The Wanderer

That was what was jolting his muscles and drumming his heart, Hunter realized — and as he realized it, his body began to quiet — simply the thought of the salt water that had been everywhere here and dozens of feet overhead, only six hours ago, leaving behind its sea-life and its sea-earth and its wreckage, the salt water that would be here again six hours from now — the thought of the tides of a few feet now sinking at low beneath the continental shelves and rushing back at high over the foothills of mountains.

The women were taking it with an incomprehensible calm, he thought. It would have seemed more natural if they’d been screaming.

Hixon and Doddsy and Wojtowicz and McHeath were coming down to them from the truck. They were walking oddly — stiff-legged and with elbows out. But, of course — the mud-coated road would be very slippery.

Hixon and Doddsy stepped beside him, while the others walked on. The Little Man said, looking out to sea: “It’s…” and then words evidently failed him.

The last sliver of green sun went under, but the whole sky stayed green — pale as a transparent wave to the west, dark as a forest to the east.

There was a rhythmic throbbing. Hunter realized that the engine of the Corvette was still turning over. He twisted the ignition key.

Only then did he realize that everyone else must be as stunned as he was.

A couple of minutes later they were all pulling out of their shock. Most of them had got out of the cars and were standing gingerly in the muck.

Wojtowicz and McHeath came trudging back uphill. The latter’s pants were covered with mud and his shoes were big blobs of it. “You can’t take a car that way, Mr. Hunter,” he said cheerfully. “It gets feet deep on the highway.”

Wojtowicz nodded emphatically. “The kid went further than I did,” he averred. “Just look at him.”

“And all deposited in only three high tides,” the Little Man said, shaking his head. “Amazing.”

Hunter said bitterly: “There’s nothing else for it — we’re going to have to go back and take that other road with the sign saying it led to Vandenberg.” He looked at Hixon. “You were right.”

Hixon nodded. He surveyed the Corvette’s mired wheels. “I guess I can pull you out of this,” he said. “I got a towline, and where I’m stopped the mud’s a lot thinner and almost dry. I should have good enough traction. And I got chains if I need ’em.”

“I don’t want to be a bird of ill omen,” the Little Man said, “but when we go back there’s the danger of running into those young goons from the Valley.”

Hixon shrugged. “That’s one of the chances we got to take. There’s no other road. We’ll hope Ross’s roadblock held ’em and they headed for Malibu. I’ll get the towline.”

Margo said to Hunter, “It’s only four miles to Vandenberg. Couldn’t we walk it? Even with the mud it shouldn’t take more than a few hours.”

Hunter said to her in a harsh whisper: “Use your head. In less than a few hours the coast road will be under water. Even this spot’ll be fifty or more feet deep.”

“Oh, I’m getting stupid,” Margo sighed wearily. “I wish…” She didn’t say what.

He inquired, rather bitterly: “Isn’t living by yourself in the new reality so much fun any more?”

She looked up at him. “No, Ross,” she said, “it’s not.”

The Little Man interrupted: “And when it comes to walking, we’ve got to remember we’ve got Ray Hanks to carry. I don’t like his condition, Ross. I’ve given him all the barbiturates I think I should. He fell asleep as soon as the truck stopped, but he’ll probably wake when it starts again. He’s in a lot of pain.”

Just then Pop came limping up. “Mr. Hunter,” he said, “I can’t stand riding the back of that truck any more. I’m all bent up.”

Hunter was about to give him a hot answer when Ida said: “You can have my place in the cab. You men don’t know how to care for Mr. Hanks, and it’s my job anyway.”

Hixon tossed down the end of the towline. “Hitch it on your front end,” he directed Hunter. “Think you can?”

“I’ll do it,” said Wojtowicz, grabbing hold of it first.

“I imagine the Corvette’s getting low on gas,” the Little Man said to Hunter.

“It is, Mr. Dodd,” Ann called from beside her mother. “I was watching the needle and it said empty.”

“I’ll get one of the reserve cans,” the Little Man said.

Hunter nodded. He felt simultaneously furious and impotent. Everyone was taking charge for him. Doc would have found something humorous to say at this point, but he wasn’t Doc. He looked at Margo, who was looking at the distant sea, and he felt a sullen hunger.

Sally Harris and Jake Lesher, blanket-wrapped, hooked their elbows for extra safety over the low ridge of the penthouse roof. Two feet below the eaves, the wavelets glittered richly with the beams from the Wanderer’s needle-eye face, which Jake alternately called the Clutching Hand — for the coiled Serpent — and Pie in the Sky — for the Broken Egg.

“And we thought we could make a play of this,” Sally said softly.

“Yeah,” Jake echoed. “We thought we could — a supercolossal spectacle. But we were still thinking indoors.”