Ivory, and Apes, and Peacocks tp-6

by Poul Anderson

  And maybe, maybe, after this is all over, if he’s survived—maybe we’ll have gained something very precious.

  “The danger will be great,” Everard said slowly. “Moreover, I await things and happenings from which hardy warriors would flee, screaming. And earlier, you’ll have to acquire knowledge which, most of the wise men in this world could not even understand, were it told them.”

  “Try me, my lord,” answered Pum. A sudden calm had come upon him.

  “I will! Let’s go!” Everard strode so fast that the youth must trot to keep up.

  Basic indoctrination would take days, assuming Pum could handle it. That was okay, though. It would take a while anyway to collect the necessary intelligence and organize a task force. Besides, meanwhile there would be Bronwen. Everard couldn’t tell if he himself would live through the conflict. Let him first receive whatever joy came his way, and try to give it back.

  Captain Baalram was reluctant. “Why should I enroll your son?” he demanded. “I’ve a full crew already, including two apprentices. This one is a landlubber born, small, and scrawny.”

  “He’s stronger than he seems,” replied the man who called himself Adiyaton’s father. (A quarter century hence, he would call himself Zakarbaal.) “You’ll find him clever and willing. As for experience, everybody begins with none, true? See here, sir. I’m anxious for him to get into a trading career. For the sake of that, I’ll be happy to… make it worth your while personally.”

  “Well, now.” Baalram smiled and stroked his beard. “That’s different. What amount of tuition had you in mind?”

  Adiyaton (who, a quarter century hence, would have no precautionary need not to call himself Pummairam) looked gleeful. Inwardly, he shivered, for he gazed upon a man who must soon die.

  From where the Patrol squadron waited, high in heaven, the storm was a blue-black mountain range crouched on the northern horizon. Elsewhere the sea reached argent and sapphire across the curve of the planet, save where islands broke the sheen and, eastward, the Syrian coast made a darkling line. Low in the west, the sun shone as cold as the blue around it. Wind whittered in Everard’s ears.

  On the front saddle of his time hopper, he huddled into a parka. The rear seat was empty, like those of about “half the two-score vehicles that shared the sky with him. Their pilots hoped to transport prisoners.

  The rest were guncraft, eggs of armor wherein fire waited to hatch. Light clanged off metal.

  Damn! Everard thought. I’m freezing. How much longer? Has something gone wrong? Did Pum betray himself to the enemy, or has his equipment failed, or what?

  A receiver dial secured to the steering bar beeped and winked red. Breath exploded out of him, white vapor that the wind strewed and swallowed. Despite his years as a hunter of men, he must gulp before he could snap into his throat mike: “Signal received by commander. Triangulation stations, report.”

  Down ahead, in wrack and spindrift, the enemy band had appeared. They had commenced their evil labors. But Pum had reached inside his garb and pressed the button on a miniature radio transmitter.

  Radio. The Exaltationists wouldn’t anticipate something that primitive. Everard hoped.

  Now, Pum, boy, are you able to find shelter, protect yourself, the way you were told to? Fear laid fingers around the Patrolman’s gullet. He’d doubtless begotten sons, here and there through the ages, but this was the closest he had ever come to having one.

  Words crackled in his earphones. Numbers followed. Instruments a hundred miles apart had precisely found the beleaguered ship. Clocks had already recorded the first split second of reception. “Okay,” Everard said. “Compute spatial coordinates for each vehicle according to our strategy. Troopers, stand by for instructions.”

  That required several minutes. He felt a chilly peace welling up within him. His unit was committed. At this exact moment, it was in battle yonder. Let that happen which the Norns willed.

  The data came crisply. “Everybody set?” he called. “Advance!”

  He himself verniered controls and flipped the main drive toggle. His machine sprang forward through space, backward through time, to the moment when Pum had hailed it.

  Wind raved. The hopper rocked and yawed in its antigrav field. Fifty yards below, black in this gloom, waves roared. The spume blown off them was sleet-colored. Everard saw by the light of a great torch some ways off. A resinous mast, fanned by the storm, burned fiercely. Tarry, flaming pieces of the ship were quenched in steam as it broke apart.

  Everard tugged down his optical amplifiers. Vision became stark. It showed him that his command had arrived correctly, so as to englobe the half-dozen enemy vehicles everywhere above the billows.

  It had not come soon enough to prevent them from starting their butchery. They had done that on the instant of their own appearance. Not knowing where any one of them would be, but knowing that each was lethally well-armed, Everard had perforce caused his group to show up at a distance where it could assess the situation before the killers noticed it.

  They would, in a heartbeat or two. “Attack!” Everard roared needlessly. His steed hurtled forward.

  A blue-white hell-beam speared through murk. Zigzagging as he flew, he felt it miss him by inches: heat, sting of ozone, crack of air. He didn’t see it, for his goggles had automatically stopped down a glare that would have blinded.

  Nor did he shoot back, though he drew his blaster. That wasn’t his business. Heaven was already lurid with such lightnings. The waters reflected them as if also afire.

