To Your Scattered Bodies Go

"It’s the old story," a woman said. She was tall and dark-haired and probably would have been a beauty if she had not been so gaunt. "The old story. We fight among ourselves while our enemies conquer. Just as we fought when Titus besieged Jerusalem and we killed more of our own people than we did the Romans. Just as…" The two men turned against her, and all three argued loudly until a guard began beating them with a stick.

Later, through swollen lips, Targoff said, "I can’t take much of this, much longer. Soon … well, that guard is mine to kill."

"You have a plan?" Frigate said, eagerly, but Targoff would not answer.

Shortly before dawn, the slaves were awakened and marched to the grailrock. Again, they were given a modicum of food. After eating, they were split up into groups and marched off to their differing assignments. Burton and Frigate were taken to the northern border. They were put to work with a thousand other slaves, and they toiled naked all day in the sun. Their only rest was when they took their grails to the rock at noon and were fed.

Göring meant to build a wall between the mountain and The River; he also intended to erect a second wall, which would run for the full ten-mile length of the lakeshore and a third wall at the southern end.

Burton and the others had to dig a deep trench and then pile the dirt taken from the hole into a wall. This was hard work, for they had only stone hoes with which to hack at the ground. Since the roots of the grass formed a thickly tangled complex of very tough material, they could be cut only with repeated blows. The dirt and roots were scraped up on wooden shovels and tossed onto large bamboo sleds. These were dragged by teams onto the top of the wall, where the dirt was shoveled off to make the wall even higher and thicker.

At night, the slaves were herded back into the stockade. Here, most of them fell asleep almost at once. But Targoff, the redheaded Israeli, squatted by Burton.

"The grapevine gives a little juice now and then," he said. "I heard about the fight you and your crew made. I also heard about your refusal to join Göring and his swine."

"What do you hear about my infamous book?" Burton said.

Targoff smiled and said, "I never heard of it until Ruach brought it to my attention. Your actions speak for themselves. Besides, Ruach is very sensitive about such things. Not that you can really blame him after what he went through. But I do not think that you would behave as you did if you were what he said you are. I think you’re a good man, the type we need. So…"

Days and nights of hard work and short rations followed. Burton learned through the grapevine about the women. Wilfreda and Fatima were in Campbell’s apartment. Loghu was with Tullius. Alice had been kept by Göring for a week, then had been turned over to a lieutenant, a Manfred Von Kreyscharft. Rumor was that Göring had complained of her coldness and had wanted to give her to his bodyguards to do with as they pleased. But Von Kreyscharft had asked for her.

Burton was in agony. He could not endure the mental images of her with Göring and Von Kreyscharft. He had to stop these beasts or at least die trying. Late that night, he crawled from the big hut he occupied with twenty-five men into Targoff’s hut and woke him up.

"You said you knew that I must be on your side," he whispered. "When are you going to take me into your confidence? I might as well warn you now that, if you don’t do so at once, I intend to foment a break among my own group and anybody else who will join us."

"Roach has told me more about you," Targoff said. "I didn’t understand, really, what he was talking about. Could a Jew trust anyone who wrote such a book? Or could such a man be trusted not to turn on them after the common enemy has been defeated?"

Burton opened his mouth to speak angrily, then closed it. For a moment, he was silent. When he spoke, he did so calmly. "In the first place, my actions on Earth speak louder than any of my printed words. I was the friend and protector of many Jews; I had many Jewish friends."

"That last statement is always a preface to an attack on the Jews," Targoff said.

"Perhaps. However, even if what Roach claims were true, the Richard Burton you see before you in this valley is not the Burton who lived on Earth. I think every man has been changed somewhat by his experience here. If he hasn’t, he is incapable of change. He would be better off dead.

"During the four hundred and seventy-six days that I have lived on this River, I have learned much. I am not incapable of changing my mind. I listened to Roach and Frigate. I argued frequently and passionately with them. And though I did not want to admit it at the time, I thought much about what they said."