Out of the Ashes

“I'll get new ID,” Ben called after him.

“Be a good idea. You're gonna be a wanted man pretty damned quick, I'm thinking.” He paused at his car and stood looking at Ben.

“How do you figure that?”

“I read that book of yours, Mr. Raines—the one that caused all the controversy. I liked it. And I'm thinking you're gonna pull something pretty quick. I might decide to join you. See ya ‘round.”

Ben drove to the top of a high mountain and turned on his military radio, preset to 39.2. He tried for several minutes to raise someone, but received no reply. He drove into the nearest town and began driving up and down the street to look for a ham operator's antenna. On his final pass through the town, he found one. He prowled several stores before finding a big enough portable gasoline generator to drive the equipment. It was after ten o'clock before he finally got the equipment hooked up and humming. It was another half-hour before he managed to locate a Rebel unit. During that time he had spoken to people in Nigeria, Burma, Australia, and to some ships at sea.

“I won't ask you where you are,” Ben said. “Just listen to me. How many people and how much equipment have been moved west?”

“Quite a lot, sir. But we don't know what the hell we're doing it for.”

“Just continue with the movement. Now then; I want you and all your people to begin searching the towns and cities. Pick up every ounce of gold and silver you can find. Also all the precious stones. Move it west to the holding areas. Be careful, there are bounties on your heads.”

“Yes, sir, we know. Sir? A new land, sir? That what you're planning?”

“Maybe. I don't like what Logan is doing.”

“Neither do we, sir. When will you be in touch again?”

“I ... don't know. I don't think I will until we can set up a different frequency. Just carry on.”

“Yes, sir.”

Ben holed up for a few days, trying to straighten out his thoughts, telling himself if he was going to lead the Rebels, then goddamn it, he should do it, and quit assing around about it. But he couldn't convince himself to stop his journal and do it. There was time, he finally concluded. He had time.

But deep down, he doubted that.

He finally pulled out, angling gently southward, recording all that the Virginia trooper had told him, including the trooper's own doubts, but leaving out the trooper's name. He also recorded all he knew about the first lady (which was plenty), but discreetly left out the fact that during their nights together she had licked his pecker like it had been made of peppermint candy.

Some things are personal. Ben grinned.

He turned west, picking up Interstate 40. At Crossville, he began seeing vehicles pass him, on the other side of the median, all heading east. And he picked up some interesting CB chatter.

“Wonder who that ol’ boy is, headin’ west?” The question popped out of the speaker.

“Don't know. But he better be careful if he's headin’ into Nashville. Logan's people will sure turn him around and point him in the right direction.”

“Yeah,” a female voice said. “After they take all his guns and shake him down like he was a criminal. At first those guys came around asking nice-like. Then they started getting hard-nosed about it. Oh well,"—she waxed philosophical—"South Carolina is probably nice. It's just I don't like being forced to do something I don't want to do.”

“How many times have you said—back when the nation was whole—that people out of work should be forced to work?” The voice of the questioner was unmistakably black.

“Maybe I was wrong in saying that,” she admitted. “The shoe sure is on the other foot now, isn't it?”

“But we're all in the same boat,” the black man said. “And I don't like it either.”

Ben pulled off the interstate at the first open exit and headed south. Forcing people out of their homes, he thought. The son of a bitch is really forcing people to relocate and retrain, against their will.

But it always looked good on paper, he reminded himself. Also reminding himself that he had written it ... several times.

“Logan,” he said aloud, “I just flat out don't like you.”

Ben kept to the little-traveled county roads, being very careful as he went under the overpasses of the interstates. He spent the night just inside the Alabama line and was up and moving at first light, heading back to Louisiana, but planning several stops along the way.

He found a group of men working on farm equipment outside of Cullman. They were shocked at what Ben told them.

“Forcing people to resettle?” a black man said. “But that's not constitutional.”

“I don't think we have a constitution,” Ben replied. “I'll wager, with the coming of martial law, it's been suspended. The government can do anything it wants to do with the muscle it has.”

“We've been out of touch for months,” a man admitted. “Busy working, trying to restore a way of life.”

“You haven't heard about the trouble in Chicago between the races?”

No one had.