Sir Dominic Flandry: The Last Knight of Terra

by Poul Anderson

  The next night had been set for departure. Dominic whiled the hours away with a new game. As the bravos came into the bunkroom for their naps, one by one during the course of the day, Dominic bet them he could make five pat five-card poker hands out of any twenty-five cards. He let his incredulous friends provide the pack, shuffle, and deal. Once or twice he lost, but the net sum he tucked away in several already fat purses was rather fantastic. Next day a bully who had once studied some arithmetic figured out that the odds in Dominic's favor had been about fifty to one. By then Dominic was gone.

  He left the house after sunset. Rain sluiced from a hidden sky, roaring on the canal surface and drowning distant lamps. A speedboat waited with Pradjung, Mandau, and the chest of silvers. Dominic kissed Sumu's unclipped toenails and embarked. The boat slipped into darkness.

  Several days previously, Dominic had proposed a route of his own as the least dangerous way out of town. Sumu had grinned and told him to stick to his storytelling. Dominic became so insistent that Sumu was forced to explain in detail precisely why a route down Burning Torch Canal and so out into the lake would attract less notice.

  Now, when the boat planed close to the Bridge Where Amahai Wept, Dominic said a polite, "Excuse me." He reached across the cockpit and switched off motor and headlights.

  "What in all hells—!" Pradjung leaped to his feet. Dominic slid back the canopy. Rain cataracted hot and heavy upon them. The boat glided toward a halt.

  Pradjung snatched for the revolver Sumu had lent him. Dominic, timid spinner of yarns, failed to cower as expected. The chopping motion of his hand was instantaneous. A hard edge smacked on Pradjung's wrist. The gun clattered free.

  The boat went slowly under the Bridge Where Amahai Wept. Someone leaped from the span. The deck thundered beneath that gorilla impact. Mandau snarled and tried to grapple. Kemul the mugger brushed his arms aside, put Mandau across one knee, broke his back, and threw him overboard.

  Pradjung had drawn a knife. He stabbed underhanded at Dominic's belly. But Dominic wasn't there any more. He was a few centimeters to one side. His left wrist struck out, deflecting the blade. His right hand took Pradjung's free arm and spun the daggerman around. They fell together, but Dominic had the choking hold. After a few seconds, Pradjung turned blue and lay quietly.

  Dominic got off. Kemul picked up the bravo. "No, wait," protested Dominic, "he's still alive—" Kemul threw Pradjung into the canal. "Oh, well," said Dominic and gunned the engine.

  Headlights strengthened from behind, through the rain. "Kemul thinks Sumu had you followed," said the mugger. "It would make sense. Now they want to catch up with us and find why your lights went out. Shall we fight?"

  "Can you lift a chest with a hundred thousand silvers?" asked Captain Sir Dominic Flandry.

  Kemul whistled. Then: "Yes, Kemul can carry it a ways."

  "Good. We needn't fight."

  Flandry steered close to the left pier. As they went by a ladder, Kemul stepped off with the chest under one arm. Flandry revved the motor and went over the side. Treading water in the dark, he watched the second boat pursue his own out of sight.

  Half an hour later, he stood in Luang's quarters above the Tavern Called Swampman's Ease and gestured at the open chest. "A hundred thousand," he said grandly. "Plus a good bit extra I made gambling. And a firearm, which I understand is hard for commoners to come by." It was thrust firmly into his own belt.

  The girl lit a cigarette. "Well," she said, "the usual black market price for a pill is two thousand." She put a vial on the table. "Here are ten capsules. You have credit with me for forty more."

  The lamp in the hooded god's hands threw soft coppery light across her. She wore a little paint on the amber skin, which was not her custom, luminous blue outlining eyes and breasts. There was a red blossom in her hair. For all its coolness, he thought her voice was not entirely level.

  "When the boy brought us your note," said Kemul, "it seemed foolishness to wait in ambush where you desired. Even though we were surprised to hear from you at all. When you first left us to win your fortune, Kemul thought you a dead man already."

  "You have more than common luck, I think." Luang frowned at her cigarette, avoiding Flandry's look. "In the past two or three days, there have been public announcements in the name of Nias Warouw. A reward is offered for you dead and a bigger one for you alive. The loudspeaker boats have not yet gotten as far as Sumu's district. It's plain to see, nobody who heard the criers had chanced to spy you, or knew you were with him. But he must soon have realized."

