Pawn’s Gambit (5 page)

I finished the dishes in a subdued frame of mind and then headed toward the front door. As I reached it, I heard a muffled sound from the bedroom and tiptoed in to investigate.

Curled into a fetal position under the blanket, her back to the door, Heather was crying. I stood irresolutely for a moment, then went in and sat down by her on the bed. She flinched as I touched her shoulder. “It's all right,” I whispered to her. “You're safe now. It's all right. I won't hurt you.”

Eventually, the sobs ceased and the tenseness went out of her body, and a few minutes later the rhythm of her breathing changed as she fell asleep. Careful not to wake her, I got up and went back to the doorway. There I stopped and looked at her for a moment, ashamed of my earlier thoughts. Heather wasn't just a warm female body put here for my amusement. She was another human being, and whether she stayed here an hour or a week she was entitled to courtesy and respect. It was the least I could do for her in the face of the barbarism out there. For that matter, it was the least I could do for
me.
There were enough savages in the world today; I had no desire to add to their number.

I closed the bedroom door halfway as a gesture to her privacy and went to finish my chores.

I stayed close to the cabin for the next couple of days, tending my garden and doing needed repairs and odd jobs. Heather's fever disappeared, and she recovered quickly from the effects of her journey and the medicine I'd given her. By the third morning after her arrival, I felt it was safe to leave her and go check on my snares. They were empty; but after a few hours of hunting with my bow and arrows I bagged a small squirrel, so at least we wouldn't go hungry. I swung by my “refrigerator” to pick up some vegetables and then returned to the cabin. Once there, I went straight to the bedroom to check on Heather.

She was gone.

I stood there for a moment, dumbfounded. The damn girl had cleared out, sure enough—and probably helped herself to everything she could get her hands on. I'd been a naïve fool to leave her here alone. “Heather!” I barked, the name tasting like a curse.

“I'm back here,” a voice called faintly.

I started, and after a second I went outside and made my way to the rear of the cabin. Sleeves rolled up, Heather was standing by the hand pump that brought water from the nearby stream and sent it into the storage tank on the roof. She smiled in the direction of my footsteps, her face glistening with sweat. “Hi,” she said. “I was just taking a break. How was the hunting?”

“Fair; we've got squirrel for supper,” I told her, trying to keep my voice casual—hard to do when you're feeling like a jerk. “Also brought some corn. Why aren't you in bed?”

She shrugged. “I've never liked being a professional freeloader. Besides, you forgot to pump any water last night.”

I hadn't forgotten—I'd just been too lazy—but I hadn't expected her to notice. The tank usually held enough water for three or four days, though I tried to keep it full. “Well, thanks very much. I appreciate it.”

“No charge. You said you had some corn? Where did you get that?”

I started to point north, remembered in time the gesture would be wasted. “About a mile upstream there's a hollow right behind a small waterfall. The creek comes from underground at that point and stays pretty cold even in the summer. I use the hollow as my refrigerator. In winter, of course, it's more like a freezer.”

“That's a good idea,” Heather nodded, “although it's kind of far to go for a midnight snack. I'll bet it's fun keeping the animals out, too.”

“It was, but I've pretty well got that problem solved.” I suddenly realized I was still holding the squirrel and corn. “Come on, let's go inside. You look tired.”

“Okay.” She seemed to hesitate just a second, then stepped up to me and took my arm, letting me lead her back into the cabin.

Another surprise awaited me in the living room. Heather had neatly folded my blanket and laid it at one end of the couch; her satchel, some of its contents strewn around it, sat at the other end. In the middle lay a shirt I'd torn just that morning, neatly mended.

“I'll be darned,” I exclaimed in delight, unaware of the pun until after I'd said it. “How did you know that shirt needed sewing?”

She shrugged. “I heard you getting dressed this morning, and right in the middle of it I heard something tear. You muttered under your breath and threw whatever it was onto the couch. When I got up I found the shirt and used a needle and thread from my sewing kit to mend it. I hope the thread doesn't look too bad there—I had no idea what colors I was working with.”

