The long day finally ended. Ron was sitting on the steps at the end of the lobby when Dewey pushed the front door open and came in, wiping sweat from his face with a red and white kerchief.

“You’d best bunk in with me tonight. The Muslims might give you trouble if they found you in the streets.”

Standing up, Ron asked, “Can I help you bring your stuff inside?”

Dewey glanced back at the counter outside, with its hardware and machinery parts scattered over it.

“No, we won’t have to. Not today. That’s one of the good things about the Muslims. Nobody steals when they’re in the market. They themselves don’t steal, and if they catch anybody else at it, they shoot him, quick and simple.”

Ron let his breath out in a low whistle.

“Besides,” Dewey said, “if we take the stuff in, they’ll think I don’t trust them. Might start a fuss.” He clapped Ron’s shoulder. “Come on, we’ve got some climbing to do.”

“What floor do you live on?”

“Tenth.”

Ron thought that they would simply have to climb ten flights of stairs. It wasn’t that easy.

They went up the first two flights. The stairway was not lighted and there were no windows, so Ron followed Dewey as the old man trudged slowly up the steps. He knows his way even in the dark, Ron thought.

“Hold it now,” Dewey said when they reached the foot of the third flight. “Stay close against the wall on your right. Halfway up this flight there’s five broken steps. If you’re not careful you’ll fall through and break your back.”

So they slinked against the wall. It felt rough and gritty. On the next flight they had to do the same thing, only this time they kept on the left side.

“Why don’t you fix these stairs?” Ron asked. “I can do it for you if—”

Dewey laughed in the darkness. “After I worked so hard to set ’em up this way?”

“What?”

“Think I want visitors bustin’ in on me while I’m asleep?” the old man said, still chuckling.

There were traps and barricades on every flight. At the eighth floor, Dewey pulled Ron into one of the rooms. By the last glimmerings of late-afternoon light filtering through a grimy window, Ron saw that there was a rope ladder hanging from a hole in the ceiling.

“It’s monkey style from here on,” Dewey said, as he grabbed the rope in one hand. “The stairs are out completely from here up to the tenth floor.”

They went up the rope ladder. Dewey climbed heavily, slowly. Ron could hear him grunting and puffing. When they reached the top of the ladder, Dewey hauled it up, hand over hand, and coiled it on the floor.

“Here we are,” he said.

The landing looked like a little fortress. There were two machine guns sitting on tripods, cases of ammunition and grenades, and a dozen automatic rifles stacked against the wall.

“Nobody gets up here unless I invite ’em,” Dewey said proudly.