  "I made the swindle move as fast as possible," Flandry said. The air was so hot and damp that he hoped they wouldn't notice the sweat on him was suddenly rather cold. "I'm an experienced con man. It's half my profession, one way or another. To be sure, I was a bit nervous about pulling a Spanish Prisoner here. You must have some home-grown version. But with refinements—" He broke off. They didn't follow his words, full of Anglic phrases as was necessary. "What do I owe you for my shirt and watch and wallet? It was good of you to give them back to me for a stake."

  "Nothing," said Kemul. "They were useless to us, as Luang explained."

  The girl bit her lip. "I hated for you to go out like that—all alone—" She put the cigarette to her mouth and inhaled so hard that her cheeks filled with shadow. Abruptly and roughly: "You are very clever, Terra man. I never had allies, except Kemul. They always betray you. But I think you could be a profitable associate."

  "Thanks," said Flandry.

  "One question yet. I forgot to ask you before. You knew Biocontrol makes all the antitoxin. What gave you the idea you could get any from us?"

  Flandry yawned. He felt tired after all the strain and watchfulness. It was good to lounge back on the bed and look up at Luang, where she paced back and forth. "I felt confident someone would have some extras for sale," he answered. "Human cussedness is bound to find ways, when anything as valuable as this drug is to be had. For instance, armed raids on dispensaries, by masked men. Or the hijacking of shipments. Not often, I suppose, but it must happen occasionally. Or... well, there must be hunters, sailors, prospectors, and so on... men who have legitimate reasons for not coming near a dispensary every thirty days, and are allowed an advance supply of antitoxin. Once in a while they will be murdered, or robbed, or will die naturally and be stripped. Or simple corruption: a local dispenser juggles his records and peddles a few extra pills. Or he is bribed or blackmailed into doing it."

  Luang nodded. "Yes," she said, "you are wise in such matters." With a sudden, odd defiance: "I get some capsules myself, now and then, from a certain dispenser. He is a young man."

  Flandry chuckled. "I'm sure he gets more than value in return."

  She stubbed out her cigarette with a savage gesture. Kemul rose, stretching. "Time for Kemul's nap," he said. "Around sunrise we can talk of what's to be done. The Captain is wily, Luang, but Kemul thinks best he be gotten out of Kompong Timur and used elsewhere for a time. Till Warouw and Sumu forget him."

  Her nod was curt. "Yes. We will talk about it tomorrow."

  "Good rest, Luang," said Kemul. "Are you coming, Captain? Kemul has an extra bed."

  "Good rest, Kemul," said Luang.

  The giant stared at her.

  "Good rest," she repeated.

  Kemul turned to the door. Flandry couldn't see his face; not that Flandry particularly cared to, just then. "Good rest," said Kemul, barely audible, and went out.

  Someone laughed like a raucous bird, down in the joyhouse. But the rain was louder, filling all the night with a dark rushing. Luang did not smile at Flandry. Her mouth held a bitterness he did not quite understand, and she switched off the light as if it were an enemy.

  VIII

  Two thousand kilometers north of Kompong Timur, a mountain range heaved itself skyward. It was dominated by Gunung Utara, which was also a city.

  The morning after he arrived, Flandry stepped out on the ledge fronting his hostel. Behind him, a tunnel ran into black basa
lt, looping and twisting and branching, for it was an ancient fumarole. Rooms had been excavated along that corridor; airblowers and fluorescent tubes had been installed; plastisurfacing and tapestries softened bare rock. Most of the city was built into such natural burrows, supplemented with artificial caves—up and down the slopes of Gunung Utara.

  Flandry could just see the cliff behind him, and about ten meters downward where the ledge tumbled below his feet. Otherwise his world was thick white mist. It distorted sounds; he heard machines and voices as if from far away and from impossible directions. The air was thin and cool, his breath smoked. He shivered and drew tighter about him the hooded cloak which local people added to kilt, stockings, and shirt. After all, they lived a good 2,500 meters above sea level.

