Part 11 (1/2)

What was that? That ridiculous phrase that the children had made up only a few years back, and which was now beginning to be picked up by their elders as a high compliment?

It was supposed to mean ”real, actual Dorsai.” Nonsense.

It occurred to her, as some minor statistic might, that she was dying; and she was vaguely annoyed with herself for not having realized this earlier. There were things she should think about, if that was the case. If Betta had been in labor before the attack began, she might well have her child by now.

If so, it was important she tell Betta what she had decided just before they moved in on the troops, that the use of the Amanda name was her responsibility now, and the responsibility of succeeding generations...

”Well,” said a voice just above her, and she looked up into the face of Ekram. He stank of sweat and anesthetic. ”Coming out of it, are you?”

”How long...” it was incredibly hard to speak ”Oh, about two days,” he answered with abominable cheerfulness.

She thought of her need to tell Betta of her decision.

”Betta...” she said. It was becoming a little easier to talk; but the effort was still ma.s.sive.

She had intended to ask specifically for news of Betta and the child.

”Betta's fine. She's got a baby boy, all parts in good working order. Three point seven three kilograms.”

Boy! A shock went through her.

Of course. But why shouldn't the child be a boy? No reason-except that, deluded by her own aging desires, she had fallen into the comfortable thought that it would not be anything but a girl.

A boy. That made the matter of names beside the point entirely.

For a moment, however, she teetered on the edge of self-pity. After all she had known, after all these years, why couldn't it have been a girl-under happier circ.u.mstances when she could have lived to know it, and find that it was a child who could safely take up her name?

She hauled herself back to common sense. What was all this foolishness about names, anyway? The Dorsai had won, had kept itself independent. That was her reward, as well as the reward to all of them -not just the sentimental business of pa.s.sing her name on to a descendent. But she should still tell Bet-ta of her earlier decision, if Ekram would only let them bring the girl to her. It would be just like the physician to decide that her dying might be hurried by such an effort, and refuse to let Betta come. She would have to make sure he understood this was not a decision for him to make. A deathbed wish was sacred and he must understand that was what this was...

”Ekram,” she managed to say faintly. ”I'm dying...”

”Not unless you want to,” said Ekram.

She stared at him aghast. This was outrageous. This was too much. After all she had been through... then the import of his words trickled through the sense of unreality wrapping her.

”Bring Betta here! At once!” she said; and her voice was almost strong.

”Later,” said Ekram.

”Then I'll have to go to her,” she said, grimly.

She was only able to move one of her arms feebly sideways on top of the covers, in token of starting to get up from the bed. But it was enough.

”All right. All right!” said Ekram. ”In just a minute.”

She relaxed, feeling strangely luxurious. It was all right. The name of the game was survival, not how you did it. A boy! Almost she laughed. Well, that sort of thing happened, from time to time. In a few more years it could also happen that this boy could have a sister. It was worth waiting around to see. She would still have to die someday, of course-but in her own good time.

INTERLUDE.

The voice of the third Amanda ceased. In the still mountain afternoon there were no other sounds but *the hum of some nearby insects. A little breeze sprang up, and was gone again.

With her words still echoing in his mind, Hal thought of the struggle she had been speaking of, that early Dorsai fight to stay free of Dow deCastries; and its likeness to the present fight on all the worlds, to resist the loss of human freedom to the Other Men and Women-those cross-breeds from human splinter cultures such as that on the Dorsai itself. This present fight in which he and the third Amanda were both caught up.

”What happened inside Foralie?” he asked. ”Inside the house, I mean, after Arvid Johnson and Bill Athyer with their men went inside? What happened with Cletus and Dow-or were they just able to take over with no trouble?”

”Something more than no trouble,” she said. ”Swahili was there, remember, and Swahili had been a Dorsai. But Eachan Khan killed Swahili when Swahili let himself be distracted for a second and Arvid and Bill were able to control the situation. Dow had a sleeve gun of his own, it turned out. He hurt Cletus, but didn't manage to kill him. In the end it was Dow who was s.h.i.+pped back to Earth as a prisoner.”

”I see,” said Hal. But his first question had immediately raised another one in his mind.

”How was that other business worked?” he asked. ”That Coalition trick of having a contingent of well soldiers up there at Foralie after they'd seemed to have been rotated down into the area of town? Where did they come from, the soldiers Amanda found wait- ing, and ready to fight, in the vehicle park?”

”You remember the military physician had phoned Dow deCastries the night before,”

Hal's Amanda said. ”He was a political appointee himself and he knew General Amorine was another. Besides Amorine was sick himself from the nickel carbonyl vapors. The military physician knew that taking his suspicions to Amorine would simply have meant Amorine arresting Ekram and trying to force some kind of answer out of him-and the military doctor was only too aware of what it would be like for him to face alone a situation where everybody was dying. So, he went directly to Dow, instead.”

”I don't understand what that would have to do with it ...” Hal frowned.

”Dow had been getting the reports from other areas. A thousand different things were going wrong in a thousand different places with his occupation forces; and, next to Cletus, he had the best mind on the planet.” She paused to look at him. ”Don't underestimate what Dow was.”

”I didn't intend to.”

”What he saw,” Amanda said, ”was that, for all practical purposes, his occupation of the Dorsai had failed. But he could still, with some luck, grab Cletus and take him off-planet as a prisoner-or at the worst, get away himself. This, if he had military control in this one district alone.”

”And he figured out that as soon as Cletus reached Foralie, Foralie would be attacked by the local people in a try to rescue him?”

”Of course.” Amanda shrugged. ”It was obvious -as the first Amanda essentially said, to Ramon, when Ramon wondered if Cletus hadn't really meant what he said at the airpad-that they should do nothing against the soldiers. One way or another the district had to attack, then. So he sent up the patrol that morning with only sick soldiers; and it brought back well soldiers, all right; but those same well soldiers- only now pretending to be sick-went back up as the troops in the convoy that escorted Cletus to Foralie.”

”Ah,” said Hal, nodding. ”How long did the first Amanda actually live?”

”She lived to be a hundred and eight.”

”And saw a second Amanda?”

Hal's Amanda shook her head.

”No. It was nearly a hundred years before there was a second Amanda,” she said.

Hal smiled.

”Who had the wisdom to name the second one Amanda?”

”No one,” Amanda said. ”She was named Elaine; but by the time she was sir years old everyone was already calling her the second Amanda. You might say, she named herself.”

Once more, in the back of his mind, Hal felt an obscure alerting to attention of that part of him which recognized the existence of The Purpose.

”Tell me something about the second Amanda,” he said.