The Secret City (16 page)

Besides, I know about his hidden pistol and so does Youpas.

I tell him right out. “I’m supposed to get rid of you before you reveal us, but I’m not going to do it.”

An ironic, “Thanks a lot.” And then a more friendly, “I know you won’t.”

It’s then Corwin looks down at my shoes, and back up at me. “You’re in trouble already.”

“I know.”

He goes to his pack and pulls out a pair of wool socks. “You’re going to need these more than I will. What’s up there in the mountains anyway? Some sort of spaceship or flying saucer?”

I don’t say. Let him go on and think what he needs to think. Better a flying saucer than a Secret City, or at least no worse. I do tell him we’re not sure of the way back. I say, “You … Hugh …” (Hugh!) “… might prefer we all freeze to death. Best you and Emily leave us before we get too lost to ever get anywhere at all. “

Corwin tells Emily she already said enough goodbyes yesterday for several more going-aways and she should come now.
Now
!

He gives me a friendly punch on the shoulder. (I feel privileged that he does.) And they mount up.

Jack watches as they leave, then sits down dejected. I feel just as bad. Socks are not going to help much with shoes as worn-out as mine. And why did I ever think Allush could be back at the Secret City waiting for me?

Youpas, still tied and flat out on the ground, frowns up at me, says, “If this whole thing is discovered you’ll be the first on my list to go and they’ll be second.”

I say, “I was already first on that list of yours a long time ago.”

We load up and start out when Jack suddenly stops, sits down and yells, “Ayy
yaa
. No! I no goodbye. I no go. I no! I no!”

Youpas sits down beside him and smiles a “so there” smile up at me.

Mutiny. On both sides. I’m not surprised or even sorry. It’ll be against my promise to Corwin but we can leave later. Our three hundred dollars would buy me shoes and us a night or two in town and a couple of good meals. We all need a rest.

I’ll have to make sure Jack doesn’t get back to Corwin’s. It still worries me though, that Jack has no idea that Emily is just a kid. Maybe a little more time in town would help him see that. Maybe if we people-watch in the park again. Maybe that would give him the right idea.

But what to do with Youpas … still dressed as a mountain man, unshaven, hair a filthy mop? Maybe Jack and I together….

We do it. It’s not hard. Youpas’ hands are still tied and I’m the one with the know-how for fighting. Again, just as Jack thought when I washed the dye and stiffener out of his hair, Youpas thinks we’re trying to drown him. He’s relieved when he finds out it isn’t so. In fact, just like Jack felt, he looks downright grateful not to end up drowned.

I hate to steal from that same summer house yet again but that was the house with clothes for a big man. I break in again. Same window. We pull and push each other up and through it. I find scissors and cut Youpas’ hair and all of his beard off. I boil up some warm water on that camping stove and shave him. At first Jack holds him down but he isn’t struggling anymore, though he could be waiting for his chance.

Afterwards he’s a whole new man. He’s younger than I thought, too. Both he and Jack are probably hardly mid-twenties in this world’s calculation. For some reason that makes me feel more sympathetic to him. Killing the beautiful white mule…. That was the desperation of the young in love.

Looks like he hardly recognizes himself. He studies himself in the three-way mirror in the big bedroom, turning side to side. Looks like he likes what he sees. Can’t get enough. I leave him admiring himself and find some worn out hiking boots. Jack already got the new ones from this house. Besides, where stealing is concerned, enough’s enough.

We’ve all taken showers. Cold ones. Youpas picks out a shirt, a sweater, and a pair of pants to his liking. Striped cowboy shirt and fancy black leather vest. I don’t stop him. Puts them on and studies himself again. That first time we were here, I had a hard time getting Jack out of the big bed. This time it looks like I’ll have a hard time getting Youpas away from the mirror.

(This time Jack eats the spaghetti, no problem.)

I’m tempted to leave our three hundred dollars in a conspicuous place to pay for what we’ve taken and the broken window, but I don’t know what we’d do without it.

And then I steal yet another thing—I promise myself I’ll come back someday and leave money—I take that silky skirt I saw in the closet last time I was here. It’s light, it rolls into a ball no bigger than a pair of socks. I may never see Allush again, but I take it for her.

