaths among elected officials. Then again, maybe it did advise Harrisburg. What else did Jackson Aranow say about Ellie Lester?”

  Lizzie said, “Not too much. But he sounded…funny about her.”

  “Funny how?”

  “I don’t know. He also said that he’s going to help us.”

  “We don’t need him.”

  “Well, he’s coming anyway. This afternoon.”

  “And is he again bringing the ferocious Cazie Sanders with him, for protection?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “I think,” Vicki said, “that if you felt such an overwhelming need to pick an additional champion among the donkeys, you could have done better than Jackson Aranow.”

  Lizzie didn’t answer. She cradled Dirk, hoping he’d wake up and nurse. Dirk didn’t criticize her. And he was an unfailing delight: a calm, unfussy baby already starting to smile. Mama said it was gas, but it wasn’t gas—nobody got gas anymore. That was just Mama, poking at Lizzie’s pleasure, just like Vicki was doing. She, Lizzie, would never do that to Dirk.

  She would never tell him he was wrong, never nag him, never let that hook in her voice that just snagged a child and unraveled all their plans. Lizzie was going to be a perfect mother. She wouldn’t make a single mistake with her precious son. When Dirk nursed, his dark blue eyes fastened unwaveringly on Lizzie’s face and his compact little body solid in her arms, she felt she could die from happiness. She kept him wrapped in nonconsumables, just so his little body wouldn’t ground-feed and so cut down her nursing time. She would never never let Dirk down. And she was going to make the world safer for Dirk—no matter how much Vicki poked at her plans.

  Vicki said, “Speak of minor devils. Here comes an aircar.”

  Dr. Aranow landed behind the building, beside the feeding ground. Lizzie and Vicki pulled on jacks, nonconsumables years old and a little tattered but still warm and bright. Jacks didn’t fade. Lizzie’s were marigold, Vicki’s turquoise. Vicki smiled as she pulled on her shirt, a smile that to Lizzie looked amused and superior. Sometimes Lizzie thought she didn’t like Vicki as much as she had when she was a child.

  “Lizzie. Ms. Turner,” Dr. Aranow said, from just inside the door flap of the feeding tent.

  “The good doctor,” Vicki said back, still smiling. Dr. Aranow flushed. Lizzie felt she’d missed something. She plunged right in.

  “Dr. Aranow, we need your help. We have a plan, but we need you to carry it out.”

  “So you said on comlink. How is the baby doing?”

  “He’s wonderful, him.” Lizzie heard her own voice change tone, and saw the softened way both donkeys looked at her. She felt a little better about Vicki. “He nurses like a vacuum pump.”

  “Good,” Dr. Aranow said. “I’d like to examine him in a bit.”

  “What for?” Vicki said. “Infection? Diaper rash? Varicose veins?”

  “There still exist structural and endocrinal deficiencies,” Dr. Aranow said stiffly. “The Cell Cleaner only eliminates malfunctions, it doesn’t build what isn’t there.”

  Lizzie said, “But Dirk doesn’t have deficiencies, him!”

  “No, I’m sure he doesn’t,” Dr. Aranow said soothingly. “Just routine. But first, what is this plan you need help with?”

  “It’s…no, come someplace else,” Lizzie said. A small crowd was heading toward them, Tasha and Kim and George Renfrew and old Mr. Plocynski, while Scott and Shockey inspected the aircar. So far Lizzie hadn’t discussed her plan with anyone but Vicki. And what if her mother came out? Lizzie didn’t want to answer any questions from Annie.

  “Whereplace else?” Vicki said. She was smiling again.

  Dr. Aranow said, “Let’s get in the aircar and lift.”

  “Nervous, Jackson?” Vicki said. “We’re not Luddites, you know. What you see on Shockey’s face isn’t rage, it’s envy.”

  “Yes, the aircar, it,” Lizzie said. Would anyone stop her from getting into it with Dr. Aranow?

  They didn’t. And it was a bigger car than last time; this one had four seats. Lizzie climbed in front with the baby, Vicki in back. In silence Dr. Aranow lifted the car, flew it a mile to the river—so fast!—and set down on the bank. Withered grass and the thick stems of dead asters. Gray rocks and cold water. On the opposite bank, a mangy-looking rabbit darted away. Lizzie wished the car had landed someplace else, but she was afraid to say so. Fear made her angry with herself, and she heard her words come out loud and bossy and Liver.

  “District Supervisor Wayland is dead, him. We called his office and demanded he open a warehouse for us ’cause we’re staying, us, in one place over the winter. The program said we weren’t registered voters for Willoughby County and couldn’t get warehouse chips without being registered. So we said we’d register. Then the program said there was a three-month county residency requirement. So we listed ourselves and waited three months. That was up yesterday. Then we called back, and the program said Supervisor Wayland was unavailable.”

