Pec-Pec sat cushioned by a bank of moss on the wooded mountainside. Far below, his panel truck was barely visible. He had parked it where the sporadic macadam road had finally surrendered to pine saplings and underbrush. Then he had hiked the rest of the way up, to where a frame of ten-by-tens formed a black square on the shaded hillside, looking like the entrance to an ancient mine shaft.
He waited patiently. Just from his seat he spotted a dozen herbs he thought he might collect—later, if there was time. That rabbit tobacco, especially. It had been a long time since he had seen rabbit tobacco.
When a metal door finally opened, down in the darkness of the tunnel, it threw out a dim oval of light that exposed the wood frame for the fake front that it was. A sturdy figure stepped through the hatch and limped down to take a seat by the Rafer. He appeared to be much older than Pec-Pec—balding, gray—although Pec-Pec was his senior by several hundred years. The man from under the mountain sat and smacked his fingerless right hand at a leg of his green camouflage jump suit.
"Humph," the grayhead said. "Ordered these from the Northlands, an' they were too piss-plum dark for our vegetation. A hunnerd pair a camouflage suits, an' I had to bleach down every one of 'em or they'd never work in these parts. Humph."
"Ah, Rosenthal Webb. I am glad to see that you still find much to complain about. Your revolutionaries have won, but there is much left that is wrong with the world, no?"
Webb stood again, uneasy, and dusted off his rear end. "So. We'll have us a ship?"
"Oh ya, Big Tom is quite convinced that the only thing that will keep him off the end of a trolling line is cooperating with this new Government. He will build you a ship to cross the big sea. I had to show him the Monitor's head, but he's a believer now. He insists on keeping the island, though, and we must ship to him advance money and the timbers."
Webb wiped at his red eyes and grunted again. "There'll not be much advance money, not till—um—not till the council is more attuned to the idea of an ocean ship. But I'll get him the cut of the entire Northland if that's what it takes. If I can keep the timber clippers from disappearing. The Monitor allowed juss seven made, and four are. . .." He shrugged.
Pec-Pec's eyebrows rose with a mischievous idea. "Ha! Mayhap it's revolutionaries such as yourself taking the clippers. Mayhap it's time to tell all the sectors that the Government is new. There are rumors of this already even in the Out Islands."
"Ya, rumors," Webb said wearily. "Well, our people are almost in place in New Chicago—thass what the Revolutionary Council is waiting for. We're finding some favorable manpower in the old mining prison, too. In Blue Hole. If all goes well we will announce it soon—if all of Merqua doesn't already know."
"Big Tom says he will have you a ship by spring. And one final condition he asks that I bring to you: He must make the voyage to find Europe. Captain the ship."
"Ho. Well. That's not decided yet. Ya see, I'm moving a little in advance of the council's wishes—they don' know the building's ta start. Who do you think should go on the ocean ship?"
Pec-Pec looked sullen, staring at the tips of his black boots. He did not answer.
"Ey, Pec-Pec? Who should go?"
Pec-Pec began slowly, and Webb read anger and unease in the voice. "Rosenthal Webb, I must caution you against such a clustering of your Fungus People. History shows that this might not go well—these people brought together by fear for their lives and hate and money and—" Pec-Pec's eyes seemed to flash red for a moment "—and, well, I have heard whispers of a Cantilou that has been drawn to the region. And these are conditions on which a Cantilou would thrive."
Webb pressed his lips together. "Cantilou. The myth, pre-war, older even—"
"A Cantilou would have you think of him as myth," Pec-Pec said. "That is his way. He can scratch soil into the brain to cover his tracks."
"You mean this," Webb said. "You actually would have me believe that this Cantilou beast is marauding in the islands?"
"No. It is the Cantilou that would have you not believe it."
"Ah."
"I would have you believe this, Rosenthal Webb: You know of the mountain feline which you call the wildcat. Yes?"
"Of course. Nasty animal."
"Then understand this: What the wildcat is to you, the Cantilou is to me. By now you must have gathered something of my way of being—our lives are on different planes that merely intersect at this point. But the Cantilou is on my plane as well. His world, too, intersects at this point."
"And how many of these Cantilous would there be?" Webb asked.
Pec-Pec shrugged. "Enough to meet demand. Always enough."
Webb was silent for several moments.
"So, then," Webb said. "You will not offer a suggestion as to who should cross the Big Ocean in the new vessel?"
The magic man sighed and nodded sadly, letting his beard touch his chest. "No, Rosenthal Webb. That is the last of it—I have persuaded this Big Tom to make a large ship for your new Government. But I do not want to be part of your new Government. You must decide these things, who should cross the Big Ocean."
"But you instigated much of this yourself! You directed us all out west—to the canyon where the Monitor was hiding. And, you bit his head off!"
"No. The fish. The fish bit his head off."
"Your little dragon fish. Ya."
"Ya. Only he was made big for a moment."
Webb rubbed again at his eyes, glanced at the grime on his fingertips, then thought better of the effort. "You're a Rafer. You hate governments. You hate bangers. But all the while the continent is springing haywire like a dropped clock. You're like your friend the inventor, Cred Faiging. He'll stay in his compound, behind the wire. Said he traded with the old Government; he'll trade with the new one. Juss leave 'im alone."
Pec-Pec shrugged again. He leaned forward, picked a stalk of rabbit tobacco, and sniffed at it appreciatively. As he rolled it between thumb and forefinger it glowed and began to smoulder, and he sniffed it again.
"But, hoo, we've got pirates up and down the coast," Webb continued. "Fel Guinness has hanged every Southland farm supervisor, criminal or not. And now the worst pig-pokin' slaver in the Caribbean you've hired on to build me an ocean ship."
"I directed you to him, suggested you have Gregory contact him, because he really was the only one among your people, Rosenthal. Besides, until spring—that is not too long. Do what you will with him then."
"If I promise him he'll captain the ship, I'll have ta let 'im."
Pec-Pec frowned. The day was dimming quickly, and that early evening known to the mountains was falling.
"Getting cool," Webb said. "Let's go inside."
Pec-Pec glanced back at the open hatch. He had been inside once—the stuffy tunnels and ladders, the life support systems and generators run by the mountain-top windmills, the large meeting chamber where the decisions of the Revolution had been made for decades.
"No. Ha. Canna go in there, thank you. You should close 'er down, Rose. No need to live in there anymore."
Webb scratched at his neck. He might let the old headquarters fall to rot one day, but it was a lifestyle hard to let go of.
"Well, g'night then," he said. "And thanks." Webb turned to go.
"You're forgetting. . .."
"Ah. . .Gregory? How is he?"
"Should not travel yet. But that is juss as well. Said he wanted to stay in the islands for a while. Watch the ship go together, I dunno what else. Guinness has started his duty there now, and he will protect Gregory while he stands guard over Big Tom."
Webb hawked and spat into the pine needles, then disappeared into the tunnel sadly.
Even in the dying light, Pec-Pec could see the red in the phlegm.