"We're buyers, not sellers. We'd like to speak to Mr. Steiner. We don't have an appointment."
"You don't have a what?"
"Never mind, can we come in?"
There was a pause.
"He says he'll come out."
Steiner was a sizable man with a shock of red hair grow-ing out of freckled skin. After a glance at the visitors, he rowed himself across in a small flat-bottomed boat.
Valentine guessed him to be about thirty-five. He wore rawhide sandals and a short wide-necked tunic that made Valentine think of pictures he had seen of Romans. It looked cool and comfortable.
"My guess is y'all are Wolves out of Southern Command. If you're looking to buy rice, I already sell mine up in Pine Bluff. I've got an agent there. And don't go quoting your Common Articles, this spread isn't part of Southern Command's ground. We built it, no help from you, and we hold it, no help from you. Last jumped-up bushwhacker that tried that ten percent routine walked up threatening and ran off yelping."
Valentine held the man's gaze. "You think you hold it, no help from us. How long you'd keep it if the Free Territory weren't still standing is another question. But I'll concede the point to save an argument."
"I'm done talking," said Steiner.
"Quite a spread you've got here. You must have room for fifty families or more. Is this a refuge if the Kur come through?"
"That's our business, Running Gun."
"We're a couple of tired Running Guns, Mr. Steiner. Hungry, too. Part of my unit is camped near the Ouachita, and I'm just trying to get to know the neighbors. I'm impressed. I've never seen a settlement quite like this in the borderlands. I'd like a better look."
"It took a lot of hard years, mister."
"Valentine, David. Lieutenant with the Arkansas Wolf Regiment."
Steiner considered. "Mr. Valentine, we don't take strangers in normally, but you seem a better sort than your usual Com-mand type. I'll offer you a tour and a meal, but I don't want your men showing up weekly, making speeches about how totin' a gun for Southern Command entitles them to a fried chicken dinner. You'll see things not many in your outfit have seen, or want to see."
They took the little dinghy to the island. More corrugated aluminum covered the wooden gate. Valentine wondered if Steiner knew his aluminum wouldn't do him any good against white phosphorus bombs.
They passed through the gate-
And froze. A pair of Grogs stood inside, cradling their long rifles. They wore tunics similar to Steiner's and pulled back rubbery lips to reveal yellow teeth.
Bozich gasped, reaching for her carbine.
"Wait, Bozich, leave the gun," Valentine barked, putting his hand on her barrel to keep her from raising it. His heart pounded, but the Grogs kept their guns in a comfortable cradled position.
"Don't worry," Steiner said. "These aren't the usual Gray-backs. They're friendly."
"I've seen a tame Grog before."
"These ain't tame," Steiner said, flushing. "They're as free as you and me."
Valentine looked at the homes. The village resembled Weening in its circular shape, but there were no barns, just henhouses and goats. A water tower stood in the center of the village, and the community focal point appeared to be the troughs where the women did the laundry. A female Grog (with just two breasts; Valentine had heard they had four teats, like a cow) pressed the water out of her wash with a bellowslike tool. People and Grogs stopped to stare at the strangers.
Steiner invited them up onto a porch of a small house and bade them them to sit down on a comfortable-looking wooden bench.
"Mr. Valentine," Steiner began, "a long time ago I came out of Mississippi with a Grog named Big Joke. He helped me and my wife escape a labor camp, and we found the Free Territory. Some of your Wolves picked us up in the border region, took both of us prisoner. Prisoner! After weeks of trying to get to this 'bastion of freedom," I had to go before a judge with the Grog who saved my life and beg for both of ours. I'm either convincing or she was liberal, and we were released as citizens of the Free Territory. Big Joke and I learned quick that there was no place for Grogs in your towns. The person- and he is a person, even if they think a little different than us-I owed my life to couldn't get a job, a bed, or a meal for love or money. Best he could do was 'work for food' on the docks. So my wife, Big Joke, and I headed south and found this land in the midst of these swamps. I'd spent years draining swamps and building paddies in Mississippi for them, so doing it a couple years for me came easy. A few others came down and joined us. That was the beginning of a lot of hard times, but we got this built."
"You lost your wife early on. I'm sorry."
Steiner's brows came together. "How-?"
"We came in past the cemetery. I saw a Lalee Steiner, who seemed about the right age. "Evergreen' was a tribute to her?"