  “‘Dead’ is pretty much unavailable,” Vicki
said from the back seat. Lizzie ignored her.

  “So I dipped a little to find out where the supervisor was. He wasn’t anyplace. Finally I checked the death deebee. He died a month ago. You were listed as the ‘certifying physician.’”

  “Yes,” Dr. Aranow said. His face was blank.

  “So then I dipped, me, to find out why Harrisburg wasn’t holding a special election, like they’re supposed to when an elected servant dies. And it turned out the state government didn’t know the district supervisor was dead.”

  Dr. Aranow said, “I checked on this after your call. Everyone is claiming a systems malfunction.”

  “Oh, yes, certainly,” Vicki said. “Let me guess, Jackson. In Wayland’s unexplained absence, no district services were authorized, costing nobody any money. Wayland’s great-granddaughter has control of his entire, not-inconsiderable fortune, which is quite a coincidence, considering that her house system is the one that developed the comglitch with Harrisburg.”

  Dr. Aranow twisted in his seat to look at Vicki. “Do you know Ellie Lester?”

  “No. But I know donkeys.”

  “From the viewpoint of one who left? Like Lord Jim knowing the merchant marine?”

  “More like Horatius knowing the Roman legions.”

  What were they talking about? Lizzie had lost control of the conversation. She said loudly, “So I told Harrisburg they were supposed to hold a special election, and they said they planned to. On April first. There’s two candidates, and they both filed campaign speeches on Channel 63. But—”

  Vicki interrupted. “Both speeches, naturally, make the same tired promises, the same meaningless avowals of providing consistent and reliable service. Meanwhile, there are exactly two hundred sixty registered voters for non-enclave elections in Willoughby County. Our tribe here, plus a few in the mountain enclaves that hold those donkeys who moved permanently out of Manhattan and into their summer places during the Change Wars. Fleeing the revolution. Workers unite, you have nothing to lose but your warehouses.”

  Lizzie said, “So we—”

  Vicki said, “The idea here, in part, is that you and your impeccable donkey credentials can discover the inside politics of these two candidates. For purposes of—”

  Lizzie said, “I’m telling this!” so loudly that Dirk woke up and blinked. “Vicki…I’m telling this. It’s my idea. It’s mine.”

  “I’m sorry, baby,” Vicki said, putting a hand on Lizzie’s shoulder. That was almost as bad.

  “I’m not a baby. I told you that before!”

  And then Vicki and Dr. Aranow exchanged a look, and Lizzie saw that they were both amused at her, and she was so angry she didn’t even care that it was the first time they’d looked like they agreed on something. Didn’t even care that it was good for the plan. They both thought she was still a baby. And they both were just damn well going to learn better. She was Lizzie Francy, she was the best datadipper in the country, she was a mother, and she was going to make the world a better place for her baby. By herself, if she had to. That would serve them right. Because her plan was going to work, and not even donkey laws could stop her this time.

  She said icily, “We’re going to elect our own candidate, us, to district supervisor. Somebody from the tribe. A Liver.”

  There, that was better. Dr. Aranow was looking at her like she’d really surprised him, her. Like she was somebody for even a donkey to notice!

  But then his expression changed. He said gently—too gently, “But, Lizzie—even if you brought that off…even if you got a Liver elected to district supervisor…don’t you know that donkeys pay taxes by providing services out of their own money? In exchange for votes? That way they get—used to get—the power to make laws that suit them, and you people got the goods and services to stay alive. But if a Liver was elected—how would he fill a warehouse? You don’t have the money in the first place. You see, my dear—”

  “Don’t talk to me like a baby, you son of a bitch!”

  Dr. Aranow’s eyes widened. Behind her. Lizzie could hear Vicki shake with badly contained laughter. At that moment she hated them both. But at least she had Dr. Aranow’s attention. In her arms, Dirk stirred and whimpered. Lizzie lowered her voice, and the baby again drifted into sleep.

  “I know more, me, than you do about it. Not all the warehouse supplies come from the politicians themselves. There’s a pool of tax money they all pay into, and it gets divided among the counties of Pennsylvania, and you can spend it on what you need. That money—I want it.”

  “There, Jackson—not up on our governance procedures, are we,” Vicki murmured. “Medicine is such a demanding mistress.”

  “I want those credits,” Lizzie repeated, because Dr. Aranow looked impressed for the first time. Or stunned. Was he stunned? Was it really so hopeless for a Liver to get elected? Again doubt attacked her. Maybe this couldn’t really work…Yes. It could. She would make it work.

