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CHAPTER 1

The child struggled under his hands; and he blamed it

not at aD. The sight of the Long Whip rising and falling

on the naked hack of ten-year-old Avalon of Wommack

made his own stomach chum. Avalon was a slight and

scrawny child, narrow of shoulder, the copper Wom-

mack hair gone dark now with the swift-pouring sweat

of her agony and clinging in a drenched coil along one

frail shoulder blade. Something about the nape of her

neck, where a babyish curl nestled all alone, tore at him

worse than the blood.

"Look you well," hissed Eustace Laddercane Trav-

eller the 4th through clenched teeth, holding his

youngest son's head as every parent in Traveller King-

dom had learned it must be done. Not just the iron grip

that kept the small head from turning away, but the lit-

tle finger of each hand jabbed cruelly into the comers of

the child's eyes, drawing the eyelids back taut against

any possible hint of their closing.

It hurt, of course; but not so much as the smack of

that Whip would hurt, should one of the College of

Deacons see the child avoiding its present duty: to

watch the public whipping of Avalon of Wommack.

And one day this boy he held so tightly now would per-

form the same service for the babe that swelled his

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mothers belly this very moment, as his older children

held their younger brothers and sisters all around him.

His wife had not been spared, either, though Eustace

Laddercane had requested it; her time was very near,

and it a tenth child—mis whipping was enough to set

off her labor and see his tenth-bom arrive in the public

square. But the Tutor had been absolutely adamant

about it. Should that happen, he'd told him, it would be

a blessing for the newbom, its first sight in this world

one guaranteed to further its moral education and set it

on the Straight path for life.

Should that happen, thought the father, he'd blind

the babe with his own two thumbs before he'd let that

be its first sight of the world ... the Holy One grant

that it not happen.

Avalon of Wommack was well shielded from any lust-

ful eyes. The Whipping Cloth hung foursquare from its

hooks above her head to her bare feet, with only the nar-

row space cut away at the back to allow the Whip room.

But it did nothing to shield her screams. Eustace Lad-

dercane hoped they hurt the ears of the Magicians of

Rank that stood one at each comer of the cloth, twelve

inches between them and their pitiful victim.

The whipping itself, now—no man could have done

that, though not one had courage enough to stop it It

was Granny Leeward of Castle Traveller, her that was

the own mother of the Castle Master, that wielded the

Long Whip.

She'd explained Avalon of Wommack's grievous sins

to them all carefully before she began me chastisement,

looking all around her with those measuring eyes, count-

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ing. She knew precisely how many people should be

there on the walkway that bordered the square, did the

Granny. Ninety-one excused by the College of Deacons

for illness near unto death, a sign of sure wicked-

ness in those ninety and one; and seven hundred

thirteen that left to be counted. Eustace Laddercane

was certain mat Granny Leeward was able to count each

and every one of the seven hundred thirteen, and would

have known if even one had been missing. They lined

up by household and by height, the tallest at the back.

There still was not room for all of them within the

Castle walls, and it had been necessary to lay out this

whipping ground outside, burning away every last sprig

and blade of growing life, grading it flat as the top of a

table, anchoring down the board walkway that bordered

it with spokes of ironwood hammered into chinks

blasted out of the Tinaseeh rock. But that was chang-

ing. The people of Tinaseeh, they were dying with a ter-

rifying speed, ten and twenty and more now in a single

day . . . soon they'd be able to take their Whipping

Cloth inside one of the courtyards, right into Roebuck

. . . might could be soon they'd have ample space in

the Castle Great Hall itself, and be hard put to it to find

anybody left to whip.

Avalon of Wommack had sinned doubly. First she

had sinned against the cause that bid the Chosen Peo-

ple of Tinaseeh repopulate this land, to replace the

dying who by their very deaths had revealed the vileness

or their souls. Avalon's father had brought her home a

husband, a man of seventeen, and Avalon not only had

not welcomed her bridegroom tenderly and obediently

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as was expected o( her, not only refused to go wiBingly

to the marriage bed where this male twice her size and

near twice her age might do her the favor of placing his

seed in her womb—Avalon had tried to hide herself

away. They had dragged her from a granary, half

suffocated already on the grain and on her terror. De-

spite the fact. Granny Leeward had hammered the point

home, that Avalon's womb had been through two full

cycles. And secondly, there was the additional fact that

Avalon of Wommack was a Two. and a female whose

name came to the numeral two was intended by destiny

to be passive and submissive and weak. The giri had also

sinned against her Naming.

That, the Granny had said, was the greater sin of the

two. A young girl, modest and timid as was fully appro-

priate, might be leniently treated for fearing the wed-

ding bed and the inevitable childbed that followed it.

She might well of had only a token stroke or two of the

Long Whip for that, provided she went then and did

her duty ever after.

But to rebel against her Naming was not just to rebel

against Jeremiah Thomas Traveller's orders to many

and be fruitful, the orders of a mere man. It was rebel-

lion against the path laid out for her by the Holy One; a

fearsome evil, a defying of the divine law.

And so the number of lashes had been set at twice

twelve. A memorable number. Eustace Laddercane re-

membered only one other unfortunate to earn so high a

number as that, and that time it had been for stealing

food from the common stores and gorging on it And

And Then There U Be Fireworks

that time the Whip had fallen on the broad back of a

man full grown.

The Long Whip whistled through the air—stroke sev-

enteen. The Magicians of Rank put themselves to the

trouble of calling out the number each time for the

watchers, that they might not lose track and think that

surely it had to be almost over.

At his side he felt a long shudder take his wife's body,

and he dared a quick look, sure it was the birth pains,

but she knew his thought as soon as he did, and without

turning her head she murmured to bim not to take

foolish chances, that she was all right All right, she said,

but for the whipping-

Avalon of Wommack did not scream again after the

nineteenth stroke, but Granny Leeward took care not to

leave the people wondering what was the point of laying

five more strokes on a body already dead.

"Praise be," said the Granny solemnly. "The house-

hold of this youngun can go tranquil to its beds this

night Avalon of Wommack has paid in full the debt of

her wickedness, and she stands now in eternal bliss,

smiling and singing at the right hand of the Holy One

Almighty. Praise bel"

The Magicians of Rank raised their long shears as one

man and cut the loops that held the Whipping Cloth to

the hooks, and there was nothing then to see but a pile

of bloody linen, very nearly Hat, upon the stained

ground.

Somebod/s child, walking the edge of hysteria,

screamed out over and over: "Where did Avalon of

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Wommack go? Where is she?" And there was the ring-

ing smack of a full blow across that child's face as its

mother moved desperately to offer up a penalty before

the College of Deacons could prescribe one.

And Granny Leeward's voice rose strong and sure—

and why not, seeing as how she was little more than

sixty and mighty young for a Granny—leading them in

the hymn that had been chosen to end this particular

whipping. It was seemly; its title was "Divine Pain,

Willingly Endured." Except that Avalon of Wommack

had not been willing.

The members of the College of Deacons moved

along the walkway, their arms folded gravely over their

chests, watching and listening for any sign of somebody

singing with anything less than righteous enthusiasm. It

was, after all, an occasion tor celebration, what with

Avalon of Wommack's eternal bliss and her family's

tranquillity and all; and the College of Deacons was

fully prepared to see to it that a suitable explanation was

provided for anybody present that couldn't understand

that on their own.

The little ones sang their hearts out, and the older

ones sighed and released their grips upon the small

heads just a mite. The children knew already; sing, sing

loud, and sing joyful. Make a joyful noise . . . they

knew. Or there'd be a smaller version of the Long Whip

waiting at home, and the mother assigned a specific

number of strokes to be laid on, by the Deacon that'd

spotted the wavering voice. It made for hearty music.

Eustace Laddercane Traveller the ^th believed, really

believed, in the Holy One Almighty. And there had not

And Then There'll Be Fireworks

been a whipping yet that he had not raised his own

voice in the closing hymn, almost roaring out the words,

waiting for the divine wrath to reach the limit of Its en-

durance and strike Granny Leeward dead before his

eyes. It had not happened yet, but his faith that it

would was a rock on which he stood, and a comfort to

him in the nights when often he dreamed it was a child

of his loins that cringed and screamed and twisted under

the strokes of the Whip.

"It went well, to my mind," said Nathan Overholt

Traveller the loist. "No faintings, no foolishness, and

no punishments to pass out afterward—all very satis-

factory."

The other three nodded, and agreed that it had gone

well enough.

