Read Online Zelazny, Roger - Novel 07 by Bridge of Ashes - Free Book Online

behind me, below.
The shot ... my shoulder ... I had left blood. They had probably typed it by
now.
                   "Nothing special," I said.
"It's all over."
                   "McCormack is still hanging on, last I
heard."
                   "It doesn't matter. The gesture is
enough. Hope he makes it."
                   "Him?"
                   "A lot of people have learned something.
That's enough. I want to stop thinking about it now."
                   "You think it will really do some
good?"
                   "Who can say? I hope so. I tried."
                   "It might take a few more incidents like
this to really get the point across."
                   "Incidents, hell! It was a killing.
Someone else can do the next one, if it's got to be. I'm retired."
                   "You deserve a rest."
                   My shoulder was throbbing again. I opened the
bottle.
                   "Want a drink?"
                   "Yeah, thanks."
                   He took it, took a slug, passed it back.
                   I thought of the waiting, of the image of the
Earth in my mind and how I hoped I had changed it ... I looked out the window
at the shadow shapes of rock and scrub, plain and hill. I wished for a little
rain, to rinse things over, for some wind, to blow them dry and clean. But the
land lay still and rugged. So be it. I may dislike it this way, yet it pleases
me also that the grasses are dry and the animals in their burrows. The pleasure
and the pride of humanity are best enjoyed against the heedlessness, the
slumbering power of the Earth. Even when it moves to crush, it adds something.
To isolate oneself too much from it detracts from both our achievements and our
failures. We must feel the forces we live with....
                   I opened the window and breathed deeply.
                   Yes. The world was still breathing life into
my lungs, and I was grateful to give it back...
                   "I really do not like keeping him awake
this long," Lydia said, staring down at her empty coffee cup.
                   Robertson clamped his jaws, loosened them.
                   "I don't think it will be too much
longer," he said, "now that the office in Casper has been alerted. He may make it out of Wyoming before they reach him, though. But with the Rapid City people heading out, too, a flier should
reach him before he is too far into South Dakota . A green vehicle heading east at this hour
... Shouldn't be too hard to spot. Another half-hour, I'd say."
                   Lydia glanced over at Vicki, asleep on the sofa.
                   "Care for some more coffee?" she
asked Robertson*
                   "All right."
                   As she poured, he asked her, "Dennis'
condition ... Isn't it rather unusual for a telepath to be able to operate at
this distance? Leishman is well over five hundred miles from here."
                   "Yes, it is," Lydia said.
                   "How does he do it?"
                   She smiled.
                   "We are not even certain why it works at
any distance," she said. "But you are correct about the range. It is
unprecedented to sustain contact for this long at this distance."
                   Robertson drained his cup.
                   "Then Dennis has never gone out this far
before— even for short periods?"
                   "No. Frankly, I had thought we would just
be giving you a lead, and that Dennis would have lost contact long before
this."
                   "It must be hard on the kid. I am
sorry."
                   "Actually, I feel no signs of strain in
him, other than normal fatigue at being up this late past his bedtime. You know
that is