  Dr. Aranow said, “You? Personally? You want to run for district supervisor?”

  “Not me.” Lizzie said. “I’m not old enough. You got to be eighteen.”

  Dr. Aranow looked over his shoulder. “Ms. Turner?”

  “Oh, certainly,” Vicki said. “A donkey gone native. Nobody in either camp would vote for me. But don’t look so terrified, Jackson…we’re not going to ask you to run.”

  “Course not,” Lizzie said. “Billy Washington is going to run. Only he don’t know it yet, him.”

  Dr. Aranow said, “Billy Washington? That elderly black man who pulled your mother off me when I was trying to deliver your baby?”

  Vicki said, “You have a good memory for names. Almost a politician already.”

  “Yes, that’s Billy,” Lizzie said eagerly. “My stepfather, him. He’ll do it, if I ask him. He’d do anything for me and Dirk.”

  “The ‘plan for the health of babies,’” Dr. Aranow said. His mouth twisted. It wasn’t quite a smile. “I see. Well, your campaign should be quite interesting. What do you plan to do, register all the nomad Liver voters in Willoughby County at least three months before the election, promise them warehouse access if they vote for Mr. Washington, and just overwhelm the divided donkey candidates by sheer numbers?”

  “Yes,” Lizzie said eagerly. “I know we can do it!”

  “I’m not so sure. Both established political parties will mobilize their own voters, you know.”

  “We figured that out. We’ll get all the voters lined up, but none of them will register until 11:30 P.M. on December thirty-first, the last day before the three-month deadline. It’ll be too late for the donkey candidates to get more people registered. They’ll never know what hit them.”

  “And do the numbers indicate—”

  “There are only four small enclaves in Willoughby County,” Lizzie said. Her confidence returned in a rush; this was data. “And they’re summer enclaves. The total of voters registered here even for internal enclave elections is only four thousand eighty. That’s all. We don’t know how many Livers are in the county right now, but more probably than we guess, in abandoned towns and farms and factories like ours. Staying out the winter. We can get them registered here, or reregistered here.”

  “Out of their vast civic pride,” Vicki said. But Lizzie saw that she didn’t smile.

  “Well,” he said, “good luck. But one question: How do you know I won’t just go tell everyone I know about this, so that more donkeys register in Willoughby before December thirty-first?”

  “You won’t, you,” Lizzie said. The baby stirred in her arms and she shifted his solid little body. “We need you.”

  “For what?” He looked nervous, and again Lizzie felt that rush of confidence. She could make a donkey nervous.

  “Two things. We need you to find out about these two candidates. Susannah Wells Livingston and Donald Thomas Serrano. How their voters are split up, like.”

  “Because,” Vicki said, “if one candidate is going to get one hundred percent of the vote, Lizzie will need
to register a lot more people than if she can be confident the vote will be split up like cannibals and missionaries. Or if, say, one of the candidates should happen to be as dead as Harold Wayland.”

  Dr. Aranow turned in his seat to face her. “You’re not taking any of this very seriously, are you?”

  “On the contrary,” Vicki said, “this is how I sound when I’m serious. When I’m frivolous, I make pontificating speeches of great pretentiousness. Such as this one: There’s a way of looking at history that traces all enormous events back to the nature of key personalities shaped by very limited environments. This theory says that Napoleon, Hitler, Einstein, and Ballieri changed the world so profoundly precisely because of the strictures or hardships of their childhoods.”

  “Who’s Napoleon?” Lizzie asked. “Or…what name did you say? Ballieri?”

  “You don’t know who Ballieri was?”

  “No.”

  “Lewis Ballieri? Last century?”

  “No! And I don’t care, me!” Why couldn’t Vicki behave like normal people? But if she had…If she had, she’d never have come to live with Livers, and Lizzie wouldn’t ever have gotten…She thrust that line of thought away from her.

  Vicki said to Dr. Aranow, “I prove my point.”

  Lizzie changed her grip on Dirk and leaned toward the doctor. “There’s a second thing that we need you for, us.”

  “What’s that?”

  She couldn’t read his expression; his face never seemed to change. She drew in a deep breath. “We need your aircar.”

  “My aircar?”

  “To borrow. We need to go look for other Livers, us, and we can’t contact them by comlink because the link might be dipped. Our plan has to be secret. So we need to cover the county by air to find everybody’s tribes in all the mountains and valleys, and then visit them. Vicki can drive. She knows how. Please. We just need it, us, for a few weeks. And when Billy is elected, we’re going to use the tax credits to get Change syringes as well as Y-cones. It’s for the babies.”