Death-Bringer

by Patrick Tilley

  As the two groups met and merged, Cadillac exchanged a perfunctory greeting with Steve then searched in vain for the familiar, much-loved face. Filled with a sudden dread, he pushed his way through the milling throng and seized Awesome-Wells by the shoulders. ‘Where is the Old One?!’

  His cry caused everyone to fall silent.

  The elder exchanged a glance with Boston-Bruin, hesitated for a moment then said: ‘He has passed over.’

  Cadillac looked stunned. ‘Dead?!’

  The rest of the welcoming posse wailed and beat their heads and chests. ‘Oyy-yehhh …!’

  Cadillac shook his head incredulously and turned to Steve as he appeared at his shoulder. ‘How did—? When—? W-Where is he?’

  Steve grimaced awkwardly but didn’t reply. The two elders and those around them averted their eyes and stepped back, clearing a path to the covered palanquin on which Mr Snow’s inert body lay with the head exposed beneath a layer of skins.

  The shock generated as the unbearable truth sank in made Cadillac go weak at the knees. He gasped as if hit by a series of body-blows. Awesome-Wells and Boston-Bruin both laid a comforting hand on his shoulders.

  Moving like a sleep-walker, he allowed himself to be led towards the palanquin by the two elders then fell to his knees beside it. Lifting the furs, he took hold of Mr Snow’s right hand. It was cold and stiff; the arm, bent across his chest, was locked at the elbow and shoulder.

  Death now held him in its unyielding grip.

  Cadillac placed a hand tenderly on the disfigured forehead. He had been the cause of many of the worry lines which had accumulated there over the years, but now death had smoothed the wrinkles away. He leant over and kissed the untroubled brow. The lifeless flesh chilled his lips. Faced with this final proof that his beloved teacher had left him forever, Cadillac howled with grief and collapsed over the body. As he tried to draw the old wordsmith into his arms, Boston-Bruin broke his grip pulled him away.

  ‘Let him rest, young one. He died to save the Plainfolk.’

  Cadillac sat slumped on his heels for a long moment then drew his hands down his face and got slowly to his feet, eyes brimming with tears. ‘Save your story for the camp-fire when we are all gathered together.’ His voice was choked with emotion. ‘If I share my sorrow with our clanfolk, it will be easier to bear.’

  Tom McFadden, Deputy-Director of AMEXICO broke the news to Ben Karlstrom when they met to review the agenda before going into the Daily Plans Conference for departmental heads of the organization.

  ‘Dead?! When did this happen?’

  ‘On the way back from the trading post,’ said McFadden. ‘We don’t have the exact date. Malone called in as soon as he got the word.’

  Karlstrom swore under his breath. ‘Has he seen the body?’

  ‘He’s seen what’s left of it, yes. Mutes on their home turf put their dead on beds of woven branches which are then raised up on four long poles. When Brickman took him up to the High Place the birds had already got to work.’ McFadden relayed Malone’s whittled-down version of the battle at the trading post. ‘As far as we can ascertain, Mr Snow was killed by his own creation.’

  ‘The tidal wave?’

  ‘No, sorry, I didn’t make myself clear. The power he summoned drained the life out of his body. Not surprising really when you consider the forces involved. Cadillac arranged for Malone to question several of the returnees. According to them the tidal wave may have killed around two hundred thousand people …’

  Karlstrom tipped back in his chair. ‘Two hun –? Wheeee-iiouuuu …’

  ‘And wrecked five of the Great lakes class wheel-boats. Lost with all hands …’

  ‘Jeezuss! That’s going to raise some flak from our friends over the border.’ Karlstrom closed his eyes and massaged his nose for a while then sat forward again and turned his attention back to his deputy. ‘So how are the M’Calls taking this?’

  ‘The clan is in deep mourning. Everyone’s walking around with their face and arms smeared with grey wood-ash. Cadillac has been formally installed as Mr Snow’s successor.’

  ‘And Brickman. You say he went to the trading post …’

  ‘Arrived after it was all over. He apparently went there to warn Mr Snow that the Yama-Shita might try and get even.’

  ‘In the hope of protecting his investment.’ Karlstrom gave a dry laugh. ‘Still, one has to give him full marks for trying.’

