Piers Anthony - Rings of Ice

They spotted the lined posts of a guard rail, well anchored but almost submerged. And a tall, firmly-positioned direction sign. Other than these, all was blank water. There were trees, but they were set far back from the highway, useless for this purpose.

“Three tie-ons should do it, for a start,” Thatch said. “Fifty, one hundred, and one-fifty.”

“I don’t see how—” Zena started.

Thatch headed back, not trying to explain. Damn him!

Gordon had split the end of one length of line and formed it into two little loops. These he hooked over the projecting ends of one bicycle wheel’s axle, and fastened them in place by screwing the wheel-nuts down tight against them. The arrangement made little sense to Zena. Obviously the wheel could now be hung from the rope in such a way that it would turn freely, but one turning wheel would hardly provide the leverage required.

“We have anchorages,” Thatch said. “Fifty, one hundred, and one-fifty feet.”

“Wrong ratios,” Gordon said, completing the split-end mounting of another wheel. “Twenty-five, fifty and one hundred is the most we can do—a little less, actually, allowing for the ties and the wheel diameters. I hope the rope can take the strain, even so. Here, I’ll show you.”

Gordon produced a crayon and drew on the glass of the bus’s back window. The lines were waxy and faint, but could be followed:

“You see, we have a three-stage reduction system,” Gordon said. “Each pulley doubles the force, reducing the forward motion by half. By the time it gets to the load— which will be the bus—our projected one horsepower of pull has become eight horsepower. But our hundred feet of forward motion has become only twelve and a half. No way around that; we’ve got to give up distance in favor of power. And we won’t really get that much power; maybe fifty per cent will be taken up by the inefficiency of the system. Wheel resistance, rope friction, and so forth. But it should be enough to get the job done, eventually.”

“But the rope’s only good for a thousand pounds,” Zena protested. “Half a ton. The bus must weigh ten times that!”

“Good point, and I am concerned,” Gordon said. “But there are mitigations. The cord around each wheel is in effect doubled, and we can double the high-tension link too. That should give us a ton—and of course we’re hauling, not lifting. If we’re careful…”

Yes, he had thought it out. What a change from sexy blonde Gloria! Gordon was a more practical male than he chose to let himself believe.

Tediously they set it up and strung it out. They made the anchorages to the posts of the fence, and fastened the base rope to the front of the motor home. “Take off the brakes!” Thatch yelled to Gus.

Then they trudged out and took hold of the front rope, near the lead wheel. There were some last-minute adjustments to get the assembly straight; actually the wheels were out of sight as they lay under the water. But when they made a concerted pull the bike wheels came up and the rope moved. It was working!

They moved the bus forward ten feet. Then Zena ran back to prop the wheels while the men held on. The resistance of the system that made the hauling hard also helped them hold it in place between pulls. Gus could have used the brakes, but it seemed better to leave him out of it for now.

Another set of attachments, another ten or twelve feet. And another, and another. Hours passed, and the gloom of evening closed in, and still the rain pelted down mercilessly. There seemed to be no one living in all the world except the three of them—and of course lazy Gus, dry and warm inside.

Zena felt the first stirrings of what she suspected could blossom into a full-fledged hate-affair. This preposterous situation!

At last they reached unflooded roadbed. And Gus let them in. But it was not the comfort she had expected in her delirium of fatigue. The motor had been dead for hours and the interior was chill.

“We’ve got to caulk this crate,” Gus said. “The water came in. The rug’s ruined!”

Zena stifled another hysterical laugh. “The rug!”

“Not only that,” Gus continued seriously. “The refrigerator’s stopped.”

Cold as she was, Zena hardly cared. She moved back to poke into the closets, seeking more dry clothing. Even one of those dowdy dresses would do.

“Water must have snuffed the pilot light,” Gordon said. “That’s of small moment. But you’re right: we can’t let the water flood us out every time we pass through a lake. We’ll have to seal off every access. We can put plastic sheeting over the external access panels, braced by hard-board and sealed over with furnace tape. Main problems will be the passenger door and the engine compartment. We’ll have to forage for what we need.”

Gus looked at him. “You know, I think I like you better as a man. You’ve got a head for practicalities.”

Exactly Zena’s thought. Gordon did not deign to answer.

Zena found a warm dress and shut herself into the bathroom to change. She could hear the men talking, despite the noise of rain outside.

“Now get the engine going!” Gus told Thatch.

“I don’t know anything about motors!” Thatch protested.

“I do,” Gordon interjected. “Gloria’s a fool about cars—that’s why we ran out of gas. But I can—”

“You can start it?” Gus cried happily.

“I’ll need a light, and some shelter when I lift the exterior access panel. So the rain doesn’t short it out all over again. And some dry cloth, and tools.”

“Fix him up!” Gus snapped to Thatch.

“There’s an interior access,” Thatch said. By the sound of it, he was rummaging in the closets.

“Why so there is!” Gordon exclaimed. “Beautiful!”

Zena emerged from the bathroom to find Gordon at work between the two front seats. She didn’t know what he did, but before long there was the blessed roar of the motor. They were on their way again!

She slept for an hour on the back couch, then woke as the bus stopped. For a moment she thought it meant more flooding, but then she heard a woman’s sharp voice.

“Three men?” the unseen female inquired. “Long trip north? I’m hungry and I’m wet, but I’m not ripe for harem duty yet! Move on—I’ll take my chances here!”

After more dialogue, too low to be intelligible, the door closed and they moved on. Zena smiled, thinking of the harem accusation. The nomenclature was wrong. A harem would be one man and three women. Then she frowned, realizing that the nameless woman would probably pay for her spirit with her life. Where would she find another lift to the mountains?

Harem… she thought as she drifted back to sleep.

She dreamed of being decked out in filmy petticoat-trousers, waiting for the Sultan.

Abruptly she was awake. Harem! That was what Gus and Thatch had been planning! Obvious all along, but she had somehow blinded herself to it. Nothing so ambitious as an empire—just making time while the sun shone.

She peered out at the rain. Sun?

That faceless girl—left behind to die, just because she had pride and spunk.

Zena was on her feet. “Turn around!” she screamed, rushing up the passage.

Gus and Gordon, nodding in the dining alcove, snapped alert. “What?” Gus demanded.

“You left a girl out there to die,” Zena accused him. “Now turn about and go back and pick her up!”

“Are you crazy? That was an hour ago!” Gus said.

“Twenty-five minutes ago,” Gordon corrected him, looking at his dainty feminine watch.

“I don’t care how long ago!” Zena yelled, sounding hysterical in her own ears. “Thatch, you turn around.”