Victory Read online

  III

  A week of the dust-filled air of Meloa had left its mark on CaptainDuke O'Neill. It had spread filth over his uniform, added another yearto his face, and made waking each morning a dry-throated torture. Nowhe stopped at the entrance to the ship where he had been reassigned aberth for the night shift. An attendant handed him a small bottle,three biscuits, and a magazine. He tasted the chemically purified watersickly, stuffed the three ersatz biscuits into his pocket, and moveddown the ramp, staring at the magazine.

  It was from Earth, of course, since no printing was being done yet onMeloa. It must have come in on one of the three big Earth freightershe'd heard land during the night. Tucked into it was another of thebrief notes he'd been receiving: "Director Flannery will be pleased tocall on Captain O'Neill at the captain's convenience."

  He shredded the note as he went across the field; he started to do thesame with the news magazine, until the headlines caught his attention.

  Most of the news meant nothing to him. But he skimmed the article onthe eleventh planet to join the Outer Federation; the writer wasobviously biased against the organization, but Duke nodded approvingly.At least someone was doing something. He saw that Cathay was in fortrouble. Earth was living up to her old form! Then he shoved themagazine into his pocket and trudged on toward the veteran'sreassignment headquarters.

  Machinery was being moved from the Earth freighters, and Duke sworeagain. Five billion Earthmen would read of their "generosity" to Meloa,and any guilt they felt for their desertion would vanish in a smugsatisfaction at their charity. Smugness was easy in a world withoutdust or carrion smell or craters that had been factories.

  There were only a few Meloans in the crude tent that served as theirheadquarters. Duke went back toward the cubbyhole where a thin, haggardman sat on a broken block behind a makeshift desk.

  The hairless blue head shook slowly while the man's eyes droppedhungrily to the paper in Duke's pocket and away again guiltily. "Nowork, Captain O'Neill. Unless you can operate some of those Earthmachines we're getting?"

  Duke grimaced, passing the magazine over to hands that trembled as theytook it. His education was in ultra-literary creative writing, hisexperience in war. And here, where there was the whole task ofrebuilding a planet to be done, the ruin of tools and power made whatcould be done too little for even the few who were left. There was nograin to reap or wood to cut after the killing gas from Throm hadruined vegetation; there were no workable mines where all had beenblasted closed. Transportation was gone. And the economy had passedbeyond hand tools, leaving too few of those. Even whole men were idle,and his artificial hand could never replace a real one for carryingrubble.

  "Director Flannery has been asking for you again," the man told him.

  Duke ignored it. "What about my wife?"

  The Meloan frowned, reaching for a soiled scrap of paper. "We may havesomething. One of her former friends thinks she was near this address.We'll send someone out to investigate, if you wish, captain; but it'sstill pretty uncertain."

  "I'll go myself," Duke said harshly. He picked up the paper,recognizing the location as one that had been in the outskirts.

  The man behind the desk shook his head doubtfully. Then he shrugged,and reached behind him for a small automatic. "Better take this--andwatch your step! There are two bullets left."

  Duke nodded his thanks and turned away, dropping the gun into hispocket. Behind him he heard a long sigh and the rustle of a magazinebeing opened quickly.

  * * * * *

  It was a long walk. At first, he traced his way through streets thathad been partially blasted clear. After the first mile, however, he wasforced to hunt around or over the litter and wreckage, picking the wayfrom high spot to high spot. There were people about, rooting throughthe debris, or patrolling in groups. He drew the automatic and carriedit in his hand, in plain sight. Some stared at him and some ignoredhim, but none came too close.

  Once he heard shouting and a group ran across his path, chasing a smallrodent. He heard a wild tumult begin, minutes later. When he passed thespot where they had stopped, a fight was going on, apparently over thekill.

  At noon he stopped to drink sparingly of his water and eat one of theincredibly bad biscuits. What food there was available or which couldbe received from the Earth freighters was being mixed into them, but itwasn't enough. The workers got a little more, and occasionally someonefound a few cans under the rubble. The penalty for not turning suchfood in was revocation of all food allotment, but there was a smallblack market where unidentified cans could be bought for five Earthdollars, and some found its way there. The same black market sold thefew remaining cigarettes at twice that amount each.

  It was beginning to thunder to the north as he stood up and wentwearily on, and the haze was thickening. He tried to hurry, uncertainof how dark it would get. If he got caught now, he'd never be able toreturn before night. He stumbled on a broken street sign, decoding whatwas left of it, and considered. Then he sighed in relief. As heremembered it, he was almost there.

  The buildings had been lower here, and the rubble was thinner. Thereseemed to be more people about, judging by the traces of smoke thatdrifted out of holes or through glassless windows. He saw none outside,however.

  He was considering trying one of the places from which smoke was comingwhen he saw the little boy five hundred feet ahead. He started forward,but the kid popped into what must have been a cellar once. Dukestopped, calling quietly.

  This time it was a girl of about sixteen who appeared. She sidledcloser, her eyes fixed on his hair. Her voice piped out suddenly,scared and desperate. "You lonesome, Earthman?" Under the fright, itwas a grotesque attempt at coquetry. She edged nearer, staring at him."I won't roll you, honest!"

  "All I want is information," he told her thickly. "I'm looking for awoman named Ronda--Ronda O'Neill. She was my wife."

  The girl considered, shaking her head. Her eyes grew wider as he pulledout a green Earth bill, but she didn't move. Then, as he added the tworemaining biscuits, she nodded quickly, motioning him forward. "Mommight know," she said.

  She ran ahead, and soon an older woman shuffled up the broken steps. Inher arms was a baby, dead or in a coma, and she rocked it slowly,moaning softly as she listened to his questions. She grunted finally,and reached out for the reward. Shuffling ahead of him, she went up therubble-littered street and around a corner, to point. "Go in," shesaid. "Ronda'll be back."

