AllFreeNovel
Share Us
"I'm not asking you to agree with me. Just hear me out and go home and think about it. And do one more thing. Think about how you can give that extra five percent. I know you all work hard. But I bet each of you can do what I did: figure out some way to do another five percent. You'll feel better about yourself, and your life will be more secure. Like me, you'll find you've got a brass ring in your pocket and not even need it because you're going the extra mile. How many of you slaughter your best milker for steaks? None, right? The Kurians are the same way. They're here, they're staying, and we've got to make the best of it.
"You've heard my story. You know I wasn't born special. No great brain, not much drive. Not even good-looking. But I've got a beautiful house-I've got pictures if any of you want to see it afterwards-a real gasoline car, and a nice house picked out down south for when I retire. So I guess that brass ring is worth something after all. Napoleon used to say that every private of his carried a marshal's baton in his knapsack. Each of you should carry a brass ring in your pocket.
You can do it. Any of you out there spend ten hours a day shoveling shit? No? Then you've all got the jump on me. You're already way ahead of where I was when I decided to give that extra five percent. Whether you're sixteen or sixty, you can do what I did, believe me. Give the extra five, and it'll happen to you, too.
"Now, before I leave for the flatlands, as you call my home, I gotta do the usual recruitment drive. We're looking for young men and women, seventeen to thirty, who want to take some responsibility for public order and safety. I won't give the usual gung-ho speech or list all the perks: You know them better than I do. I will guarantee that you won't be mounted on a bicycle with no rubber on the tires. And don't forget, even if you go to boot camp and flunk out, you still get your one-year bond, no matter what. So who's going to be the first to come up on stage and get the bond? Okay, moms and dads, aunts and uncles, now's your chance to tell those kids to come up and get the bond."
Valentine listened to the forced applause as a few youths took to the main stage, then joined in. It seemed safest to do what everyone else was doing. He wondered how many in the audience believed the story, and how many were just going along to get along.
Touchet shook hands with the bishop who'd introduced him. The bishop patted his back and said something in his ear. Touchet returned to the microphone.
"Before you leave, I have a couple of announcements. The Triumvirate has changed your quotas, or reckoning, I mean. They'll be discussed individually with you by your local commissary officials."
The audience knew better than to groan at the news, but they did quiet down and stop filing out of the aisles.
"On the good news side, there's an exciting announcement from the New Universal Church and the Madison Triumvirate. Any couple that produces ten or more children in their lifetime automatically wins the brass ring."
Valentine and Molly Carlson exchanged a significant look, and she tweaked up the corner of her mouth at him.
"The New Order recognizes the importance of motherhood and family life," the snake oil salesman continued, "and wants to get the northern part of the state repopulated. Any children already born to the family count, so you big families with five or six children are already well on your way to the brass ring."
Some more applause broke out, probably from the bigger families.
"And finally, we've had some problems with insurgents and spies recently. The standard reward of a two-year bond has been upped to a ten-year bond in exchange for information leading to the capture of any undocumented trespassers in the Triumvirate's lands. Thank you for your cooperation."
"Thank you for your cooperation," Molly whispered. "Now go home and start making babies. God knows what you're going to feed them, since they are upping the reckoning."
"Now, Molly," Mr. Carlson said quietly. The tent was emptying fast, save for a few people with questions for either the bishop or Touchet. Valentine escorted Molly to the exit, following her parents, and paused to look back at the podium. Touchet was looking at him and speaking to the bishop. The Wolf smelled trouble at that look. He hurried out of the tent, racking his brain as he tried to remember if he'd ever seen the lllinoisan's face before.
What was there about him that would draw the golden touch?
* * *
Back at the wagon and buggy, the Carlsons ate a quick dinner out of their baskets. Flanagan joined them, helping himself to a choice meat pie.
"He left a few things out, you know, Gwen," Flanagan said, treating them all to a view of half-chewed food. "In his lecture to the patrols, he elaborated a bit about how he got out of the jam after he was caught helping those folks hide animals from the commissary. While he was sitting in the depot, they offered him his life back if he would turn in each and every farmer who withheld so much as an egg or a stick of butter from the commissary. Turned out he had a real good memory," Flanagan chuckled.
"It was all part of the talk he gave on duty this morning. Oh, and the brass ring he threw out into the audience is a phony. But don't tell anyone I told you. Don't hurt nothing to have those folks believing they got it made, as long as they stay in our good graces."
"Duty, Mike?" Mrs. Carlson said. "I bet you could tell Mr. Midas there a thing or two about devotion to duty. Like putting it before family. You're an expert at that."
"Don't start, Gwen. That's in the past. I've done plenty for you since, even a few things that would get me on the next train to Chicago. Oh, shit, it's starting to rain again," Major Flanagan grumbled, looking at the sky. "Bye, kids. Stay out of trouble. Glad to see you showed up for the meeting, Saint Croix. Maybe you're smarter than you look."
On the ride back, Molly drove the buggy. Valentine was unsure of himself on the rain-wet surface, and they decided a pair of experienced hands on the reins would be best. Valentine and Molly sat together under the tarp again, but he couldn't recapture the half-excited, half-scared mood of the trip down when he first felt her close to him.
"You didn't fall for any of that baloney, did you?" Molly asked.
"No, but he did know how to tell a good story. He had me spellbound for a while."
"Yes, he's one of the best I can remember hearing. That's what you'd expect right before they increase the reckoning." She paused for a moment. "You seem a million miles away."
"I didn't like the way he looked at me. At the end, when he was talking to the bishop. Almost like he was asking about me.Funny, because I've never seen him before in my life."
"Well, according to Uncle Mike, he really is from Illinois. You ever been there?"
"I passed through it on the way here, but we stayed in the uninhabited part. Or mostly uninhabited, that is. Sorry if I seem preoccupied. You sure pegged the baby thing. How did you know?"
She smiled at him. "Just because I'm eighteen and hardly been more than twenty miles from home, you think I'm ignorant. There's a fresh batch of vampires up in New Glarus. Nobody knows when they came in with their Master exactly, but it seems like they're here to stay. That's more hungry mouths. How often do they need feeding, anyway?"
