Astounding Science Fiction Stories: An Anthology of 350 Scifi Stories Volume 2 (Halcyon Classics)

by Various

  "Present me!" he ordered.

  Gunnar performed the small ceremony with white lips. His voice sounded as if he'd been running hard.

  "Zura El Shabur. Zura of the Mist," translated the sheykh. "I am your friend. I have many friends of your Western world. The language! All languages are one to me!"

  Dale beamed. "Ah! Good linguist and all that! Jolly good name yours, what! Gave us quite a scare, popping up out of the atmosphere like Aladdin's djinnee!"

  El Shabui's thin lips again showed his teeth.

  "Those that dwell in the desert's solitude and silence learn to reflect its qualities."

  "Quite! Quite!" Dale gurgled happy agreement. "Neat little accomplishment Very convenient—for you!"

  "Convenient on this occasion for you also, since my coming prevented the inhospitality of my servant from driving you away."

  "No! You're wrong there. Gunnar's been our guardian angel for weeks past. Given us a wonderful time."

  "Nevertheless, I heard that he urged you to go—to go quickly from Solium."

  Dale burst into laughter; long, low gurgles that relieved tension all around. "I'm one of those fools that'd rather lose a pot of gold than alter my plans. One of the camel-drivers has made off with a few bits of loot. You heard the thrifty Gunnar imploring me to follow him."

  Merle backed up the tale with quick wit. "Nothing of vast importance. My silver toilet things, a leather bag, and a camera. Annoying, but hardly worth wasting hours to retrieve."

  She came forward, all anxiety to give Gunnar time to pull himself together.

  El Shabur made her a second low obeisance and stared down into her upturned vivid face. "Such youth and beauty must be served. Shall I send Gunnar after the thief?"

  The idea of separation gave her a shock. Intuition warned her to keep the Icelander at her side for his sake, and for her own. Together there seemed less danger.

  Danger! From what? Why did the word drum through her brain like an S.O.S. signal? She glanced at Gunnar. His face was downbent.

  "No." She met the Arab's eyes with effort and gave a valiant little smile. "No. Indeed not. We can't spare him. He's promised to come with us, to be our guide to the Siwa Oasis."

  "Hope this won't clash with your plans for him. We've got so dependent on his help now." Dale's cherubic face registered anxiety.

  "So." The Arab put a hand on Gunnar's shoulder. "It is good. You have done well."

  The young man shivered. His eyes met Merle's in warning.

  El Shabur turned to reassure her and Dale.

  "Now all goes well. I, too, will join your caravan. It is necessary for my—my work—that I should visit Siwa very soon. I go also."

  Dale took the outstretched hand. "Fine! Fine! We'll make a record trip now."

  In his tent, Dale slept after many hours of hard, concentrated thought and intellectual work—very pink, very tired, younger-looking than ever in his profound repose.

  In her tent, Merle lay quiet too.

  Native servants snored, shapeless cocoons in their blankets. Even the camels had stopped moaning and complaining, and couched peacefully, barracked in a semicircle. Great mounds of baggage within its wide curve lay ready for loading.

  Moonlight silvered long miles of grass and rushes. Leagues of shining water swung in almost tideless rhythm half a mile from camp.

  Gunnar looked out on the scene from his tent. What had roused him from sleep? Why was his heart thumping, and the blood drumming in his ears? He peered out into the hushed world.

  Tents, men, camels and baggage showed still as things on a painted canvas. He left his tent, made a noiseless detour about the sleeping camp, then frowned and stared about in all directions.

  A bird, rising on startled wing, made him look sharply at an old Turkish fort. It stood, grim and battered sentinel, on a near-by promontory of Solium Bay. Through its gaping ruined walls he caught a glint of fire—green, livid, wicked names that stained the night most evilly.

  "El Shabur! Already! The Pentacle of Fire!"

  His whisper was harsh as the faint drag of pebbles on the shore. For several minutes he. stood as if chained. Fear and anger warred with dawning resolution and a wild anxiety. Then he stumbled over to Merle's tent and tore open its flap. Flashlight in hand, he went in and stared down at the sleeping girl. She lay white and rigid as if in a trance. Gunnar touched her forehead, took up a limp hand in his own. She gave no sign of life.