  ‘It wasn’t an entirely wasted journey,’ said McFadden. ‘He was able to make a first-hand assessment of the situation. He’ll give us the full details when he comes in but the She-Kargo, M’Waukee and San’Paul delegations have agreed to set up some kind of loose alliance, and they may be joined by some of the C’Natti clans. It’s early days yet but Brickman believes it could form the basis of a mutual defence pact.’

  ‘Leaving the D’Troit isolated …’ The thought caused Karlstrom to pull out his bottom lip.

  ‘Or as front-runners for the japs. I must say this alliance doesn’t sound like good news.’

  ‘No, it doesn’t,’ agreed Karlstrom. ‘But it presents less of a danger now that the Mutes are cut off from their supply of arms. The problem is, the Iron Masters will be back in strength. They’re not going to take this defeat lying down – and that could create a somewhat delicate situation.

  ‘If the mutual trade agreement is now a dead letter, they’ll have to establish a permanent hold on the Great Lakes and Northern Plains if they want to continue to exploit its resources. And that means occupying territory which they agreed was ours when we signed that secret protocol.’

  ‘Can we stop them?’ asked McFadden.

  ‘By having a word on our private line? It’s possible – but not before we’ve delivered the heads of what’s left of the Clan M’Call. And then the Clan Kojak. Our friend the Lord High Chamberlain would like me to hand over Brickman as well but I managed to talk him out of that idea. The man upstairs has plans for our young hero.’

  ‘I see. But now that Mr Snow is out of the frame, does the plan to use Red River to take out the M’Calls still stand …?’

  ‘Yes. The terrain in Wyoming does not favour the wagon-trains and the dense tree cover prevents us from solving this problem by a sustained programme of air strikes. That’s why we have to draw the clan down from the hills and into Nebraska.’

  ‘Okay. But since Cadillac doesn’t present the same level of threat as Mr Snow, we won’t need to bring Roz Brickman into play. Shall I arrange to have her flown back to the Federation?’

  ‘No, leave her out there. Clearwater too.’

  McFadden made a note on his Memo-Typer. ‘We’ve got a slight problem with Malone.’

  ‘Go on …’

  ‘When he sold Cadillac on the idea of attacking the train, it was agreed that Mr Snow would be playing a major role. When he and Brickman found out that Mr Snow had left for the trading post, he decided to backpedal to give Brickman time to bring the old lump in.

  ‘Basically, what Malone said was “Either the summoner’s in, or we’re out”. Mr Snow’s death has left him out on a limb. If you want this joint attack on Red River to go ahead, he needs a good reason for the climb-down. Why don’t we just use Brickman and Malone to set up Cadillac and take him out with a snatch-squad? We can wrap up this whole thing inside forty-eight hours of getting the green light.’

  Karlstrom shook his head. ‘It’s not just Cadillac I’m after, Tom. It’s the M’Calls. Every single man, woman and child. Not just to please our slant-eyed colleagues but for what they did to The Lady and for being the root cause of his latest trouble. It’s left the She-Kargo riding high. If we can destroy their paramount clan, it’ll be a real body blow. Ordinarily, the Trail-Blazer Division would be handling this. CINC-TRAIN would like nothing better. But because of the Brickmans, the P-G has turned the heat on us.’

  ‘I understand.’

  ‘Good. Keep on it. And don’t cut back on any of the defensive measures. I want the reception committee prepared f
or any eventuality. And send the same message to Malone.’

  McFadden eyed Karlstrom shrewdly. ‘That would seem to suggest that you don’t think Mr Snow is dead.’

  ‘Let’s just say I don’t trust those fuckers an inch.’

  ‘Does that include Brickman?’

  ‘At the moment, it’s not a question of whether I trust Brickman, but whether the Mutes do. If you check back through Malone’s signals you’ll see that Cadillac voiced the suspicion that Brickman may be an undercover agent.’ Karlstrom smiled. ‘Fortunately, it doesn’t seem to have occurred to him that Malone is not the genuine article.’

  ‘But –’

  Karlstrom cut him off. ‘I know what you’re going to say. If Mr Snow left the settlement before Cadillac and Brickman returned there could be no collusion between pupil and master. If his death has been faked then Brickman would have to know about it.’