I opened my mouth, but closed it again and instead reached for the shirt, my cheerful mood suddenly overshadowed by an uncomfortable feeling creeping up my backbone. Dimly, I remembered the sequence of events Heather had described, but it seemed too incredible that she should have pieced such subtle clues together that easily. Was it possible she wasn't quite blind?

There was a way to check. Still holding the shirt, I walked over to the window, loosening my belt with one hand until the big brass army buckle was free. The sun had come out from behind the clouds and light was streaming brightly through the glass. I turned slightly so that I was facing Heather and twisted my buckle, sending a healthy chuck of that sunlight straight at her eyes.

Nothing. She didn't flinch or even blink. Feeling a little silly, I let the loosened buckle flop back down against my leg and held up the shirt for a close examination, trying to pretend that that had been my reason for moving into the light in the first place. The seam was strong and reasonably straight, though the material bunched a little in places and the white thread was in sharp contrast with the brown plaid. “It looks fine,” I told Heather. “Its exactly what I needed. Thank you for doing it for me.”

Her face, which had been looking a little apprehensive, broke into a tentative smile. “I'm glad it's all right,” she said, and I wondered that I had ever doubted her handicap. Only a blind woman could ever face me and still smile like that. And even though I knew how undeserved that smile was, I rather liked it.

I cleared my throat. “I guess I'd better go skin the squirrel and start cooking it.”

“Okay. First, though, come on back and show me how to tell when the water tank's full. I want to finish that pumping before dinner.”

It was pretty clear that Heather was completely healed from whatever she had caught, but I decided to keep her at the cabin for a few more days anyway. My official reason was that it would be best to keep her under observation for a bit longer, but this was at least eighty percent rationalization, if not outright lie: the simple fact was that I found her very nice to have around. I had never before had the chance to find out how much easier primitive life could be with an extra pair of hands to help with the work. Despite her blindness, Heather pitched in with skill and determination, and if I somehow failed to give her enough to do she would seek out work on her own. One morning, for example, as I was weeding the garden, she came to me with a pile of dirty clothes and insisted that I lead her down to the stream and find a place where she could wash them.

But most of all, I enjoyed just being able to relax in the company of another human being. That sounds almost trite, I suppose, but it was something I hadn't been able to do for five years. And, while I'd buried my need for companionship as deeply as I could, I hadn't killed it, a fact my infrequent trips to Hemlock usually only emphasized. The people of that tiny community were helpful enough—their assistance and willingness to teach me the necessary backwoods survival skills had probably saved my life the first year after the war—but I couldn't relax in their presence, any more than they could in mine. My face was a barrier as strong as the Berlin Wall.

But with Heather the problem didn't exist. We talked a great deal together, usually as we worked, our conversation ranging from trivia to philosophy to the practical details of postwar life. Heather's knowledge of music, literature, and household tasks was far superior to mine, while I held an edge in politics, hunting, and trapping. Her sense of humor, while a little dry, meshed well with mine, and a lot of our moral values were similar. Under different circumstances I would have been happy to keep her here just as long as I possibly could. But I knew that wouldn't be fair to her.

My conscience finally caught up with me late one evening after dinner as we sat together on the couch. Heather was continuing her assault on the pile of mending I'd accumulated over the years; I was trying to carve a new ax handle. My heart wasn't really in it, though, and my thoughts and gaze kept drifting to Heather. Her sewing skill had increased since that first shirt she'd mended for me; her fingers moved swiftly, surely, and the seam was straight and clean. Bathed in the soft light of a nearby candle, the warmth of which she enjoyed, she was a pleasure to watch. I wondered how I was going to broach the subject.

She gave me the opening herself. “You're very quiet tonight, Neil,” she said after a particularly long lull in the conversation. “What are you thinking about?”

I gritted my teeth and plunged in. “I've been thinking it's about time to take you to Hemlock, introduce you around, and see if we can get you a job or something with one of the families there.”