  He stood looking down at the still, waxen features. The rather square, resolute little face was uniformly white, even to the curved, just-parted lips. The hair seemed wrought in metal, so black and heavy and lifeless did it wave above the broad, intelligent brow. Gunnar looked in awe. The girl's animated, sparkling face was changed to something remote and strange and exquisite. Half child, half priestess.

  "And in a few short weeks or months," he muttered, "El Shabur will initiate her. This is the first step. She will rot—perish—as I am doing!"

  He bent, in passionate horror, over the still face.

  "No! No! Not for you! Dear lovely child!"

  He clenched his hands. "But if I disturb him now!"

  For minutes he stood irresolute. Fear took him by the throat. He could not—he could not interfere! At last his will steadied. He mastered the sick terror that made him tremble and shiver like a beaten dog. As he left the tent, he glanced back once more.

  "Good-bye! I'll do all I can," he promised softly. "I'd give my soul to save you—if I still had one."

  He ran to the headland where the old fort stood. If El Shabur's occupation was what he feared, he would neither hear nor see. Intensely concentrating on his rites, nothing in the visible world would reach him.

  Gunnar's calculations were justified. He went boldly in through the arched entrance to an inner court where green fires burned in a great ring, five points of two interlacing triangles which showed black upon the gray dust of the floor. In the center of this cabalistic symbol stood El Shabur, clothed in black. The rod he held was of black ebony.

  Gunnar drew breath. He listened to the toneless continuous muttering of the sheykh. What point had El Shabur reached in his conjurations? How long since he had drawn Merle's soul from the lovely quiet body lying in her tent? It was of vital importance to know. If the devilish business was only begun, he might free her. If El Shabur had reached the last stage, closed the door behind the soul he was luring from its habitation, then it was fatally late.

  He listened, head thrust forward, trying to distinguish the rapidly muttered words.

  "Shekinah! Aralim! Ophanim! Assist me in the name of Melek Taos, Ruler of wind and stars and sea, who commands the four elements in the might of Adonai and the Ancient Ones!"

  "A-h-h-h!" Gunnar gave a deep gasping sigh of relief. He was not too late. Sheykh El Shabur called on his allies. Merle's spirit was not yet cut off from its home. Her will resisted the Arab's compulsion.

  He leaped forward, oversetting all five braziers. Their fire spilled and died out instantly. In the cold clear moonlight, El Shabur loomed tall, menacing. He stood glaring across the courtyard at the intruder. His black-clad figure overshadowed the Icelander's by many inches, like a cloud, like a bird of prey. Malignant, implacable he towered.

  Gunnar's golden head sank. His strong, straight body seemed to shrink and crumple. Inch by inch he retreated, until he reached the wall. He tried to meet the Arab's unblinking stare and failed. Again his bright head sank. His eyes sought the dusty earth. But his whole frame trembled with a wild, fanatical excitement. He had succeeded so far—had brought El Shabur back from that void where Merle's spirit had so perilously wandered. She was free. Free to go back to that still white body lying in her tent.

  "So! You love this girl. You would save her from me. You—who cannot save yourself!"

  "You're right." The young man's voice shook. "Right as far as I'm concerned. But Miss Anthony's on a different plane. You're not going to play your filthy tricks on her."

  "So! It would seem that,
in spite of my teaching, you are not yet well disciplined. Have you forgotten your vow? Have you forgotten that a cabalist may never retreat one inch of the road he treads? Have you forgotten the punishment that overtakes the renegade?"

  "I would die to save her from you."

  The other showed white teeth in a mirthless sardonic grin.

  "Die!" echoed his deep, mocking voice. "Death is not for us. Are you not initiated and under protection? What can bring death to such as you?"

  "There must be a way of escape for me—and for her. I will defeat you yet, El Shabur!"

  The Icelander's voice rose. His eyes were blazing. He stepped forward. Moonlight touched his shining hair, his passion-contorted features, his angry, bloodshot eyes. Control slipped from him. He strove in vain to recapture it, to use his reason. He knew that anger was delivering him bound and helpless into his enemy's hands. It had been so from their first encounter. Emotion versus reason. He knew his fatal weakness, and strove against it now—in vain. Long habit ruled. Anger made his will a thing of straw.

  "You would defy me—the Power I serve—the Power that serves me?"

  Gunnar felt the blood rushing to his head. His ears sang. Red mist obscured his sight.

