Dewey glanced back at the counter outside, with its hardware and machinery parts scattered over it.
“No, we won’t have to. Not today. That’s one of the good things about the Muslims. Nobody steals when they’re in the market. They themselves don’t steal, and if they catch anybody else at it, they shoot him, quick and simple.”
Ron let his breath out in a low whistle.
“Besides,” Dewey said, “if we take the stuff in, they’ll think I don’t trust them. Might start a fuss.” He clapped Ron’s shoulder. “Come on, we’ve got some climbing to do.”
“What floor do you live on?”
“Tenth.”
Ron thought that they would simply have to climb ten flights of stairs. It wasn’t that easy.
They went up the first two flights. The stairway was not lighted and there were no windows, so Ron followed Dewey as the old man trudged slowly up the steps. He knows his way even in the dark, Ron thought.
“Hold it now,” Dewey said when they reached the foot of the third flight. “Stay close against the wall on your right. Halfway up this flight there’s five broken steps. If you’re not careful you’ll fall through and break your back.”
So they slinked against the wall. It felt rough and gritty. On the next flight they had to do the same thing, only this time they kept on the left side.
“Why don’t you fix these stairs?” Ron asked. “I can do it for you if—”
Dewey laughed in the darkness. “After I worked so hard to set ’em up this way?”
“What?”
“Think I want visitors bustin’ in on me while I’m asleep?” the old man said, still chuckling.
There were traps and barricades on every flight. At the eighth floor, Dewey pulled Ron into one of the rooms. By the last glimmerings of late-afternoon light filtering through a grimy window, Ron saw that there was a rope ladder hanging from a hole in the ceiling.
“It’s monkey style from here on,” Dewey said, as he grabbed the rope in one hand. “The stairs are out completely from here up to the tenth floor.”
They went up the rope ladder. Dewey climbed heavily, slowly. Ron could hear him grunting and puffing. When they reached the top of the ladder, Dewey hauled it up, hand over hand, and coiled it on the floor.
“Here we are,” he said.
The landing looked like a little fortress. There were two machine guns sitting on tripods, cases of ammunition and grenades, and a dozen automatic rifles stacked against the wall.
“Nobody gets up here unless I invite ’em,” Dewey said proudly.
“Have you ever . . . had anybody . . .”
“Tried to break in on me? Sure. But not for a long while. The word gets around. All them other merchants, they all slink out of the Dome at night, like rats going back to their nests. But I stay here. I live here. All the time. And if you can’t defend yourself, you’d best not try it.”
Dewey’s apartment was a staggering surprise. It was big, roomy, and beautiful. The lights went on as soon as they stepped into the living room, and Ron could hear the soft whine of a well-maintained generator running somewhere not too far away.
“It’s like a palace!”
“Ought to be,” Dewey said. “I’ve got the whole floor to myself. And I’ve spent twenty years fixing everything up just the way I like it.”
There was a carpet on the floor; not as rich or as thick as those Ron had known back home, but it was clean and well kept. The living room was filled with real furniture—sofas and soft chairs. One whole wall was lined with bookshelves, and there wasn’t an empty space to be seen.
“No TV,” Ron muttered.
“Can’t get TV broadcasts here inside the Dome,” Dewey said, “except in the summer, when they pipe ’em in from Outside.”
Dewey excused himself for a few minutes, leaving Ron alone to wander around the big living room. Looking at the books, the furniture, the big clean windows with real curtains on them, suddenly Ron felt his eyes filling with tears. It was like home! The home he would never see again. He had almost forgotten what it was like to be in a comfortable room with real chairs and a sofa.
Dewey came back into the living room, cleanly washed and wrapped in a gorgeous blue robe. “I have to wear my old clothes down on the street or the kids would start to get ideas about how rich I am,” he explained. “But up here I can dress like a gentleman.”
Ron just stood there, blinking away tears and feeling stupid.
An uncomfortable look crossed Dewey’s face. “Go on in and take a bath while I fix dinner,” he said gruffly.
For the first time in months, Ron sank into hot water and scrubbed himself clean. He never realized that ordinary soap could smell so good.
And Dewey’s dinner was the best Ron had eaten since coming into the Dome. Even better than the restaurants. The old man drank wine with his dinner and had glass after glass of brandy afterward.
“My one vice,” he said to Ron, holding his glass up crookedly over his head for a moment.
They went back into the living room and sat side by side on the big sofa. Dewey brought his glass and brandy bottle with him. He put the bottle on the table beside the sofa, next to him.
It was night outside now, but through the sweeping windows at the far end of the room, Ron could see little pinpoints of light here and there in the otherwise darkened city, like tiny stars in the unending blackness of space.
“See anything?” Dewey asked, squinting at the windows.
“Just a couple of lights,” Ron said. “Don’t you see them?”
Shaking his head, the old man answered, “No. I can’t see very much anymore. I’m going blind.”
