Cat•A•Lyst

Alan Dean Foster

This book is dedicated to Boris Gomez Luna, David Ricalde, and Charlie Munn, three men of very different background who recognize one simple fact: it is better to keep one’s neighborhood clean than to dirty it.

And for the people of Peru, who have had the wisdom to preserve the jewel of the world’s rainforests, the great Manú.

And for Mittens, Saturn, Orca, Dusty, Peaches, and Daylight, who helped in the writing.

Human kind cannot bear very much reality.

T. S. ELIOT

I

Splinters of light flashed from the captain’s buttons as he strove to peer through the roiling actinic smoke. His ears were assaulted by the screams of dying men, echoes of an insufficiently distant Hell. A shell struck nearby, showering him with clods of hot earth and fragments of torn human flesh.

“I don’t see her!” He had to scream to make himself heard above the awful thunder of battle. “Regulus! Can you see anything?”

The colored soldier crouching alongside wiped at his eyes with one hand, the knuckles of the other pale where they gripped his rifle.

“No, suh! But she got to be heah somewheres, suh!” He squinted into the stinging smoke. “This be the country where I was raised and I still remembers it like the back o’ mah hand. I ain’t been gone North that long, suh.” He gestured with the muzzle of his rifle.

“That be the old quarters over there, where I growed up. The big house be just beyond. The creek’ll be to our right, with the smokehouse where they used to dry the fish. Let’s try there, suh. I know the missus. She too smart to stay in the house while this fightin’s goin’ on.”

“This is all Sherman’s fault,” the captain growled as he dragged the dirty, sweaty sleeve of his uniform across his forehead. The yellowish light imparted an eerie glow to his saber. “Won’t be anything left of Atlanta when he gets through.”

“No, suh. The general, suh, he’s a hard man.”

“He’s fighting to win, Regulus. To win this war and keep your people free. But he’s no gentleman.”

“Yes, suh. Missy Amanda, suh, she might be …”

A feminine scream rose above the sound of exploding shells and the deadly whistle of minié balls. The soldier rose excitedly.

“That’s her, suh! I’d know that precious voice anywheres!”

“Quickly now, Regulus!”

The two men scrambled down the sloping riverbank toward the slate-roofed shed that squatted by the water’s edge.

The interior of the ramshackle structure had become the stage for a scene of imminent outrage. Three men—dirty, worn, conscripts all—orbited a flurry of white crinoline and silk through which flashes of red hair and smooth skin could occasionally be glimpsed. Their expressions, gap-toothed and grim, left no doubt as to their intentions. Though outnumbered and overpowered, the woman trapped in their midst was doing her best to resist their onslaught.

Sword at the ready, the captain burst into the room. “That’ll do for you, you bastards.” His voice and hand were steady.

The trio whirled to regard the intruder. The nearest, a tall, heavyset ruffian who might once have been a seaman, glared unrepentantly at the officer.

“This be none of your business, sir.” He grinned nastily. “Why don’t you just take that darkie with you and go on about your business, and leave us to ours?” Grunts of assent issued from his companions.

The captain returned the smile as he hefted his saber. “My intention was just to see the three of you court-martialed, but I think now that it would be only proper that I spare Mr. Lincoln’s government that expense.” Regulus at his side, he let out a yell and charged.

One man took a saber cut to the cheek and dropped like a stone, leaving the brigands’ erstwhile spokesman to engage the captain from behind. The officer spun and parried, too late to block the scything rifle butt which struck him across the forehead. As he stumbled away from the blow he saw the third attacker taking shaky aim at the recumbent woman with his service revolver. The coward’s intent was clear: no witness, no trial.

“No!” With a cry, Regulus threw himself forward.

The officer heard the revolver discharge as he twisted and lunged. Down went the giant, his heart pierced by the captain’s blade. The private who’d wielded the unsteady pistol scrambled through the open doorway and fled.

The captain started to pursue but halted at the sight of Regulus lying sprawled near the woman’s feet. A spreading crimson stain darkened the front of the corporal’s uniform.

“Regulus!” Putting his sword aside, the officer knelt next to his orderly’s body. “You can’t die, my friend,” he said more softly. “Not after all we’ve been through together. Not since New York.”

The enlisted man’s reply was hoarse, strained. “It … it’s alright, Captain Hector, suh. It’s my time, is all.” He turned to gaze up into his friend’s face. “It had to be this way, don’t you see?”

“Oh, Regulus, I remember you, I do! I knew you’d come back!” The woman cradled the dying man’s head against her crinoline-caressed bosom, tears streaming down her flushed cheeks. “Please don’t die!”

Pain made the orderly flinch as he turned his head to gaze fondly up at her. “I promised your daddy, Miss Amanda, that I’d look after you if the war came. I nevah forgot that you was the one responsible for havin’ me set free. If …” He paused. It was a long pause. The woman continued to peer expectantly down at him while the captain knelt sorrowfully at her side.

“If what, Regulus?” she finally murmured.

“Shit!” the orderly exclaimed explosively. “I can’t do it!” He sat up sharply. “I can’t do these lines, man! I can’t identify with this part.”

“Cut!” howled a new voice. The distant rumble of background explosions ceased. Fans began to chide smoke from the shed. “I said cut, dammit!”

A new figure joined the trio. The man was short, dark-eyed, swarthy, more than a tad apoplectic. “What do you mean,” he inquired through clenched teeth, “you can’t do these lines?”

“I’m sorry, man.” Showing no effects from what had transpired earlier, the orderly stood and wiped dirt from his face. The stain on his chest had stopped spreading. “I just can’t do this anymore. I mean, this dude was born a slave, right? So he gets freed, goes North, finds a decent job, joins the Union Army where he meets this white bread over here”—he gestured at the captain, who was now standing and listening quietly—”and they’re the same age, right?

“This corporal, he’s gone through all that hell to make it out of the South, so what does he do? He decides to play servant again to this captain so he can come all the way back to where he was a slave and throw himself in front of a bullet to save the fox whose daddy once owned him. Why? Because she had an attack of conscience and freed him? She didn’t free nobody else. It just doesn’t jibe, man. I can’t buy it.

“I mean, this character’s got a wife and kids back in New York. Sure, maybe he feels grateful to this chick.” He indicated the woman in the shredded crinolines, who by now was looking thoroughly disgusted. “But he ain’t gonna give his life for her. It just ain’t real.”

The shorter man was staring hard at him. “So now you’re a writer.” He glanced at the captain. “What about you, Jason? You a writer too?”

The captain raised both hands, palms outward. He’d left his sword lying on the ground. A man in his early twenties was cleaning it with a white cloth.

“Don’t look at me, Nahfoud. I read my lines.”

“I’m asking your opinion. You think he’s right?”