"Okay."
He slammed the door, O-ed his fingers to Hunaker through the glass. J.B.'s Steyr was now inside the long coat he, too, wore. The bullpups of the other two had similarly vanished from sight.
A couple of blocks up the street two lurched together, went into a complicated dance routine, arms around each other, to stop themselves from falling over. Or that's what it looked like. Maybe, thought Ryan, they just liked each other. Or maybe they felt lonely in this desolate street. A wind had sprang up, whipping at his hair. He could hear the sound of fiddle music, muted, coming from somewhere.
He turned to the door of Charlie's Bar, shoved down on the handle, walked in.
Charlie's Bar was like just about every other bar in the street, just about every other bar in Mocsin, just about every other bar in the whole of the Deathlands. It was a place whose entire reason for existence was booze. It was a place where you went to drink yourself into a stupor, a place where you drank to forget.
The bar itself ran down most of one wall with barrels atop it, strategically placed every three or four meters along, bottles on shelves behind. Tall mirrors hung behind the bar. These aided the lighting by reflecting what was already there. Even so, the long room was murky, a place of dancing shadows, with only three or four lamps and not a hell of lot of candles flickering in the many drafts that struck through uncaulked cracks and crevices in doors and window shutters. It was low ceilinged, drab walled, stale smelling, greasy atmosphered. Smoke hung heavily in the air, a thick miasma that the guttering candles did little to cut through.
Opposite the bar were curtained booths. Small round tables were scattered down the room. The seats were covered in plush that was a century old and looking it. There was chrome everywhere, but it was rusty, tarnished. The booth curtains, threadbare velvet, had once had tassels hanging from them. Early in the reign of Fishmouth Charlie, the current owner, there had been a time when certain captains of Jordan Teague's sec men had taken to wearing fancy epaulettes on the shoulders of their black leather jackets. It was noted by the more sharp-eyed of Mocsin's citizenry that these epaulettes bore a remarkable resemblance to the curtain tassels from Charlie's. Charlie had not made a fuss. Charlie had always had a wise and circumspect nature.
The bar was nearly empty; maybe fifteen or twenty people sitting in the booths or at the center tables, drinking steadily. One or two were eating something that smelled like regular meat stew, and probably was. Charlie had a good rep where food was concerned; you had no worries about suddenly discovering you were gorging yourself on roach mince or putrid hog or prime cut of human when you dined at Charlie's. Many of the drinkers were muties, which, considering the owner, was not surprising.
Ryan went to the bar. He nodded to the woman behind the bar and the woman behind the bar nodded back. Nothing could be gauged from her features. Only her protuberant eyes were at all expressive. From below her eyes, her face bulged out to her mouth, a tiny, thin-lipped orifice like the spout of a volcano. There seemed to be no jawline whatsoever. Although her hair was thick and curly, her eyebrows were nonexistent. She was short, her arms plump, her fingers spatulate. She wore a drab brown-colored shift that had clearly seen better days, yet was clean and well pressed.
Ryan said, "Miss Charlene."
A flicker of amusement darted across the woman's eyes.
She said, "Ryan. Always the gentleman." The voice that emanated from that tiny mouth was surprisingly deep. She said, "What d'you fancy?"
Ryan said, "What else but you?" He put his hands on the bar top and said, "Okay, Charlie, now we got the civilities out of the way, how about a pitcher of wine?" He glanced around, recognized a few faces he knew — Blue Bennett, Stax with his pointy ears, The Lizard, Hal Prescott, Chewy the Chase, one-time ace wheelman with a bunch of hog-riders out East and now retired since some joker had blown both his legs off, and Ole One-Eye, grizzled veteran of the short-lived but bloody mutie War of '68, which had flared in what had once been Kentucky. Ryan noted that none looked at all pleased to see him. One or two indeed looked positively murderous. "Then you can explain what's going on, why there were guys spitting at us as we went past, and how come Ole One-Eye there looks like he'd like to pluck out mine to add to his."
Charlie drew the cork on a liter bottle of red and pushed glasses across the bar.
"No one wants you here, Ryan. No one wants the Trader. You tell him to fuck off outta here, get back the hell where he came from."
Ryan poured himself a glass of wine, then shoved the bottle toward J.B. "You say the friendliest things." He sipped some of the liquid, rolled it around his mouth, savored the nutty taste of it. "Tell me more."
"You got weapons, right?"
"Sure. Some."
"Spike 'em."
"As bad as that?"
"The men blew two of the mines three days back."
"They what!"
"I said, the men..."
"Yeah, yeah. I heard you. Deliberate?"
Charlie's tiny mouth closed, then opened. It was her way of smiling.
"Sure, deliberate. They'd have blown the other two, but something went wrong. Fuses, timers — I dunno. So they barricaded themselves in down there."
J. B. Dix's eyelids fluttered. It was his way of expressing astonishment. He said, "I take it you're sure about this?"
"As I am that you're drinking my wine and not paying for it."
"Oh. Yeah." Ryan reached into a back pocket and pulled out some tin. He said, "How blown?"
"Roof rockfalls. Teague's two main sources are now blocked to hell. The other two mines are smaller, easier to defend."
"Defend? They have pieces?"
"They killed a whole squadron of Strasser's sec men. Tore 'em apart barehanded. As you're probably aware..." the deep tones were thick with irony "...Teague's police are well weaponed up. Handguns, auto-rifles, MGs. And plenty of ammo."
"Gas would clear 'em," J.B. pointed out.
Charlie shook her head, black curls dancing.
"Miners have blocked off the entrance to both mines, and the old ventilation system."
"So they just die of no air?"
"Uh-uh. They've been drilling their own air holes. It'd take Strasser's men days, weeks, to find them. Months, maybe."
"Food?"
"Sure."
"Water?"
"Plenty. Pure, too. Can't be got at from outside."
"I suddenly have the feeling," said Sam dryly, "that this one's been a long time in the planning."
Charlie's tone was equally dry. "Right."
Ryan said, "What we have for that fat bastard won't make a piece of spit's worth of difference, Charlie. One, it wasn't a mighty load to begin with. Two, owing to circumstances not entirely beyond our control, the load is damned near halved, anyway."
Charlie shrugged and said, "Makes no odds. You trading with Teague makes you the enemy, places you on his side of the fence. Firmly, buddy. Story goes you helped set the bastard up, anyway."
"Shit!" exploded Ryan in exasperation. "That was twenty years ago!"
A tingle of alarm ran up his spine. There was, it occurred to him, another angle to all this. If Teague was desperate...
He turned to Samantha. "Radio the Old Man. Tell him what's up. Find out if the main train's still checking in on the hour, and tell him to switch to every fifteen minutes."