"Well enough, perhaps." That was Feebus Timothy

Traveller the 6th, youngest of the Magicians of Rank on

Tinaseeh. "But the child ought not to have died."

The two Fanon brothers, Sheridan Pike the 2$th and

Luke Nathaniel the i9th, looked at each other. There

were times when they wondered about Feebus Timothy,

finding him a tad soft, wondering if there wasn't a slight

taint of Airy blood there somewhere to account for what

came near at times to romantic notions. Times when

they felt he'd profit from a stroke or two of the Long

Whip himself. He sorely needed toughening up.

"There is no room on Tinaseeh for a disobedient

child," said Nathan Overholt harshly. "The subject is

closed."

"There was a time," persisted Feebus Timothy,

And Then There'll Be Fireworks

"when we could have saved her, any one of us, no mat-

ter how many lashes she had taken."

"There was a time," said Sheridan Pike reasonably,

"when we could cause the Mules to fly and carry us on

their backs, and a time when the winds and the rains

and the tides obeyed us. And that was that time, and it

is gone. We deal now with this time."

The mention of the powers they had lost silenced

them all. It was not something you got used to. Once

you had been someone whose fingers could make a cas-

ual move or two and a cancer would shrivel and disap-

pear inside the sick one's body, leaving no trace behind.

Once you had been someone that could SNAP through

space, moving from the Wilderness Lands of Tinaseeh,

across the vastness of the Oceans of Remembrances and

of Storms, to land less than a second later in the court-

yard of any of the twelve Castles of the planet Ozark.

Once you had been someone who saw to it that the rain

fell only when and where it was needed, and that the

harvests were always bountiful, and that the snow fell

only deep enough and often enough to be an amuse-

ment for the children and a change for their elders . . .

once.

Now, on the other hand, it was as Sheridan Pike had

said. Now they had to deal with this time. Four Magi-

cians of Rank, their tides as hollow as their stomachs

and their gaunt faces, garbed in a black grown shiny

with wear, and their only power now the power of fear.

It was a painful comedown, for they had been truly

mighty.

Luke Nathaniel Farson had been picking idly at his

And Then Therell Be Fireworks

front teeth with his thumbnail, a maddening little noise

in the silence; and then he stopped, just before they

could demand for him to, and asked: "Do you suppose

it's true, that rumor about the Yallerhounds?"

"Luke Nathaniel!" Even Feebus Timothy got in on

the outrage.

"I don't know," mused the other man. "They're hun-

gry. We're hungry, here at the Castle . . . think of the

people in the town. A Yallerhound, or a giant cavecat,

that's a sizable quantity of meat. And though it's true I

can't think of any of the men with strength enough left

to take a cavecat, you know as well as I do that a boy of

three could catch a Yallerhound. AH you have to do is

call the creature, and it will come to you."

"Nobody," said Sheridan Pike, "nobody at afl.^ would

eat a Yallerhound. They would starve first."

"They will, then/' said Luke Nathaniel "Those that

haven't already.*'

"Change the subject/' ordered Sheridan Pike flatly.

"Can't any of you think of something that's not intoler-

able to talk about? You've lost your magic powers, but I

wasn't aware that you'd lost your minds as well."

"Well," said Feebus Timothy, "we could discuss to-

day's scheduled urgent and significant meeting. That's

not intolerable, just useless, and silly, and stupid."

"Your sarcasm is very little help. Cousin/' said Sheri-

dan Pike.

"All right, then, 111 ask seriously. What is on today's

agenda?"

"A discussion of the situation."

"Again?" Feebus Timothy was serious now, serious

And Then There's. Be Fireworks

and Habbergasted. "Whatever for? We have had nine

hundred and ninety-nine 'discussions of the situation'

and we have yet to arrive at a single—"

Sheridan Pike cut him off. "Jeremiah Thomas Trav-

eller is Master of this Castle, master of the four of us,

son of Granny Leeward, and representative of the Holy

One upon this earth. If he says we are to discuss the sit-

uation yet one more time—or one hundred more times

—then we will discuss it"

Feebus Timothy snorted, "The only thing in all that

that impresses me. Cousin, is the claim that he's Lee-

ward's son. That I believe, it being a matter of record;

and that I'm impressed by. As for the rest of it ... if

you'll pardon a phrase from the fonnspeech . . .

cowflop."

"You talk a good line," said Luke Nathaniel Farson.

"But I have yet to see you do more than talk."

Sheridan Pike moved smoothly to cover the charged

silence, and observed that another discussion was not

necessarily a waste of time.

"Each time we meet," he said, "there is the possi-

bility that we will hit upon something we have over-

looked before, colleagues. Somewhere there is a clue to

be found, if only we were wise enough to spot it"

"The clue you seek," retorted Feebus Timothy, "lies

in pseudocoma on a narrow bed at Castle Brightwater.

Where we put her, we wise Magicians of Rank, these

sixteen months past"

"Nonsense!"

"Not nonsense," said Nathan Overholt, knowing he

plowed ground already furrowed to exhaustion, but too

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And Then There'U Be Fireworks

tired to care, "not nonsense at all. Feebus Timothy is

somewhat confused, and somewhat overdramatic, but

the facts of the matter are obvious. While Responsible

or Brightwater went about her interfering and infuriat-

ing business on this planet, we were truly Magicians,

with the power of Formalisms & Transformations at our

command. From the moment we laid her in pseudo-

coma on that bed my cousin refers to so poetically, our

power began to wane . . . and now it is gone. Entirely^

completely, wholly gone. Magic is gone . . . and on

Tinaseeh we have no science. The question is: why?"

"We have no science because we never needed it,"

said Sheridan Pike disgustedly. "Magic was a great deal

faster than science ever hoped to be, and far more

efficient"

"No, no ... that was not my question! And you

know it, don't you?"

"Of course I know it!"

"Then stop playing the fool!"

"He is not playing the fool," said Luke Nathaniel

wearily, "he is just cross, like the rest of us. And we have

considered that question so many times already."

"Magic/' said Nathan Overholt, "is a great web, a

great web in always changing equilibrium. Touch it any-

where, change it anyhow, and you affect the whole.

When we removed Responsible of Brightwater from

that web-"

"We haven't removed her. She's in better health than

any of us. In pseudocoma you don't need to eat"

"In a sense," Nathan Overholt went on, "we removed

her. We changed her from an active principle to a pas-

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And Then There'll Be Fireworks

sive one . . . and yet she is a female. How can a female

represent an active principle?"

"Granny Leeward is exceedingly 'active' with the

Long Whip/' observed Luke Nathaniel. "And she is fe-

male."

^She is not a principle—she is only an item."

Feebus Timothy longed to lay his head, still aching

from the screams or Avalon of Wommack, down on the

table, right then and there, and go to sleep. They had

been over it And over it The difference between an

item and a principle. The difference between substi-

tution of a null term and substitution of a specified

term. The degree of shift in an equation sufficient to de-

stroy its reversibility—or restore it And over and over

. . . what role had Responsible of Brightwater, a girt of

fifteen like any other girl of fifteen to the eye, played in

that equation, such that the cancellation of her input

had been enough to destroy the entire system?

There were never any answers. That she had known a

little magic, some of it more advanced than was suitable

for a female or even legal, they all knew. The four of

them had been present when Responsible fell into

Granny Leeward's trap and changed the old woman's

black fan into a handful of rotting jet-black mushrooms

before their astonished eyes. Jeremiah Thomas Traveller

had been mightily impressed by that, as the Granny had

intended him to be.

But they were Magicians of Rank. It was a Trans-

formation, certainly, and the girl should not have been

able to do it, but it was trivial. It was a baby trick, such

as any one of them might have done—in a less ugly way

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And Then ThereU Be Fireworks

—to entertain guests at a celebration of some kind. It

was probable that it had been as much blind luck as

skill, and mostly the product of the girl's rage; for she

had lain in torment while they watched her and mocked

her misery, suffering from the girt of Andersen's Dis-

ease, die deathdance fever that Granny Leeward had or-

dered them to impose as punishment for her scandalous

behavior. And she'd shown no sign of any talent for

things magical but that one . . . nor had she been able

to stand against them when the nine Magicians of

Rank had chosen to impose pseudocoma upon her or

during the months that had dragged by since. If there

was something special about her, why had she not

leaped up from that bed and laughed at them and put

all of them into pseudocoma?

It was hopeless.

"It's hopeless," he said aloud. "Hopeless."