  There was no good way to seize any enemy pilots. Everard’s gunners had orders to kill, at once, before the reavers realized how outnumbered they were and skipped off into space-time. The job of the single-riding Patrolmen was to capture those spies who had been aboard the ship.

  He didn’t expect he’d find them clinging to the sections of hull that swung to and fro in the swells and disintegrated. Men would check those, of course, just in case. But likeliest the travelers were afloat by themselves. They’d surely taken the precaution of wearing cartridge-inflatable life jackets under their contemporary kaftans.

  Pum could not risk doing so. As a crewboy, he’d have looked wrong in much more than a loincloth. It served to conceal his transmitter, but nothing else. Everard had made certain he learned to swim.

  Few Punic sailors could. Everard glimpsed one who gripped a plank. Almost, he went to the rescue. But no, he mustn’t. Baalram and his mariners had gone under—except for Gisgo, whose survival revealed itself to be no accident. The Patrol had pounced in time to save him from being hunted down as he drifted; and he had the strength to keep hold of his heavy sweep till it washed ashore. The rest, his shipmates, his friends—they died and their kin mourned them, as would be the fate of seafarers for the next several thousand years… and afterward spacefarers, timefarers…At least these men perished so that their people, and untold billions of people in the future, might live.

  It was a bleak consolation.

  Everard’s reheightened vision brought him sight of another head, unmistakable, yes, a man who bobbed about free as a cork—an enemy to take. He swung low. The man looked up out of froth and turmoil. Malignancy wrenched at his mouth. A hand rose from the water. It carried an energy pistol.

  Everard was quicker to shoot. A thin beam stabbed. The man’s scream was lost in the gale. Likewise was his weapon. He gaped at seared flesh and naked bone on that wrist.

  Here Everard felt no pity. But he had not wanted to slay, in this encounter. Live captives, under painless, harmless, absolute psychointerrogation, could direct the Patrol to the lairs of all sorts of interesting villainies.

  Everard lowered his vehicle. Its motor throbbed, holding it in place against the waves that crashed over it, the wind that tore and hooted and chilled. His legs clenched tight on the frame. He leaned from his saddle, got a hold on the semiconscious man, lifted him and laid him across the bow. Okay, let’s get some altitude!

  It was sheer chance, but not the less
satisfying, that he, Manse Everard, turned out to be the Patrol agent who clapped hands on Merau Varagan.

  The squadron sought a quiet place, to make assessment before it went uptime. Its choice was an uninhabited Aegean islet. White cliffs rose out of cerulean waters, whose calm was stirred only by glitter of sunlight and foam. Gulls flew equally lucent, and mewed through the lulling of the breeze. Shrubs thrust forth among boulders. Warmth baked pungencies out of their leaves. Far and far away, a sail passed by. It could have been driving the ship of Odysseus.

  The constables held conference. They had suffered no harm apart from a few wounds. For those, analgesics and antishock medications were directly available, and later hospital treatment would restore whatever had been lost. They had shot down four Exaltationist vehicles; three got away, but would be hunted, would be hunted. They had taken a full complement of captives.

  One of the Patrolmen, homing on the transmitter, had plucked Pummairam from the sea.

  “Good show!” Everard bawled, and hugged the boy to him.

  They sat on a bench at the Egyptian Harbor. It was as private a spot as any, since everyone roundabout was too busy to eavesdrop; and soon the pulse of Tyre would beat no more for either of them. They did draw stares. In honor of the occasion, which had included various recreations around town, Everard had bought them both kaftans of the finest linen and most beautiful dye, fit for the kings they felt themselves to be. He didn’t care about the clothing, except that it would make duly impressive his farewell at Hiram’s court, but Pum was ecstatic.

  The quay resounded—slap of feet, thud of hoofs, creak of wheels, rumble of rolled barrels. A cargo was in from Ophir, by way of Sinai, and stevedores were unloading its costly bales. Sweat beneath the sun made their muscled bodies shine. Sailors lounged in a nearby lean-to tavern, where a girl danced to music of flute and tabor; they drank, gambled, laughed, boasted, swapped yarns of countries beyond and beyond. A vendor sang the praises of the sweetmeats on his tray. A donkey cart passed laden. A priest of Melqart, in gorgeous robes, talked with an austere foreigner who served Osiris. A couple of red-haired Achaeans swaggered piratically by. A long-bearded warrior from Jerusalem and a bodyguard for a visiting Philistine dignitary exchanged glares, but the peace of Hiram stayed their swords. A black man in leopard skin and ostrich plumes drew a swarm of Phoenician urchins. An Assyrian walked weightily, holding his staff like a spear. An Anatolian and a blond man from the North of Europe reeled arm in arm, beerful and cheerful… The air smelled of dyeworks, dung, smoke, tar, but also of sandal-wood, myrrh, spice, and salt spray.

  It would die at last, all of this, centuries hence, as everything must die; but first, how mightily would it have lived! How rich would be its heritage!

  “Yes,” Everard said, “I don’t want you to get above yourself—” He chuckled, “—though are you ever below yourself? Still, Pum, you’re a remarkable find. We didn’t simply rescue Tyre, we won you.”

