The morning after the robbery Sheriff Bakersfield assembled a few men on horseback and ranged out along the road toward Dig Town. I climbed onto the roof of our diner and watched them disappear from sight. I waited eagerly to see them return with at least one of the miscreants walking behind the horses with a rope extending from his bound hands to the pommel of the sheriff’s saddle. Despite the meek talk of the night before, there was yet no doubt in my mind that justice would be delivered to all who deserved it.
They came home in defeat that afternoon. It was beyond my comprehension. They led their horses back into town, passing by the diner and beneath my dangling feet.
“You couldn’t find them?” I called.
Fenris turned his face toward me, though he lacked the fortitude to raise his shamed glance above the level of my shoes. “We just rode up to its border. We didn’t go in.”
“What? Why not?”
He said nothing more, just followed the others toward the stables.
I wanted to shout at them, call them cowards, ask them why they’d given up so easily, why they couldn’t even muster the courage to go into Dig Town, let alone beyond it; but I knew they’d developed a callus against my opinions. So instead I stared at them and marked them all for failed men.
Across the street, Jeremiah Shank stood outside the door of his business, looking smart and clean in his starched white shirt and buttoned black vest. It occurred to me that I had never seen the man dirty, which only gave me further cause to hate him. He watched the horses go by, and when they had passed, he fixed his gaze on me.
“You’re going to have to accustom yourself to disappointment, young Miss Crisp,” he called.
“Then I should thank you for providing me an excellent lesson,” I said.
He turned and went back into his store.
I decided to linger on the rooftop a little longer. Father was moving around downstairs, against the doctor’s wishes. He wanted to restore order to the Mother Earth Diner, and to open the doors again as quickly as possible. The men who’d gathered last night to rationalize their own lack of initiative had caused more upset to the place than the thieves, who at least had been quick and methodical in their enterprise. I wanted to help, but I could sense the darkness falling upon him again, the kind that dragged him into isolation and bitterness, and I did not want to be around it. I feared the attack had compromised his ability to fight it off.
Normally if I was not working at the diner I’d be in school, but Miss Haddersham had said there’d be no classes that day. Though people strutted about with their brave words and their sturdy chests, fear had settled quickly over New Galveston.
That was the effect Dig Town had had upon us since the Silence. It had become a haunted place.
For years there’d been nothing special about Dig Town; it was just where the real work of our colony was done. The Strange—that miracle ore—was hacked from the Martian rock and sent back to Earth, where it was processed into a substance that we could add to our Engines, giving them personalities—the illusion of intelligence. Starting out as nothing more than a few dozen tents surrounding the Throat, Dig Town had grown to become a small town unto itself. It had its own mercantile, its own infirmary, its own church. It was where Mr. Wickham maintained his machine parts shop. This served the purposes of the miners quite well; they had their basic needs fulfilled immediately, and came to New Galveston only when they wanted to.
After the Silence, that separation came to serve our interests, too. It used to be that the Teller Mining Company rotated its employees back to Earth every three months, limiting their exposure to the Strange, allowing them to decontaminate at home. None of them were allowed more than one rotation a year. The miners who came to town in those days had been like any other working men, and their business was welcome.
The Silence changed that, as it changed everything else. Now, the Strange worked its fingers deep into the meat of their heads. The mining work continued, to the dismay of everyone in New Galveston, though there was nowhere to ship the rock to, and no way to process it here. It was changing anyone who worked with the ore. The green luminescence of their eyes was the most obvious example of that, but it changed their behavior, too. They became distant, distracted… and oddly confrontational. Occasionally some would still make the trip to New Galveston, and when they did, they spoiled the atmosphere around them. People became troubled and uneasy. The Dig Towners seemed to be a harbinger of some dark eventuality, ghosts of a future time come back to warn us.
The Strange was locked safely in the rock, we thought. But if it was changing them, would it come to change us, too? Going to Dig Town forced thoughts no one wanted to confront.
Easier, it seemed, to let the thieves go to ground there, and forget about them.
This was to say nothing of the desert cults, like the Moths. We knew precious little about them. They lived in the sprawling Peabody Crater, which put them uncomfortably close to New Galveston. The Strange was abundant in the crater, its veins breaching the surface in so many places that sometimes its basin took on a pale green hue, as if it was covered in blowing grasses. These cultists, in their unknown numbers, steered their lives according to whatever mysterious beliefs or hallucinations guided them.
We were indoctrinated with fear of them, both at home and at school. They accrued a horrible mystique. We were told they were religious zealots, or bacchanalians, or cannibals. We were told the Strange caused their brains to rot with too many dreams. Since the Earth had gone silent and the long summer drought loomed over us with its terrible promise, the threat these cults posed to us was an urgent and divisive topic of debate, even more pressing than the question of Joe Reilly and his grounded saucer.
