Bad Grrlz' Guide to Reality Read online

  PRAISE FOR THE WRITING OF PAT MURPHY

  The Falling Woman

  Winner of the Nebula Award for Best Novel

  “A lovely and literate exploration of the dark moment where myth and science meet.” —Samuel R. Delany

  “Murphy’s sharp behavioral observation, her rich Mayan background, and the revolving door of fantasy and reality honorably recall the novels of Margaret Atwood.” —Publishers Weekly

  “Murphy’s convincing modern setting is a marvelous foil for her frighteningly alien Mayan ghost, and the archeological material, besides being fascinating in its own right, is put to excellent use in the plot.” —Newsday

  The City, Not Long After

  “A grand adventure.” —San Francisco Chronicle

  “In Ms. Murphy’s skillful hands, the showdown between art and power takes on mythic dimensions… . No one comes out of this confrontation unchanged, including the reader.” —The New York Times Book Review

  Points of Departure

  “There is something of Borges’s absurdist fables and of the fey, fog-haunted feel of Celtic myth to [Points of Departure]. This collection reverberates with the sound of the author’s unmistakable voice, a poetic blend of the everyday and the never-never.” —Elle

  “Brilliant, passionate, and dangerous as only the clearest visions can be … Murphy creates seamless blends of ideas and emotions, holistic works where genres mingle so the reader does not stop to ask if this is sf, fantasy, or horror… . These tales unite the power of a force of nature with the subtlety of the human heart.” —Locus

  Wild Angel

  “A charming adventure.” —The Denver Post

  “A delightful cross-genre mix with elements of mystery, western and fantasy/adventure infused with a feminist sensibility.” —Rambles.net

  “Faithful to the spirit of Edgar Rice Burrough’s Tarzan tales and Rudyard Kipling’s Jungle Book, this [is the] story of a young girl’s courage and resourcefulness.” —Library Journal

  Adventures in Time and Space with Max Merriwell

  “Set on a cruise ship that blithely steams through the Bermuda Triangle, this savvy romp buttresses its nonstop action with quantum-mechanical insights into the nature of the universe and postmodern noodling about the nature of writing and reading.” —The New York Times Book Review

  “This cerebral equivalent of a roller-coaster ride … is replete with absorbing ponderings on the nature of reality and the nature of the novel… . The questions of who is in charge, who is real and whether the answers to those questions matter will leave readers pleasantly dizzy.” —Publishers Weekly

  “A paean to the potentialities of imagination, foaming quantum uncertainties, and the sheer plasticity of human reality.” —Analog Science Fiction and Fact

  The Shadow Hunter

  “The clash of prehistoric shamanic traditions with future technology makes for a gripping tale—the first novel written by this Nebula Award-winning author.” —Publishers Weekly

  Bad Grrlz’ Guide to Reality

  The Complete Novels Wild Angel and Adventures in Time and Space with Max Merriwell