The others looked at him, suddenly caught by the

nuance of his voice. He was young, and he was inexpe-

rienced, but he had been a skilled Magician of Rank.

Now they detected something ... a note of petulance.

Petulance?

Nathan Overholt Traveller reached over abruptly and

laid his hand on the younger man's forehead and swore

a broad word.

"He's burning up with fever!" he said. "One of you

get the Granny, and tell her to lose no time coming

down here!"

It had been bound to happen sooner or later.

Sickness, the Master of this Castle had been telling ev-

eryone, sickness and death, were nothing more than the

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And Then ThereU Be Fireworks

marks of wickedness and sin made visible in the flesh.

Only the Holy One culling the rotten fruit from the

crop and leaving the sound and the wholesome behind.

It made an entertaining sermon, and perhaps dulled

grief for some . . . after all, if those that suffered and

died deserved their fate, then what was there to grieve

over?

But the Magicians of Rank had been uneasy, listen-

ing. For if one of them, one of the Magicians of Rank,

one of the Family, were to fall sick or, the Twelve Gates

forbid, to die—how was that to be explained? The ur-

gency of preventing that had provided them with a

shaky justification for the extra rations they shared in se-

cret in the Castle, while tadlings cried with hunger in

the houses of the town. Eggs, they had been eating . . .

it was safe to assume that no one else on Tinaseeh had

seen an egg in six months or more, much less eaten one.

And now this? It must not happen.

"Why call the Granny?" demanded one of the

others, and Nathan Overholt took time from rubbing

the temples of his brother's head to give him a look of

contempt

"We have no magic now, you benastied fool," he

spat, beside himself with worry, and his elegant manners

and speech forgotten for once, "and no medicine either.

We have nothing—except what the Grannys know. The

ancient simples. The herbs and teas and potions and

plasters of the times before magic, the Holy One have

mercy on us all! Now get her!"

"Nathan Overholt-'

"You think," shouted Nathan, "you think that if one

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And Then ThereU Be Fireworks

of us falls to a fever we will be able to stand on the

whipping ground and convince the people of Tinaseeh

that we order that Whip laid on out of our own inno-

cence of all sin? You think that Granny Leeward would

scruple to set that Long Whip to your back, or to mine,

<f that seemed necessary to further the cause of the Cho-

sen People? Dozens, man, don't you realize that if

Feebus Timothy has it we may all be in the same fix,

whatever it is—and it could be anything? Now go!"

He went around behind his brother and clasped the

young man's head in his hands, closing his eyes, concen-

trating fiercely. It was an act he knew to be only super-

stition. But perhaps. Perhaps there was still some frag-

ment of healing in it. He could not do nothing at all.

He had no desire to die like Avalon of Wommack had

died; nor did he want to leam how many strokes of the

Long Whip it would take to kill a strong man in

reasonably good condition.

15

CHAPTER 2

Mount Troublesome was not much, as mountains go; it

peaked at a fad past four thousand feet, and it hadn't a

glacier or a crevasse to its name. On the other hand,

though it didn't live up to the "Mount" part, it more

than made up for that in its fidelity to the "Trouble-

some" part It missed no smallest opportunity for ra-

vines to get stuck in and caves to get lost in and vast

duckets to be scratched ragged in; and it was abun-

dantly generous in poisonous ivies and creepers winding

along the ground and up around the trees to hang down

and smack you in the face. Springs were everywhere,

trickling along under matted undergrowth that looked

solid as a stable roof, till you set foot on it and sank in

icy water up to your knees. There were waterfalls'

enough to go around, pretty white water gushing over

sheer rock faces into pools circled by ferns and near-

wfllows. The pools were tempting to the eye, and might

of been pleasant-feeling, but you waded them at your

peril and the pleasure of dozens of small ferocious yel-

low snakes with ingeniously notched teeth. It did hap-

pen to be a fact that Mount Troublesome was the tallest

thing on the entire continent of Marktwain.

The seven old women toiling their way up its tangled

sides were more than satisfied with the obstacles it

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And Then There'll Be Fireworks

presented. If it had been any worse, there was consid-

erable doubt in their minds that they could of made it

to the top at all

"Drat the ornery female!" Granny Sherryi'ake had de-

clared after the second time a whole hour had to be

wasted finding a way round a beny thicket as impene-

trable as solid rock and twice as unpleasant And she

went on to expand on that, and elaborate on it, and

weave variations on it, as the hours went by and it be-

came obvious that there was no way they could reach

the top before nightfall. They'd be overnighting out on

the mountain.

But Granny Hazelbide, that was in residence along

with Granny Gableframe at Castle Brightwater, had

taken exception to that It was fully appropriate, she'd

said, slapping back at a branch that had slapped her

first, for a woman named Troublesome to choose a

mountain named Troublesome when she went into

exile.

"FuBy appropriate, and seemly," said Granny Hazel-

bide. "I'd of done the same exact thing, in her place."

"Well," grumbled Shenyjake, "there may be some-

thing to what you say."

"I should hope and declare there is. Naming is nam-

ing!"

"But," went on the other doggedly, "I do not see that

there was any special merit to be gained from her es-

tablishing herself at the very most tip top of this ac-

cursed hump of dirt and rock. She was not named Peak

of Troublesome, you know. Halfway up would of done

it, seems to me. Quarterways up."

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And Then ThereU Be Fireworks

"Troublesome of Brightwater was instructed to take

herself as far away from the rest of the population of

Brightwater as it was possible for her to get," said

Granny FrostfaD firmly. "I hold with Hazelbide; she did

what was proper. But I surely do not find that it makes

for a pleasant little stroll."

"Time was," fussed Granny Gableframe, "this would

of been no more than that, for any of us."

"And in such a time," snorted Granny Frostfall,

"we'd none of us of crossed a city street to pay a call on

Troublesome of Brightwater. Can't say as how I see that

it applies, Gableframe-"

Granny Gableframe didn't bother to argue, but

sighed a long sigh and took a firmer grip on her walking

stick with her thin old fingers. It wouldn't do to lose it

Grannys had always been thin, that went with the ter-

ritory; but these seven were thin to the bone, and those

bones pained them. Grannys had always been old; but

up till recently they'd been protected from the usual

miseries of old age by their own Granny Magic, and

from its more unusual miseries by the skills of the Magi-

cians and the Magicians of Rank. Without that protec-

tion, things had changed for them. Angina and arthritis,

gall-bladder colic and kidney trouble, ulcers and head-

aches and high blood pressure, all the bodily discom-

forts taken for granted as the lot of any aged woman on

Old Earth, had struck the Grannys of Ozark. It was

even said that at Castle Clark—though she denied it

fiercely—Granny Golightly was developing a cataract in

her right eye.

Under the circumstances, when Granny Gableframe

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And Then There'll Be Fireworks

first proposed that the seven of them should go up to

the mountaintop and talk to Troublesome of Bright-

water, the hilarity had been like a squawkercoop with a

serpent inside, and two servingmaids had come running

to find out what the commotion was.

"You are daft, Gableframe," the other Grannys had

said with a single voice, and they'd sat in their rockers

and cackled and held their aching sides at the very idea.

Seven creaking old ladies, half blind and half deaf, feet

too swollen to go in their shoes and bones so brittle they

barely dared move them—and they were to trek up the

meanest mountain on Marktwain in the middle of the

autumn? It was a fool idea to top all fool ideas.

"That does take the rag off the bush, Gableframe,"

they'd said, and it was unanimous.

"And what do you propose to do, ladies?" Gable-

frame had challenged them, standing there arms akimbo

and her sharp chin stuck out ahead of her. "You pro-

pose to just sit here, do you? While the crops all die and

the animals sicken and the people do the same, and Re-

sponsible of Brightwater lies month after weary month

on that white counterpane, so still the only reason I can

believe she's alive is that her body has yet to mortify?

Well, ladies? You laugh right prompt, real quick to

make fun, you are! But I don't hear you offering any

plans of your own."

They did know two things, there was that. In the first

months after Responsible had been struck down, while

the power of magic was waning but not yet exhausted,

the Grannys had managed to leam two small pieces of

information. They'd read tea leaves, they'd swung their

20

And Then There'U Be Fireworks

golden rings on long black threads, they'd stared into

springwater till their eyes were red and weeping, night

after night. And back at them had come two scraps.

The reason behind the trouble, the reason behind Re-

sponsible's deathlike interminable sleep, was "an impor-

tant man." That had come first, and after much labor,

and had irritated them considerably. Then there had

been the search for that man's location in this world,

holding the golden rings over the maps, holding their

breaths as well, waiting for one ring to begin its telltale

swinging and circling. All atremble like they were, it

took a sharp eye to tell when the movement was of its

own self and when it was just the doings of a Granny

that's hand was no longer steady.