So, with the day half gone, we head back to town. Youpas has changed. I seem, now, to have two of them looking up to me as though I know what to do next. They’re both willing to do what I say. Couldn’t just be the clothes and haircut, could it? Youpas all slicked up and admiring himself? Wanting to act like a real human being? Like Homo sapiens sapiens? Or should I say, a real Neanderthal?

Maybe now I can get him to tell Jack to lay off Emily, that she’s not a prime example of native womanhood, but a prime example of a child. Though for all I know Youpas will tell him, Go ahead, and, good luck.

We spend the night in cabins. I sign in with an old address my parents had when we lived just outside of L.A. The cabins are the old-fashioned kind—separated from each other. Not very good beds. The pictures on the walls are cut out of magazines—flowers or cute children. There’s a little kitchen. (A big sign over the sink says: Don’t Clean Fish Here!!! Three exclamation points.) I show Jack and Youpas how to work the stove. I fill up the ice trays. Even Youpas hasn’t seen any of these things since he was a kid. He starts Jack saying, “Oh boy, oh boy,” and Jack gets Youpas to saying, “Outta sight.”

The corner store is in walking distance (actually everything is) and we get an assortment of groceries. Lots of fruit. That’s what Jack has least trouble eating.

Youpas looks around at everything just as much as Jack does. They window-shop. It takes a long time to get to the store and back. As we pass the park, I buy them ice-cream cones at the little stand there and we sit on a bench to eat them.

Jack says, “Cold, too much,” and I say, “That’s OK. It’s supposed to be.”

I ask Youpas how old he was when he went up to the Secret City and he says, “Six.”

“Did you want to go?”

“Of course not.” He practically yells it. “I missed all the things we had down here. Like this ice cream. I had friends and lots of toys. My parents made me give away all my toys but one.”

“What toy did you keep?”

“It had to be something small. A little truck. A red one that dumped. I lost it up there. My fire engine was too big to bring. I told my parents I wanted to grow up to be a fireman. They said I was too important to be a fireman. After a while I practically forgot what trucks were.”

“If my parents had known about the city, I’d have been up there with you.”

“They said the city was a waiting place—just for a little while and we’d go home, but after a couple of years of it even our parents got bored and started building the Secret City—for something to do. They were also trying to show us kids how marvelous it was back home but I think they mostly did it because they were just as bored as we kids were. Everybody was unhappy. Maybe not Allush. She was climbing trees and taming animals the minute we got there. It’s funny that she wanted to go home so much.”

“How about you? You want to go home?”

“I don’t know. My parents said I’d be important back there so maybe. “

Later, when we’re in front of a hardware store window, I’m feeling sorry for him. I say, “We could spare some money. Is there something you want?”

He gives me a look. He’s thinking about me, not about what he might want me to buy. He’s trusting me. Maybe even liking me. Then he says, “I’ll think about it.” Then he thinks again, says, “You want to go back to the city because of Allush don’t you.”

“I don’t know where else to go that she could find me.”

“Winter was no fun up there. We were holed up like moles.” Then,
“Rats
!
”
he says. “More like rats. I hated it. “

“Back at the city, Jack can get homing devices and go home if he wants to. Does he want to?”

“He’s pretty fascinated with everything here right now, and there’s that girl.”

“She’s only thirteen for heaven’s sake. Tell him.”

They talk. Then Youpas says. “He doesn’t believe me. He says she cares about him, too. He says she followed us because of him.”

Youpas says I should do something about Emily and Corwin. They know about us. “All the more dangerous, if Emily’s a kid, she’ll tell somebody.”

“Nobody will believe a kid.”

“For all we know she has proof. Or maybe she knows how to get proof.”

“Why would she want to tell on us? She likes Jack.” I raise my hands up and out on both sides. “I don’t know what to do.”

Youpas laughs. “That’s a gesture our parents always made. You’re still one of us.”

Makes me realize I haven’t heard him laugh before. He seems so changed. Could getting out of that place, getting all cleaned up, being down here with everything new… could these, just like that, have tipped him over into sanity? Made him realize there’s a big world out here? Except he still wants to kill people.

I had thought to buy him a nice hunter’s knife that would fit on his belt and then I think: Maybe not, considering.