  ‘Unless, of course he really is dead.’

  ‘Exactly. I’m confident that Brickman and his kin-sister will come through for us. But with an operation of this importance one can’t leave anything to chance. That’s why they will both be given ample opportunity to prove their loyalty on the day.’

  Karlstrom expected the meeting to end there but his deputy didn’t get up. ‘You got something else to tell me?’

  ‘Yes.’ McFadden bared his teeth the way a chimpanzee does when he’s trying to appease an aggressor. ‘That was the good news.’

  ‘And the bad …?’

  ‘It concerns that decoy SIG-INT unit that was dropped into Wyoming. The one with –’

  ‘Yes, yes, there’s no need to explain. I set the goddam thing up. Malone led the M’Calls to them and everything went according to plan. The Mutes killed the defaulters and went away bright-eyed and bushy-tailed with the stuff they needed to attack the wagon-train.’ Karlstrom paused and aimed a beady eye at McFadden. ‘Or are you now going to tell me they didn’t?’

  ‘No, all that’s fine, as far as it goes. It’s just that –’

  ‘Someone screwed up. Okay, who? Is this an in-house fuckeroo?’

  ‘No. This one’s down to some clerk manning a computer in the main supply depot of the Quarter-Master General.’

  ‘That makes a change …’

  ‘When the requisition order came through for the uniforms and equipment for the SIG-INT unit, the people at QMGC didn’t know it was for a decoy outfit staffed by Code One defaulters. They just punched up the list of hardware carried by a SIG-INT squadron on a field operation and issued everything on the print-out.’

  ‘Didn’t our people fix the air bottles and take away most of the ammunition when they set up the campsite?’

  ‘Oh, yes, they did all that. They laid everything out so as it looked realistic. But it never occurred to them that all the items delivered to the site were standard issue and … fully operational.’

  Karlstrom sank back in his chair and pinched his nose between his right thumb and forefinger. ‘Such as …?’

  ‘Six packs of plastic explosive, with detonators and timers, and twelve AP108’s. Anti-personnel mines with pressure fuses.’

  The list lifted Karlstrom’s eyebrows. ‘What in hell’s name does a SIG-INT squadron need stuff like that for?!’

  ‘Well, these units are tasked with setting up radio beacons. They’re issued with PX in case they need to blast out the holes for the base of the mast in rocky terrain. Once they get the mast up and braced, they plant the AP mines in a circle around it to dissuade any roving Mutes from trying to pull it down.

  ‘Most of the lump-heads inside the Territories have learned to steer clear of the masts, but for those who haven’t all it needs is for one of these goons to put a foot in the wrong place and bang! Up he goes. After that, his friends – if there are any left – tend to keep well away.’

  Karlstrom had a feeling he knew the answer but he put the question anyway. ‘So what happened to this stuff?’

  ‘It seems to have gone astray. We know it was issued, and received for forward shipment by the Air-Mexico base at Dallas.’ McFadden threw up his hands. ‘You know what these outfits are like. They’re great at covert operations but they tend to lose track of the paperwork.’

  ‘So you can’t say with absolute certainty the mines and the PX reached Wyoming.’

  ‘We’re ninety-nine percent certain. That’s why I checked with Malone before speaking to you. If it was there, it had vanished by the time Malone came on the scene. His people made their own trawl of the camp-site but all they came up with were a few more rifles and odd bits of equipment – the sort of stuff the M’Calls had already collected.’

  ‘Did he ask Cadillac about it?’

  ‘In a roundabout way, yes. The Mute told him that all they’d found was on the ground – waiting to be split two ways. When Malone became more specific, the Mute appeared not to know what PX was. He couldn’t press the matter too hard because his orders were to keep the Mute sweet until –’

  ‘Sure …’

  ‘Still, the thing is, Mutes can’t read. So even if the M’Calls have squirreled this stuff away they won’t know what it is.’

  ‘Cadillac can read,’ said Karlstrom. ‘He also knows everything that Brickman knows about explosives. It was Cadillac who wired up the bomb that blew a big hole in Hartmann’s wagon-train!’

  ‘Christo! Yeah, I forgot about that! The lying piece of lumpshit! What d’you think we ought to do?’