And then there'd been argument. The Spells were so

little use by then, the movement of the rings so near no

movement at all, and so ambiguous—was it Tinaseeh or

was it Kintucky? All of a week they'd nattered over that,

half for one and half for the other, knowing that if they

made the wrong choice there'd be no second chance.

There weren't resources enough for trying twice, for one

thing. And for another, if anything was to be done it

had to be done swiftly; there was nothing in the way of

extra resources of time, either.

Grannys Gablerrame, WhifBebee, and Edging had

been strong for Tinaseeh, swearing it was Jeremiah

Thomas Traveller that was the "important man." Did

he not, after all, rule that continent with a fist of iron,

and hadn't he always? And hadn't he always hated Re-

sponsible of Brightwater and everything she stood for?

"Hmmph," said Granny Cobbledrayke of Castfe

21

And Then There'll Be Fireworks

McDanieIs, "it's not Jeremiah Thomas as rules Tina-

seen, it's his mother, her that took Leeward as her

Granny Name and is about as much like a leeward side

in a storm as a lizard's like a bellybutton. Don't give me

Jeremiah Thomas Traveller for an 'important man*—

he's a mama's boy, and always was."

She, and the rest of the Marktwam Grannys. had

been set on Kintucky, and Castle Wommack. Hadn't

Responsible herself, they argued, run away from Castle

Wommack—her that wasn't afraid of anything living or

dead—run away, rather than face Lewis Motley Wom-

mack? And wasn't it Lewis Motley Wommack that now

governed all of Kintucky?

"He is barely twenty-one years old ... -wouldn't be,

not quite yet," Gableframe protested. "A boy yet, last

time we saw him! Here for the Jubilee, remember? With

his little sister Jewel set to tag around after him and

keep him out of mischief? How can that one be the 'im-

portant man,' I ask you?"

"He is important on Kintucky," said Sherryjake.

"Well, we don't know how that came to be/' grum-

bled the others. "We don't know atall. Way our magic

was working in those last months, for all we know the

messages we got were plain scrambled . . . might could

be Jacob Donahue Wommack the 23rd's still hale and

hearty and Master of that Castle and the whole tale

about it being Lewis Motley in charge is no more than

a puckerwrinkle in a puny Spell. Who'd be fool enough

to put a wild colt like that one in charge of a Kingdom?

Now last you. . ."

But the time had come when the decision had to be

22

And Then There'Q Be Fireworks

made; and for want of anything better to base it on

they'd deferred to Granny Hazelbide, seeing as it was

Hazelbide had had the raising of Responsible of Bright-

water and knew her best of any of them.

Now, fighting the thorns and the vines and the poison

weeds, keeping a sharp eye for the false earth over run-

ning water, making a hardscrabble way up through a

drizzle that threatened to be a rain and praying they'd

find at least an overhang to shelter them through this

night, they hoped they'd decided rightly. Everything

rode on this one throw of the dice, and Granny Hazel-

bide shivered with more than the fever that plagued her

now every day of her life, thinking what she'd done if it

was the wrong choice and she had convinced the others

of it. And what they'd do to her . . . law, that would be

a production!

"Ah, Hazelbide," said Granny Willowithe, her that

almost never spoke, and had done her grannying in the

farther reaches of the Kingdom where there were few to

bother her, "if you are wrong?" It was always that way.

Those as spoke rarely, when they did speak it tended to

be significant- and to be what everybody else was think-

ing and hadn't gotten up gumption to give voice to.

Troublesome of Brightwater woke to a wind howling

round her cabin doors and windows, and that was ordi-

nary enough. She woke also to a downright infuriated

rapping on her cabin door, and that was distinctly not

ordinary. Over ten years she'd been here now, and she'd

never had a visitor but her little sister, and that only

three times. It could not be her little sister this time.

23

And Then There'll Be Fireworks

She listened again, and stretched in the warmth of

her bed, wondering if it had been maybe something

blown by the winds, or something in a dream, half a

mind to go back to sleep. And then the hollering came:

"Troublesome of Brightwater, will you open this door?

Or have you taken to murdering old ladies along with

the rest of your wicked ways?"

That brought her up out of her bed in a hurry. Old la-

dies, was it, on her doorsill? She went to the door just as

she was, and stood there before them mothemaked and

barefoot, with no cover but the heavy black hair that

tumbled almost to her knees. She held the door with

one hand and set the other on the curve of her shame-

less hip, and she sighed a sigh of sheer wonderment.

"Whatever in all the world?" breathed Troublesome

of Brightwater, looking them over. "Whatever in all the

wondering twelvesquare world?"

The Grannys were a sight to behold, for sure. They

were wet and they were dirty and they were nettle-

stung, and they were cold and wrinkled and miserable.

With no more Housekeeping Spells to use, and nothing

around for a tidy-up but one stream the width of their

hand trickling over slabs of bare rock, they were as piti-

ful a representation of seven old ladies as had ever met

the eye.

"Out of my way, trollop," announced Granny Gable-

frame, and would of pushed right past Troublesome

into the welcome warmth of the cabin; but the young

woman barred her way with one sturdy arm.

"I'm no trollop. Granny Gableframe/' she said. "I'm

virgin as I came from my mother's womb—and that's

24

And Then There'll Be Fireworks

more than any one of you here can say back at me, as I

recollect. As for my costume, I don't recall sending out

any invitations. You've gotten poduck, Grannys."

"Law, the creature's enjoying it," muttered Granny

Hazelbide. She'd had the raising of her, too. "Trouble-

some," she demanded, "will you for the love of decency

drop that arm and let us in? We are tired near to death,

we spent all yesterday on this mountain and all last

night in a cave full of varmints and dripping water, and

we've no magic any more to ease the toll all that has

taken. Would it pleasure you to see one of us drop dead

right here before your eyes, you dreadful female?"

Troublesome dropped her arm at that and let them

by, saying: "Well, that's more fair. A trollop I'm not,

but a dreadful female I'm willing to admit to. Do come

• in, and I'll put the kettle on and stir up the fire. I don't

suppose youali'd take your clothes off and let me hang

them to dry, would you?"

That met the frigid silence she'd anticipated, and she

nodded her head in resignation.

"Stay cold and wet, then," she said, "and die of pneu-

monia, not on my doorstep but on my hearthstone—but

don't you lay it to my account. There's not a one of you

as has anything different to her body than I have myself,

and I do believe I could bear the sight of your old

skinny-skin-skins ... for sure I would not lust after

you! But if you rank your modesty higher than your

misery, so be it; I'll not squabble with you."

The cabin was small and bare, and even after Trou-

blesome got the fire crackling in the fireplace the best

she could do was pull up a rough board bench with no

25

And Then There'U Be Fireworks

back to it for them all to sit on and try to bake the damp

from their bones. Troublesome had no rugs, and no cur-

tains; her bed was a pallet laid on a rope frame in the

comer, she had one straight chair and one rocker and

one low stepladder and a small square table and a cook-

stove. And except for a bucket or two and a shelf here

and there, that was it. The Grannys were bemused by it,

even with their teeth chattering.

"Don't have eight cups, do you?" asked Granny Sher-

ryjake.

Troublesome chuckled, and admitted she didn't, and

served them up the scalding tea in an assortment of )'ars

and ladles and whamots that was ingenious, but not ele-

gant.

"Never needed more than three before," she told

them. "One to drink with, one to measure with, and one

in the dishpan soaking."

"I can't say as you exacdy ... do yourself proud,"

commented Granny Frostfall, and a kind of snort of

agreement ran down the bench.

"No, I don't suppose I do," Troublesome agreed.

"Tain't natural," said one, and Troublesome's eye-

brows rose.

"You expected things up here to be natural?" she

asked.

The Grannys sighed all together, seeing it was a hope-

less case, and Troublesome went to a row of three pegs

on a wall by her bed and took down a long dress all in a

soft scarlet wool and slipped it over her head.

