The Return | Page 8

the First Tenant, were guarding pows, whatever they were. The pows were all killed by a big bomb, and the First Tenant, Lieutenant Gilbert Dunbar, took his ... his platoon and started to march to Deecee, where the Government was, but there was no Government, any more. They fought with the people along the way. When they needed food, or ammunition, or animals to pull their wagons, they took them, and killed those who tried to prevent them. Other people joined the Toon, and when they found women whom they wanted, they took them. They did all sorts of things that would have been crimes if there had been any law, but since there was no law any longer, it was obvious that there could be no crime. The First Ten--Lieutenant--kept his men together, because he had The Books. Each evening, at the end of each day's march, he read to his men out of them.
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"Finally, they came here. There had been a town here, but it had been burned and destroyed, and there were people camping in the ruins. Some of them fought and were killed; others came in and joined the platoon. At first, they built shelters around this building, and made this their fort. Then they cleared away the ruins, and built new houses. When the cartridges for the rifles began to get scarce, they began to make gunpowder, and new rifles, like these we are using now, to shoot without cartridges. Lieutenant Dunbar did this out of his own knowledge, because there is nothing in The Books about making gunpowder; the guns in The Books are rifles and shotguns and revolvers and airguns; except for the airguns, which we haven't been able to make, these all shot cartridges. As with your people, we did not die out, because we had women. Neither did we increase greatly--too many died or were killed young. But several times we've had to tear down the wall and rebuild it, to make room inside it for more houses, and we've been clearing a little more land for fields each year. We still read and follow the teachings of The Books; we have made laws for ourselves out of them."
"And we are waiting here, for the Slain and Risen One," Tenant Jones added, looking at Altamont intently. "It is impossible that He will not, sooner or later, deduce the existence of this community. If He has not done so already."
"Well, sir," the Toon Leader changed the subject abruptly, "enough of this talk about the past. If I understand rightly, it is the future in which you gentlemen are interested." He pushed back the cuff of his hunting shirt and looked at an old and worn wrist watch. "Eleven-hundred; we'll have lunch shortly. This afternoon, you will meet the other people of the Toon, and this evening, at eighteen-hundred, we'll have a mess together outdoors. Then, when we have everybody together, we can talk over your offer to help us, and decide what it is that you can give us that we can use."
"You spoke, a while ago, of what you could do for us, in return," Altamont said. "There's one thing you can do, no further away than tomorrow, if you're willing."
"And that is--?"
"In Pittsburgh, somewhere, there is an underground crypt, full of books. Not bound and printed books; spools of microfilm. You know what that is?"
The others shook their heads. Altamont continued:
"They are spools on which strips are wound, on which pictures have been taken of books, page by page. We can make other, larger pictures from them, big enough to be read--"
"Oh, photographs, which you enlarge. I understand that. You mean, you can make many copies of them?"
"That's right. And you shall have copies, as soon as we can take the originals back to Fort Ridgeway, where we have equipment for enlarging them. But while we have information which will help us to find the crypt where the books are, we will need help in getting it open."
"Of course! This is wonderful. Copies of The Books!" the Reader exclaimed. "We thought we had the only one left in the world!"
"Not just The Books, Stamford; other books," the Toon Leader told him. "The books which are mentioned in The Books. But of course we will help you. You have a map to show where they are?"
"Not a map; just some information. But we can work out the location of the crypt."
"A ritual," Stamford Rawson said happily. "Of course."
* * * * *
They lunched together at the house of Toon Sarge Hughes with the Toon Leader and the Reader and five or six of the leaders of the community. The food was plentiful, but Altamont found himself wishing that the first book they found in the Carnegie Library crypt would be