  Duke shoved the crude door back and stepped into what was left of afoyer in a cheap apartment house. The back had been blasted away, butthe falling building had sealed over one corner, covering it from mostof the weather. Light came from the shattered window, showing a scrapof blanket laid out on the floor near a few possessions. At first,nothing identified the resident in any way, and he wondered if it werea trap. Then he bent over a broken bracelet, and his breath caughtsharply. The catch still worked, and a faded miniature of him wasinside the little holder. Ronda's!

  Duke dropped onto the blanket, trying to imagine what Ronda would belike, and to picture the reunion. But the present circumstanceswouldn't fit into anything he could imagine. He could only remember thebravely smiling girl who had seen him off five years before.

  He heard a babble of voices outside, but he didn't look out. The walkhad exhausted him. Hard as the bed was, it was better than standing up.Anyhow, if Ronda came back, he was pretty sure she would be warned ofhis presence.

  He slept fitfully, awakened by the smells and sounds from outside. Oncehe thought someone looked in, but he couldn't be sure. He turned over,almost decided to investigate, and dozed off again.

  It was the hoarse sound of breathing and a soft shuffle that wakenedhim that time. His senses jarred out of slumber with a feeling ofwrongness that reacted in instant caution. He let his eyes slit open,relieved to find there was still light.

  Between him and the door, a figure was creeping up on hands and knees.The rags of clothes indicated it was a
woman and the knife in one handspelled murder!

  Duke snapped himself upright to a sitting position, his hand dartingfor the gun in his pocket. A low shriek came from the woman, and shelunged forward, the knife rising. There was no time for the gun. Hecaught her wrist, twisting savagely. She scratched and writhed, but theknife spun from her grasp. With a moan, she collapsed across his knees.

  He turned her face up, staring at it unbelievingly. "Ronda!"

  Bloated and stained, lined with fear, it still bore a faint resemblanceto the girl he had known. Now a fleeting look of cunning crossed herface briefly, to be replaced with an attempt at dawning recognition."Duke!" She gasped it, then made a sound that might have been meant forjoy. She stumbled to her knees, reaching out to him. But her eyesswiveled briefly toward the knife. "Duke, it's you!"

  He pushed her back and reached for the knife. He was sure she'd knownwho it was--had probably been the one who awakened him by looking inthrough the broken window. "Why'd you try to kill me, Ronda? You sawwho it was. If you needed money, you know I'd give you anything I had.Why?"

  "Not for money." She twisted from him and slumped limply against abroken wall. Tears came into her eyes. This time the catch in her voicewas real. "I know ... I know, Duke. And I wanted to see you, to talk toyou, too." She shook her head slowly. "What can I do with money? Iwanted to wake you up like old times. But Mrs. Kalaufa--she led youhere--she said--"

  He waited, but she didn't finish. She traced a pattern on the dust ofthe floor, before looking up again. "You've never been really hungry!Not that hungry! You wouldn't understand."

  "Even with the dole, you can't starve that much in the time sinceKordule was bombed," he protested. He gagged as he thought of themeaning he'd guessed from her words, expecting her to deny it.

  * * * * *

  She shrugged. "In ten years, you can do anything. Oh, sure, you cameback on leave and we lived high. Everything was fine here, wasn't it?Sure it was, for you. They briefed me on where I should take you, sothere'd be good food ready. They kept a few places going for the menwho came back on leave. We couldn't ruin your morale!"

  She laughed weakly, and let the sound die away slowly. "How do youthink we sent out the food and supplies for the fleet the last threeyears, after the blockade on our supplies from friendly worlds? Why doyou think there was no more leave for you? Because they didn't thinkyou brave soldiers could stand just seeing how the rest of us lived!And you think you had it tough! Watch the sky for the enemy while yourstomach hopes for the sound that might be a rat. Hide three cans offood you'll be shot for hoarding--because there is nothing elseimportant in the world. And then have a man steal them from you whenthe raids come! What does a soldier know of war?"

  The sickness inside him grew into a knot, but he still couldn't fullybelieve what she was saying. "But cannibalism--"

  "No." She shook her head with a faint trace of his own disgust. "No,Duke. Mrs. Kalaufa told me ... you're not really the same race--Not asclose as you are to an Earth animal, and you don't call thatcannibalism. Nobody on Meloa has ever been a cannibal--yet! How muchmoney do you have, Duke?"

  He took it out and handed it to her. She counted it mechanically andhanded it back. "Not enough. You can't take me away when you leavehere."

  "I'm not leaving," he told her. He dropped the money back on theblanket beside her.

  She stared at him for a moment and then pulled herself up to her feet,moving toward the door. "Good-by, Duke. And get off Meloa. You can'thelp us any more. And I don't want you here when I get desperate enoughto remember you might take me back. I like you too much for that, evennow."

  He took a step toward her, and she ducked.

  "Get out!" She screamed it at him. "Do you think I can stand looking atyou without drooling any longer? Do you want me to call Mrs. Kalaufafor help?"

  Through the open door, he saw Mrs. Kalaufa across the street, stillcradling the child. As the door slammed shut behind him, the womanscreamed, either as a summons or from fear that he'd seek revenge onher. He saw other heads appear, with frantic eyes that stared sullenlyat the gun he carried. He stumbled down the street, where rain wasbeginning to fall, conscious that it would be night before he got backto the port. He no longer cared.

  There was no place for him here, he now saw. He was still an Earthman,and Earthmen were always treated as a race apart somehow. He didn'tbelong. Nor could he go back to a life on Earth. But there were stillthe recruiting stations there; so long as war existed, there had to besuch stations. He headed for the fat ships of Earth that squattedcomplacently on the wrecked port.