"There," she said, "now I'll not be quite such an

ofiense to your eyes." And her long fingers were almost

26

And Then There'U Be Fireworh

too quick for those same fourteen sharp eyes to see as

che put the mass of hair into a braid and wound it up

around her head and fastened it tight

It was unjust that anything so wicked should be so

beautiful, or so clever, or so serene, or so happy with her

lot—especially the last—and the Grannys stared glumly

into the fire and pondered on that

"Well, ladies," Troublesome said at last, sitting her-

self down on an upended bucket with her arms wrapped

round her knees, since it wouldn't of been mannerly to

take a chair while the old women huddled on that

bench, "now you're a bit warmer and dryer, maybe

you'd tell me what I'm beholden to for the pleasure of

your company?"

"Maybe you might offer us a bite of breakfast first!"

snapped Granny Gableframe. "If you care to spare it!"

"It's already cooking," said Troublesome calmly, "but

I can't do anything much to hurry it along. And while

we're waiting on it—no, I don't have eight plates either,

but as it happens I do have eight spoons—while we're

waiting on it I see no reason not to make the time go by

speaking up on the reason for this visit. I'm afraid I'm

not much for visitors."

The Grannys allowed as how they never would of

figured that out if she hadn't mentioned it, and she

chuckled again.

"Earn your keep, you dear old things," she teased

Aem, brazen as brazen, "earn your keep. What brings

you Hanging round my door all unannounced and

unkempt, with snow before the week's out or my name's

not Troublesome of Brightwater? You should be home,

27

And Then There'll Be Fireworks

each in your rocker with your knitting, by your own fire,

telling terrible stories to the tadlings."

Granny Hazelbide was embarrassed; true, this one

was properly Named, and her outrageousness came as

no surprise to anybody, but it had been her, poor

Granny Hazelbide, that had tried to keep some control

over her when she was a little girl at Castle Brightwater.

"Troublesome," she said sadly, "have you no feelings

atall?"

"Probably not," said Troublesome promptly. "Feel-

ings about what?"

*Times arc hard, young woman," said Hazelbide,

"times are fearsome hard! You talk of sitting by our fires

. . . there's precious little left to lay a fire with, down in

the towns. People are suffering, and your own sister lies

near death in the Castle. How can you sit these and face

us and make jokes over it all?"

"Would it help," Troublesome put the question, "if I

moaned about it instead? Would it ease anybody's

fever, stop anybody's bleeding, or put food in anybody's

stomach or fire on their hearth? Would it wake my sister

—who is nor, by the way, anywhere near death. Not as

near as the seven of you, I assure you."

"Ah, you're heartless," Granny Hazelbide mourned.

"Just heartless!"

Troublesome said nothing at all, but waited and

watched, and they began to smell the porridge on the

stove and their stomachs knotted.

"Well, we want you to make a journey," said Granny

Gableframe when it finally became clear that they'd get

28

And Then There'll Be Firework

no more out of the girl. "A long and a perilous journey.

And that's why we're here... to ask you. Politely."

Troublesome stared at her, black brows knit over her

nose, and gave a sharp "tchh" with her tongue.

"A journey? Go on a trip?"

"Yes. And a good long one."

She stood up and went to the stove and began passing

the porridge over to them, warning them to use their

shawls to hold on so they'd not burn their fingers.

"Certainly can't hurt the shawls, the state they're in,"

she said.

She watched them while they ate; and seeing that

they were truly hungry, she didn't bother them, but

busied herself pouring more tea and serving more por-

ridge until it seemed to her that everybody was at last

satisfied and she could gather up the motley collection

of serving things in her apron and put it all into a pan of

hot soapy water.

Whereupon she sat down, shaking her hands to dry

them, and said, "No more excuses, now. You're dry, and

you're warm, and you're fed and watered. It's too cold

for you to be taking baths at your age, so youll have to

stay dirty, and I've no remedies for your other miseries;

I've made you as comfortable as I'm capable of. Now

111 have you tell me about this journey, thank you

kindly."

"We want you to go to Castle Wommack," said

Granny Hazelbide, and Troublesome almost fell off her

makeshift stool in astonishment

"To Kintucky? Granny, you've lost your mind en-

tirely! However would I get to Castle Wommack?"

29

And Then There U Be Fireworks

"On a ship."

"Granny Hazelbide, there's no ship goes to Kintucky

any more, and no supplies to last the journey if there

were. You've been nibbling something best left on its

stem, f say."

"We have a ship/' said Hazelbide, putting one stub-

born word after another, "and a crew—not much of a

crew, but it'll serve in this instance—and supplies

enough to get all of you to Kintucky and back. Includ-

ing me Mule you'll be taking along to get you from the

coast to the Castle."

"Dozens!" said Troublesome. "I'd of said that was

impossible."

"It wasn't cheap."

"It took all we had," put in Granny Whiffietree, "and

aB that the Grannys had on Oklahomah, and a contri-

bution or two—not necessarily voluntary, if you take my

meaning—from a few useless Magicians and Magicians

of Rank. But we did it"

"Bribed the ship captain, did you? And bribed the

crew?"

"That we did."

"And you think they'll stay bribed!"

"We do. The captain's a Brightwater, and all but one

of the crew as well. And that one's a McDaniels. They'll

stay bribed."

"Supposing," hazarded Troublesome, leaning for-

ward, "that I was such a lunatic as to go gallivanting off

to Kintucky in the middle of me autumn . . . just sup-

pose that, which I'm not... what precisely is my goal,

50

And Then There'll Be Fireworks

other than to drown myself and the captain and the

crew and that poor Mule?"

They told her, and they watched her face go thought-

ful, and Granny Gableframe pinched the next Granny

down on the bench, gently; they knew then that they

had her.

"I agree," said Troublesome slowly, "that it's sure to

be Lewis Motley Wommack the ^yd. I do agree on

that. Not a thing Jeremiah Thomas Traveller could have

done that would account for what's happened, but that

Wommack boy is something else again, and I do believe

he lay with Responsible while the Jubilee was going on."

"So that's who it was!" exclaimed Granny Hazelbide.

"How did you know?"

"Ask me no questions. Granny, I'll tell you no lies,"

said Troublesome. "It makes no nevermind how I knew.

But you've chosen right, for sure and for certain- How-

ever. . . you've nothing here but missing pieces."

"Explain yourself!"

"Did you learn, before your magic wound down, that

if somebody went to see this 'important man' it would

make some difference in the course of events on

Ozark?" Troublesome stared them down, and they had

to admit that they hadn't

"And did you learn that just because he's the cause of

Responsible's hearty nap he knows how to wake her up

again?

"And did you learn that even if my sister was awake

again, she'd be able to do something about all this tribu-

lation we suffer from? Did you?"

It was no to both, of course, and they had to admit it

31

And Then There'll Be Fireworks

"But you*d send me half round the world on a wild

goose chase, on the slim tagtail of a chance that Acre

might be some use to it?"

And they agreed that they would.

"Well," said Troublesome. "I never heard such non-

sense."

"Sass!"

"No, I never did. Unless it was youall coming up here

like you did, risking pneumonia coming up and breaking

every bone in your bodies going down—'cause you pay

me mind, now, if you thought you had a hard time get-

ting up here, you just wait till you try getting back

down! It's a heap faster, but it's not a safe trip. No way,

no way in this world, am I going to take any part in such

a fool project, and you should of known better than to

ask me."

"Your sister lies—"

"Tell me no more about how my sister lies!" shouted

Troublesome. "And tell me no more about the suffering

of the people down there below! Wasn't it those very

same people that would not heed my sister when she

tried to warn them, and voted away the government that

was holding them all together? Wasn't it?"

Troublesome—"

"And for all my sister had done for them, was it not

those very same people that showed her no more grati-

tude than they would a stick? That's the people we're

talking about, amn't I right, Grannys? Don't you ask me

to reel sorry for those people—1 despise them for a pack

of contemptible ignorant two-faced good-for-nothing

belly-creeping serpents, do you hear me? If their stom-

52

And Then. There'll Be Fireworks

achs hurt them and their backs pain them and their

hearts are broken, they've asked for that, and no call to

come whimpering to me! They made their beds, let

tiiem wallow in them and cry in their pillows."

"And your sister?" said Granny Hazelbide, ever so

carefully, in the hush. When Troublesome got going,

she gave a spectacular performance, and even the

Grannys were impressed just a tad.

"It is well known," said Troublesome of Brightwater

in tones of ice, "that I have no natural human feelings.

My sister can rot there for all I care—not that she will,

that doesn't go with it, but she's welcome to—and you

know it perfectly well. Ask any man, woman, or tadling

on Marktwain about the compassion and the warm

heart of Troublesome of Brightwater and see what you

get back, if you don't know it already!"

