"Back up; you've just lost me." Jane sat down beside him and rested an arm across his shoulders. "Just who and what is Jomo?"
Makhno turned to stare at her, then remembered that she'd spent less than a turn at the landing-site before getting her land-grant, collecting her settler, and himself, and striking off into the wilderness. What she knew of Docktown she'd learned mostly through Makhno, and he hadn't told her everything.
"Okay, from the top." Makhno rubbed his eyes. "Remember the day you came in on the third ship, right after you got back from seeing Castell?"
"Oh, yes." Jane chuckled.
She remembered that well; as soon as she'd set foot on the lake shore, she'd gone after Charles Castell, finally caught up to him in a cow-barn, and asked him then and there for legal right to a full land-grant. Of course she could have just gone off and land-squatted, as so many did, but the fact that she bothered to ask the head of the Church of Harmony had impressed the old man. In return, he had bothered to ask her what manner of land she wanted and how she meant to work it.
In the end they'd struck a mutually profitable deal; Jane got a river island in exchange for a tithe of her crops for the next five years. A secondary deal for breeding-stock of turkeys, pigs and two cows for another half-tithe. She'd headed back to the landing-site, looking for a boat and whistling "Solidarity Forever," feeling quite charitably disposed toward Castell and his crowd.
"That's when I got hold of you and the Black Bitch, to take me down river."
"Right, right." Makhno had a vivid memory of the first time he'd seen her, a big stocky blonde woman in denim bib overalls, wrapped bundle of tools on her shoulder, huge pack on her back, plodding up to his ship. "You remember, after you stowed your pack and went out to collect volunteers. ."
"You thought I was nuts." Jane grinned, remembering the skinny, grease-stained, hungover riverboat-captain who believed all the usual crap about "transportees," "Especially when I asked only women."
Makhno winced. Looking back now, it made sense; the women had no illusions about their situation, good reason to fear what the bigger and badder elements might try on them. Damn right, they'd taken Jane's offer to get out of town and set up on their own.
"Well, that was part of the problem, you know," he reminded her. "There you were with a whole gang of women. A real prize for any pimp."
"I don't recall that we had much trouble with that," Jane frowned. "Just that one fool who came up and tried to bully us. . "
"And you hit him on the head with the shovel," Makhno finished. "That was Jomo. He won't remember you kindly."
That too was part of the problem. Jomo had always been a strong-arm man and a thug, but now he was a thug with weapons, and was moving to secure all Docktown.
His first obstacle would be the other, smaller gangs. Jomo commanded about thirty men. DeCastro had about twenty, but until now they had been better armed: three shotguns, one old-but-serviceable rifle and nine pistols of various calibers. However, getting ammunition for them was a problem. The rest of DeCastro's men carried clubs and knives and had shown great willingness to use them. Jomo, with his new weapons was a power to reckon with.
". . He must have made that arms deal way in advance," Makhno concluded. "When he knew the guns were coming in, he took out Old Harp, grabbed Harp's place. It won't take him long to deal with DeCastro and the others, take over Docktown, maybe even Castell City. . Hell, I was the one who delivered those crates! 'Mining Equipment'-Goddam, if only I'd known, I'd have pitched the things overboard!" Makhno pounded his fist on the stone floor.
Jane caught his wrist. "There's no way you could have known."
"I could have saved Docktown. . "
"But not Old Harp. You said he was killed before the ship landed."
"Yeah." Makhno took a deep breath and straightened his back. "So how do we deal with this, Janey? What do we do when Jomo takes over Docktown, maybe all the settlements he can find. He'll try to make himself king of the whole valley before he's done. How do we survive?"
"We organize," said Jane. "Up and down the river, among all our friends, we organize. Then, we strike."
Jomo was talking with his accountant, and the news was not good.
"For the last two turns the take is down, and instead of cash, barter is being offered. Most of those clients insist that Old Harp always took trade goods, so why don't we?" The accountant, a small skinny man of unguessable age and race, paused to tap his pen against his teeth.
Jomo briefly rattled his fingers on the table before him. "Has any of the trade been in foodstuffs?"
"No, and no beer either. It has mostly been in timber, some furs and in a few cases, fish from the lake. What beer we do get is made right here and is of very poor quality. It's hard to tell if food is going to Castell City, for the Harmies appear to be living on lake-fish and the. . paste from the synthetic-food plant, like the rest of us."
"So no real food is coming into Docktown?" Jomo frowned, remembering the taste of paste and baked lake-fish. "Not from inland or along the rivers?"
"No boats from anywhere up or downriver have come here for three turns." The accountant sighed. "In short, nothing coming in from out of town. The entire trade has dried up. I have not seen anything like this since I got here, and that was on the second ship."
". . Then this is not the result of poor harvest." Jomo tapped his fingers on the table again. "I believe we are victims of a boycott."
"That is my impression also, Master Jomo."
"If the supplies do not come to us, then we must go to them." Jomo set both palms flat on the table. "Send me DeCastro on your way out."
After the man left, Jomo glanced down at the desk where his second-best treasure lay: a recent satellite-map of the entire Shangri-La Valley. With it he could find any structure or farm in the valley, and then no one could hide from him. With the stunners and this map he would take all of Haven.
Leo Makhno considered that of all the ways of wasting time on Haven, trying to make the Harmonies understand a problem was his least favorite. They simply didn't comprehend that some problems could not be sung away and that others must be dealt with immediately.
He had been trying for the last two hours to convince Charles Castell that Jomo was a threat to the Harmonies and their way of life, and had gotten nowhere.
"You are not in tune Captain Makhno. This Jomo person only affects Docktown, not us. We have complied with your request not to trade farm goods to Docktown because that is harmonious with our beliefs, but to use violence against him, or to even support violence is discordant with our way."
Makhno sighed. "Then you will not help us against him?"
"No, Captain, there is nothing we can do. Even if there was, we would not. Each must find their own way in the Grand Tapestry of the Universal Song."
Leo could hear the capitals and knew that further talk was useless.
"Good-bye then, Mr. Castell. I hope you survive what is coming."
"We will, Captain. Go in peace."
Leo figured it was time to see if he could find at least one of the Military types he had seen earlier.
If a deal to at least train the women at Janesfort could be struck, some progress would be made.
Owen Van Damm was hunting. It was his profession to hunt on occasions, and he took pride in his ability at it. Right now he was approaching the "lair" when he saw his quarry leaving. He followed unobtrusively down the street.
This quarry was difficult in that he didn't walk very fast, perhaps slowed by his lame leg, and was quite aware of his surroundings. Van Damm stayed about ten meters back and ambled slowly.