Our life here was so tenuous. We manufactured our electricity from solar- and wind-powered batteries, and these powered the heat lamps that kept us warm at night; a determined saboteur could unleash a lethal cold into the city. We relied on greenhouses for our crops; they’d never survive the night temperatures otherwise. One cascade of crop failures and we would be crippled, possibly finished. The greenhouses themselves were strong, built to withstand the Martian dust storms and the fluctuating temperatures, but there were stories of massive storms, big enough to blot out the sky for days and to scour the land to naked rock. If one of those came upon us, the greenhouses would be gone. And those of us who still lived would starve.
So we feared the cults. We feared how they might take advantage of our vulnerability. We feared what they might do to us, what they might want from us.
The posse had dispersed. From my elevated position I cast my eyes over the town. The shops and the homes all grouped together in this great red waste like silver-backed beetles. Beyond, the pastures where the cattle were kept in fading green acres, the domed fields where the crops of corn and wheat and soy and tobacco were planted and harvested, the water tower and the windmills. A ways off to the north, the landing pad where the saucer was parked, gleaming in the afternoon sunlight. And farther still, the shoulders of Peabody Crater, with its sandy floor and its huge, scattered rocks. I wondered if those rocks were where they lived. If they sheltered in caverns and holes like vermin. I had a vision of them crawling through their underground networks, rotting out Mars from the inside.
I could not figure how we could possibly survive if we did not answer this attack.
A single cloud scudded across the high atmosphere. It was the straggling end of the great herds of cumulus that filled the sky during monsoon season; we would not see more for many months. Seeing even this one was remarkable so late in the season, and I could not help but consider its appearance a sign from whatever spirit organized the world. A friendly wink from God or the Devil.
WHEN I DESCENDED the ladder into the diner’s back room again, I heard Father talking to someone up front. Cautiously—not wishing to be called a snoop—I peered around the door. Father was standing by the entrance, which was propped open. He was talking to Sheriff Bakersfield. The sheriff was not a regular at Mother Earth, but he came by often enough for me to have formed a favorable opinion of him. I liked his big belly, his white mustache, his kindly demeanor. He seemed grandfatherly, though I doubt he was more than fifty. But my opinion changed after the robbery. I decided he was too old. I decided that the law should be represented by someone younger and more inclined to action. Like his deputy, Mae Ackerman, who was not with him that day.
Jack was, though. A hulking Law Engine, Jack was designed to intimidate. He had guns folded into his arms, and instead of feet he rolled on massive treads. I didn’t like him. I’d never seen him do anything to warrant that dislike, but it was so, just the same. And I immediately wondered why the sheriff had brought Jack here but hadn’t seen fit to take him to Dig Town, where he might have done some good.
“Was she there?”
“I didn’t see her. But I believe she’s holed up there for now, yes.”
“Then go get her. Bring her back and get her to tell you where the Moths are. Then round ’em all up.”
“We can’t do it, Sam, and you know it,” said the sheriff.
“That’s horseshit, Wally.”
“No, it isn’t. I can’t find anybody wants to go to Dig Town. Mae and Jack, sure, but we won’t be enough. And if I wheel Jack in there, well, some might consider it a declaration of war.”
“Declare war, then.”
I felt a fierce swell of pride for my father. There was life in him yet.
“If we get into it with Dig Town, people die. People we need to till the soil and dig for water. We can’t afford any losses right now, Sam. Not with the dry season about to start, and nothing more coming from Earth.” He paused. “Not to mention, we might not fare too well in a contest with the miners. We can’t afford to indulge in revenge.”
Father looked the sheriff in the eye. “You’re afraid of them,” he said.
“I’d be a fool not to be. That doesn’t discount any of what I just told you. I know you see it. Let me station Jack down here a few evenings, just to hang around.”
“Jack? No, thank you. A Law Engine doesn’t quite fit the decor.”
“Mae, then.”
“That’s not necessary.”
“I think it is. They might come back. And I don’t mean to disrespect you by saying so, but it might be better if they found somebody prepared to meet them. Mae’s a good shot.”
“We’ll be fine. I appreciate the offer.”
“Sam, I’m not sure you will be. It’s not just the outsiders I’m thinking about. Those boys in the posse were entertaining some troubling notions.”
I could tell Father was angry, though he tried to cover it. He shook the sheriff’s hand and thanked him. “I won’t be driven from my store,” he said. “Not by cultists, and not by good men.”
Sheriff Bakersfield nodded reluctantly. “My job is to keep the peace, Sam. To keep this applecart from turning over. I hope you understand.” With that, he wished my father a good afternoon, and left with Jack in tow.
Whatever help was being offered, I wished that Father had taken it. It’s a peculiarity in some men that they cannot accept help without feeling compromised by it. It’s better to die alone, it would seem, than to live in the debt of another human being.
So we were by ourselves, and only I was there to see his face as he surveyed the diner’s interior, to see the despair settle in. I’d been right: the darkness was back, a buzzard on his shoulder, wings outstretched.
He noticed me standing in the kitchen doorway.
“What did the sheriff mean about troubling notions?” I said.
He shook his head. “Who knows.” He paused. “Let’s go home, Belle.”
“But… there’s more work to do.”