  Pat Murphy

  Contents

  WILD ANGEL

  PART ONE: 1850

  1. MURDER IN THE WILDERNESS

  2. IN THE MOUNTAINS WITH THE BEASTS

  3. A CLEVER VILLAIN

  4. WANTED

  5. FIRST KILL

  6. ROMULUS AND REMUS

  7. THE BEGINNING OF A CORRESPONDENCE

  8. AN AMAZING YOUNG SAVAGE

  PART TWO: 1855

  9. STONE WOLF

  10. THE CAPTAIN’S WIFE

  PART THREE: 1859

  11. A YOUNG MAN’S GUIDE

  12. THE SAVAGE LIFE

  13. LITTLE LOST LAMB

  14. ANGEL IN THE WILDERNESS

  15. LEADER OF THE PACK

  16. HER OWN KIND

  PART FOUR: 1863

  17. PROFESSOR SERUNCA’S WAGON OF WONDERS

  18. UP A TREE

  19. A FORMIDABLE WOMAN

  20. THE CIRCUS COMES TO TOWN

  21. HAVE YOU SEEN THE ELEPHANT?

  22. UNEASY MEMORIES

  23. THE DEAD MAN

  24. POWER AND MERCY

  25. NELLY WAS A LADY

  26. THE END

  Mary Maxwell’s Afterword to Wild Angel

  Max Merriwell’s Afterword to Wild Angel

  Pat Murphy’s Afterword to Wild Angel

  ADVENTURES IN TIME AND SPACE WITH MAX MERRIWELL

  ONE

  TWO

  BAD GRRLZ’ GUIDE TO PHYSICS

  THREE

  BAD GRRLZ’ GUIDE TO PHYSICS

  FOUR

  FIVE

  SIX

  SEVEN

  EIGHT

  BAD GRRLZ’ GUIDE TO PHYSICS

  NINE

  TEN

  ELEVEN

  TWELVE

  BAD GRRLZ’ GUIDE TO PHYSICS

  THIRTEEN

  FOURTEEN

  FIFTEEN

  BAD GRRLZ’ GUIDE TO PHYSICS

  SIXTEEN

  SEVENTEEN

  EIGHTEEN

  BAD GRRLZ’ GUIDE TO PHYSICS

  NINETEEN

  TWENTY

  TWENTY-ONE

  TWENTY-TWO

  TWENTY-THREE

  TWENTY-FOUR

  BAD GRRLZ’ GUIDE TO PHYSICS

  TWENTY-FIVE

  BAD GRRLZ’ GUIDE TO PHYSICS

  Afterword to Adventures in Time and Space with Max Merriwell

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  Afterword to Bad Grrlz’ Guide to Reality

  About the Author

  Wild Angel

  FOR EDGAR RICE BURROUGHS

  —MARY MAXWELL

  FOR MARK TWAIN

  —MAX MERRIWELL

  FOR OFFICER DAVE

  —PAT MURPHY

  Contents

  PART ONE: 1850

  1. MURDER IN THE WILDERNESS

  2. IN THE MOUNTAINS WITH THE BEASTS

  3. A CLEVER VILLAIN

  4. WANTED

  5. FIRST KILL

  6. ROMULUS AND REMUS

  7. THE BEGINNING OF A CORRESPONDENCE

  8. AN AMAZING YOUNG SAVAGE

  PART TWO: 1855

  9. STONE WOLF

  10. THE CAPTAIN’S WIFE

  PART THREE: 1859

  11. A YOUNG MAN’S GUIDE

  12. THE SAVAGE LIFE

  13. LITTLE LOST LAMB

  14. ANGEL IN THE WILDERNESS

  15. LEADER OF THE PACK

  16. HER OWN KIND

  PART FOUR: 1863

  17. PROFESSOR SERUNCA’S WAGON OF WONDERS

  18. UP A TREE

  19. A FORMIDABLE WOMAN

  20. THE CIRCUS COMES TO TOWN

  21. HAVE YOU SEEN THE ELEPHANT?

  22. UNEASY MEMORIES

  23. THE DEAD MAN

  24. POWER AND MERCY

  25. NELLY WAS A LADY

  26. THE END

  Mary Maxwell’s Afterword to Wild Angel

  Max Merriwell’s Afterword to Wild Angel

  Pat Murphy’s Afterword to Wild Angel

  PART ONE

  1850

  Oh, what was your name in the States?

  Was it Thompson or Johnson or Bates?

  Did you murder your wife

  And fly for your life?

  Say, what was your name in the States?

  —Popular song of the 1850s

  1 MURDER IN THE WILDERNESS

  “Persons attempting to find a motive in this narrative will be prosecuted; persons attempting to find a moral in it will be banished; persons attempting to find a plot in it will be shot.”

  —The Adventures of Huckl
eberry Finn; Mark Twain

  RACHEL MCKENSIE SAT ON THE GROUND beside the canvas tent that was her temporary home. She was writing a letter to her sister, using a flattopped granite boulder as a writing desk. For just a moment, she had paused to appreciate the beauty of the California foothills.

  The spring air carried the sharp scent of the pines and the sweet green smell of new leaves. A few feet from the tent, a brook flowed through a tumble of boulders. Her daughter Sarah stood by the water, playing with pebbles. Barely a toddler when Rachel and her husband William had started the long overland journey west, Sarah was walking confidently now. She was three years old—small for her age, but bright and alert, fearless in her acceptance of the wilderness world through which they traveled. As Rachel watched, the child laughed and held her hands out, showing her mother a white pebble that she had found in the streambed. “Mama!” she said. “Mama, look!”

