Lucifer's Hammer - Larry Niven [196]
"Welcome to the palace," Harvey said. "Here, get that jacket off and let yourself dry out a bit." He spoke calmly and naturally, as if there were nothing strange about finding her alone on a bare rock knob in a lightning storm.
The shelter was large; there was room to stand. Harvey shrugged himself out of the rainhat and poncho, then helped her with the jacket. He hung the wet clothes on pegs near the open entrance.
"What are you guarding?" Maureen asked.
"The back way in." He shrugged. "In this rain it's not likely that anyone will come or that I'd see them if they did, but we have to get the shelter built."
"Do you live here?"
"No. We take turns. Me, Tim Hamner, Brad Wagoner and Mark. Sometimes Joanna. We all live down below here. Didn't you know?"
"Yes."
"I haven't seen you since we got here," Harvey said. "I came looking a couple of times, but I got the impression you wouldn't ever be at home for me. And I wasn't all that welcome around the big house. Thanks for voting for me, anyway."
"Voting?"
"The Senator said you'd asked to have me let in."
"You're welcome." That had been easy enough to decide. I don't sleep with every man I meet. Even if you got terminal guilt and went off to another room, it was nice, and I don't really regret it. There's an honest thought. If I thought enough of you to sleep with you, I sure as hell had to save your life, didn't I?
"Have a seat." He waved toward the wooden box. "Eventually there'll be furniture. Nothing else to do up here but work on the place."
"I don't see what good you're doing here," Maureen said.
"Nor I. But try to explain that to Hardy. The maps show this as a good place for a guard post. When the visibility is more than fifty yards it will be, too, but right now it's a waste of manpower."
"We've got plenty of manpower," Maureen said. She sat gingerly on the box and leaned back against the hard boulder. The plastic liner between her back and the boulder was damp from water condensing on its inside surface. "You're going to have to insulate this," she said. She ran a finger along the wet plastic.
"All in good time." He stood nervously in the center of the shelter, finally went over to the air mattress and sat on top of his sleeping bag.
"You think Al's a fool," she said.
"No. No, I didn't say that." Harvey's voice was serious. "I suppose I could do some good up here. Even if a raiding party got past me, I'd be an armed man behind them. And any warning I could give would be worth something down there. No, I don't think Hardy's a fool. As you say, we've got plenty of manpower."
"Too much," Maureen said. "Too many people, not enough food." She didn't recognize this matter-of-fact man who sat on his sleeping bag and never smiled; who didn't talk about galactic empires, and didn't ask why she was up here. This wasn't the man she'd slept with. She didn't know who he was. Almost he reminded her of George. He seemed confident. The rifle he'd brought in was leaning against the post, ready to his hand. There were cartridges sewn in loops on his jacket pocket.
In all this world there are two people I've slept with, and they're both strangers. And George doesn't really count. What you do at fifteen doesn't count. A hurried, frantic coupling on this hill, not very far from here, and both of us so afraid of what we'd done that we never talked about it again. Afterward we acted as if it had never happened. That doesn't count.
George, and this man, this stranger. Two strangers. The rest are dead. Johnny Baker must be dead. My ex-husband too. And … There weren't many more to inventory. People she'd cared for, for a year, for a week, for one night even. They