Mildred Pierced Read Online Free PDF Page B

attack?”
    “The next effort to destroy our resistance, to enslave us. It could come from almost anywhere.”
    I could have said, “You’re nuts,” and added, “Good-bye and keep your arrows sharp,” but I had a mission.
    “Maybe you’ve got a point,” I said.
    “You don’t believe that,” he countered. “I’ve gotten where I am because I can read people.”
    Where he was, as far as I could see, was three log cabins, some homemade weapons, a gun or two and about a dozen people wanting to buy into a religion of survival.
    “What about Jews?” I asked. “Negroes?”
    He shook his head. “You don’t understand. The Jews are too smart to want to take over. There aren’t enough of them, and they’re doing fine the way they are. Hitler’s an idiot, a con man. While he’s been busy killing harmless Jews, the British, Russians, and Americans have been killing Nazis. Negroes don’t have the capacity to constitute a threat. They don’t have the will, with a few exceptions. Negroes are nothing to be afraid of. Waste of effort. They just let out two more of those Scottsboro Boys after thirteen years. Two more of them are still in jail. They didn’t do it. Pigeon Minck is a Jew. Pathfinder Jackson is a Negro. We have no prejudices here. We are all human beings determined to survive.”
    “Pathfinder?” I asked.
    “Our levels,” said Timerjack. “Pathfinder Lewis will explain.”
    This time the pipe stem pointed over my right shoulder and I turned as the baby-faced boy said, “Pigeon. Bumppo. Pathfinder. Deerslayer.”
    Timerjack gave a smile of approval. It was pretty much what Shelly had told me. The boy smiled back and looked at me. It was the look and smile of someone Mrs. Plaut would call “simple of mind.”
    “You beginning to understand?”
    I was beginning to understand that he was a loony and belonged in a loony bin, but I had a dentist to try to save.
    “How good is Shelly with a crossbow?” I asked.
    “Pigeon Minck is improving by the week.” Timerjack examined the bowl of his pipe.
    “Improving?”
    “When he started, he couldn’t hit the broad side of a large barn. Now he can. I’m not talking figuratively here. I’m talking about an abandoned farm through the woods over there.”
    He pointed to his right, looked that way with his right eye and at me with his left.
    “So, what would be his chances of hitting a person about twenty yards away from him?”
    “Given amazing luck or lots of tries, it would be within the realm of possibility.”
    “You willing to say that to the police?”
    “I don’t talk to the police. They come for me, and I go to the woods. I’m ready.”
    “But not to save Pigeon Minck?” I asked.
    “I’ll take it up with … I’ll think about it. Pigeon Minck took the oath. He knows that the survival of the individuals in our group takes precedence over the survival of a prisoner of war.”
    “Who taught him how to use the crossbow?” I asked.
    “I did, and Deerslayer Helter,” he said, pointing this time at the woman.
    I turned to her. She didn’t look at me.
    “Deerslayer Helter used to be a Catholic nun,” Timerjack said.
    “Mind if I ask Pathfinder Helter a few questions?”
    “No,” said Timerjack, “but don’t expect any answers. She’s taken a vow of silence in penance for a violation.”
    I was going to ask what the violation had been, but decided it might take me down a path with a pathfinder that I did not want to follow.
    “Other people here have crossbows?” I asked.
    “We all do,” Timerjack said. “We all learn to use whatever weapons we might be called upon to take up.”
    He stood up suddenly, emptied the tobacco from his pipe into an ashtray, pocketed the pipe, and announced, “Four o’clock. Judo in Fortress One. Care to join us, Mr. Peters?”
    “I’ll watch.”
    “No,” he said. “Our lessons are open only to members. I want to know if you want to join us, become a Pigeon, and learn to be a survivor. Special