A meadow was the assigned meeting place, and by noon the clans would be there.
Questions and introductions and ceremony had detained Jonnie until after eleven of the morning, and he looked up with a shock to see that he had very little time indeed to get to the plane and stop Terl from committing a folly that would ruin the future.
With a sharp pain in his side from exertion, Jonnie pounded up the steep, twisting trail, swift feet spurning the ground. He hardly dared take time to check the sun. He could not be sure whether Terl was keeping the appointment by a clock or by the heavens. He dreaded any moment to hear ahead of him the roar of the plane taking off for a lethal pass over the village.
More than five miles and all uphill! And over a very bad trail.
Jonnie heard the beginnings of a start-up ahead of him. He was almost there. He burst through the brush at the edge of the plateau. The plane was already beginning to rise.
He yelled, waving his arms, racing forward. If he missed, all his work would be undone.
The plane hovered, feet off the ground, turning toward the village.
Jonnie threw his kill-club the last thirty feet to strike the fuselage and attract attention.
The plane settled back. Jonnie collapsed on the ground, drawing air in loud, hoarse breaths. The roar of the plane turned off and Terl opened the door.
“Did they chase you out?” said Terl into his face mask. “Well, get in, animal, and we'll go down and carry out a proper plan.”
“No,” said Jonnie as he crawled up into the seat, still panting. His feet were bruised from stones and he inspected them. “It’s all set.”
Terl was derisive. “All night I saw fires burning on the tops of the hills. I was sure they were roasting you for a feast!”
“No,” said Jonnie. “They lit fires to call in candidates for the work group.”
Terl plainly did not see how this could be.
“We have to be very careful,” said Jonnie.
Terl could agree with that.
“They're going to meet in a meadow about three miles from here.”
“Ah, you got them to get together so we could blast them better.”
“Look, Terl, we can succeed only if we do this exactly right.”
“You sure are wheezing. Tell me the truth, are they chasing you?”
Jonnie threw down a moccasin and it made a loud snap. “Blast it! It 's all arranged! Only we have to finish it. There will be hundreds in that meadow. I want you to land at the upper edge of it. I’ll show you where. And then you must sit in the door of the plane and do absolutely nothing. Just sit there. I will choose from the candidates. We will get them aboard and leave by tomorrow morning.”
“You're giving me orders?” shouted Terl.
“That's how it was arranged.” He was putting his moccasins back on. “You must just sit there in the plane door so you can watch and make sure it all goes well.”
“I understand,” said Terl with a sudden grin. “You have to have me there to frighten them into submission!”
“Exactly,” said Jonnie. “Can we go down there now?”
Chapter 11
There had never been so many together within memory, Robert the Fox said.
Over a thousand Scots, with a few English and some Norsemen, crowded the broad meadow. They had brought some food and drink. They had brought arms– just in case. And they had brought their pipers. The panorama was of colored kilts, ponies, shifting groups of men, and smoke from fires, and over all lay the skirling whine and shriek of bagpipes.
There was a momentary surge back when the plane landed on the little knoll overlooking the meadow. But on Jonnie's instructions the Chiefs had briefed their people well. And when the huge Terl took his position within the open plane door, there was no unseemly panic. The men left a wide distance between the plane and themselves, however. The obvious fear Terl saw on some of the faces confirmed for him that the animal had been right: he was needed there to overawe them.
Jonnie kept one eye on Terl. He could not be sure that Terl's sadism would not cause some sort of incident.
Over five hundred young men were part of the throng. Their Chiefs had already talked to them and they gathered now in a central group below Jonnie.
Jonnie sat on a horse lent him by Chief Glencannon so he could be seen by all. He sat the mount easily even though it had a saddle and bridle, things Jonnie had never seen before and that he considered effete for one who never had trouble with horses.
The Chiefs and heads of groups stood with their young men. Outside these groups and at the edge of the crowd stood pipers. A few women, some young, some old, and older men sat on the grass where a knoll side overlooked the scene. A few children raced about, running into legs.
Jonnie began. He already knew they had been briefed. His job was made much easier by a high literacy level among these people. They had not lost the art of reading and writing and they knew a lot of history, mainly their own myths and legends.
“You all know why I am here. I want fifty young men who are able, courageous, and strong, to go on a crusade to rid the world of the demon up there who does not speak or understand our language. When I ask you to look at him and shrink back in fear, please do so.”
“I amna afeered ofnaething!" said one young man.
“Just act so when I ask you to. I will not for a moment believe, and neither will your friends, that you are afraid. All right?”
The young man said it was.
“I feel it is necessary to tell you the character of this demon so you can help me. He is treacherous, vicious, sadistic, and devious. He lies from choice even when the truth will serve. When I point now, cower back and look terrified.”
Jonnie pointed. The crowd, on cue, looked up at Terl in the plane door and cowered back.
Terl grinned behind his face mask. This was more like it.
“The mining company that conquered this planet in ages past has equipment and technology beyond those of man. Planes in the air, machines to drill the earth, gases and guns that can slaughter whole cities. Man has been deprived of his planet by these creatures. The men who volunteer to come with me will learn to use those tools, fly those planes, man those guns!
“Our chances are not in our favor. Many of us may die before this is through.
“Our race is growing fewer in numbers. In coming years we may be gone forever. But even though the odds are against us, at least let it be said that we took this small last chance and tried."
The crowd went into a raving, excited roar of enthusiasm. The pipes took it up and screamed. Drums pounded.
In to the din, Jonnie shouted, “I want fifty volunteers!”
All volunteered instantly. Not just the five hundred young men but the whole thousand in the meadow.
When he could again be heard above the shrilling pipes and shouting voices, Jonnie announced a series of tests he would give during the afternoon. The Chiefs turned to their people to organize it and Jonnie dropped down from the horse.
"Mon, MacTyler," cried the grizzled old man who had first captured Jonnie, “ye are a true Scot!”
And Jonnie found, as he assisted in straightening out the turmoil for the tests, that his name had indeed changed to MacTyler. There were even some arguments as to which clan his people had originally belonged to, but it was at length decided that the MacTylers had been distributed evenly among all the clans before they went to America.
The only problem with the tests was in trying to disqualify someone. Jonnie had the young men, one after another, walk a straight line with closed eyes to make sure their sense of balance was good; he made them run a distance to be certain their wind was excellent; he made them look at letters at a distance to make sure their sight was passing. Only a couple of the Norsemen were as tall as Jonnie, but the scattering of black beards and blond beards was about equal. Jonnie assumed that refugees from Scandinavia or the lower countries and even from Ireland had changed their blood over the centuries, but it certainly had not changed the hard-core ethnology of the Highlands, which had held out now against all corners and defeats for thousands of years.