  Karlstrom’s face darkened. ‘You can start by telling Malone to find out what Brickman knows about this. If the answer’s nothing, he’s to check that campsite out again. Inch by inch. And meanwhile, put a couple of dozen key-pushers on the shuttle to Dallas. They’re to make an inventory of every single item on that air base right down to the last blade of rainbow-grass.’

  He pointed to the work-station on his desk. ‘And I want the results up on this screen by this time tomorrow. Comprendo?’

  ‘Yessir!’ McFadden leapt to his feet.

  ‘And find out which of our people processed this requisition. I expect heads to roll, Tom. I won’t tolerate this kind of sloppiness at any level of AMEXICO, and I won’t accept any excuses.

  ‘SQUARE-DANCE is one operation we cannot allow to fail. It’s probably the biggest, certainly the most complex task we’ve undertaken. Years of work, decades of planning, hundreds of lives – including yours and mine – are now in jeopardy and will remain there until we can establish the whereabouts of those explosives.’

  ‘Don’t worry. We’ll find them.’

  ‘You’d better. Who else knows about this?’

  ‘Nobody apart from my assistant. She was logging the documentation on the SIG-INT set-up into the master file and just by sheer chance happened to read though the equipment list supplied by QMGC as it came up on screen. She thought it seemed a bit overloaded considering the life-expectancy of the unit it had been issued to and brought it to my attention.’

  ‘Bright girl …’

  ‘Jo-Anne? Yes, she is.’

  ‘Get her to unpick it. Take those two items off the list, and delete them all the way back to the QMGC supply depot. That means accessing their records too. Those explosives were never issued to AMEXICO. You understand?’

  ‘Yessir.’ It wasn’t the first time.

  ‘Okay. Anything else?’

  ‘Only what’s on the agenda for this morning’s meeting.’

  ‘Good …’ Karlstrom sighed wearily, planted his hands on the desk and levered himself out of his chair. ‘Well done, Tom. Thanks for spoiling my day …’

  Out in Wyoming, Steve decided to make himself useful by taking over the job of training the fifty Mute warriors who had been selected to take part in the initial assault on the wagon-train. Since many of the Bears who hadn’t been picked were somewhat envious of those who had, Steve thought it best – in the interest of general harmony – to widen the training to include all those who wanted to take part.

  It gave everyone a chance to dress up in the u
niforms and deck themselves out with all the bits and bobs – something which appealed to the Mutes’ love of dressing-up and putting on an extravagant performance – like they did when singing fire-songs. And it also introduced a measure of competitiveness, since Steve made it clear that only the top fifty recruits would make the final team.

  There was no hope of teaching them how to use the electronic head-up displays projected onto the visor, but they had all handled the rifles supplied by the Iron Masters, and they were used to sighting and firing a crossbow from the shoulder. Since most Mutes were uncannily good marskmen, the transition from crossbow to carbine, using the basic optical sight, went relatively smoothly.

  Cadillac, who had taken Mr Snow’s death very badly, dropped out of circulation after his normal appointment as wordsmith and made it clear, via the warrior who barred the door to his hut, that he didn’t feel like talking to anybody – including Steve.

  Three days later, he turned up at one of Steve’s training sessions shadowed by four warriors: Blue-Thunder, Funky-Deelix, Storm-Trooper and Twilight-Zone. Seeing him watching from the sidelines, Steve told the two Bears he’d appointed as squad leaders to carry on practising fire and movement and went over to greet him.

  Steve hailed the Bears then shook Cadillac’s hand warmly. ‘Welcome back.’ He was going to say ‘to the human race’ but decided it might be taken the wrong way.

  ‘How’s it going?’

  ‘How does it look?’

  ‘You’d better ask my clan-brothers,’ said Cadillac. ‘I’ve never seen real Trail-Blazers in action. Have you got everything you need?’

  ‘Yes. You guys did a good job. I never thought you’d be able to get hold of this much stuff so quickly. Y’know what? I’m beginning to think we’ve got a good chance of pulling this off!’

  ‘In that case, you’d better have a word with friend Malone.’

  ‘Has he got cold feet?’

  ‘Well, let’s just say I’ve failed to persuade him that we can still take on Red River without Mr Snow. He says that air rifles aren’t enough. We need explosives, mines – that kind of thing.’