Robert Heinlein - The Number of the Beast

"Good! I'll get busy at once!"

"No, Jacob." I explained what we were going to do. "While you two get

everything out of the car, Deety will teach me the rudiments of shotgun. Then I will take over guard duty and she can help unload. But keep your rifles loaded and handy, 'cause if I shoot, I'll need help in a hurry. Then, when we restow, I'll do it because I'm smallest and can stand up, mostly, behind the bulkhead. While Zebbie stands guard, and Deety and Jacob pass things in to me."

Jacob wasn't smiling-and I suddenly recognized his expression. I once had a dog who (theoretically) was never fed at the table. He would sit near my knee and look at me with that same expression. Why, my poor darling was hungry! Gut-rumble hungry. I had such a galloping case of nerves from becoming captain that I had no appetite.

"Deety, in the pantry back at Snug Harbor I noticed a carton of Milky Way bars. Did that get packed?"

"Certainly did! Those are Pop's-his vice and eventual downfall."

"Really? I don't recall seeing him eat one."

My husband said, "I haven't been eating them lately. All things considered, my dear-my dear Captain-I prefer you to candy bars."

"Why, thank you, Jacob! Will you share those candy bars? We understand that they are your personal property."

"They are not my personal property; they belong to all of us. Share and share alike."

"Yup," agreed Zebbie. "A perfect communism. 'From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs.' With the usual communist dictator on top."

"Zebbie, I've been called everything from a black reactionary to a promiscuous old whore-but never before a communist dictator. Very well, you may address me as 'Comrade Captain.' When we come across those candy bars, everybody grab one for quick energy-unless somebody remembers where they were packed?"

"Gay knows!" said Deety, and backed toward the car's open door while still keeping her eyes swinging the arc away from the river-perfect sentry and looking cute at it. "Gay Deceiver!"

"Hi, Deety! Getting any?"

"Inventory. Food supplies. Candy. Milky Way bars. Report location."

"Frame twenty. Starboard. Closed storage seven-Ess-high. Bottom shelf."

Five hours later everything was back inside except a heap of wrapping, packaging, and such-yet the increase in space was far greater than that pile. This was because storage did not have to be logical. Just tell Gay. A left shoe could fill an odd space in with the swords while the right shoe from the same pair was a space filler in a tool storage far to the rear-yet the only inconvenience lay in having to go to two places to get them.

I did the stowing; Deety stayed in the cabin, received items handed from outside, described the item to Gay, then described to Gay where the item was stowed, as I reported it. Gay was under instruction to hear only Deety's voice-

and what Deety told Gay was so logical that no one need remember it. Like this: "Gay Deceiver."

"Boss, when will you learn to say 'Please'?"

"Clothing. Zeb. Shoes. Field boots."

"Right boot. Abaft bulkhead. Starboard. Frame forty. Under deckplate. Outboard compartment. Left boot. Abaft bulkhead. Portside. Frame sixty. Under deckplate, middle compartment. Warning: Both boots filled with rifle ammo padded with socks."

You see? If you got categories in the wrong order, Gay would restring them. Give her the basic category and the identification, leaving out the other steps, and Gay would search the "tree" (Deety's words) and get the "twig" you identified. You could even fail to give category and she would search until she found it.

But hardest was to build up the decking of the rear compartment about twenty centimeters with chattels or stores that would not crush, fasten it down to keep it from floating in free fall, and make it smooth enough that it would not be unbearably lumpy as a bed-while making some effort neither to build into this platform nor to store in compartments under it things needed frequently or quickly.

I had to lower my standards. It is impossible to store so many things in such limited space and have all readily at hand.

I studied things outside, admitted that I could not do it, then asked for advice. Zebbie solved it: "Captain, do a dry run."

"Uh....o on, Zebbie."

"Take my sleeping bag inside, open it out. It is too wide for the space, especially at the rear. So keep it as far forward as you can and still miss Jake's twister and the bulkhead door. Mark the amount you have to lap it. Mark on the deck the foot of the opened-out bag. You'll find space abaft that, frustum of a cone, sort of. Drag the sleeping bag outside, mark the tuck-in, build your platform on it. Then fill that rear space and build a bulkhead. Better get Jake; he's a born mechanic."

"Zebbie, would you prefer to build this bed yourself?"

"Nope."

"Why not? I'm not speaking as captain; I'm inquiring as your old friend Sharpie."

"Because I'm twice as big as you, which makes that space half as big for me. Tell you what, Cap'n Sharpie-excuse me!-Captain Hilda-do the measuring. Meanwhile we'll pick out plunder that might be bricks in that platform. Then drag the sleeping bag outside. If you'll let Jake relieve me, Deety and I can piece together the platform in jig time."

It changed "impossible" to "possible." The cubbyhole was filled, contents held in place with opened-out cartons tied with wire to ho~d-downs-"padeyes" Jacob called them. The platform was built, chinked with this and that, covered with more flattened-out cartons, and topped off with sleeping bag and blankets.

It was still light. Deety assured me that there was one hour and forty-three

minutes till sundown. "Time enough if we hurry. Jacob, first bath. Deety, guard him. Both come back so Jacob can start dinner-then Zebbie and Deety go down-goodness, this sounds like the farmer and the rowboat with the fox and the geese-and bathe, taking turns guarding. Both come back; Deety relieves me; Zebbie takes me down to bathe while he guards. But please hurry; I want a bath, too. Forty minutes before sundown bathing stops and we eat- at sundown we are inside, dirty dishes and all, locked in till sunrise. If that does me out of a bath, we still hold to it. Jacob, how far is this 'easy way' down? I mean, 'How many minutes?"

"Maybe five. Hilda my love, if you weren't insisting on always-two-together there would be no hurry. All go down together; I hurry through my bath, grab my rifle and trot back. The rest needn't hurry. You've got us going down and up, down and up, four times-forty minutes. Which squeezes four baths into twenty minutes, five minutes to undress, soap, squat down and rinse off, towel dry, and dress. Hardly worth the trip."

"Jacob, who guards you while you're getting supper? No. I can bathe in the morning." (Damn! I wanted that bath. I'm used to a shower in the morning, a tub at night, a bidet at any excuse. Decadent-that's me.)

"Beloved, this place is safe. While we were out earlier, Zeb and I scouted for sign. None. That's when we found this way down to the creek. It would be a natural watering place. No sign. I don't think there are any large fauna here."

I was wavering when Deety spoke up. "Pop, that's three down-and-ups, not four, as Zebadiah and I get baths on one. But, Captain Hilda, if we all go down and come back together, there can't be danger. Put that stuff back inside and lock up, of course." She pointed at Jacob's preparations. While Jacob had been handing stuff to Deety, he had set aside a hot plate, cooking and eating utensils, a tarpaulin, comestibles for supper and breakfast, and had passed word for me please to store food so that it could be reached easily.

Jacob said hastily, "Deety, I've got it planned for minimum therbligs. Dried apricots soaking in that pan, soup mix in that one. There's no level deck space left inside."