The Return of Santiago: A Myth of the Far Future (27 page)

      
"That's what we're going to talk about," said Dante. "You want a cold drink? This is going to take some time."

      
"Later."

      
"Good. Now let's talk about what Santiago really was, and why he lasted so long."

      
Dante spent the next two hours giving the Bandit the full history of Santiago as he understood it. He explained in detail how Santiago made war against the excesses of the Democracy, but always hid it behind a cloak of criminality, because while the Democracy was content to send bounty hunters after the King of the Outlaws, they would have spared no expense hunting him down had they know he was actually a revolutionary. He explained that the first Santiago had trained his successor, and the next three had done the same, that the various Santiagos had included a farmer, a bounty hunter, a thief, even a chess master. Finally, he told the Bandit how the last Santiago and his infrastructure had been wiped out by the Democracy, which didn't even know he was on the planet of Safe Harbor when they turned it to dust.

      
"All that happened more than a century ago," said the Bandit. "It's interesting, Mr. Alighieri, but what does it have to do with me?"

      
"More than you think," said Dante. "The Democracy's abuses have grown since Santiago vanished. They confiscate property, they illegally detain and kill men and women, they destroy planets that pose no threat to them."

      
"I know all that," said the Bandit. "That's why I'm here on the Inner Frontier."

      
"But the Democracy's forces are here on the Inner Frontier, too."

      
"True."

      
"Well?"

      
"What do you expect
me
to do about it?"

      
Dante smiled. "I thought you'd never ask."

      
The Bandit stared at him.
"Me?"
he said at last.

      
"Why
not
you?" Dante shot back. "You're as decent a man as I've met out here. You're absolutely deadly when you feel you must be, yet you're not bloodthirsty or you'd have wiped out the Unicorns. You disapprove of the Democracy. You're generous to a fault; I saw an example of that last night. I have a feeling that you've never met anything that frightens you."

      
"That's not so," admitted the Bandit uncomfortably. "
Failure
frightens me."

      
"So much the better," said Dante. "I consider that a virtue."

      
"But—"

      
"We've been waiting 106 years for Santiago to reappear. Are you going to make us wait even longer?"

      
"I wouldn't know how to go about
being
Santiago."

      
"That's what you'll have me and Matilda for, at least until you're comfortable with it."

      
"Just the three of us against the Democracy?" asked the Bandit, looking at him as if he was crazy.

      
"There's more. I found us a financial wizard last night."

      
"Why?"

      
"Money is the mother's milk of revolution. We'll need this man to set up and fund a network throughout the Frontier. Dimitrios of the Three Burners will work for the cause. So will Virgil Soaring Hawk."

      
"I've heard of Dimitrios."

      
"Virgil's in the poem as the Scarlet Infidel."

      
"Well, if you thought enough of him to write him up . . ." said the Bandit.

      
"There are more. And that's without any of them knowing we have our Santiago."

      
The Bandit was silent for a long moment, then another. Finally he looked up at Dante, his face filled with self-doubt. "What if they won't follow me?"

      
Dante smiled. "Why wouldn't they?"

      
"I'm just . . . just
me
," said the Bandit. "I'm nothing special, that men should die for my cause."

      
"It's the cause that's special, not its leader," said Dante. "Though he's special too," the poet amended quickly. "He has to be a man of his word, a resourceful man—and he has to be a man who won't back off from doing what's necessary. He has to know that if his cause is just, it doesn't matter that every citizen of the Democracy thinks he's an outlaw or worse; in fact he has to strive for that to protect his operation and his agents." Dante paused. "I think you're such a man."

      
"I think you're wrong."

      
"Santiago must also be a modest man, even a humble one—a man who
thinks
he's nothing special, when it's apparent to everyone else that he's very special indeed."

      
"I'll have to think about it, Mr. Alighieri."

      
"Think hard," said Dante. "Think of the difference you could make, the things you could do." He paused. "I can't rush you. There are no other candidates for the job. You're the man we want. But the sooner you agree, the sooner we can put everything in motion."

      
"I understand, Mr. Alighieri."

      
"Dante."

      
"I appreciate your confidence in me," said the Bandit. "I'll give you my answer tonight."

      
"When and where?"

      
"There's a restaurant called The Brave Bull. Meet me there for dinner, an hour after sundown."

      
"I'll see you then," said Dante. He walked to the door, then turned back. "Do you want me to open the window again?"

      
"No," said the Bandit. "I'm going down to the lobby to have some coffee."

      
"I'll join you."

      
"I'd rather you didn't. I've got a lot to consider, and I do my best thinking when I'm alone."

      
"Whatever you say," replied Dante. He turned and walked out the door, then took the airlift down to the main floor.

      
A very pretty woman was smiling at him. It took him a moment to place her; then he realized that she was the same woman who had bumped into him and placed the note in his pocket.

      
He walked over and stood in front of her. "Good morning," he said. "My name is—"

      
"I know who you are, and I know why you're here."

      
"Of course you do," he said. "But I don't know who you are or why you're here. Perhaps you'd care to enlighten me?"

      
"First things first. Did he agree?"

      
"I think he will."

      
"Good. Let's go back to your hotel."

      
"Why?"