  A trifle more hesitant than usual, the youngster stared before him. “You explained that, lord, when teaching me. That hardly anybody in this age of the world is able to imagine travel through time and the marvels of tomorrow. It is no use to tell them, they merely get bewildered and frightened.” He cradled his downy chin. “Maybe I am different because I was always on my own, never cast into a mold and let harden.” Happily: “Then I praise the gods, or whatever they were, that kicked me into such a life. It prepared me for a new life with my master.”

  “Well, no, not really that,” Everard replied. “We won’t see each other often again, you and I.”

  “What?” exclaimed Pum, stricken. “Why? Has your servant offended you, O my lord?”

  “Not in any way.” Everard patted the thin shoulder beside him. “On the contrary. But mine is a roving commission. What we want you for is an agent in place, here in your home country, which you know in and out as a foreigner like me—or Chaim and Yael Zorach—never can. Don’t worry. It will be a colorful task, and require as much of you as you can give.”

  Pum gusted a sigh. His smile flashed white. “Well, that will do, master! In truth, I was a little daunted at the thought of faring always among aliens.” His tone dropped. “Will you ever come visit me?”

  “Sure, once in a while. Or if you like, you can join me in assorted interesting future locales when you take your furloughs. We Patrollers work hard, and sometimes dangerously, but we have our fun.” Everard paused, then went on: “Of course, first you need training, education, every kind of knowledge and skill you lack. You’ll go to the Academy, elsewhere in space and time. There you’ll spend years, and they won’t be easy years—though I believe on the whole you’ll revel in them. At last you’ll return to this same year in Tyre, aye, this same month, and take up your duties.”

  “I will be full-grown?”

  “Right. In fact, they’ll put quite a bit of height and weight on you, as well as information into you. You’ll need a new identity, but that won’t be hard to arrange. The same name will serve; it’s common enough. You’ll be Pummairam the sailor, who shipped out years before as a youthful deckhand, won a fortune in trade goods, and is ready to buy a ship and organize his own ventures. You won’t be especially conspicuous, that would defeat our purpose, but you’ll be a prosperous and well-regarded subject of King Hiram.”

  The boy clasped hands together. “Lord, your benevolence overwhelms his servant.”

  “It isn’t done with doing that,” Everard answered. “I have discretionary authority in a case like this, you know, and I am going to make certain arrangements on your behalf. You can’t pass for a respectable man when you settle down unless you get married. Very well, you’ll marry Sarai.”

  Pum squeaked. His gaze upon the Patrolman was dismayed.

  Everard laughed. “Oh, come!” he said. “She may not be any beauty, but she’s not hideous either; we owe her much; and she’s loyal, intelligent, versed in the ways of the palace, lots of useful stuff. True, she’ll never know who you really are. She’ll just be the wife of Captain Pummairam and mother of his children. If any questions arise in her mind, I think she’ll be too wise to ask them.” Sternly: “You will be good to her. Do you hear?”

  “Well—ah, well—” Pum’s attention strayed to the dancing girl. Phoenician males lived by the double standard, and Tyre held more than its share of joyhouses. “Yes, sir.”

  Everard slapped the other’s knee. “I read your mind, son. However, you may find you’re not so interested in roaming. For a second wife, what would you say to Bronwen?”

  It was a pleasure to watch Pum being flabbergasted.

  Everard grew serious. “Before leaving,” he explained, “I mean to give Hiram a gift, not the sort of present that’s customary but something spectacular, like a gold ingot. The Patrol has unlimited wealth and a relaxed attitude toward requisitions. For the sake of his honor, Hiram can refuse me nothing in his turn. I’ll ask for his slave Bronwen and her children. When they are mine, I’ll formally manumit them and furnish her a dowry.

  “I’ve sounded her out. If she can have freedom in Tyre, she doesn’t really want to go back to her homeland and share a wattle-and-daub hut with ten or fifteen fellow tribesfolk. But to stay here, she must have a husband for herself, a stepfather for her kids. How about you?”

  “I—would I—might she—” The blood came and went through Pum’s face.

  Everard nodded. “I promised I’d find her a decent man.”

  She was wistful. Still, practicality takes precedence over romance in this era, as it does in most. It may be hard on him later, seeing his family grow old while he only fakes it. But what with his missions through time, he’ll have them for many decades of his life; and he’s not brought up to the American kind of sensitivity, after all. It should go reasonably well. No doubt the women will become friends, and league to quietly rule Captain Pummairam’s roost for him.

  “Then… oh, my lord!” The youth leaped to his feet and pranced.

  “Easy, easy.” Ever
ard grinned. “On your calendar, remember, you’ve years to go before you’re established. Why delay? Seek the house of Zakar-baal and report to the Zorachs. They’ll get you started.”

  For my part… well, it’ll take me a few days yet to wind up my stay at the palace in graceful and plausible fashion. Meanwhile, Bronwen and I— Everard sighed, with a wistfulness of his own.

  Pum was gone. Feet flying, kaftan flapping, the purple wharf rat sped to the destiny he would make for himself.

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