  "You are a devil! And you serve devils!" he shouted. "But you won't always win the game! Curse you, El Shabur! Curse you! Curse you!"

  The Arab looked long into his angry eyes, and came closer. With an incredibly swift movement he clasped the shaking, furious figure.

  Gunnar felt dry lips touch his ears and mouth and brow, heard a low quick mutter. Then EI Shabur released him suddenly, and stood back.

  "Ignorant and beast-like! Be what you are—slave to your own passion! You, yourself, create the devil that haunts you. Therefore are you mine—for all devils are subject to me. Be what you are! Out, beast! Howl and snarl with your own kind until the dawn."

  For a moment something dark scuffled in the dust at El Shabur's feet. The courtyard rang with a long, desolate howl. A shadow, lean and swift, fled from the camp, far, far out across the empty wasteland.

  At sunset, the next day, Dale Fleming and his caravan reached Bir Augerin, the first well on their march. They had delayed their start some hours. Merle had insisted in waiting for Gunnar, but he had not turned up.

  "He will join us en route," the sheykh had assured her. "He is well used to desert travel, Mademoiselle!"

  "But his camel?"

  "We will take it. He can easily hire another."

  "Have you no idea why he went off and left us without warning? It's so unlike him."

  El Shabur gave his dark unmirthful smile.

  "He is young. Young and careless and—undisciplined. He has—friends. Oh, he is popular! That golden hair of his—it has a fascination...."

  Merle's face crimsoned and grew pale. Dale's round face concealed his thoughts. He glanced at the Arab's lean hands that twisted a stiff length of wire rope with such slow and vicious strength. He had learned how betraying hands may be.

  Merle made no more objections, and at 3:30 p. m. the caravan set out. The natives were superstitious about a journey's start. Mondays, Thursdays and Saturdays were fortunate; and Saturday the luckiest of the week.

  At Bir Augerin, camp was quickly made. The servants drew up water from the large rectangular tank in leather buckets. Merle sat disconsolate to watch, and smoke, and think of Gunnar. Dale joined her, leaving the sheykh to direct the men.

  "I don't believe it!" Merle burst out.

  "About our absent friend?"

  "Gunnar's not that sort. I think they've had a quarrel. Dale!" She put a beseeching hand on his arm. "You don't think—he wouldn't kill Gunnar!"

  "My prophetic bones tell me not." He patted the hand in brisk, business-like fashion. "He'll turn up and explain himself. Don't worry. This Sheykh of the Mist's a queer old josser. About as trustworthy as a black panther, but the boy's too useful to be killed off in a hurry. All the same—look here, Merle: keep this handy at night."

  He put a small snub-nosed automatic in her hand.

  "It's loaded. And I've taught you to use it. Listen! There are wolves on this trail. Heard 'em last night about the camp."

  "Wolves? In the desert? Jackals, you mean."

  "Don't speak out of turn. Wolves. You know—things that go off like this."

  He threw back his head and gave a blood-curdling howl that electrified the camp. El Shabur spun on his heel, long knife drawn. The servants groveled, then ran to pluck brands from the fire.

  Dale gave a rich, infectious gurgle. "Splendid! Must have done that jolly well. Now perhaps you'll recognize a wolf when you hear it. If you do—shoot!"

  Soon after four a. m. the caravan set out again in the chill clear moonlight. In spite of grilling days, the nights remained cool and made travel easy. They reached their next halt, Bir Hamed, about eight o'clock. This cistern was the last before real desert began. They decided to give the camels a good day's grazing and watering and push off again in the small hours before dawn.

  Cooking-pots were slung over crackling fires. Fragrance of wood smoke mingled with odor of frying sausages and onions. Dale went over and implored the cook to refrain from using last night's dish-water to brew coffee. El Shabur approached Merle and pointed to the east.

  "He comes."

  She dropped a camera and roll of films and jumped to her feet.

  "Who? Gunnar? I see no one."

  "He comes riding from over there."

  Low rolling dunes to the east showed bare and smooth and empty of life. She stared, and frowned at the speaker. "I see nothing. Dale!" she called out. "The sheykh says Gunnar's coming from over there. Can you see him?"

