He shook his head slowly. His hands dropped to his sides. "I can't. I gave my word. Maybe the Confederacy isn't all I thought it was once… but I can't betray it."
"Then I haven't any choice, Aubrey." She raised the little gun to the level of his chest. He stared back into her eyes, once so gay, so familiar, now detached and cold and still somehow regretful. He forced himself to stand straight, and closed his eyes.
Then he heard the front door swing open.
SEVENTEEN
There were two ways, Vyry knew, to reach the capital from the vicinity of Norfolk.
The fastest and most direct route led northwest across the two-mile-wide strait of Hampton Roads, past the outer works of the Union base at Fort Monroe, and straight on to Richmond through Carter's Grove, Williamsburg, Lightfoot, Providence Forge, and Sandston. Unfortunately, Leo felt the thirty-five-minute ferry crossing made them too vulnerable to detection, even after dark. There'd be guards on the ferry; and, since this was a well-traveled route, it would probably be roadblocked as a part of the government's response to the utter failure of Project Shiloh.
The other route was much longer. It led not north but southwest from Lynnhaven; then, across a downtown bridge over the Elizabeth, and on through Portsmouth and Suffolk. West of Suffolk it became the old Petersburg road, turning northwest and paralleling the James River through Windsor, Zuni, Ivor, Wakefield, Waverly, and Disputanta to Petersburg. From there, via the new National Highway One, it was only twenty fast miles to downtown Richmond.
She'd never gone either way. Her work assignment at the House kept her in Norfolk, and CEs didn't travel for pleasure. Leo had, though. He described the indirect route as a two-lane, gently rolling road through wooded country, almost deserted except for the occasional small town — all of which should be pretty well closed up at the hour they'd be going through.
She turned her head to look at the Railroad man. In the darkness of the truck's cab he was slumped against the right window. To her left, she was crowded against Turner, feeling every movement of his arms as he kept the heavy vehicle on the narrow road. He liked the windows closed and it was very hot inside the cab. Leo's loud rasping breath began to worry her. She twisted in her seat to put her hand to his forehead. He felt hot even in the stifling air.
"How is he?" grunted Turner, keeping his eyes on the road. The truck's headlights lit fence rows and the beginnings of scrub woods as the peanut fields and mills of Suffolk dropped behind them.
"Leo?" she said.
He moaned in reply.
"It's fever. That arm — he's got to have a doctor real soon, or he's going to die."
The arm wasn't all that worried her. She remembered how the shell had rested on his back. She didn't know much beyond first aid — one of the few things the colored schools taught that was any use — but there could be lung damage, he could be bleeding inside. She just didn't know. All she could do was try to make him as comfortable as she could. And she'd been doing that for the last twenty-four hours.
After getting the shell into it, they'd parked the truck in the garage of the big house. The watermen — Nose, Willie, Ben, Finnick, the others — had scattered. They'd show up on the docks in the morning, sleepy of course, but with no reason for anyone to suspect them of anything.
She, Johnny, and Leo had spent the day indoors, in the garage. Sleeping. The white woman had brought them food, the bandages that wrapped Leo's arm, and what medicines she had — primarily aspirin and bourbon whiskey. As Vyry lay there waiting she'd considered going back to check on Quidley. Finally she'd decided not to. He'd saved her life, she'd saved his, they were even. Eventually somebody would find the boat and free him, if he didn't work himself loose. And there was another reason. Johnny, in his odd way, seemed to have forgotten all about the white major. To mention him now might send him off again into one of the strange attacks of violence.
At ten, well after dusk, it was time to leave. With surprising gentleness Turner lifted the injured man into the cab. She arranged pillows under his feet and head while he slid behind the wheel and studied the gears.
"You drive careful now, Johnny."
"Woman, we run off the road with what we got in back and you never feel a thing."
Humor? She glanced at him as they swung out onto the road out of Lynnhaven. His face seemed more relaxed, less ridden by puzzlement and anger. Was he coming back? She'd just try not to set him off again. Keep him calm, he might get better by himself.
Now, west of Suffolk, she felt the pull of the engine as he accelerated, sending the coffee truck hurtling along the ribbon of darkness that was State Road 460.
"What?" she said.
"Didn't say nothing," grunted Turner.
"… Vy."
It was Leo. She leaned over him. "I'm here. What you need, man?"
"Hurts," he whispered.
"I know. We'll get you to the Railroad people soon, they'll take care of you. Try to lie still now."
"Where… are we?"
"Just outside Suffolk."
"Much traffic?"
Slumped down as he was, he couldn't see the road. She helped him sit up. "No. We see maybe three in the last ten minutes. It's getting late."
He sat painfully erect, breathing in his strange ragged tearing way, and said nothing.
"We got some of that whiskey the Hunt woman gave us—"
"No. Got to be alert, 'case someone stops us. Give me some of that aspirin."
"How many?"
"Ten."
"That's a lot, Leo."
"Hell with that," he said faintly. "Maybe a short drink to wash 'em down. Thanks." He tilted the bottle up and liquor sloshed and she felt him shiver and then it came down, and he handed it back and wiped his mouth with his good hand. "Yeah, that's all-right liquor."
His voice was losing the gloss of white speech as he got sicker. She glanced at Turner, but could see nothing in the dark but his silhouette against speed-blurred trees. If something happened to the Railroad man, they'd not know where to go in Richmond, nor whom to see.
"I might not make it all the way," he murmured, anticipating her.
"Sure you will."
"Sure try. But if I don't, you and Johnny got to know what to do, you get there."
Neither said anything. She stared out of the window. Two brilliant points of yellow fire in the headlights: a cat. It loped across the road in front of them. Turner held the wheel steady. The cat hesitated, the lights swept over it. A faint tremor came through the seat to her.
"First we got to get into the city, through any roadblocks, patrols they got out."
"We'll do that," grunted Turner.
"Drive in along Highway One. Now we can't go right in to the city center." He paused to breathe. "So we got to pick up some people. Guys who know the city. Couple to carry radios and guns, so when the Road makes the announcements, they can hold off the po-lice."
"Where we meet 'em?"
"What… I'm telling you. Listen now. Get off Highway One on Bells Road. That'll be maybe four miles before you cross the James, there'll be a sign."
"Bells Road," she repeated.
"Follow that to the left to Jeff Davis Road. Take a right, go a mile, you'll enter the Bellemeade Colored Area." She repeated it.
"In Bellemeade you — well, better just stop. Ask someone. LeLand Ray's. It's a dive. Don't talk to nobody but Ray. Nobody."
"Bellemeade. LeLand Ray."
"He got the men there. They'll be waiting. Give him the shell, and the fuze."
"The what?"
"That metal thing that major had on him. That was the fuze for the shell."
She glanced up at Turner, and felt his eyes turn toward them from the road. In the dark, in the backwash from the dashboard, the whites seemed to glow.