Lucifer's Hammer

“Oh, sure. And you’re all right, aren’t you? You can walk. You’re safe. Thank God.” Before Tim could interrupt she went on. “Tim, we won! We must have killed half of the ca

“They’ll never try us again,” someone boasted, and Tim realized he was surrounded. The man who spoke was a stranger, an Indian, by his looks. He handed Tim a bottle. “Last Irish whiskey in the world,” he said.

“Should save it for Irish coffee,” someone laughed, “but there ain’t no more coffee.”

The bottle was nearly empty. Tim didn’t drink. He shouted “There are wounded in the back! I need stretcher bearers!” He called again, “Stretcher bearers. And stretchers, come to that.” Some of the merrymakers moved toward the hospital. Good.

Eileen was frowning, more in puzzlement than sadness. She kept looking at Tim to be sure he was still there, that he was all right. “We heard about the attack on the plant,” she said. “But you beat them. None of our people hurt—”

“That was the first attack,” Tim said. “They hit us again. This afternoon.”

“This afternoon?” The Indian was incredulous. “But they were ru

“They stopped ru

Eileen put her mouth close to his ear. “Maureen will want to know about Joh

“He’s dead.”

She looked at him, shocked.

Men came with stretchers. The wounded were in the back of the van, wrapped in cocoons of blankets. One was Jack Ross. The men carrying the stretchers stopped in surprise at seeing the others: Both were black. “Mayor Allen’s police,” Tim told them. He wanted to help carry, but he was lucky to carry himself. He found the stick Horrie Jackson’s fishermen had given him and used it for a cane as he limped into the hospital.

Leonilla Malik directed them into a heated front room. It had a large office table set up as a surgery. They put the stretchers on the floor and she examined the men quickly and carefully. First Jack Ross; she used her stethoscope, frowned, moved the instrument, then lifted a hand and pressed hard on the thumbnail. It went white and stayed that way. Silently she pulled the blanket over his head and went to the next.

The policeman was conscious. “Can you understand me?” she asked.

“Yeah. Are you the Russian spacewoman?”

“Yes. How many times were you hit?”

“Six. Shrapnel. Guts are on fire,” he said.

As she felt for the pulse, Tim limped out of the room. Eileen followed, hugging at his arm. “You’ve been hit! Stay here,” she said.

“I’m not bleeding. I can come back. Somebody’s got to ten George about his brother-in-law. And there’s something else I have to do. We’ve got to have reinforcements. Fast.”

He saw it in her face. Nobody here wanted that kind of news. They’d fought and won, and they didn’t want to hear that there was more fighting to do. “We don’t have a doctor at the plant,” Tim said. “Nobody wanted to dig that steel out of me.”

“Get back in that hospital!” Eileen commanded.

“I will. But the cops come first, they’re hurt worse than me. The plant nurse squeezed sulfa in the hole and covered it with sterile gauze. I’ll be okay for awhile. I’ve got to talk to Hardy.” It was hard to keep his thoughts in order; his hip felt like fire, and the pain kept him confused.

He let Eileen help support his weight as they crossed the narrow way toward City Hall. Damn, they were surrounded again. Steve Cox, Jellison’s foreman, asked, “Hamner, what happened?” Someone else bellowed, “Let him alone, let him tell all of us at once.” And another: “Hamner, are you going to drink that?”

Tim discovered the near-empty bottle still in his hand. He surrendered it.

“Hey,” Steve Cox yelled. “Give that back to him. Come on, man, have a drink with us. We won!”

“Can’t. Have to talk to the Senator. And Hardy. We’ve got to have help.” He felt Eileen stiffen. The others looked as she had: They hated him for his bad news. “We can’t take another attack,” Tim said. “They did us too much damage.”

“No. It’s got to be over,” Eileen whispered. Tim heard.

“You thought it was all over,” Tim said.

“Everybody does.” Eileen’s face showed unbearable grief. It should have melted Tim Hamner, but it didn’t. “Nobody wants to fight again,” Eileen said.

“We won’t have to!” Joa

“Mark’s fine.” Tim was just begi

It could help.

In a room off the meeting hall at City Hall, Rick Delanty argued for his honor against Ginger Dow, who seemed determined to take him home with her. She was also indecently amused by the whole thing. “You don’t have to marry me, you know.”

When he didn’t answer, she laughed. She was a sturdy matron in her mid-thirties whose long brown hair had been brushed to a soft glow, possibly for the first time since Hammerfall. “Although if you like everything, you could move in. And if you don’t, leave in the morning. Nobody will care. This isn’t Mississippi, you know. There’s probably not another black woman other than the ca

“Well, I admit it makes me nervous,” Rick said. “The whole situation. But it isn’t just that. I’m in mourning.”

He would have been less nervous if he and Ginger hadn’t been trying to raise their voices against the singing in the big room next door. The tune seemed to be optional, but at least they were loud.

Ginger lost some of her smile. “We’re all in mourning for someone, Rick. We don’t let it get to us. The last I ever saw of Gil, my husband, he was off to Porterville for lunch with his lawyer. Then banal I think the dam must have got them both.”

“It’s not mourning time,” she told him. “It’s time to celebrate.” Her mouth puckered into a pout. “There are a lot of men. Lots more than women. And nobody’s ever told me I was ugly.”

“Ugly you’re not,” Rick said. Was it the astronaut’s scalp she wanted to collect, or the black man’s? Or was she husband hunting? Rick found he was flattered; but the memories of the house in El Lago were too vivid. He opened the co

The City Hall was also the town library, police station and jail. The large book-lined meeting room had been decorated with paintings and drapes. They absorbed some of the sound, but it was still a damned noisy party. Rick found Brad Wagoner at the end of the big room. Wagoner was staring at something in a glass display case.

“Where did that come from?” Rick asked. “Somebody up here collect Steuben glass?”