Troublesome wasn't out of breath, but she was out of

patience and way beyond out of hospitality. She stood

up then and ordered them off, ignoring what they said

about needing to rest, stuffing a careless handful of

peachapples in a sack with some cold biscuits and shov-

ing it at them for food on the journey home, telling

them where the water was safe to drink and which paths

to stay shut of. Warning them of a place where the

snakes were thick this time of year because of a rock that

got warm each day in the sun, and all but slamming her

door behind them. They were back out in the weather

and the downhill trek ahead of them before they could

catch their breaths, and they heard the thump of that

bucket as it hit the wall when she gave it a toss across

the room.

33

And Then There U Be Fireworks

"Well!" said Granny Frostfall. "I've seen manners,

and I've seen manners ... but she does beat all. She is

every last thing she's made out to be, and some left over,

and I'll wager she eats nails for breakfast when she's got

no company to see her."

"She has a reputation to maintain," pointed out

Granny Hazelbide.

"What's important," said Granny Gableframe, "and

all that matters now except for getting down this dratted

mountain, is that she'll do it."

"We're sure of that, Gableframe? I don't see it!"

"Oh, we're sure," said Gableframe; and Granny Ha-

zelbide and Granny Sherryjake agreed. "We had her the

minute she asked us to tell her about it, don't you know

anything atall? If she'd turned us a deaf ear, now, and

refused to even listen, and sent us all packing without so

much as letting us tell her why we were here . . . well,

that would of been Troublesome's way."

"Oh, yes," said Granny Hazelbide. *(We've got her

fast, the Twelve Comers preserve us all."

"But howll she know where to go? How to find the

ship?"

"I had that aD on a slip of paper before ever we

started up this overblown hill," sniffed Granny Hazel-

bide. "And tucked away safe in the pocket of my skirt

And it's tucked away safe now in her own hand, every-

thing she needs to know. She gave that bucket quite a

Bing, there at the last, and she may well pitch the bench

we sat on into her Ere—but she'll keep that piece of

paper safe. Every last detail she needs to know, it's on

mere."

54

And Then There's. Be Fireworks

"Law, Granny Hazelbide/' said one or two. And "My

stars, Hazelbide."

"Well, I know her/' said the Granny. "I know her

well."

"Can't say as I envy you that."

"I don't envy my self that, but there's times it's use-

ful," said Granny Hazelbide. "And now let's us head for

home. Might could be we'll make it before dark. Like

Troublesome said, it's a sight faster going down than

coming up."

55

CHAPTER 3

Smalltrack was neither a supply freighter nor a pleasure

craft. The smell aboard, in spite of a powerful scrub-

bing, made you instantly aware that it had been a

fishing boat tor a very long time. Having the Mule

aboard didn't improve matters, since Dross had no re-

spect whatsoever for a human being's ideas about waste

disposal; she added a new fragrance to the prevailing

reek of blood and entrails and ancient sUme. The cap-

tain and the four men of his crew had been on work-

boats of one kind or another all their lives; if they no-

ticed the smell atall, they paid it little mind. They knew

themselves fortunate that it was wintry weather, and no

hot sun broiling down to bring everything to a constant

simmer and perk. As for their passenger, if she found

conditions not to her liking, they didn't mind that atall.

If pushed, all five would have acknowledged a relish

for the idea that Troublesome of Brightwater might not

be all that comfortable crossing the Ocean of Storms to

Kintucky in their racketydrag old boat. They didn't pre-

cisely want her to sutler, being good-natured men, but

they were in mutual accord that she had a trifle discom-

fort coming to her. If the mechanisms of the universe

saw fit to provide that discomfort without any call for

their hands meddling in it, why, they found that posi-

37

And Then There U Be Fireworks

tively Providential. It spoke to their sense of the fitness

of things.

They were Marktwainers—four, including the cap-

tain, being Brightwaters by birth, and a single McDan-

iels finishing up the party—and they were conscious

enough that the woman who spent her time silent on an

upturned barrel in the stem, looking out over the rough

water, was their kinswoman. It comforted Gabriel John

McDaniels the zist that he was fust a tad less related to

her than the other four, but they all recognized it as a

burden to be borne. Relations, like poison plants and

balky Mules and the occasional foolfish spoiling a catch,

were part of the territory; wasn't anybody didn't have

kinfolk they'd just as soon not of.

They'd had their instructions from the Grannys:

**You leave her alone, she'll leave you alone." Same in-

structions as for most pesky and viperous things in this

world, and they'd proved accurate enough. She sat there

on her barrel by the hour, peering through hooded eyes

they none of them would of cared to look into directly.

If she wanted a drink of water, or something to eat, or a

blanket to wrap round her strong thin shoulders, she got

it without bothering any of them. If there was anything

she wanted that she didn't have—and likely there was,

though it was said she lived a spare and scrimped exist-

ence on her lonely mountaintop—she didn't mention it

And if a line fouled near to her, or a solar collector was

wrong in its tilt, she fixed whatever was awry, without

fuss and without error and with no assistance from the

crew.

38

And Then There'll Be Fireworks

^'Uncanny, she is," muttered Haven McDaniels

Brightwater the 4th, some six hours out to sea. "Just un-

canny!" He cleared his throat and stared up at the gray

flat lid of the sky as if he was indifferent to the whole

thing, just mentioning it in passing. "Can't say as how I

wouldn't rather of had something else along ... say a

serpent, or maybe a Yallerhound."

Gabriel John McDaniels spat over the side to signify

his disgust and demanded to know what Haven McDan-

iels had come along for, if that was the way he felt

about it.

"What'd you expect?" he asked, jamming his hands

into his pockets and setting his feet wide against the roll

of the boat. "You expect a fine lady sitting on a tusset?

With needlework to her hand, maybe, and a kerchief to

her delicate little nose? That is Troublesome of Bright-

water back there, just as agreed upon with the Grannys,

and exactly as advertised."

<<! know it," said Haven McDaniels sullenly. "You

think I don't know it?"

'*Well, then," Gabriel John answered him, "there's

no call to comment on it I strongly misdoubt the

Grannys would of offered each of us the sum they did if

we'd been taking a Yallerhound to Kintucky. We're

being paid for the hazard of the thing . . . and she's

rightly named, is Troublesomel Rightly named, her as

could fry your heart in your chest with no more'n her

two blue eyes, if she'd a mind to."

The captain heard that, and it didn't surprise him.

He'd heard the rest, too, but he'd been ignoring it One

39

And Then There'll Be Fireworh

of the advantages to captaining so small a boat was that

neither crew nor anybody else aboard could keep any-

thing from him. He spoke up sharp and quick.

'That's enough of that, Gabriel John McDanieIs," he

rapped out "Days we've got ahead of us, this trip. Bad

weather and poor food and none of us truly fit... last

thing we need here is superstitious claptrap fouling the

air."

"Now, Captain—"

"I said it was enough. You hear me? I can speak

louder, should there be call for to do so. You look to the

weather, Gabriel John, and to this leaky woodbucket we

travel in so precariously, and leave the tall tales to the

tadlings and the Grannys. I'm purely astonished, hear-

ing such stuff from a full-grown man, and him with four

years' full service now on the water."

Gabriel John McDanieIs was not impressed, and he

was not about to drop his eyes to the captain. He'd not

spent his own childhood roaming the Wilderness Lands

of Marktwain with the man, but his daddy had; and

many a night he'd seen the two of them with more whis-

key in them than had pleased his mother. He held Cap-

tain Adam Sheridan Brightwater the Jyd in HO awe.

"You're obliged to take that stand," he said, speaking

right up. "We know that, all of us. But there on that

nailbarrel sits the Sister and the Mother and the Great-

grandmother of Evil, the Holy One help us all, and we

all of us know that, too! If she so chooses we'll have

storms and leaks; and if she don't so choose we'll have

an easy journey of it That's no tale for tadlings, now—

40

And Then There U Be Fireworks

that's same as saying the sun's more use to solar collec-

tors than snow is."

There were two Michael Callaway Brightwaters

standing near, one of them a ^oth and the other a 37th,

something of a nuisance in such close quarters. They

hadn't much use for one another, or for Gabriel John,

but they shook their heads like one man now and al-

lowed as how he was absolutely right and the captain

could leave off his tales any time.

"We're not fools," said the one they called Black

Michael—not that his hair was any blacker than Mi-

chael Callaway the ^yth's, that was called simply Mi-

chael Callaway in the ordinary fashion, but you

couldn't be having them both speak up every time one

was wanted. And Michael Callaway nodded, saying:

""We came for the money, same as you. Captain. And

what trouble we've got on our plates is trouble we

bought ourselves. Complaining about it, that's not

seemly; I agree to that. Howsomever, Captain, you'll do

us the favor of telling us no lies, thank you very much."

