Lucifer's Hammer

“Silver Valley,” Maureen a

Now why do I feel a twinge of jealousy? Harvey wondered. “Why is it so fu

“We were all of fourteen at the time he proposed,” Maureen said. “Almost sixteen years ago. Dad had just been elected, and we were going to Washington, and George and I schemed to find a way so I could stay.”

“But you didn’t.”

“No. Sometimes I wish I had,” she said. “Especially when I’m standing here.” She waved expressively.

Harvey turned, and there were more hills, rising higher and higher until they blended into the Sierra Nevada range. The big mountains looked untouched, never climbed by human. Harvey knew that was an illusion. If you stooped to tie your bootlaces on the John Muir Trail, you were likely to be trampled by backpackers.

The great rock they stood on was cloven toward the edge of the cliff. The cleft was no more than a yard wide, but deep, so deep that Harvey couldn’t see the bottom. The top of the rock slanted toward the cleft, and toward the edge beyond it, so that Harvey wasn’t even tempted to go near it.

Maureen strolled over there, and without a thought stepped across the cleft. She stood on a narrow strip of rock two feet wide, a three-hundred-foot drop in front of her, the unknown depth of the cleft behind. She looked out in satisfaction, then turned.

She saw Harvey Randall standing grimly, trying to move forward and not able to do it. She gave him a puzzled look; then her face showed concern. She stepped back onto the main rock. “I’m sorry. Do heights bother you?”

“Some,” Harvey admitted.

“I should never have done that — what were you thinking of, anyway?”

“How I could get out there if something happened. If I could make myself crawl across that crack—”

“That wasn’t nice of me at all,” she said. “Anyway, let me show you the ranch. You can see most of it from here.”

Afterward, Harvey couldn’t remember what they’d talked about. It was nothing important, but it had been a pleasant hour. He couldn’t remember a nicer one.

“We ought to be getting back down,” Maureen said.

“Yeah. Is there an easier way than the one we came up?”

“Don’t know. We can look,” she said. She led the way off to their left, around the opposite side of the rock face. They picked their way through scrub brush and along narrow goat trails. There were piles of goat and sheep droppings. Deer too, Harvey thought, although he couldn’t be sure. The ground was too hard for tracks.

“It’s like nobody was ever here before,” Harvey said, but he said it under his breath, and Maureen didn’t hear. They were in a narrow gully, nothing more than a gash in the side of the steep hill, and the ranch had vanished.

There was a sound behind them. Harvey turned, startled. A horse was coming down the draw.

Not just a horse. The rider was a little blonde girl, a child not more than twelve. She rode without a saddle, and she looked like a part of the huge animal, fitted so well onto him that it might have been an undergrown centaur. “Hi,” she called.

“Hi yourself,” Maureen said. “Harvey, this is Alice Cox. The Coxes work the ranch. Alice, what are you doing up here?”

“Saw you going up,” she said. Her voice was small and high-pitched, but well modulated, not shrill.

Maureen caught up to Harvey and winked. He nodded, pleased. “And we thought we were the intrepid explorers,” Maureen said.

“Yeah. I had enough trouble getting up by myself, without taking a damn big horse.” He looked ahead. The way was steep, and it was absolutely impossible for a horse to get down there. He turned to say so.

Alice had dismounted and was calmly leading the horse down the draw. It slipped and scrambled, and she pointed out places for it to step. The horse seemed to understand her perfectly. “Senator coming soon?” she asked.

“Yes, tomorrow morning,” Maureen said.

“I sure like talkie’ to him,” Alice said. “All the kids at school want to meet him. He’s on TV a lot.”

“Harvey — Mr. Randall makes television programs,” Maureen said.

Alice looked to Harvey with new respect. She didn’t say anything for a moment. Then, “Do you like ‘Star Trek’?”

“Yes, but I didn’t have anything to do with that one.” Harvey scrambled down another steep place. Surely that horse couldn’t get down that?

“It’s my favorite program,” Alice said. “Whoa, Tommy. Come on, it’s all right, right here — I wrote a story for television. It’s about a flying saucer, and how we ran from it and hid in a cave. It’s pretty good, too.”

“I’ll bet it is,” Harvey said. He glanced at Maureen, and saw she was gri

“You ride alone up here a lot?” Maureen asked.

“Sure,” Alice said.

“Doesn’t anybody worry about you?” Harvey asked.

“Oh, I know the way pretty good,” Alice told him. “Got lost a couple of times, but Tommy knows how to get home.”

“Pretty good horse,” Maureen said.

“Sure. He’s mine.”

Harvey looked to be sure. A stallion, not a gelding. He waited for Maureen to catch up to him. Masculine pride had kept him trying to lead the way, although it was obvious that they ought to leave that to Alice. “Must be nice to live where the only thing to worry about is getting lost — and the horse takes care of that,” he told Maureen. “She doesn’t even know what I’m talking about. And last week a girl her age, about eleven, was raped in the Hollywood Hills not more than half a mile from my house.”

“One of Dad’s secretaries was raped in the Capitol last year,” Maureen said. “Isn’t civilization wonderful?”

“I wish my boy could grow up out here,” Harvey said. “Only, what would I do? Farm?” He laughed at himself. Then the way was too steep for talking.

There was a dirt road at the bottom of the steep hillside. They were still a long way from the ranch, but it was easier now. Alice somehow got onto the horse; Harvey was watching the whole time, but he didn’t see how she managed it. One second she was standing next to the animal, her head lower than its back, and the next moment she was astride. She clucked and they galloped off. The illusion that she was somehow a part of the beast was even stronger: She moved in perfect rhythm with it, her long blonde hair flowing behind.

“She’s going to be one real beauty when she grows up,” Harvey said. “Is it the air here? This whole valley’s magic.”

“I feel that way sometimes too,” Maureen told him.

The sun was low when they got back to the stone ranch house. “Little late, but want to catch a swim?” Maureen asked.

“Sure. Why not? Only I didn’t bring a suit.”

“Oh, there’s something around.” Maureen vanished into the house and came back with trunks. “You can change in there.” She pointed to a bathroom.

Harvey got into the trunks. When he came out, she was already changed. Her one-piece suit was a shiny white material. She had a robe over one arm. She winked at him and dashed off, leaving Harvey to follow. The path led by a pomegranate grove and down to a sandy beach by a bubbling stream. Maureen gri

“Ye gods!” he shouted. “That’s ice water”

She splashed water onto his dry chest and hair. “Come on, it won’t hurt you.”

He waded grimly out into the stream. The water was swift, out away from the banks, and the bottom was rocky. He had trouble keeping his feet, but he followed her upstream to a narrow gap between two boulders. The water plunged out swiftly there, threatening to dump both of them. It was just chest-deep for Harvey. “That cools you off fast,” he said.