“Tomorrow. I’m tired. Let’s you and me just try to forget all this for a little while. We’ll come back in the morning, open up again tomorrow night.”
This was unlike him, and I welcomed it. I couldn’t remember the last time we’d taken time away from the store, just for ourselves. Just me and him.
“Okay,” I said, smiling. “I’ll lock up.”
EVENING FOUND US reclining in chairs outside the rear of our hab, out of sight of the neighborhood’s foot traffic and presenting us with a clean, unobstructed view of the plain to the west, where the light of the day still lingered. We sat in a companionable silence, watching as the moons became visible in the sky, like faint smudges of chalk.
“This reminds me of back home,” he said. “Sitting on the porch with your mother, sipping iced tea, watching the stars come out.”
I closed my eyes, listening to him talk. I liked it when he got into these reflective moods, telling stories about Mother, about life back on Earth. Although they skirted the center of a great pain, they were a comfort to me, and I suspect to him, too. They didn’t come freighted with misery or regret; they were simply good memories, taken from his pocket like a timepiece, polished and cared for in the waning sunlight.
“I remember one late summer evening, the sky looked a lot like this: a deep twilight blue. Fireflies everywhere, like a tide of stars washing across the fields. Do you remember what fireflies were like?”
I shook my head. I wished that I could. They sounded like something out of a fairy tale.
“The moon was out, and we could see Mars, a little red dot. We’d just started talking about moving here. It was your mother’s idea, really. She didn’t have to twist my arm, I’m not saying that. It’s just… she was the one with the passion for adventure. She never felt like she fit in.” His voice was getting wistful. “She always felt a little out of place, no matter where she was. I like to think she didn’t feel that way with me, but you never know.”
“I don’t think she felt that way with either one of us, Dad.”
He gave me that lonesome smile people give when they don’t believe what you’re saying, but are grateful to you for saying it.
I knew there was more to the story of what brought them here. I knew they were poor, that he’d had a failing restaurant and owed the bank a lot of money. Life had always been a series of beatings, it seemed, and coming to Mars was a chance to escape them. To start fresh. But it was Mother’s adventurous heart that served as his lantern and his compass.
“What are you reading now?” he asked.
“Sherlock Holmes. ‘The Red-Headed League.’ ”
“Is that about a society of evil redheads?”
“No but it would be fun if it was. It’s about a bank robbery.”
“You already know how it ends, though, right? How many times have you read that book?”
I shifted in my chair. He was starting to sound a little bit like Silas Mundt, and I didn’t like to think that they shared a similar reasoning. “It’s not about knowing what happens. I just like the stories. They make me feel, I don’t know. Safe, I guess.”
“Safe, huh.”
My cheeks flushed. I’d said the wrong thing. “Comfortable is a better word. Those stories are like a blanket. I feel warm when I read them.”
It was too late; I could see the shadow in his face again. “I’m sorry I didn’t keep you safe, pea.”
“That’s not what I meant.”
He didn’t say anything. The sky to the west was darker now. Stars glittered overhead. Earth was there, the brightest of them. He was staring at it. I could feel him pulling away from me.
“I haven’t read to you in a while,” I said. “I could read you some of the Sherlock Holmes stories. They might make you feel good, too.”
“I’d like that,” he said, distantly.
“I’ll go get the book,” I said, though it was fast becoming too dark to read outside.
I’d taken a few steps toward the hab when he said, “Bring Watson and the cylinder out here, will you?”
My heart sank. He meant Mother’s cylinder, the recordings she left. When the darkness found him, he would listen to it repeatedly. The world ceased to exist for him, outside of her voice and the memories he favored. He might as well have been back on Earth, and me stuck here, alone.
Maybe that was one of the reasons I’d never listened to it myself. It didn’t make me feel like she was with me; it made me feel like no one was.
Still. Father needed it.
I headed into the warm hab and opened the drawer in the kitchen, pulling out the box of loose items where it was kept. It wasn’t there. Father must have brought it with him to the diner; he did that sometimes.
I searched for it a few seconds more, trying to ignore the panic welling in my gut. I remembered Silas, collecting our spare cylinders during the robbery, slipping them like silver bars into his filthy pocket. I guessed he must have taken them for the Engine programs, thinking we might have something he needed—depending on which cylinder you slid into your Engine, it would function as a dowser, a helpmate, a postal clerk, a dishwasher in a diner. Or even as a vessel for your mother’s ghost.
I let the box fall to the floor, its contents spilling everywhere. Then I made my way back outside. I had my hands crossed over my stomach; I felt like I was going to throw up. Father was still sitting in his chair, staring up at Earth, which burned like a cinder in the night sky. The moons had flared to bright life, no longer chalky images but bright, boiling eyes.
“They stole Mother,” I said.
He blinked, looked at me. “What?”
“They stole Mother.”
He paused, then nodded. “Oh,” he said. “Well then, I guess that’s that.” His eyes turned back to the sky. I looked for some sign that it mattered to him. I looked for something in his face to pull me back from my own terrible precipice. But there was nothing there at all.