The captain stared at the three of them, considering,

and at the eloquent back of Haven McDanieIs Bright-

water the 4th, pretending to be fooling with a sail—him

that had started all this—and he shrugged his shoulders.

"All right," he conceded. "I'll not dispute youall on

it I don't care for her myself . . . they say she was a

child once, but I'm hard put to it to believe it. But I'll

not listen to prattle over the matter, either, mind you.

As Michael Callaway rightly says, this is our own doing,

of our own free will, and talk'U change nothing. Fur-

41

And Then There'll Be Fire-works

thennore and to go on with, such talk heard at the

wrong end of the boat might well provoke the lady.

You'll do me the favor of not chancing that. That's my

last word!"

Truth was, he thought as he turned away from them

with a set jaw intended to impress them with his

firmness of purpose, the sight of her made his blood run

colder than the seawater. No woman should stand six

feet tall like she did; no woman should fit to a fishing-

boat like she'd been born on one, when she'd spent her

whole life in Castle and in mountain cabin; no woman

should have the dark fierce beauty that somehow flamed

around her, putting him in mind of the black roses that

grew near the edge of Marktwain's desert in deep sum-

mer.

Anybody'd described her to him, and him not know-

ing, he'd of thought she'd stir his loins. Especially out

on this b'damned ocean with no other woman for many

a mile and many a long lonely night. Yet when he

looked at Troublesome of Brightwater, for all the sweet

curve of her breasts and hips and the perfection of her

face, he would of swom he could feel his manhood

shriveling in his trousers. He'd as soon of bedded a tall

stake of Tinaseeh ironwood.

That didn't mean he'd tolerate a dauncy and frac-

tious crew, whatever the feelings she raised in him or in

them. He'd keep the men too busy to have time left over

for mumblings and cany-ons. He wanted to get this fool

trip over with—he needed the money the Grannys had

come up with, and how they'd done it he couldn't imag-

ine, but it was none the less a fool trip for all that—and

42

And Then There'U Be Fireworks

he wanted to find himself back in his own bed, cosy

with his own wife, that was a sort round woman more

his style. With a voice like the call of an Ozark house-

dove just as the sun was coming up, and no more like

that female in the stem than if they'd been different

species altogether.

'"You turn to," he barked over his shoulder at the

men, "and 111 do my share, and we'll get this out of the

way and be home to brag on it before we have time to

think."

Nobody said "if we get home"; they weren't whiners.

They'd been offered a fair sum of money badly needed,

and they'd do the job it was offered for. Still, it was a

sony time of year to take to sea in a boat this size and

age. Troublesome or no Troublesome. Had the boat

been newer, that would of been a help; had it been

larger, they couldn't have handled her with only the five,

and that would not have been a good thing. It would

cause a certain amount of fuss and feathers to drown

five good men, for sure—but if they drowned a daughter

or Castle Brightwater they'd set every Granny on Ozark

whirling like a gig . . . that happen, they'd better hope

they all drowned with her. It'd be more comfortable in

the long run.

Behind the men. Troublesome chuckled under her

breath, and Gabriel John jumped like he'd been

pinched.

"Knows what we're thinking, that one does," he said

flatly.

"And so does the Mule, and that doesn't bother

you."

45

And Then There U Be- Fireworks

"She bothers me," insisted the man doggedly, "con-

sidering what I was thinking just then when she

laughed."

The captain turned back and grabbed Gabriel John's

shoulder in his Est. "That's one word too many," he said

through his teeth. "One word too manyl You guard

your thoughts and keep 'em proper; and you sail this

boat and keep your mind on your business. I don't in-

tend to have to say any of this again."

As they'd said, there were certain stands he was

obliged to take.

It happened that Troublesome did know what they

were thinking. But not because of any telepathic

powers, such as the Mules had, or the Magicians of

Rank. No special powers were required to read those

stiff backs with the muscles knotted round the necks-

whopping headaches they were going to have, later onl

—or the rigid shoulders, or their muttering back of their

hands and out of the comers of their mouths. It amused

her mightily to think that they could believe she had

special skills and still be fretting about their hides; it

showed a lack of common sense. After all, if this boat

went down, she'd go down with it Or perhaps it was

their souls that they were really worried about, and not

their hides; perhaps they thought the wickedness might

blow off of her in the seawind and stick to them forever

and ever more. She chuckled again, and watched the

muscles in their backs twitch to the sound, before she

turned her head to look out over the water.

She wasn't sure,of what she'd seen out there, not yet

44

And Then ThereU. Be Fireworks

Might could be it'd been only a trick of the light slanted

on the water, such as had ages back made men think

dragons swam in the oceans of Old Earth. Might could

be it had been the squint of her eye against that light, or

her irritation of mind. There was not a single reason to

believe that a creature never seen since First Landing-

seen then by a group of exhausted people that might

have been over given to imagining—should choose to

show up a thousand years later and swim alongside her

to Kintucky. It was as unlikely a happenstance as had

come her way within memory, and she wasn't going to

assume it for gospel too quickly.

First, she'd wait for another sight of that great tail

split three ways. And then probably she'd wait for the

loyal purple of the thing's flesh to show up clear in the

gray of the sea. And when both had happened, assum-

ing they did happen, she'd think it over—and might

could be she'd go below and swallow a dose to cure her

of her mindfollies.

The Teaching Story had not one word extra to spare

on the subject of the creature she half thought she'd

seen. The fuel on The Ship had gone bad. Every last

thing had been going from bad to worse. The time had

come when it was land or die; and then just as they

made a desperate plunge toward the planet below them

the engines gave up completely and The Ship fell into

the Outward Deeps. At which point, as the Grannys

taught ib

Even as the water closed over the dying ship and

First Granny told the children to stop their cater-

wauling and prepare to meet their Maker with their

45

And Then There'll Be Fireworks

mouths shut and their eyes open, a wonderful thing

happened. Just a wonderful thing!

Forty of them there were, shaped like the great

whales of Earth, but that their tails split three ways

instead of two. And their color was the royal pur-

ple, the purple of majestic sovereignty.

They met The Ship as it fell, rising up in a circle as

it sank toward the bottom. And they bore it up on

their backs as easy as a man packs a baby, and laid

it out in the shallows, where the Captain and the

crew could get The Ship's door open, and every-

body could wade right out of there to safety.

They were the Wise Ones, so named by First

Granny; and it may be that they live there still in

the Outward Deeps. . . .

And it may be that they don't. A thousand years ago,

that was, that First Granny had looked into the huge

eye of one of them and seen there something she

claimed at once for wisdom, and no least sign of them

since in all this long time. They could certainly all have

died—long, long ago. If ever they were real, that is, and

not an illusion born of desperation and nourished on

Grannytalk.

No other Teaching Story made mention of them, and

no song; not even a scrap of a saying referred to them. It

made them most unlikely traveling companions! Why,

even the creatures of Old Earth, those left-behind ones

that nobody'd seen since before the Ozarkers left their

home planet, came up now and again in sayings. Take

the groundhog; what a groundhog might be, Trouble-

46

And Then There'U Be Fireworks

some couldn't have said. There was nothing whatsoever

in die computer databanks about them, nor anywhere

else. But she knew easy enough from the roles ground-

hogs took in daily converse that they couldn't of been

any kind of hog- "Quick as a groundhog down a hole!"

the Grannys would say. "No bigger'n the ear on a

groundhog!" "Saw its shadow and popped under like a

groundhog!" Had to of been little, and quick, and some-

how significant; you could figure that out from the

scraps. But the creatures of the Outward Deeps? They

were mentioned nowhere at all, and what mysterious

purpose might bring one to be her escort now . . . She

sighed. It wasn't reasonable; but then her ignorance was

great

Troublesome turned her head to the wind and took a

deep breath of the salt air to drown out some of the fish

stink, and gathered her shawls closer round her, wrin-

kling her nose as the blown spray spattered her face. It

would come up a rain shortly, she was sure, and the men

would be blaming her for it Law, what wouldn't she

give to have had the weather skills they were willing to

lay to her account! Now that would of been of some

use. Dry fields she could of watered, and high winds tak-

ing off the good topsoil she could of tempered, and

where the rivers were bringing sullen rot to the roots of

growing things she could of driven back the clouds and

let the sun see to drying them out There'd of been a

good deal less hunger on Ozark if she'd been able to

turn her hand to such work as that.