  There was a rumbling underfoot, deeper than any engine, and the ground quivered a little. Gunung Utara dreamed.

  Flandry lit an atrocious native cigarette. Luang had promptly sold all his Terran supply. Presently he would go look for some breakfast. Food in the lowlands had been heavy on rice and fish, but Luang said meat was cheaper in the mountains. Bacon and eggs? No, that would be too much to hope for. Flandry sighed.

  It had been a pleasant trip here, though. Extremely pleasant, on admirably frequent occasions. The girl had not merely sent him off to hide, but come along herself, with Kemul at heel. They had been ferried across the lake at night by someone who would keep his mouth shut. At the depot on the far side, she engaged a private cabin on one of the motorized rafts which plied the Ukong River. He stayed inside that, and she spent most of her time with him, while the raft chugged them slowly northeast to Muarabeliti. (Kemul slept outside the door, and said little in waking hours, spending most of his time with a marijuana pipe.) There they could have gotten an airliner, but since that was only for the wealthy, it seemed safer to go by monorail. Not that they jammed themselves into a third-class car like ordinary peasants; they got a compartment, suitable conveyance for petty bourgeoisie. Across a continent of jungle, plantation, and drowned lowland, Flandry had once more paid less attention to the scenery than a dutiful tourist should. And now they were holed up in Gunung Utara until the heat went off, with Biocontrol certain that Flandry must be dead.

  And then?

  He heard the lightest clack of shoes on stone and turned around. Luang emerged from the tunnel. She had yielded to this climate with a flame-red tunic and purple tights, but the effect was still remarkable, even before breakfast. "You should have called me, Dominic," she said. "I rapped on Kemul's door, but he is still snoring." She yawned, curving her back and raising small fists into the fog. "This is no town for long naps. Here men work hard and wealth flows quickly. It has grown much since I visited it last, and that was only a few years ago. Let me get well established, and I can hope to earn—"

  "Oh, no, you don't!" Somewhat to his own astonishment, Flandry discovered that he retained a few absurd prejudices. "Not while we're partners."

  She laughed, deep in her throat, and took his arm. It was not a very gentle gesture, though. She was curt and fierce with him, and would never say much about herself. "As you wish. But what then shall we do?"

  "Live quietly. We've more than enough funds."

  She let him go and snatched a cigarette out of a pocket. "Bah! Gunung Utara is rich, I tell you! Lead, silver, gems, I know not what else. Even a common miner may go prospecting and gain a fortune. It's soon taken from him. I want to do some of the taking."

  "It is quite safe for me to show myself?" he asked cautiously. .

  She looked at him. With his beard still inhibited, he needed only to shave his upper lip each day. Dye had blackened his hair, whose shortness he explained to the curious as due to a bout of jungle fungus, and contact lenses made his eyes brown. The harsh sunlight had already done the same for his skin. There remained his height and the unPulaoic cast of his face, but enough caucasoid genes floated around in the population that such features, though rare, were not freakish. "Yes," she said, "if you remember that you are from across the ocean."

  "Well, the chance must be taken, I suppose, if you insist on improving the shining hour with racketeering." Flandry sneezed. "But why did we have to come here, of all drizzly places?"

  "I told you a dozen times, fool. This is a mining town. New men arrive each day from all over the planet. No one notices a stranger." Luang drew smoke into her lungs, as if to force out the mist. "I like not the god-hated climate myself, but it can't be helped."

  "Oh, right-o." Flandry glanced up. A light spot showed in the east, where sun and wind were breaking the mists. A warm planet like Unan Besar could expect strong moist updrafts, which would condense into heavy clouds at some fairly constant altitude. Hereabouts, that was the altitude at which the mines happened to lie. The area was as foggy as a politician's brain.

  It seemed reckless to build a town right into a volcano. But Luang said Gunung Utara was nearly extinct. Smoldering moltenness deep underneath it provided a good energy source, and thus another reason for this settlement; but the crater rarely did more than growl and fume. It was unusually active at the present time. There was even a lava flow. But the same engineers whose geophysical studies proved there would never again be a serious eruption, had built channels for such outpourings.

  As the fog lightened, Flandry could see the ledge below this one, and the head of a crazily steep trail which wound down past tunnel mouths. He caught a sulfurous whiff.

