Lucifer's Hammer - Larry Niven [225]
"And Armitage—"
"Says you are the chief angel of the Lord," Jackie said. "He say your sins are forgiven, you and all of us, we're forgiven and we got to do God's work, with you as Chief Angel."
Sergeant Hooker stared at them, wondering if they were falling under the spell of that ranting preacher, wondering if the preacher meant what he was saying. Hooker had never been a superstitious man, but he knew Captain Hora used to take the chaplains seriously. So did some of the other officers, ones that Hooker had admired. And … dammit, Hooker thought, dammit, I don't know where we're going, and I don't know what we ought to do, and I do wonder if there's any reason for anything, if there's a reason we stayed alive.
He thought of the people they'd killed and eaten, and thought there had to be a purpose to it all. There had to be a reason. Armitage said there was a reason, that it was all right, all the things they'd done to stay alive …
That was attractive. To think there'd been a purpose to it all.
"And he say I'm his chief angel?" Hooker demanded.
"Yeah, Sarge," Jackie said. "Didn't you listen to him?"
"Not really." Hooker stood. "But I'm sure as hell going to listen to him now."
Sixth Week: The High Justice
No proposition is likelier to scandalise our contemporaries than this one: it is impossible to establish a just social order.
Bertrand de Jouvenal, Sovereignty
Alvin Hardy made a final check. Everything was ready. The library, the great book-lined room where the Senator held court, had been arranged and everything was in its place. Al went to tell the Senator.
Jellison was in the front room. He didn't look well. There was nothing Al could put his finger on, but the boss looked tired, overworked. Of course he was. Everyone worked too hard. But the Senator had kept long hours in Washington, and he'd never looked this bad.
"All set," Hardy said.
"Right. Start," Jellison ordered.
Al went outside. It wasn't raining. There was bright sunshine. Sometimes there were two hours of sunshine a day. The air was clear, and Hardy could see the snow on the peaks of the High Sierra. Snow in August. It seemed to be down to the six-thousand-foot level yesterday; today it was lower, after last night's storm. The snow was inexorably creeping toward the Stronghold.
But we're getting ready for it, Hardy thought. From the porch of the big house he could see a dozen greenhouses, wood frames covered with plastic drop cloths found in a hardware store, each greenhouse covered with a web of nylon cord to keep the thin plastic from billowing in the wind. They wouldn't last more than one season, Al thought, but it's one season we're worried about.
The area around the house was a beehive of activity. Men pushed wheelbarrows of manure which was shoveled into pits in the greenhouses. As it rotted it would give off heat, keeping the greenhouses warm in winter—they hoped. People would sleep in them, too, adding their own body heat to the rotting manure and grass clippings, anything to keep the growing plants warm enough, which seemed silly today, in bright August sunshine—except that already there was a tinge of cold to the air, as breezes came down from the mountains.
And a lot of it was going to be wasted effort. They weren't used to hurricanes and tornadoes here in the valley, and no matter how hard they tried to place the greenhouses where they'd be sheltered from high winds, yet get enough sunshine, some of them would be blown down. "We're doing all we can," Hardy muttered. There was always more to do, and there were always things they hadn't thought of until too late, but it might be enough. It would be close, but they were going to live.
"That's the good news," Hardy said to himself. "Now for the bad."
A ragged group stood near the porch. Farmers with petitions. Refugees who'd managed to get inside the Stronghold and wanted to plead for permanent status and had managed to talk Al—or Maureen, or Charlotte—into getting them an appointment with the Senator. Another group stood well apart from the petitioners. Armed