The Return of Santiago: A Myth of the Far Future (12 page)

      
Suddenly a cheer went up from the assembled gamblers and drinkers.

      
"What the hell are they applauding?" asked Dante, staring at the dead bounty hunter.

      
"They're paying for my protection, remember?" said Bailey, who wasn't even panting from his efforts. "They're cheering because I've just shown them they're getting their money's worth. Bennett came after you, but he could have been
any
bounty hunter coming after any of
them
."

      
Virgil stuck his head in the door in response to the cheering, and gazed impassively at Bennett's corpse.

      
"Couldn't wait til tomorrow, huh?" he said.

      
"Out!"
ordered Bailey, and Virgil removed himself from the doorway. Tyrannosaur then ordered two of the men on his staff to remove the body and dispose of it.

      
"The usual method, sir?" asked one of the men.

      
"Unless you've got a better way," answered Bailey. He turned back to Dante, who was staring at him intently. "I thought I just solved your problem. Suddenly you look like you've got another one?"

      
"No."
Just a question.

      
"Good. And don't forget our bargain: I get five verses."

      
"At the very least," said Dante.
Who knows? You may get a hundred or more. It's become clear to me that I can't be an Orpheus without a Santiago. Could I possibly have found you this soon?

7.

      
      
Tyrannosaur, Tyrannosaur,

      
      
Whatever you give him, he wants more,

      
      
The world is his oyster, the stars are his sea;

      
      
He fishes for souls, a man on a spree.

      
That was about as political as the Rhymer ever got to be.

      
The first three verses were about Bailey's size, his strength, his mastery of martial arts and martial weapons. It glorified his fighting abilities, and in time it made his name a household word.

      
But it was the fourth verse, the one you see above, that was written with a purpose, for the new Orpheus sought a new Santiago, and the mythic proportions he drew—"the stars are his sea" and "He fishes for souls"—were written expressly to get Tyrannosaur Bailey thinking along those lines, to consider himself as something unique and special, a man not so much on a spree as on a holy mission.

      
"I like it," said Bailey enthusiastically after Dante had read it aloud to him the morning after he killed Wait-a-bit Bennett. "I don't know that I understand it, especially that last bit, but I like it. You've fulfilled your end of the bargain, Rhymer."

      
"Maybe I could explain the parts you don't understand," offered Dante.

      
"Sure, why not?"

      
"It means you collect lost souls, just as you've been doing here on Devonia. But you don't just collect them here; like the poem says, the stars are your sea."

      
"Well, that's right," agreed Bailey. "They come from all over."

      
"I don't see you being so passive, just sitting here and waiting for them to come to you," said Dante, selecting his words carefully. "As a matter of fact, I can see you going out and recruiting them."

      
"Devonia can't support that many more people," Bailey pointed out.

      
"Then you'll leave Devonia," said Dante. "Maybe you'll come back here from time to time for spiritual refreshment, but you'll find you have a greater purpose and you'll have to go abroad to fulfill it."

      
"I doubt it," said the huge man. "I'm happy with the purpose I've got."

      
"The choice may not be yours. It may be thrust upon you by powers that are beyond your control."

      
"I still don't know what you're talking about, Rhymer," said Bailey. "You almost make it sound like I'll be recruiting an army."

      
"Not the kind anyone else would recruit."

      
"We've already got the Democracy protecting us from the rest of the galaxy."

      
Dante leaned forward. "Who's protecting you from the Democracy?"

      
Bailey stared at him for a long moment, then laughed. "You're crazy!"

      
"Why?" demanded Dante. "Exceptional times call for exceptional men. You're an exceptional man."

      
"I'm a
live
man. I plan to stay that way." The huge man paused. "And you'd better get off the planet soon if
you
want to stay a live man. The Democracy's got to have traced your ship by now."

      
"Send them packing when they show up."

      
"Me? Take on the whole Democracy?"

      
"Just one squad. How the hell many men are they going to send to find a thief and his ship?"

      
"You don't understand much about geometrical progressions, do you, Rhymer?" said Bailey. "Say they send ten men, and I kill them all. Next week they'll send fifty to exact revenge. Maybe I'll hire some help and kill
them
, too. Then they'll send five hundred, and then thirty thousand, and then six million. If there are two things they can spare, they're men and ships—and if there's one thing they can't tolerate, it's having someone stand up to them."

      
"There are ways," said Dante.

      
"The hell there are!" growled Bailey.

      
"It's been done before."

      
"Never!"

      
"It has!" insisted Dante.

      
"By who?"

      
"Santiago."

      
"Come off it—he was just an outlaw!"

      
"He was a revolutionary," Dante corrected him. "And what kept him alive was that the Democracy never understood that he
wasn't
just an outlaw."

      
"What do you know about it?"

      
"Everything! If the Democracy had ever guessed what his real purpose was, they'd have send five billion men to the Frontier and destroyed every habitable world until they were sure they'd killed him. But because they thought he was just an outlaw—the most successful of his era, but nothing more than that—they were content to post rewards and hope the bounty hunters could deliver him."