  William was farther downstream. The shallow metal dish that he used to pan for gold was leaning against a boulder and his broadbrimmed hat was pushed back on his head. He was talking with a blond man who had just ridden down the trail that led out of the mountains. It was, Rachel thought, the same man they had seen riding up that mountain trail with a companion earlier that day. The man had his friend’s horse tied behind his own. Rachel wondered idly if the man and his friend had a claim higher in the hills.

  William was asking the man about gold—Rachel was sure of that. The year was 1850, just after that precious metal had been discovered at Sutter’s Mill. In the California foothills, men always talked of gold. Rachel and her husband, like so many others, had come west to find their fortune.

  Rachel shook her head, chiding herself for her idleness. It was time that she stopped daydreaming and prepared the midday meal. She corked her bottle of ink and set it and the pen on top of the letter to keep the paper from blowing away. Then she stood and shook out her long skirts. Just as she turned her head toward the tent, a gunshot echoed up the valley.

  William lay on the ground at the blond man’s feet. William’s hat had fallen beside him and a dark stain was spreading across his blue-cotton shirt. Rachel froze, staring at her fallen husband. In that moment, the blond man turned toward her, lifted his rifle, and fired.

  The bullet caught Rachel in the chest and sent her staggering. As she fell, she cried out—a wail of pain and surprise. On the long journey west, she had worried about Indians and wolves, about stampedes that would trample them and flooding rivers that would carry their wagon away. But now that they were in California, she had thought her worries were over. How could this be happening now?

  She could feel hot blood seeping from the wound in her shoulder, wetting the rocky ground beneath her. The sunlight was warm on her face; the world seemed unnaturally bright and clear. In the distance, the blond man left his horse and began climbing the slope toward her. She could see her daughter, standing by the stream. The little girl was gazing up at her, eyes round in sudden fear.

  “Mama?” Sarah said, her voice barely audible over the roar of the stream.

  “Run, Sarah,” Rachel gasped. “Run and hide.”

  Sarah knew how to run and hide. It was a game they had played together often. On the long journey across the prairie, the Indians that they met had admired the child for her coppery hair. More than one chief had wanted to trade for her—offering William buffalo robes and ponies. That was when Rachel had taught Sarah to run and hide, to find a place that was out of sight and come out only when her mother called.

  “Run and hide, Sarah,” Rachel called, in a voice barely audible over the rush of the stream. “Run and hide. Hurry.” She closed her eyes against the sunlight.

  Sarah scrambled among the boulders, searching for a place to hide. She squeezed between two boulders and found a slab of granite leaning against a rocky patch of hillside, making a tiny cave. She slid through the opening, which was just big enough to admit her, and crouched in the cool shadows, her heart pounding with fear. Through the opening, she could see the tent, see her mother lying on the ground.

  The man had a knife in his hand and a rifle under his arm. Sarah sat very still motionless in the darkness. As she watched, the man bent over her mother with his back to Sarah. When he stood, a few minutes later, he held a handful of bloody hair. He glanced around then, as if he felt her eyes upon him, as if he feared someone had witnessed his crimes. For a moment, his eyes rested on the mouth of the cave where Sarah hid.

  Sarah did not move. She was crying, but she did not make a sound. Her mother had told her that she must be silent when she hid, as quiet as a mouse. She squeezed her eyes shut, not wanting to watch, not wanting to see what the man would do next.

  When she opened her eyes, he had yanked her mother’s quilts from the tent. Boxes of food were open, spilling flour and beans onto the ground. He held up the feather bed, her mother’s precious feather bed, and slashed it with his bloody knife. The wind caught the feathers, and they swirled and danced above the boulders, flying away into the mountains.

  The man tossed the feather bed aside and turned away. Silent and motionless in the safety of the cave, Sarah watched him go.

  She stayed in the cave, hugging her knees for warmth and waiting for her mother to call her. She waited. She was very young. It seemed strange that her mother had fallen to the ground, but the world was filled with events that she could not explain.