      
"So we don't distract him," said the woman. "I've been studying him for weeks. Whenever he needs to think out a problem, he comes down here and drinks coffee."

      
"All right, let's go," said Dante, leading her to the airlock. He took two steps outside and felt like melting. "My God, it's even worse than yesterday."

      
"If you plan to stay here for any length of time, you really should go to a doctor for help or acclimatization—adrenaline, blood oxygenating, muscle stimulants, the whole works."

      
"I have high hopes of leaving Heliopolis II in a day or two and never seeing it again," Dante assured her as they began the seemingly-endless two-block walk to the Tamerlaine. "And now, who are you?"

      
"My name is Blossom."

      
"Very pretty name," said Dante. "Where are you from?"

      
"Samarkand."

      
"Where the hell is Samarkand?"

      
"It was a city back on old Earth, or so they tell me," she replied. "In my case, it's a planet in the Quinellus Cluster."

      
"Okay, Blossom," he said, and found himself gasping for breath again. "I'll wait until we're at the hotel to talk to you. I think I'm going to need all my oxygen just to get there."

      
"I could give you a pill."

      
"Don't bother," he rasped. "We'd be at the hotel before it had a chance to take effect."

      
They trudged down the block in silence. Dante stopped at a corner, leaned against a building until his head stopped spinning, and then walked the rest of the way to Tamerlaine without any further incident.

      
"The Bandit must keep some doctor in business, considering how much time he spends outside," said Dante when they'd passed through the hotel's airlock and were back in comfortable gravity and temperature.

      
"He doesn't take any medication," answered Blossom. "He doesn't believe in it."

      
"He doesn't believe it works?"

      
"Oh, he knows it works. He doesn't believe in putting any foreign substances in his body."

      
"Better and better," muttered Dante, taking her to one of the lounges and collapsing in a chair. She sat down opposite him. "All right, Blossom—suppose you tell me why you sought me out and what this is all about?"

      
"I had a long talk with Virgil Soaring Hawk last night," she began.

      
"I didn't know he
talked
to women," interrupted Dante. "I thought he just pounced on them."

      
"He tried." She showed off a steel-toed boot. "He'll be walking bow-legged for the next few days."

      
Dante smiled his approval. "Good for you."

      
"Anyway, he told me that you found Black Orpheus' manuscript, and were taking his place."

      
"I'm continuing his work," Dante corrected her. "That's not quite the same thing."

      
"Close enough," said Blossom. "Anyway, he mentioned that you were looking for a new Santiago to write about."

      
"I'm looking for a new Santiago because the Inner Frontier is in desperate need of him," said Dante, idly wondering if he was telling the truth, and then wondering if all writers had that particular problem. "My being able to write about him is very unimportant compared to that."

      
She stared at him for a moment, making no effort to hide her disbelief, and finally shrugged. "Your motivation is no concern of mine," she said at last. "I just want to know when you've found him."

      
"Why?"

      
"Because I want to offer him my services."

      
"And just what
are
your services?" asked Dante.

      
"Whatever the job requires."

      
"We're not dealing with nice people."

      
"I know that," said Blossom.

      
"The job could require you to sleep with some men you can't stand the sight of, or perhaps even kill them."

      
"As long as it hurts the Democracy, I'm in."

      
"Just what do you have against the Democracy?"

      
"My parents were missionaries. The Democracy had a chance to evacuate them before they pacified Kyoto II. They didn't. The first attack killed them." She lowered her voice, but continued talking. "My husband's mother was a diplomat; he grew up on Lodin XI. His closest friend was a Lodinite. They were like brothers. During the Lodin insurrection, the Democracy killed my husband's friend for unspecified crimes, none of which he had committed, and then they executed my husband for being a collaborator." She paused, her jaw set, her face grim. "You just tell me what I have to do, and if any member of the Democracy suffers because of it, I'll do it."

      
"It's not up to me to tell you anything," replied Dante. "I'm just a poet. Santiago will decide what needs to be done, and by whom."

      
"You'll tell him about me?"

      
"Of course."

      
"Do you think he'll let me join him?"

      
"We're just starting out. He'll need all the help he can get." He sighed. "Hell, he'll need all the help he can get 50 years and a hundred victories from now. This is the
Democracy
we're going up against, even if they're not allowed to know it." He pulled out his pocket computer. "Where can I get hold of you, Blossom?"

      
"As long as you've assured me that Santiago will be giving me my orders, I'll reserve that information for him."

      
"But—"

      
"Don't worry," said Blossom. "Neither you nor he will leave Heliopolis before I speak to him—but there's no sense doing that until he makes it official, is there?"

      
"It might help him decide."

      
"If I'm what it takes to make him decide, then you picked the wrong man for the job." She got to her feet. "I'll be watching, Rhymer."

      
"It shouldn't be long," said Dante.

      
She turned and left, and he watched her make her way through the lobby and the airlock. It seemed difficult to believe that such a gorgeous woman could have suffered so much—and then he realized that he was thinking in stereotypes. Santiago would know that it was the suffering that mattered, not the appearance of the sufferer.

      
Hurry up and make up your mind, Bandit. The Frontier is filled with Flowers of Samarkand. Someone has to step forward and make sure that the Democracy doesn't make any more of them suffer as this one has.