The nimble fingers faltered for a moment. “I see,” she said at last. “Are you sure I'm not contagious anymore? I wouldn't want to get anyone sick.”

“No, I'm certain you're completely recovered. I'm not even sure you had a deadly bug, anyway.”

“Okay. But I wonder if it might be better if I stick around for another week or two, until the garden's going a little better and you don't have to spend so much time on it.”

I frowned. This was going all wrong—she was supposed to be jumping at the chance to get back to humanity again, not making excuses to stay here. “Thanks for the offer, but I can manage. You've been a lot of help, though, and I wish I could repay you more ­than . . .” I let the sentence trail off. Heather's face and body had gone rigid, and she was no longer sewing. “What's the matter? Would you rather go somewhere else instead of Hemlock? I'll help you get to anywhere you want.”

Heather shook her head and sighed. “No, its not that. I just … don't want to leave you.”

I stared at her, feeling sandbagged. “Why?”

“I like being here. I like working with you. You don't—you don't care that I'm blind. You accept me as a person.”

There was a whole truckload of irony in there somewhere but I couldn't be bothered with it at the moment. “Listen, Heather, don't get the idea I'm all noble or anything, because I'm not. If you knew more about me you'd realize that.”

“Perhaps.” Her tone said she didn't believe it.

There was no way out of it. Up till now I'd been pretty successful at keeping my appearance a secret from her, but I couldn't hide the truth any longer. I would have to tell her about my face. “If you weren't blind, Heather, you wouldn't have wanted to stay here ten minutes. I'm … my face is pretty badly disfigured.”

She nodded casual acceptance of the information. Maybe she didn't believe it, either. “How did it happen?”

“I was a captain in the army during the Iranian segment of the Last War; you know, the Soviet drive toward the oil fields. They were using lots of elaborate nerve gases on us, and one of them found its way into the left side of my gas mask.” I kept my voice even; I was just reciting facts. “None of it got into the nosepiece or respirator, so it didn't kill me, but it left one side of my face paralyzed. I won't trouble you with any details, but the net effect is pretty hideous.”

“I thought something must have happened to you in the war,” she murmured. “You never speak of your life during that time. … Is that why you were here when the missiles came?”

“Yes. I was in a hospital in Atlanta, undergoing tests to see if my condition could be reversed. They hadn't made any progress when I saw the handwriting on the wall and decided it was time to pull out. A friend of mine had told me about his cabin in the Appalachians, so I loaded some supplies in a Jeep and came here. I beat the missiles by about three hours.”

“Oh, so this place wasn't originally yours. And I'd been thinking all along how terribly clever and foresighted you'd been to have built a cabin out here in case the world blew itself up.”

“Sorry. Major Frank Matheson was the one with all the foresight. He was also one of the best friends I ever had.” That sounded too much like an epitaph for my taste; I was still hoping he'd show up here someday. But he and his wife had been in Washington when the missiles started falling. … I shook my head to clear it. “Anyway, we're getting off the subject. The point is that I'm taking advantage of you by keeping you here. I think you'd be better off living in a community with other people.”

“Yes, I suppose you would think that.” Heather's lip curled, and for the first time since I'd met her I heard bitterness in her voice. “You probably think it's been beer and skittles for me. Well, it hasn't.” She glowered at some unknown memory; but even as I groped for something to say, her anger turned to sadness, and when she spoke again her voice was quiet. “I went blind almost a year before the war; two weeks after my eighteenth birthday. I had a small brain tumor in the back of my head and was taking an experimental interferon derivative. Somehow, something went wrong with the batch they were giving me, and at about the same time I caught some kind of viral infection. The combination nearly killed me—they told me afterwards that I had delirium, high fever, and an absolutely crazy EEG trace for nearly forty hours. When I recovered, the tumor was shrinking and I was blind. That first morning, when I woke up … I thought I was either dead or insane.” Her eyes closed, and she shivered violently. After a moment she continued. “People hate me, Neil. Either hate me or are afraid of me, especially now that civilization's becoming a thing of the past.”