“‘Daddy’?”
“Mayor Washington. That’s my paterfamilias.”
I blink. “You speak Latin?”
“You don’t?” she shoots back, and I smile. There’s something incredibly appealing about the girl, and not just because she reminds me of the stories of pixies my momma used to read me.
“Girl, you are heavy,” Sue grumbles from out of view.
“I am not, stop being mean. Anyway, Jane, I figure you’ve got a couple of days before anyone tries to run a lynch mob on you again. The council has been holding meetings all day, talking to all those survivors and taking statements. But right now they’re all too busy at the wall, getting ready to watch the rail gun take out the dead,” Callie says, her voice positively chirpy next to Sue’s lower timbre. “That’s why we’re here.”
“Rail gun? What’s that?”
Just then comes a sound, like a cannon shot but without the echo. And it doesn’t stop. It’s like a barking dog, but louder, dominating the still afternoon. I’d think it was thunder, but the sound is too close and the sky is as clear as can be.
“Did that answer your question?” Callie says. “Gideon built it. It uses magnetic fields to fire bullets, instead of gunpowder. It’s powered by electricity!”
“Ugh, you’re heavy,” Sue grunts. “And your boot is on my spine. Hurry up.”
“Sorry!” Callie says without really meaning it.
“Electricity,” I say, remembering Gideon’s experimental lab back at Summerland, his horrific shambler wheel. “How is it generated?”
“Windmills! That tinkerer sure is smart.”
I remember now that Gideon had mentioned something about windmills. It’s better than keeping a bunch of shamblers inside the town walls to run his machines, anyway.
“So, you knew Gideon in Summerland?” she says. Her tone is light, but there’s an edge to it, a curiosity, and something in her face that makes me think that there’s more to her question than she’s letting on. I don’t know who this girl is or what she’s about, but I’m not about to give her any more information until I find out.
“I did.”
“Did he help you escape the horde there?” she asks.
“No. Let me talk to Big Sue,” I say. None of this is going to help me escape.
“It’s just Sue,” she says as Callie disappears and she comes back into view. “Don’t call me that no more.”
I open my mouth to tease her, but if she’s saying not to do something, there’s no fun in pushing her. Not the way there is with Katherine. “Okay, okay. So, back to the matter at hand. Getting me out of here.”
Just then, the gun falls silent.
“You see how that thing makes a racket, right?” Sue asks.
“Yep.”
“They’re going to fire it regular-like until that massive horde is gone,” Sue says.
“Every hour on the hour!” Callie says, jumping up behind Sue’s shoulder. If this wasn’t a life-and-death situation it’d be funny, the way Callie keeps bouncing back into view every now and again like an overeager puppy. “They can’t fire it for more than a minute or two at a time because it overheats.”
“They think they can take out that horde out there with these inventions,” Sue says. “But you and I know better, Jane McKeene. At some point, the bullets and the electricity and whatever else are going to run out, but the shamblers are just gonna keep on coming.”
I snort. “I already told them that.”
“They ain’t about to listen,” she says. “We saw the eastern horde when we were fleeing Baltimore. They can try fighting the dead all they want, but them shamblers never get tired. Never.”
It’s the most I’ve heard Sue talk in almost forever. But it ain’t ever about what Sue is saying, it’s about what she ain’t saying. She knows that there’s nothing to be done about a horde but to run from it, and that’s real life talking, not academic inquiry. I don’t care if Gideon’s got some of his fantastical inventions working here—if I was ever of a mind to put my faith in walls and guns, that time is past.
I stretch a little taller and eye what of Sue I can see. “You feeling sharp? Because you know there ain’t no one like you that can clear a path, and we’re going to need your bladework to get out of this place.”
Sue snorts dismissively. “Sharp enough, I suppose. Just be ready later tomorrow night, close to dawn. We’re going to do what needs to be done.”
“You know where to find me,” I say. It’s meant to be a joke, but nobody laughs.
Sue and Callie take their leave, Callie giving me one last inscrutable look over her shoulder, and I turn just as Miss Duncan walks in, carrying my canteen and a plate of food. My stomach rumbles; I’d been so preoccupied I’d almost forgotten how hungry I am. I have to keep myself fed; there’s no telling when the next opportunity for food will arise.
I lean against the bars of the cell, arms hanging out. Miss Duncan pauses. “Planning something, Jane?”
I grin at her, then retreat until my back is against the wall. “Eating. Is that for me?”
“Yes, compliments of Gideon Carr. He wanted to make sure you got an extra portion this evening.” An expression I can’t name crosses her face. Disgust? Fear? “You do know that he is Mayor Carr’s son?”
I shrug. “Yes, ma’am, that’s what he said.”
“So why exactly has he taken such a shine to you?” Her voice is heavy with suspicion, and I know what she’s on about: a freewheeling Negro girl getting cozy with an affluent white man. There’s only one way that story ends, and it ain’t happily ever after.
Plus, they got names for girls like that. And I’m sure it ain’t escaped Miss Duncan’s notice that I rode into town in the company of women who make their living on their back.
The extra food is straight bribery, his not-so-subtle way to try and convince me to champion his cause. But I ain’t got any use for standing behind rubbish like his vaccine, and no amount of extra helpings is going to change my mind.
But I ain’t about to tell Miss Duncan any of that.
“Miss Duncan,” I say, giving her my best smile even though my tone is far from polite, “I promise that there is nothing going on except that this town is about to be overrun. And at some point you folks will think the answer yet again is to throw us colored girls at another problem of your own making.”
I don’t bother to keep the cold rage from my voice. Miss Duncan worked to train girls for years, girls who were packed off as little more than slaves, sent west to die just because they were cheap and expendable and no one would miss them. She’s got no room to judge me, and I’ll be damned if I let her start now.
“Jane—”
“I’ll thank you to hand my supper on through. Seems like some folks could stand to think on their own sins and stop worrying about how I account for mine.”
Miss Duncan purses her lips before handing me my canteen through the bars. She unlocks the door and hands through the plate, nearly catching my hand as she quickly slams it shut.
An ominous silence settles over the sheriff’s office once again. “You know they ain’t going to be able to stop that horde with the gun, no matter how fancy it might be,” I say. “The dead are going to take this town, and this county, hell, all of Kansas. Our best bet is to run, and keep running.”