For almost a minute, Jameson did not reply. At last he said, “You’re still the officially-appointed commander of this expedition, and he’s your deputy—by order of the Council.” Then he relaxed enough to smile tightly. “I’ve served under him and I’ve served under you. If it comes to trouble—I’ll stand with you.”
Alec breathed out a sigh of relief and put his hand out to the bigger man. Jameson took it in his grip and let his smile broaden. It was like a glacier melting.
“We’re both insane, you know,” he said.
“I know,” Alec answered. “I know.”
The meeting was arranged, after several tedious discussions by radio. They agreed to meet on a boat in the upper Delaware River at a spot identified on the map as the Delaware Water Gap. The term puzzled Alec until he saw the place.
The snow was melting fast under the early spring Sun and the ground was muddy and slow for travelling. Alec and four picked men made their way on horseback southward, following the maps. It took a week of hard travel.
On the fifth day, as they picked up the uppermost stream of the Delaware, they were joined by a fifth rider: Ferret. He trotted up alongside Alec’s horse, an enormous gap-toothed grin on his pinched, wizened face. He was mud-spattered and filthy, but across the rump of his stringy mount were laid out a brace of game birds.
“Ferret!” Alec called to him, genuinely pleased to see him again. “Where have you been all winter?”
The scrawny young man shrugged. “Around. Huntin’. Mountains, mostly.” He waved vaguely south-southwesterly.
“And how did you find us?”
Ferret scratched his jaw, grinned some more, mumbled something unintelligible. Alec didn’t care. The strange character had ways of his own, and Alec felt better with him by his side. Ferret carried no gun; as far as Alec could tell he would be useless in a fight. But he could somehow snare game. They would eat better with him along.
The tiny group of horsemen made their way down the valley of the river, where the going was much easier. And once they reached the Water Gap, Alec saw at a glance what the name meant. The Delaware cut between two high-shouldered mountains, slicing through layers of striated rock that had been laid bare by millions of years of the river’s erosion.
There was a passable road along the base of the mountains, by the river’s bank, the remains of an old paved highway. The cement was broken and covered with rubble, but the horses stepped over the litter easily enough and clopped along, making good time. It was an enormous relief after the rough going of the muddy countryside. Alec and his men kept wary eyes on the slopes rising above them and across the river. Good spots for ambush. The trees and brush had not leafed out yet, however, so the ground was bare and difficult to hide in.
Ferret would disappear for most of the day, and then come back grinning happily with enough game to keep their stomachs full.
At the Gap’s narrowest point they found a surprise: the graceful arch of a bridge that still stood, spanning the river with steel and concrete that did not even look particularly begrimed or weathered until they got quite close to it. Anchored at the base of one of the bridge’s supporting pillars was a small power boat.
There can’t be more than four or five men aboard a boat that size, Alec thought to himself as they nosed their horses down a trail that led to the water’s edge. We won’t be badly outnumbered—unless Kobol has other boats hidden further down the river.
The boat was close enough to the shore for Alec and two of his men to wade to its boarding ladder. The rest of Alec’s men, and two of Kobol’s crew, stayed on the shore with the horses.
“Good to see you,” Kobol said tonelessly as Alec climbed aboard. He looked thinner than the last time Alec had seen him: harder and leaner, with more lines in his face. He shifted a wooden cane to his left hand and put out his right. The hand felt leathery when Alec shook it. Kobol’s eyes were still hooded, masked.
“The outdoor life seems to agree with you,” he said, smiling toothily. “You’ve lost your baby fat.”
Alec grunted a noncommittal reply as he glanced around the boat. The forward deck and the top of the cabin were covered with solar cells. No guns were in sight, but something squat and bulky was covered by a tarpaulin at the boat’s stern. A laser? he wondered.
With two of his own men preceding him, Kobol led Alec down into the cabin. Alec’s two men took up the rear. He saw that Kobol leaned on the cane when he walked. They stepped down into a tight little compartment with foldup bunks locked against the bulkheads and an oversized table jammed between narrow padded benches. Atop the table was pinned a photomap of Douglas’ base.
“We pieced this together from satellite photos,” Kobol said, sitting down with an audible sigh between his two aides. He put the walking stick carefully by his side. “I think you’ll find this map extremely accurate.”
Alec slid into the bench on the opposite side of the table, flanked by his two men. He studied the map. The photos were very detailed; he could even make out Angela’s house. What were we doing when this picture was taken? he wondered idly.
Another of Kobol’s men appeared at the hatchway, bearing a tray of sandwiches and brown bottles of beer.
“It’s quite good,” he told Alec, preferring a bottle. “Only slightly alcoholic. One of the first things the natives got running again in the Miami area was their brewery. They use half the wood in the region to keep the place supplied with power.”
Alec sipped at it. It tasted sour and awful. The homebrew at Douglas’s base was far better. He frowned, and Kobol said, with an air of superiority, “You have to develop a taste for it.”
“I’d rather not.”
“We have fresh milk,” said a low voice.
Alec looked up and saw Jameson standing in the compartment’s narrow hatchway. Suppressing a smile, Alec answered, “Fine. I’ll take milk.”
They spent several hours poring over the map. Alec fitted in all the details he knew about Douglas’s defenses until the map fairly bristled with inked-in lines representing fences, circles and squares that pinpointed watchtowers and firebases.
Kobol looked impressed. “We’ll have to concentrate everything on one massive onslaught—straight up this major road.” He swept his bony hand along the map.
“That’s just what Douglas would expect,” Alec countered. “He’ll stop you here...” he pointed to a spot where the road snaked between firebase-topped hills, “...or here, where the streams and lakes will force you into a narrow line of march.”
Kobol tugged at his mustache. “He doesn’t have the strength to stop us. We’ll have nearly five thousand men by the time we get there.”
“The defense always has at least a two-to-one edge,” Alec quoted at him. “With someone as clever as Douglas you’ll need every man you can get. Remember, he’s been preparing these defenses for years. Why throw the men right into his guns?”
“And what would your military genius suggest?” When Kobol became angry or upset his voice ascended from its normal irritable nasal tone into a positively adenoidal whine.
Alec glanced up at him. “We have an advantage in numbers. Let’s use it! We’ll attack over a broad front, spread Douglas’s troops thin trying to defend such a large area. Bypass the firebases and strongpoints...”
“And have them chop us to shreds?” Kobol flared.
“They can’t. I’ve seen what they’ve got there. No more than ten rounds apiece for most of the heavy guns. They’ll shell us until they’re out of ammunition, then they’ll either have to come out and engage us in small groups or sit on their hilltops and wait until we come after them.”
Kobol said nothing, but his head was rocking back and forth in an unspoken negative.
