“Rice.”

“Rice.” He made a note. “How much rice?”

“Lots. I mean really a lot.” She giggled. “Only good thing about this war, I’m losing weight, because I’m getting sick of rice-hey, I look good. You’ll like the new me.”

“Great. Okay, then. Bye.” He inspected his list and dialed again.

There was no beef in the land, Sarge Harris complained. “Cattle cars are too big. Snouts blast ’em, think they’ve got tanks or weapons in them.”

Probably not. The major says they’re not doing that just now. But no point in arguing. “Yeah. Chicken costs an arm and a leg, too.”

“Maybe that’s how chicken farmers get red meat,” Sarge said.

“Heh-heh. Sure. Look, what can you bring?”

“Eggs. Traded some carpentry work for them.”

“Good. Bring ’em.” Ken hit the cutoff button and dialed another number.

Patsy Clevenger admitted to being one of the lucky ones. An occasional backpacker, she’d stored considerable freeze-dried food in sealed bags; but the steady diet was driving her nuts. She jumped at his offer. Sure, she could bring a freeze-dried dessert, and flavored coffee mix, and pick up Anthony Graves, who was seventy and couldn’t drive anymore. Ken shifted the receiver to his other ear.

The Copeleys lived at the northern end of the San Fernando Valley, They could get fresh corn and tomatoes, and almonds, and oranges. Could they bring a pair of relatives? Because the relatives had gas. Hell, yes!

He tried Marty Carnell, just on the off chance. The meteorchewed highways had probably stranded him somewhere on a dog-show circuit—

But Marty answered.

“I’ve done this once before, and it worked out,” Ken told him. “It isn’t that everyone’s starving. Things haven’t got that bad. But anyone’s likely to have a ton of something and none of everything else, and the way to make it work is to get all the food together and make a feast.”

“Sounds good.”

“Okay. Get here around noon—”

“For dinner?”

“Stone soup takes time, and I want sunlight for the mirror. I’d guess we’ll eating all day and night. Come hungry. Have you got meat?”

“I found a meat source early on. I can keep the dogs fed till I run out of money, but it’s horsemeat, Ken. I’ve been eating it myself—”

“Bring it. Can you bring five pounds? Four will do it, and you won’t recognize it when I get through, Marty. I’ve got a great chili recipe. Lots of vegetables.”

The Offutts would have to come by bicycle. Chad Offutt sounded hungry. With no transportation, how the hell were they to get food? How about some bottles of liquor in the saddlebags? Ken agreed, for charity’s sake. Damn near anyone had liquor; what was needed was food.

Ken hung up.

He caught himself humming while he lugged huge pots out into the backyard and set them up around the solar mirror. It seemed almost indecent to be enjoying himself when civilization was falling about his ears. But it did feel good to finally find a use for his hobbies!

The Copeleys had brought everything they’d promised, and yellow chilis too. The pair of guests were a cousin’s daughter and her husband-Halliday and Wilson; she’d kept her maiden name — both much younger than the others, and a little uncomfortable. They seemed eager to help. Ken put them to cutting up the Copeley’s vegetables.

“Save all seeds.”

“Right.”

The lost weight looked nice on Con Donaldson. She chatted while she helped him carry dishes. Things were bad throughout the Los Angeles Basin… yeah, Ken had to agree. Con had tried to get to Phoenix, but her mother kept putting her off, she wouldn’t have room until her brother moved out… and then it was too late, the roads had been chewed by the snouts’ meteors. Yeah, Ken had tried to get out too.

He should have asked someone — to bring dishwashing soap! Someone must have an excess of that.

Marty was cuffing horsemeat into strips. “Could be a lot worse,” he said. “We could be dodging meteors. I can’t figure out what the snouts think they’re doing.”

“They think they’re conquering the Earth,” Ken said. “It’s their methods that’re funny. They’re thorough enough. I haven’t heard of a dam still standing. Have you?”

“No big ones. No big bridges either.”

“But they don’t touch cities.” Could be worse, He might have fled with no destination in mind. Still, it was hard times. Food got in, but not a lot, and not a balanced diet. There would have been no fruit source here without the Copeleys’ oranges and the lemon tree in Graves’ backyard.

Reflected sunlight blazed underneath Ken’s largest pot. The water was beginning to boil. He ladled a measured amount into the chili, then moved it into the focus.

He’d built the solar minor while he was still married, and after the first month he’d almost never used it. They’d gone vegetarian for a few months too, and his wife hadn’t taken the cookbooks with her. He had the recipes, he had the skills to build a balanced meal, and the phones worked sometimes. If the snouts shot those down, he might try to form a commune. His next-door neighbor had fled to the mountains, leaving the keys behind. More important, he’d left a full swimming pool. Covered, to prevent evaporation, the water would last until the fall rains, and the goldfish would keep the mosquitoes down.

Then there was the golf course across the street. The President asked everyone to grow food, especially to put up greenhouses. There wasn’t any water for the golf course, but there were flat areas, good places for tents if the commune got big enough.

When the aliens had blasted Kosmograd, everything had turned serious. So had Kenneth Dutton. Two years before he’d studied greenhouses; but in one two-day spree he’d built one, from plastic and glass and wood and hard work, and goddam had he been proud of himself. It worked! Things grew! You could eat them! He’d built two more before he’d even started the Stone Soup Parties, just because he could.

Past two o’clock, and the Offutts weren’t here yet. Not surprising, if they were on bicycles, especially if malnutrition was getting to them. Sarge Harris hadn’t arrived either. Lateness was less a discourtesy than a cause for worry: had dish-shaped craters begun to sprout in city roads? The snouts had been gone for three weeks, but when might they return? And with what?

Patsy Clevenger arrived with Anthony Graves. Graves was short and round and in fair health for a man pushing seventy. He had been a scriptwriter for television. He brought treasure: lemons from his backyard and a canned ham. They settled him in a beach chair from which he could watch the proceedings like a benevolent uncle.

Ken pulled the kettle to the side, where sunlight spilling from the mirror would keep the chili simmering. “An hour,” he announced to nobody in particular. He dumped rice into another pot, added water, and set it in the focus. Fistfuls of vegetables went into the water pot. Cook them next. Chop up vegetables, boil or steam them, add mayonnaise and a chopped apple if you had it. Leave out a few vegetables, fiddle with the proportions, forget some of the spices, as long as you didn’t put in broccoli it was still Russian salad if you could get mayonnaise. Where was Sarge Harris?

Sarge didn’t arrive until four. “I got a late start, and then there was a godawful line for gas, and then I tried three markets for potatoes, but there weren’t any.” At least he had the eggs. Ken set Cora to making them into mayonnaise.

The sun was getting too low for cooking. Mayonnaise didn’t need heat. Coffee did. Better start water warming now. Sometimes there was no gas. Patsy’s flavored coffee could be drunk “iced”: room temperature, given the lack of ice.

The chili was gone, and a vegetable curry was disappearing, and the Copeleys’ young relatives were just keeping up with the demand for lemonade. There was breathing space for Ken to find conversations; but he tended to drift when his guests started talking about how terrible things were. By and large, they seemed cheerful enough. It felt like Cora might stay the night, and that would be nice, since it felt like Patsy would not.