  She could not come out until her mother called. Those were the rules. She closed her eyes and waited, her mind drifting like a feather on the wind. She listened to the roar of the stream as it flowed over the rocks, and the sound filled her head, washing away the sight of the man standing over her fallen mother. For a time, she slept.

  When she woke it was cold in the cave, and she was hungry. She squeezed through the opening into late-afternoon sunshine and made her way to the tent. The spring air smelled of new leaves, pines, and freshly spilled blood.

  Her mother’s body lay in front of the tent. Her scalp had been torn away and the rocky ground beneath her head was dark and sticky with blood. The wound in her chest had bled freely as well, and a dark stain had spread across her dress.

  Sarah stood a few feet away, unwilling to approach too close. “Mama?” she said. In the past, when she made that sound, her mother had smiled and responded. But now the magic sound failed her.

  “Mama,” she said again, louder this time. “Mama!” A shout that echoed from the valley walls. “Mama!”

  She ran to her mother’s side and tugged on her hand. The skin was cold to the touch; the hand was stiff and unyielding. As the shadows grew long, Sarah crouched beside her mother’s body, her small fists clutching the faded calico dress, her face wet with tears.

  The hill to the west cast a shadow that engulfed the weeping girl. Sarah, chilled in the evening air, huddled by her mother’s side, shivering in the cold.

  The sun set, and the full moon rose, illuminating the valley with its cold silver light. In a clearing up the hill from where Sarah waited, a she-wolf named Wauna sat on her haunches and lifted her head to howl at the rising moon. Her voice rose on a mournful note, stretched thin by the wind. The other members of the pack joined in, their voices singing in harmony.

  Wauna’s teats were heavy with milk. Early that day, she had gone hunting with the pack, leaving her pups in the care of a younger she-wolf. The hunt had gone well. The pack had brought down a young deer, and Wauna had eaten her fill. But when they returned to the den, the wind was scented with gunpowder and blood.

  The young she-wolf that they had left to guard the pups was dead by the mouth of the den, shot in the head. The pups lay beside her. They had been hauled from the den and their throats had been slit.

  All her pups were dead on the ground. While the pack milled about in confusion, Wauna had licked the pups, trying to wash away the blood and bring them back to life. They were so young, their eyes barely open. She smoothed their soft fur with her tongue, cleaning them, trying to warm their cold bodies. Perhaps
they only slept. If she tried, she might wake them.

  Her mate Rolon and the other members of the pack milled around her in confusion. Buried in the den, where the pups had been hidden, was a wooden box that stank of man sweat. In the bushes below the den, there was a dead man, one of the two men who had carried that box. The dead man had been shot, and he had fallen facedown in the bushes. The other man—the man who had left the scent of his hands on the bodies of her dead pups—had ridden away. The smell of horses lingered in the bushes where the animals had been tied.

  Rolon had begun to follow the killer, but Wauna would not go with him. She had stayed with her pups, lying beside them and offering her teats so that they might suckle. She nudged the largest one with her head—a black male, the color of Rolon. She whimpered to them, a low plaintive sound, but they did not respond. There was no life in them. Despite her efforts, the pups lay still.

  Now night had come and the moon had risen. Wauna knew that the pups would not wake from their terrible sleep. She had followed Rolon away from the den and up a small trail that stank of man scent. In a clearing by the dead trunk of a lightning-struck pine, Wauna had stopped, raised her muzzle to the moon, and howled, a mournful cry that echoed through the valley.

  When she paused to take a breath, she caught a scent on the wind. Gunpowder and blood—human blood this time—and the same stink of man sweat that lingered by the den and on the trail. She stood for a moment, growling low in her throat, then set off in the direction of the scent. Rolon and the other members of the pack followed.

  Less than a mile from the den, she saw the tent, a flapping white thing on the side of the hill. That’s where the scent of man sweat was strongest. The man scent was old—the man was gone. But mixed with the scent of blood was the warm smell of another human.

  Rolon and the others headed downstream, following the man smell, but Wauna stalked toward the tent and found Sarah, still clinging to her mother’s body.

  When the wolf approached, Sarah looked up. She knew dogs—one of the other families on the wagon train had brought their old farm dog, a tolerant animal that let Sarah pull his ears and ride on his back. That dog had been her friend.