The Annals of the Heechee

“Ah, the young lady is having trouble,” he said sympathetically. “Do you know, Cyril, I think that if you would take charge of Harold, I could carry Oniko down.”

Basingstoke didn’t answer directly. With a quick motion he hefted Oniko to set her on his shoulder, never releasing Sneezy in the process. “You take her crutches, boy,” he ordered.

The general turned and regarded him without speaking. Sneezy hissed softly to himself in foreboding. There was something humanly nasty hovering around them in the warm tropic air. Evidently Oniko perceived it too, because she said, in a shaky attempt to make neutral conversation, “Oh, look across the water! Papeete’s lights are on!”

It was true: On the other side of the strait the sprawling lights of Tahiti’s principal city were bright gold. Moreover, whatever had been about to happen between the two men was at least postponed.

“Their power is on,” said Basingstoke thoughtfully, and Heimat chimed in, “We could go there!”

“Yes, we could, if we had a plane or a boat. But what would we do then?”

“There’s an airport, Cyril. Planes go to Auckland, Honolulu, Los Angeles—”

“Indeed they do, man,” said Basingstoke, “for people who have money to pay for the tickets. Are you carrying a credit card?”

“Why, Cyril,” Heimat said reprovingly, “you haven’t been listening. These children have credits. Especially”—he smiled-“young Oniko here is very rich. I am sure she will do something nice for an old man, one way or another.”

Basingstoke stood silent for a moment. Sneezy could feel the tension in the man’s grip and wondered just what peculiar Earth-human nuances he was missing. Then the man said, “Beaupre, what you do for your own pleasure is no business of mine. But if it interferes with getting off these islands for me, then it becomes a personal matter. Then, man, I will kill you.” He paused, letting the words hang there. Then he said, “Now, let us see if there is a boat.”

There were boats, all right. There were at least a dozen drawn up along the beach, where the school kept its small fleet, but four of them were kayaks and six were windsurfing boards, and the only big one nearby was the sailing yawl, which none of them were skilled enough to operate. “You can’t do it,” Harold said, boldness returning. “So just let us go! We won’t say anything—”

Heimat looked at him without speaking. Then he turned to Cyril Basingstoke. “They must have something we can use,” he said. Each of the children looked as blank and ignorant as possible, because of course the school did.

“There is a pier,” said Basingstoke softly, pointing down toward the point of land, and all three children sighed at once in resignation. As they crunched over the shelly sand toward the school’s dock, Sneezy hoped against hope that the entire little flotilla had been taken in for repairs, or drifted out to sea, or sunk. And then when they reached the dock and Heimat uttered a roar of rage, his hopes rose. “No power!” he snarled. “They’re all dead!”

But Basingstoke raised his chin as though sniffing the wind. “Listen, man,” he commanded. Over the sound of the breeze that came down from the mountain, there was a mild, insistent hum. He leaped to the end of the dock, where the school’s glass-bottomed boat lay moored to the power takeoff. “Flywheel drive,” he crowed. “They must’ve been revving it up overnight. Get in!”

There wasn’t any help for it. The old terrorists shepherded the boys in first, then Basingstoke handed Oniko in to Heimat, who stroked her head promissorily before setting her down. With Basingstoke at the tiller, Heimat cast off the lines, and the little boat purred out into the mirror-calm lagoon.

Sneezy and Oniko, holding hands on the bench over the dark glass, gazed sadly back at the looming mountain and the dark buildings of the school. No, not entirely dark, Sneezy saw with a quick flicker of hope; but it died as quickly, as he saw that only a few windows had faint glows behind them. Someone had rediscovered candles. Most of the students were still on the beach; Sneezy could see the shapes moving around in the torchlight. But as the glass-bottomed boat angled out toward the passage through the reef, they maintained their distance from the beach.

Then, just at a time when he needed all the alertness and strength he could find, Sneezy felt his eyes growing heavy. How odd, he thought, shaking himself awake. It was no time to be falling asleep-and no reason for it, either! He made a great effort to wake up and put his thoughts in order.

The first question was, What were his options?

To begin with, he calculated, the boat was still only a few hundred meters from the beach. To swim that distance, in the warm, shallow lagoon, would have been child’s play for almost any child-almost any other child, he thought regretfully, than either Oniko or himself. She lacked the strength, he the buoyancy. A pity. Probably if they had been able to swim for it, the old men wouldn’t even follow, Sneezy thought wistfully, since all they really wanted was escape .