JAMES DICKEY
453
maybe not so much, and somewhere in it, down the dock from where I
was, I heard voices, and they were coming. I hit a stillness, a new stillness
like a marmot's, and two little men came by shorter than me, even, al–
most transparent with smoke, talking right into each other's faces. I
hadn't had time to find the chute, and I hoped they wouldn't notice it,
wherever it was. I had my hand on my knife, but didn't even crack the
blade to light, to any sort of light; I didn't want to give light a chance
at it, even though I was in the shadow of the crane. They went past till I
couldn't hear them.
Using every bit of cover on the dock, I went looking for the
chute, and finally found it spread and crumpled over some barrels and
boxes, like it was making a display. I bundled it up and shoved it under
the boxes, piled some other boxes and crates on it, then walked back a
ways toward the crane - it was friendly - and tried to size up the situa–
tion, decide what to do. I really didn't have any notion just then; just a
feeling something like the one I got when the guns of the fighter
sparkled and I knew he was on the pursuit curve; a feeling that was a
kind of guess but not completely; a guess with another thing added to it,
something I didn't have a name for. I didn't want a name .
It
was not
words.
What did I need? Where the bombs had hit had been concentrated
in one place, I had seen from the chute, but the smoke was fading off
now and I couldn't hear any more sirens.
In
other words, I couldn't
bank on people having to deal with the fire. And the bomb drop was
only in a small part of Tokyo. Since I hadn't seen any night watchmen
011
the ocean-side of the docks, I thought I might have a look down the
streets between the dock-buildings, and try to find out what they went
into. I edged out past the co rner of the warehouse nearest to the crane,
looked as far as I co uld toward the city, and then started down that
way, in the fullest and longest shadows I could find .
If I
saw a single
person I would turn back, and try something else.
I got almost to the end of the building, and could see a little way
into the blacked-out blocks, when I heard voices; not one or two but a
lot. A whole crowd went by the end of my truck-alley, talking fast.
There was no light but moonlight, but I could make them out against
the cement of the street, and the light-colored buildings on the other
side. I couldn't have dealt with them; I had no odds going for me.
Using the same shadows I went back to the dock, and to the crane.
What had bored me before, the words of the Colonel at the briefing, all
his talk about fire, came up in my head, and all over me. Fire was what I
needed; fire from my own side. I needed a whole city in panic, a lot of
confusion, as much as there could be, and things would be different. I
didn't know when the raid would come, but I knew that it would be
