"Name don't matter," he said without moving the heater an inch.
"What's important is, who are _you_? And what are you doing here?"
"James Carson's my name," I said. "I'm from Ancarta." It was a small
city halfway around the planet, a nice, anonymous place to be from.
"And I'm minding my own business."
"Sure," the big man said. He jerked his head and whistled, one sudden
sharp note. The clearing was full of men.
They were all sorts, big and small, thin and fat, dressed in uniforms,
cast-offs, suits, rags, anything at all. Half of them were carrying
heaters. The rest had knives, some good and some home-made. They
watched me and they watched the big man. Nobody moved.
"Maybe you're a Government man," the big man said, "and have come out
to catch some of Bill Sergeant's boys."
"No," I said.
He grinned at me as if he hadn't heard me. "Well," he said, "this
ought to be a big enough batch for you, Mister. Want to capture us all
right now and take us back to New Didymus with you?"
"You've got me wrong," I said.
Another man spoke up. He was older, in his late forties, I thought.
His hair was thin and gray but his face was hard. He had a heater
strapped to his side, and he wore a good uniform. "Government men
don't come out one at a time, do they, Huey?" he said.
The big man shrugged. "No way to tell," he said. "Maybe Mr. Carson
here's got a call-radio for the rest of his boys. Maybe they're all
just waiting for us, some place nearby."
"If they're waiting," the other man said, "they'd be here by now.
Besides, Huey, he don't look like a Government man."
"Think they all got tails?" Huey asked him.
I judged it was about time to put in a word. "I'm not Government," I
said. "I'm from Ancarta. I'm here to help you--if you're the men I
think you are."
That started some more discussion. Huey was all for labeling my offer
a trick and getting rid of me then and there--after which, I suppose,
he was going to clear out my mythical followers in the nearby jungle.
But he was pretty well all alone; there's got to be a rotten apple in
the best-picked barrel and these boys were smart. The only sensible
thing to do was staring them in the face, and it didn't take them long
to see it.
"We'll take you back with us," Huey's friend told me. "When we get to
a safe place we can sit down and talk this out."
I wanted to insist on finishing my supper right where I was, but
there's such a thing as playing a little too much for the grandstand.
Instead, I was herded into the center of the group, and we marched off
into the jungle.
Only it wasn't a march; there was no attempt at order. For a while we
used the trail, and then straggled off it and went single-file through
masses of trees and bushes and leaves. Being in the center of the line
helped a little but not enough; the spines kept coming through and I
got a few more nice scratches. The trip took about half an hour, and
when we stopped we were in front of a cave-mouth.
The band went inside and I went with them. There was light,
battery-powered, and what seemed to be all the comforts of a small,
ill-kept town jail. But it was better than the naked jungle. I was
still porting my knapsack, and when we got into the cave I unstrapped
it and sat down and opened it. The men watched me without making any
attempt to hide the fact.
The first thing I took out was an instant-heat food can. It didn't
look like a bomb, so nobody did anything. They just kept watching
while I came up with my call-radio.
Huey said: "What the hell!" and came for me.
I stood up, spilling the knapsack, and got ready to stand him off; but
I didn't need to, not then. Three of the others piled on him, like
dogs on a bear, and held him down. Huey's friend was at my side when I
turned. "How come?" he said. "Who are you planning on calling?"
"I said I wanted to help you," I told him. "I meant it."
"Of course," he said smoothly. "Why should I believe it?"
"I know the spot you're in, and I--"
He didn't give me a chance to finish. "Now, you wait a minute," he
said. "And don't touch that box. We've got some talking to do."
"Such as?"
"Such as how you managed to get here from Ancarta, and why," he said.
"Such as what all this talk about helping us means, and what the
radio's for. Lots of talking."
I decided it was time to show some more independence. "I don't talk to
people I don't know," I said.
He looked me up and down, taking his time about it. Huey had quieted
down some, and our conversation was the main attraction. In the end he
shrugged. "I suppose you can't do any harm, not so long as we keep an
eye on that box of yours," he said. He gave me his name as if it
didn't matter. "I'm Hollerith," he said. "General Rawlinson
Hollerith."
* * * * *
I gave him the prepared story automatically; it rolled out but I
wasn't thinking about it. He'd given me my first real surprise; I'd
thought Hollerith had been killed at Andrew's Farm, and, as far as I
knew, so did the Government. Instead, here he was, alive and kicking,
doing a pretty good job of working with a guerrilla gang. I wondered
who Huey would turn out to be, but it didn't seem like the time to
ask.
The story, of course, was a good one. Naturally it wasn't proof of
anything, or even susceptible of proof right then and there; it wasn't
meant to be. I didn't expect them to buy it sight unseen, but I'd
planned it to give me some time until I could start the next step.
James Carson, I told Hollerith, was a reasonably big wheel around
Ancarta. He wasn't in sympathy with the Government, but he hadn't
fought in the revolutionary armies or been active in any overt way.
"Why not?" he snapped at me.
"I was more valuable where I stood," I said. "There's a lot that can
be done with paper work in the way of sabotage."