  "We should find it interesting for a while," he said. "But what do we do afterward?"

  "Go back to Kompong Timur, I suppose. Or anywhere else in the world that you think there may be a profit. Between us we will always do well."

  "That's just it." He dropped his cigarette butt and ground it under his sandal. "Here I am, the man who can free your whole people from Biocontrol—I don't believe in false modesty, or even in true modesty—"

  "Biocontrol never troubled me very much." Her tone grew sharp. "Under a new arrangement... oh, yes, I can easily foresee what an upheaval your cheap antitoxin would bring... would I survive?"

  "You could prosper in any situation, my dear." Flandry's grin died away. "Until you get old."

  "I don't expect to reach old age," she snapped, "but if I do, I'll have money hoarded to live on." The clouds rifted, and one sunbeam dashed itself blindingly along the mountainside. Far down the slope, among ledges and crags and boulders, a rolling road was being installed to carry ore from a minehead to a refinery. Antlike at this distance, men crawled about moving rock by hand. Flandry had no binoculars, but he knew very well how gaunt those men were, how often they lost footing and went over a cliff, how their overseers walked among them with electric prods. But still the sunbeam raced downward, splitting the fog like a burning lance, until it touched the valley under the mountain. Impossibly green that valley was, green fire streaked with mist and streams, against the bare red and black rock which surrounded it. Down there, Flandry knew, lay rice paddies, where the wives and children of the construction gang stooped in the mud as wives and children had since the Stone Age. Yet once upon a time, for a few generations, it wasn't done this way.

  He said, "The hand labor of illiterates is so cheap, thanks to your precious social system, that you're sliding back from the machine era. In another several centuries, left to yourselves, you'll propel your rafts with sweeps and pull wagons with animals."

  "You and I will be soundly asleep in our graves then, Dominic," said Luang. "Come, let's find a tea house and get some food."

  "Given literacy," he persisted, "machines can work still cheaper. Faster, too. If Unan Besar was exposed to the outside universe, labor such as those poor devils are doing would be driven off the market in one lifetime."

  She stamped her foot and flared: "I tell you, I don't care about them!"

  "Please don't accuse me of altruism. I just want to get home. These aren't my people or my way of life... good God, I'd never find out who won this year's meteor ball pennant!" Flandry gave her a shrewd glance. "You know
, you'd find a visit to some of the more advanced planets interesting. And profitable. D' you realize what a novelty you'd be to a hundred jaded Terran nobles, any of whom could buy all Unan Besar for a yo-yo?"

  Her eyes lit up momentarily. Then she laughed and shook her head. "Oh, no, Dominic! I see your bait and I won't take your hook. Remember, there is no way off this planet."

  "Come, now. My own spaceship is probably still at the port, plus several left over from pioneering days, plus the occasional Betelgeusean visitor. A raid on the place—or, more elegantly, the theft of a ship—"

  "And how long until you returned with a cargo of capsules?"

  Flandry didn't answer. They had been through this argument before. She continued, jetting smoke between phrases like a slender dragon: "You told me it would take several days to reach Spica. Then you must get the ear of someone important, who must come investigate and satisfy himself you are right, and go back, and report to his superiors, who will wrangle a long time before authorizing the project. And you admitted it will take time, perhaps many days, to discover exactly what the antitoxin is and how to duplicate it. Then it must be produced in quantity, and loaded aboard ships, and brought here, and—Oh, by every howling hell, you idiot, what do you think Biocontrol will do meanwhile? They will destroy the vats the moment they know you have escaped. There is no reserve supply worth mentioning. No one here could hope to live more than a hundred of our days, unless he barricaded himself in a dispensary. Your precious Spicans would find a planetful of bones!"

  "You could escape with me," he said, chiefly to test her reaction.

  It was as he had hoped: "I don't care what happens to all these stupid people, but I won't be a party to murdering them!"

  "I understand all that," he said hastily. "We've been over this ground often enough. But can't you see, Luang, I was only talking in general terms. I didn't mean anything as crude as an open breakaway. I'm sure I can find a way to slip off without Biocontrol suspecting a thing. Smuggle myself aboard a Betelgeusean ship, for instance."