She was a pale, thin, ragged-looking girl, perhaps twenty at the most, who might have been pretty in some other world. But her cheeks were sunken and coarse, her eyes dull and glassy, her arms bony and angular.
As they drew near she huddled back, cursing defiantly, and prepared to defend herself. She doesn’t understand, Katterson thought. She thinks she’s going to be attacked.
Perspiration streamed down his body, and he forced himself to watch, kept himself from leaping out of hiding. The four marauders closed in on the girl. She spat, struck out with her clawlike hand.
They chuckled and grabbed her clutching arm. Her scream was suddenly ear-piercing as they dragged her out into the open. A knife flashed; Katterson ground his teeth together, wincing, as the blade struck home.
“In the sack with her, Charlie,” a rough voice said.
Katterson’s eyes steamed with rage. It was his first view of Malory’s butchers—at least, he suspected it was Malory’s gang. Feeling the knife at his side, in its familiar sheath, he half-rose to attack the four meat-raiders, and then, regaining his sense, he sank back into the trench.
So soon? Katterson knew that cannibalism had been spreading slowly through starving New York for many years, and that few bodies of the dead ever reached their graves intact—but this was the first time, so far as he knew, that raiders had dragged a living human being from the streets and killed her for food. He shuddered. The race for life was on, then.
The four raiders disappeared in the direction of Third Avenue, and Katterson cautiously eased himself from the trench, cast a wary eye in all directions, and edged into the open. He knew he would have to be careful; a man his size carried meat for many mouths.
Other people were coming out of the buildings now, all with much the same expression of horror on their faces. Katterson watched the marching skeletons walking dazedly, a few sobbing, most of them past the stage of tears. He clenched and unclenched his fists, angry, burning to stamp out this spreading sickness and knowing hopelessly that it could not be done.
A tall thin man with chiseled features was on the speaker’s platform now. His voice was choked with anger.
“Brothers, it’s out in the open now. Men have turned from the ways of God, and Satan has led them to destruction. Just now you witnessed four of His creatures destroy a fellow mortal for food—the most terrible sin of all.”
“Brothers, our time on Earth is almost done. I’m an old man—I remember the days before the war, and, while some of you won’t believe it, I remember the days when there was food for all, when everyone had a job, when these crumpled buildings were tall and shiny and streamlined, and the skies teemed with jets. In my youth I traveled all across this country, clear to the Pacific. But the War has ended all that, and it’s God’s hand upon us. Our day is done, and soon we’ll all meet our reckoning.”
“Go to God without blood on your hands, brothers. Those four men you saw today will burn forever for their crime. Whoever eats the unholy meat they butchered today will join them in Hell. But listen a moment, brothers, listen! Those of you who aren’t lost yet, I beg you: save yourselves! Better to go without food at all, as most of you are doing, than to soil yourselves with this kind of new food, the most precious meat of all.”
Katterson stared at the people around him. He wanted to end all this; he had a vision of a crusade for food, a campaign against cannibalism, banners waving, drums beating, himself leading the fight. Some of the people had stopped listening to the old preacher, and some had wandered off. A few were smiling and hurtling derisive remarks at the old man, but he ignored them.
“Hear me! Hear me, before you go. We’re all doomed anyway; the Lord has made that clear. But think, people—this world will shortly pass away, and there is the greater world to come. Don’t sign away your chance for eternal life, brothers! Don’t trade your immortal soul for a bite of tainted meat!”
The crowd was melting away, Katterson noted. It was dispersing hastily, people quickly edging away and disappearing. The preacher continued talking. Katterson stood on tip-toes and craned his neck past the crowd and stared down toward the east. His eyes searched for a moment, and then he paled. Four ominous figures were coming with deliberate tread down the deserted street.
Almost everyone had seen them now. They were walking four abreast down the center of the street, the tallest holding an empty sack. People were heading hastily in all directions, and as the four figures came to the corner of 14th Street and Fourth Avenue only Katterson and the preacher still stood at the platform.
“I see you’re the only one left, young man. Have you defiled yourself, or are you still of the Kingdom of Heaven?”
Katterson ignored the question. “Old man, get down from there!” he snapped. “The raiders are coming back. Come on, let’s get out of here before they come.”
“No. I intend to talk to them when they come. But save yourself, young man, save yourself while you can.”
“They’ll kill you, you old fool,” Katterson whispered harshly.
“We’re all doomed anyway, son. If my day has come, I’m ready.”
“You’re crazy,” Katterson said. The four men were within speaking distance now. Katterson looked at the old man for one last time and then dashed across the street and into a building. He glanced back and saw he was not being followed.
The four raiders were standing under the platform, listening to the old man. Katterson couldn’t hear what the preacher was saying, but he was waving his arms as he spoke. They seemed to be listening intently. Katterson stared. He saw one of the raiders say something to the old man, and then the tall one with the sack climbed up on the platform. One of the others tossed him an unsheathed knife.
The shriek was loud and piercing. When Katterson dared to look out again, the tall man was stuffing the preacher’s body into the sack. Katterson bowed his head. The trumpets began to fade; he realized that resistance was impossible. Unstoppable currents were flowing.
Katterson plodded uptown to his apartment. The blocks flew past as he methodically pulled one foot after another, walking the two miles through the rubble and deserted, ruined buildings. He kept one hand on his knife and darted glances from right to left, noting the furtive scurryings in the side streets, the shadowy people who were not quite visible behind the ashes and the rubble. Those four figures, one with the sack, seemed to lurk behind every lamppost, waiting hungrily.
He cut out into Broadway, taking a shortcut through the stump of the Parker Building. Fifty years before, the Parker Building had been the tallest in the Western world; its truncated stump was all that remained. Katterson passed what had once been the most majestic lobby in the world, and stared in. A small boy sat on the step outside, gnawing a piece of meat. He was eight or ten; his stomach was drawn tight over his ribs, which showed through like a basket. Choking down his revulsion, Katterson wondered what sort of meat the boy was eating.
He continued on. As he passed 44th Street, a bony cat skittered past him and disappeared behind a pile of ashes. Katterson thought of the stories he had heard of the Great Plains, where giant cats were said to roam unmolested, and his mouth watered.
The sun was sinking low again, and New York was turning dull gray and black. The sun never really shone in late afternoon any more; it sneaked its way through the piles of rubble and cast a ghostly glow on the ruins of New York. Katterson crossed 47th Street and turned down toward his building.