  Dale scrutinized the empty eastern horizon, then turned to El Shabur with a bland wide smile. "Ah, you wonderful Arabs! Putting one over on us, aren't you? You people have extra valve sets. Pick up things from the ether. It's enough to give me an inferiority complex."

  He thrust an arm through Merle's. "If he says so, it is so! I'll tell cook to fry a few more sausages.

  "Servants are all in a state of jim-jams this morning," he said as he returned from his hospitable errand. "Ilbrahaim's been handing out samples from the Thousand and One Nights' Entertainments, What d'you suppose he's started now?"

  "They talk much," the sheykh's deep scornful voice replied. "And they say nothing."

  "Ilbrahaim is a chatty little fellow. Be invaluable at a funeral, wouldn't he? Distract the mourners and all that! Unless he got on to vampires and ghouls. He's keen on cabalistic beliefs."

  "Such things are childish; they have no interest for a cabalist."

  "No—really! Well, you probably know. Is there a place called Bilad El Kelab?"

  El Shabur's eyes glinted. His chin went up in a gesture of assent.

  "There is? Ah, then Ilbrahaim tells the truth now and then. His brother went to this place. Country of the Dogs—suggestive name! The yarn is that all the men there turn to dogs at sunset. Like werewolves, you know."

  "Bilad El Kelab is far away. South—far south in the Sudan. Ilbrahaim has no brother, moreover."

  "No?"

  "No. There are many foolish legends from the Sudan."

  "Not so foolish. I'm interested in folklore and legend and primitive beliefs. That's why I'm going to Siwa, apart from looking after my little cousin here."

  El Shabur's eyes smoldered. "It is unwise to be too curious about such things. That which feeds an eagle is no meat for a fish."

  "Quite! Quite! Good that, isn't it, Merle? Meaning we Westerners are fish! Oh, definitely good! This Ilbrahaim, though — he swears our camp's being haunted. He thinks a weredog, or werewolf, has attached itself to us. Says he woke and saw it prowling about last night."

  "A long trail from the Bilad El Kelab!"

  "You're right, El Shabur. Still, what's a few hundred miles to a werewolf? And I suppose it travels on camel-back by day, if it's got its man's body in good repair. Have to be a new camel each morning—eh? Not likely a self-respecting
mehari would trot hoof in paw with a wolf each night."

  "Dale! Is it the same wolf you said was——"

  A cousinly kick on the ankle, as Dale moved to replace a blazing branch on the fire, warned her.

  "Is it the wolf-tale they talked about in Alexandria?" she switched off quickly.

  "Dear child!" Dale beamed approval. "How your little wits do work! No! That wolf was a jackal that haunted the Valley of the Kings in Egypt."

  El Shabur turned his head sharply. "The lost one arrives," he remarked.

  In the distance, magnified and distorted by the hot desert air, a vast camel and rider loomed. Merle lighted a cigarette with slow, unsteady hands.

  "It may be anyone. Impossible to tell yet."

  The sheykh spread his hands. "Mademoiselle will soon discover."

  In half an hour, Gunnar rode into Camp. A sorry figure, disheveled, unshaven, he looked as if he'd been across Africa with a minimum of food and sleep. Merle had meant to be unrelenting at first, to await explanation, but her heart betrayed her at sight of this desperately weary man. She ran to meet him as he dismounted, and tried to lead him over to where Dale and the Arab sat smoking.

  He stood swaying on his feet. "No. Not now." His cracked, parched lips could scarcely frame the words. "I must sleep. I—I could not help it. I was prevented—I was prevented," he croaked.

  "Gunnar—of course!" She beckoned to a servant. "Take care of him. I'll send Dale effendi to give him medicine. He is ill."

  In the late afternoon the camp was in more or less of an uproar. The camels were driven in from pasturage to drink once again. They would have preferred to go on grazing, and, being camels, they expressed disapproval noisily, and gave much trouble to the cursing, sweating men.

  Dale sauntered off from their vicinity. The sun was casting shadows that lengthened steadily. He stopped in the shadow of a huge boulder and stared thoughtfully out across the barren desert.

  "Got his goat all right about that legend and the cabalists. Now, just why did that strike home? The pattern's there, but all in little moving bits. I can't get the confounded mosaic right. Cabalists! Werewolves! Gunnar and the Sheykh of the Mist! Haunted camp and all the rest of it! A very, very pretty little mix-up. I wonder now.... I wonder...."