B
ACK AT THE MOTEL, GETTING READY
F
OR BED
, J
ACK
and I start to tie up Youpas again, but he says, “Trust me. Please. We want the same things and we can help each other.”

Then he says it over again in the home language for Jack. Or it seems he does. As usual I can make out words such as: “and” and “but” and “also,” but nothing important.

He looks such a different person lying there—waiting to be tied. Even has his wrists held out. He’s all slicked up. Handsome … our kind of handsome. What will Allush think when she sees him?

I say, “Maybe.” But Jack says, “OK, OK.”

So I guess that’s it.

They share a bed and I get to sleep by myself. They defer to me. Again as if I’m in charge.

They both fall right to sleep, happy to be in a bed for a change, but my mind goes on and on. I wonder about Allush appearing back on this world looking for me. What if she comes to the Down in a hairdo like Jack’s? In ridiculous clothes all wrong for the weather? Would I recognize her? I wouldn’t, anymore than I would have recognized Youpas.

And there’s that skirt I stole. I should feel guilty—and I do—but I also can’t wait to give it to her. It’s so wonderfully soft and flimsy. Of course it’s the wrong season for such a light material. But maybe she doesn’t like skirts. She seems like a tomboy. Except she had to be, living up there in the wilds, there was no other way.

And someday I’d like to get hiking boots for her, that is if she wants to go back to the Secret City.

I’d like to get her a ring though our people seldom wear them. Our knuckles are too big. She might wear one, though, if I asked her to.

And I want to bring back another white mule. I know it can’t ever be as magical and mysterious as the other one. You can’t ever replace an old love with something that looks like your love but isn’t. Maybe a mule-colored mule would be best so as not to remind Allush of what happened.

It wouldn’t be just for Allush, but for us, too. It would help us get back to the city. He… she … could carry our packs and we could ride her now and then.

But I’m fooling myself. The homeworld is what she always wanted. Is she there right now enjoying herself? Meeting new people. New men. I wonder if she’d try to come back for my sake.

I look at the clock. Three twenty-five. I’m wasting this nice bed. I wish I had some kind of pill or other.

I
WAKE UP LATE, STILL TIRED
. I
T’S
ALMOST ELEVEN. I don’t want to get out of bed and I’m hoping Jack and Youpas don’t want to either.

I look at the other bed. But they’re gone. I jump up—scared. I’m thinking they’re off at Corwin’s to kidnap Emily—and she’d be glad to go with them. Or to kill people, or maybe they’re off to L.A. Youpas spoke of wanting to go there. Jack knows how to hitchhike. My God, both of them babes in the woods. I’ll never find them.

And they took my wallet with our money. Now I’m sure they’re gone. Well, half of it belongs to Jack so I guess that’s fair.

I throw on my clothes and rush out.

And there they are, cross-legged on a grassy spot in front of the motel, gabbing away in our home language. They’ve got hamburgers and drinks from McDonald’s. Jack is eating with as much gusto as Youpas. Youpas hands me a cup of coffee and my wallet. I collapse down beside them. It’s a little while before I can eat or drink.

I
NSTEAD OF A WHITE MULE
, I
SETTLE
F
OR A BURRO
. She’s beautiful in a different way from the mule: Black ears, mane, and tail, white underbelly, gray back, white nose. Dignified and gentle. A down-to-earth creature. Not at all magical.

She was free at the donkey rescue center. All you have to do is give a donation and bring her back a month later so they can check to see that she’s well cared for. I say, I will, but, if they don’t mind, maybe a little late. I’m taking her into the mountains.

I let her stay in a field just outside of town temporarily, which is where she was in the first place. I’ll pick her up when we’re on our way. She’ll be sad, leaving her donkey friends. I wonder if I should rescue two of them so she’ll have company.

Her name is Toots. It doesn’t fit her. She’s too serious and quiet.

But I’m not so sure we’re going anywhere anytime soon. Jack doesn’t want to start camping again and he doesn’t want to leave the town were Emily lives, and Youpas wants to stay here, too, maybe to kill the person Jack’s in love with and her father. Allush said he’s already killed three people. She said he’d have no qualms about killing natives. All he knows about the Down he read in books. I should try to explain that here in civilization, he won’t get away with it. And once they arrest him, our people could be in trouble.