Instead of which, she thought, reality falling back

over her with a thump, she was off on the wildest of

47

And Then There II Be Fireworks

goose chases, set her by seven dithering Grannys. Off to

see the Lewis Motley Wommack the 33rd-

No special wonder her sister had lusted after the man

and taken him so willingly to her bed. There was no

prettiness to him, no softness anywhere, but he was a

man to feast the hungry eyes on, not to mention a few

other senses- He gave off a kind of drawing warmth that

naturally made you want to shelter in it, male or female

—as she herself gave off a cold wind that said, Stand

Back! If lust had been one of the emotions known to

her she might very well have fancied him her own self;

in a kind of abstract fashion, she could see that. But

handy though he might be in a bed, the idea that some

act of his lay behind Responsible's sorry condition, or

that he could do anything to improve it ... ah, that

was only foolishness. Troublesome had no hope for the

journey's end; she traveled to Kintucky for the excellent

reason that she'd never been there and might never have

a second chance, and because curiosity was one of the

emotions she was familiar with.

There were times, in point of fact, when she found

herself so curious about the workings of this world that

the lack of any source to ask questions of was almost a

physical pain. At such times, there being no purpose to

such a feeling, she was grateful for the mountain to take

out her energies on, and she welcomed the work given

her to do though she understood it scarcely at all. She

would go at her loom then with a vengeance, making

the shuttle fly, singing ballads so old she didn't know

what half the words meant. Unlike her sister, she could

sing to pleasure even the demanding ear, and when her

48

And Then There'll Be Fireworks

audience was only birds and small creatures she didn't

mind doing it. There was nobody on the mountain to

wonder at a female singing out "I go to Troublesome to

mourn and weep" when the word was her very name,

nor to pity her for the next line all about sleeping un-

satisfied, nor to wonder as she changed tunes where

Waltzing Hayme might be. She loved the queer ancient

songs and valued them far above such frippery as was

sung these modem days.

Thinking of it, she very nearly began to sing, and

then remembered the five men—it would not do to have

them hear her singing and carry the tale of it back to

Brightwater. She closed her lips firmly on the riddling

song she'd almost let escape, and resolved to close her

mind just as tight to the questions running round there.

She'd get no answers to them in her lifetime, and might

could be it wasn't meant that humans should have those

answers. Might could be, for instance, that they were

the proper knowledge of the Wise Ones, kept in trust

against a time when they might be needed, . . .

Granny Hazelbide, commenting to the little girls on

Ae Teaching Story about the saving of the Ozarkers at

First Landing, always said the same thing: "First

Granny looked right into the eyes of one of them, just

right into its eyes! And she said then and there, no hesi-

tating and no pondering on it, 'They are the Wise

Ones,' and no doubt that is so."

Perhaps, thought Troublesome. Perhaps. She'd seen

eyes to creatures that looked to contain all the secrets of

the universe. The feydeer, for example, along the ridges

above timberline. They had eyes you could gaze into

49

And Then There'U Be Fireworks

forever, and they had minds as empty as a shell left

behind by its tenant and scoured out by a determined

housewife. Rain gave them a fever that became a pneu-

monia and kept them few in number, but they hadn't

sense enough to go down a few feet on the mountain

where they could have stood beneath a tree or under a

ledge out of the weather. They just waited, shaking and

bedraggled, for the rain to kill them off. It gave the lie

to those eyes, for all they looked so knowing.

She had a firm intention, if there was indeed a Wise

One keeping this dilapidation of a boat company for

some purpose of its own; and it was that intention that

kept her here with her eyes fixed to the water, hour after

hour. She wanted to look, her own self, "right into" the

eye of the sea creature. It would be an eye to remember,

if it were no more a gate to wisdom than the feydeer'sl

Judging by the tail she thought she'd caught a glimpse

of, be the animal truly wise or truly foolish it was as big

as this boat The eyes would be ... how big? The size

of her head, with a pupil to match? Might could be.

Law, to see that, to give it a look as it rose to dive, and

to get a look back! That would be a thing to remember

all her days and all her nights, and she had no intention

of missing it if it came her way. She had no other

chores; she would sit here and watch over the water for

that exchange of glances, all the way to Kintucky and all

the way back if need be.

The men turned surly eventually, as was to be ex-

pected. And after they'd seen Troublesome well onto

50

And Then There'U Be Fireworks

the land the captain thought it prudent to let them talk

it out of their systems while the boat rode at anchor.

They went on awhile about their various disgruntle-

ments, allowing as how they were sony they ever let the

Grannys tempt them to this forsaken place. Allowing as

how they'd never before seen a Mule swim the sea with

a woman on its back and they called that witchery and

they'd like to hear the captain deny them that. And they

did a ditty on the short rations—as if they were any

shorter than they'd been ashore—and another on the

constant drizzling rain that had pursued them all the

way and looked likely to pursue them all the way back,

and they'd like to hear the captain deny them that!

Adam Sheridan Brightwater was wise in the ways of

surly men; he denied nothing, made uninterpretable

noises when they drew breath and seemed to expect a re-

sponse, and let them wear themselves out. Only when

they were reduced to muttering that if she hadn't been a

woman, by the Holy One, they'd of gone off and left her

and her bedamned Mule to tend for themselves did he

add anything to the conversation. Seeing as there was no

knowing how long they'd be there waiting for her, he

thought it might be better to turn their minds from the

idea of abandoning her in the Kintucky forests and

heading for home.

^'What do you suppose she was looking at back there

all that time?" he threw out, rubbing at his beard.

"That has got to be the lookingest woman ever I did see

. . . and nothing to look at but water, water, and still

more water. Thought her eyes would drop right out of

her head."

51

And Then There'U Be Firework

"I don*t know what it was she was staring after/'

Gabriel John answered him prompdy, "but I know one

thing—it never turned up, and she's given up on it"

"How do you know that?

"Heard her. This is a mighty smafl boat, if you hadn't

noticed that already, for keeping secrets on."

"What'd she say?" demanded Black Michael, and

when Gabriel John told them they whistled long and

low.

"No woman says that," declared Haven McDaniels

Brightwater.

"She did." Gabriel John was staunch as staunch.

"Right in a string, she said it, three broad words such as

I never heard before at one time in the mouth of a man.

And I saw her give the gunwales a kick that I doubt did

her foot much good. In a right smart temper, she was!"

"We could ask her," Michael Callaway proposed.

"Ask her? You enjoy being dogbit, Michael Calla-

way?"

"There's no dogs on this boat, you damned fool!

Mules, but no dogs. Talk sense, why don't you!"

Black Michael gave him an equally black look and

smacked his thigh with the flat of his hand and called

him a damned fool.

"You ask her a question," he said, "shell take your

head right off at the armpits! Dogbit's not a patch on it,

I can tell you. Why, I had the uppity gall to ask her

highandmightyness could I help her with a jammed

hatch, Michael Callaway, and I near lost part of my

most valuable anatomy when she flung it back at me

. . . you'd of thought I'd offered to toss her skirts up

52

And Then There'U Be Fireworks

and tumble her, tall scrawny gawk that she is, and I

meant her only a kindness! Huh! I say leave her alone,

as Ae Grannys directed, and be grateful if she follows

suit Womanbit, that's what you'll be otherwise ... or

womankicked, or womanstung, or worse!"

Captain Brightwater nodded his agreement with that

as a general policy, it being somewhat more than obvi-

ous, and the nods went slowly all round.

"Maybe she'll sight whatever it was on the way back

after all," he said easily. "And maybe that'll make her

pleasanter to be around. We can hope."

Troublesome, doing her best to keep the branches

rrom whipping Dross into a refusal to go on through the

Kintucky Wilderness, was not expecting any such thing.

The tail she'd seen again, a time or two, and a flash of

purple. Sufficient to prove that the animal was there and

as real as she was. But had it meant her to see anything

more, had it intended a shared glance, it would have

happened by now, and she'd resigned herself to that

She'd not be staring over the water on the trip back,

yearning after what she was not to have.

She only hoped they'd make it back to Marktwain,

Glad as she was that they hadn't seen their huge com-

panion, those stalwart sailing men, and determined as

she was to let slip no careless word now or later, she was

astonished. It seemed to her that they might well have

trouble even finding Marktwain again, it being no

bigger than a continent- What kind of sailors were they,

that an animal the size of their boat could swim along-