      
"Let me get this straight," said Bailey. "You're saying that you want me to pretend I'm Santiago?" He snorted derisively. "They may be dumb, Rhymer, but they can count. He'd be close to 175 years old."

      
"I don't want you to
pretend
anything," said Dante. "I want you to
be
Santiago!"

      
Tyrannosaur Bailey downed his drink in a single swallow and stared across the table. "I never used to believe all artists were crazy. You've just convinced me I was wrong."

      
Dante was about to argue his case further when Virgil Soaring Hawk burst into Rex's and walked directly over to him.

      
"Time to go," he said, a note of urgency in his voice. "Say your good-byes, pay your bar tab, and let's get the hell out of here!"

      
"What's your problem?" asked Dante irritably.

      
"You haven't paid any attention to the news, have you?" said Virgil.

      
"What news?"

      
"Remember New Tangier IV, that pleasant little planet where you and I met?"

      
"Yeah. What about it?"

      
"It's become a piece of uninhabited rock, courtesy of the Democracy."

      
"What are you talking about?" demanded Dante.

      
"They sent a Navy squadron to find you and your ship," explained Virgil, figiting with impatience. "No one there knew where you'd gone. The Navy didn't believe them, so to punish them for withholding information they dropped an exceptionally dirty bomb in the atmosphere." He paused. "Nothing's going to live on New Tangier IV for about seven thousand years."

      
Dante turned to Tyrannosaur. "Did you hear that? The time is ripe!"

      
"The time is ripe to get our asses out of here, and to lose that fucking ship as soon as we can," said Virgil.

      
"Shut up!"
bellowed Dante, and Virgil, startled, fell silent. "It's time for him to come back."

      
"The Democracy does things like that all the time."

      
"Then it's time to stop them."

      
"Maybe it is," agreed Bailey reluctantly. "But I'm not the one to do it."

      
"You've got all the attributes."

      
"You don't even know what his attributes were," said Bailey. "And neither do I. No one does."

      
"Someone has to stand up to the Democracy!"

      
"And have them do to Devonia what they did to New Tangier IV?" snapped Bailey irritably. "How do you stand up to a force like that?"

      
"
He
found a way.
You
will, too."

      
"Not me, Rhymer. I'm no revolutionary, and I'm no leader of men."

      
"You
could
be."

      
"I've
done
my time in the trenches. You'd better listen to the Injun and get the hell out of here, because if it comes to a choice between fighting the Navy or telling them where you've gone, I'll be the fastest talker you ever saw."

      
Dante stared at him, as if seeing him for the first time. "You mean it, don't you?"

      
"You bet your ass I mean it.
You
may have a death wish;
I
don't."

      
Dante blinked his eyes rapidly for a moment, as if disoriented. Then he sat erect. "I'm sorry. I was mistaken. You're not the one."

      
"I've been telling you that."

      
"But I'll find him."

      
"If he exists."

      
"If the times call exceptional men forth, they're practically screaming his name. He exists, all right—or he will, once I find him and convince him of his destiny."

      
"I wish you luck, Rhymer."

      
"You do?" said Dante, surprised.

      
"I live here. I know we need him." Bailey paused. "Are you going to keep my four verses?"

      
"Yes."

      
"Even that last one?"

      
"Even the last one," replied Dante. "It's not your fault you're not Santiago."

      
"Okay," said Bailey. "You played square with me. Maybe I can do you a favor."

      
"We're even," said Dante. "You killed Bennett, I gave you four verses."

      
Bailey shook his head. "A couple of hours from now the Navy is going to show up and ask me what I know about you, and I'm going to tell them. So I owe you another favor."

      
"All right."

      
"If you want to find a new Santiago, you'd better learn everything you can about the old one."

      
"I know everything Orpheus knew."

      
"Orpheus was a wandering poet who may never even have seen Santiago," said Bailey dismissively. "If you really want to know what there is to know about Santiago, there's a person you need to talk to."

      
"What's his name and where can I find him?"

      
"He's a she, and all I know is the name she's using these days—Waltzin' Matilda. She's used a lot of other names in the past."

      
"Waltzin' Matilda," repeated Dante. "She sounds like a dancer."

      
Bailey smiled. "She's a lot more than a dancer."

      
"Where is she?"

      
"Beats me. She moves around a lot."

      
"That's all I have to go on—just a name?"

      
"That's better than you had two minutes ago," said Bailey. Suddenly he looked amused. "Or did someone tell you that defeating the Democracy was going to be easy?"

      
The giant's laughter was still ringing in Dante's ears as he and Virgil left the casino and hurried to their ship.

Part 2: WALTZIN’ MATILDA'S BOOK

8.

      
      
Matilda waltzes, and she grinds.

      
      
Matilda gets inside men's minds.

      
      
Matilda plunders and she robs;

      
      
Matilda's pulled a thousand jobs.

      
It was an exaggeration. At the time Dante found her, Matilda had pulled only 516 jobs, which was still sufficient to make her one of the most wanted criminals on the Frontier.