Left of Africa

by Hal Clement

  Gizona remained standing; the captain did not invite him to be seated, and did not at first appear to notice him at all. He waited until the soldiers were comfortable, and then began to talk.

  "You two have probably been wondering what I hired you for, since there hasn’t been anything for you to do for half a year. I trust you know me well enough by now to realize that I usually have a reason for what I do; I think the time has come to make that reason clear.

  "You know about this trip; I don’t have to explain that to you." (Gizona immediately became even more alert; if there was anything his masters did not know, it was the true purpose of the voyage.) "We had two convoying galleys, whose soldiers were to protect the riches we gathered on their way back to Egypt and Pharoah. We lost one of these ships, but the other could still destroy the remainder of this fleet if the men on it so chose. Her captain is a Phoenician, and a friend of mine whom I trust; but the soldiers are not only not Phoenicians, they are not even Egyptians. It seems to me more than likely that some of them are going to get ideas of their own about the treasure once the cargo ships have it on board; and that worries me. We are far from Pharoah’s power, and if they were to cut all our throats and make for the Land of the Two Rivers with their loot Niku would probably never hear of it, let alone avenge us."

  Both soldiers nodded; they were not strangers to this idea, as Gizona well knew.

  "I remembered meeting you nearly a year ago, coming down from the Bitter Lakes; and it struck me that it would be a good idea to have a couple of non-Phoenicians working for me during this trip. The soldiers on the galley, of course, would not trust Phoenician sailors; they’d assume that they were spies and throw them overboard even before getting around to an actual mutiny. What I need is a couple of spies who will be trusted by them, and can get away with the job. I'd like to get one or both of you onto the galley to keep your ears open and report to me any sign that the soldiers there are planning anything against Pharoah’s interests-or mine, of course."

  There was silence for a minute or two while the men digested this speech. It was Nimshi who finally spoke.

  "I suppose it would not be hard to make reports to you when we were ashore at night— "

  "Your slave could carry them easily, so you would not arouse suspicion by visiting me yourself.”

  "That wasn’t my big question. Supposing we do find that they are planning to take over the fleet and treasure, what can you do about it?"

  Captain David pursed his lips in thought for a moment, the motion just visible through his beard. Then he shook his head.

  "I have made plans," he said, "but I think it would be wisest not to explain them until it becomes necessary. It is enough, just now, for you to understand that I will need advance notice of any mutiny-the longer in advance the better. From then on, what happens will be my worry."

  Nimshi nodded his head understandingly, and spoke just in time to cut off an indignant objection from Sargon.

  "I understand, sir. It would reflect very badly on your intelligence to tell those plans, particularly to us. After all, we’re not Phoenicians either-and I expect there are even some Phoenicians you'd rather not trust that far. I’m a little surprised that you trust us as far as you do." Sargon looked at his partner in bewilderment, but decided not to say anything.

  "I haven’t much choice," the captain pointed out drily. "I’ll just have to depend on your preferring the reward I give, and whatever Pharoah gives, along with his friendship and support, to whatever you might get sharing the cargo with the other soldiers along with the problem of keeping out of Egypt's reach the rest of your lives. Maybe you’re stupid, or maybe you just prefer to be fugitives-that’s the chance I take. I know some of the soldiers on the galley are that stupid; that’s why I need you." "That makes sense." Nimshi became businesslike. "What plan have you made to get us onto the galley without arousing suspicion?"

  "It can be done gradually," the captain replied. "We will be here for several months, as you probably know by now. The soldiers will be camped ashore and the galley hauled out to get her bottom cleaned, as will the other ships. You should be able to make plenty of friends in camp during that time-you may know some of them already.

  "The soldiers who were picked up from the galley that sank were kept on the ships that saved them; that was my idea. If you don’t say anything about it the others will probably take for granted you’re a couple of those, and the real ones will think you’re from this galley. Just don’t get caught lying." He grinned, and the two soldiers did the same.

  Those grins seemed to make the captain relax a bit; he must have felt that he could trust them— and then Gizona remembered what he had heard that long-gone night through a crack in a deck, and wondered just how good an actor David was.

  "There’s one reason I want you to be on good terms with those soldiers before we leave here," the Phoenician went on. "I wasn’t going to tell you at first, but have changed my mind-never mind why. The tribes who trade gold live only a little farther along the coast; we have only a short journey once we start again. That means that once we leave here there will be little time for you to get on proper terms with the galley fighters."

  Sargon spoke for the first time, blurting out the natural question before Nimshi could interrupt-if he had wanted to.

  "Why did you stop here instead of going on to the Land of Gold, if it’s so close?"

  "Because we need supplies; we have to grow more grain for the trip back. I don’t dare take those soldiers on to the trading place without enough food for return; they’d loot the tribes of everything, gold and food as well, and no one would ever be able to trade there again. I know. Only Phoenicians have the sense to trade fairly so that they can come back again; Asians and Greeks and others are thieves and fools." Gizona, who knew that the Carthaginians were of Phoenician descent and who had spent weeks on a Greek trader, knew that the captain was not telling the whole truth, but said nothing.

  "That’s it, soldiers." The captain sat up straight suddenly. "You can either work for me and Pharoah, or for anyone else you like-whichever you think will be best for you.

  You can help me hold in hand that shipful of butchers Pharoah thought would be needed, or join them and do as you please. I won't say it makes no difference to me, but I will say that I can do no more to make up your minds for you. Leave me now— "

  "Wait," said Nimshi. "If we’re close to these people who have gold, isn’t there a chance of some of them finding us while we grow food here?" "I doubt it. There is a large river farther south, and they live on the other side, well upstream. I’ve never heard of their wandering this far." That was all the captain would say; he dismissed them to make up their minds. The soldiers left his hut thinking hard.

  They were not thinking as hard as Gizona, however. They were merely trying to decide which action would make them richest; Gizona was trying to decide what the captain could possibly be planning. For of course he knew perfectly well that Captain David's story was a lie from start to finish.

  CHAPTER 15

  Nimshi and Sargon did not know this, and the ideas they were discussing showed it clearly. "This is the time, Nimshi!" The Ninevite was emphatic. "He’s told us all we need to know. We can find the place, and we can get a crew to go with us."

  "Do you expect to carry enough treasure to satisfy the whole crew in a galley? We'd need at least one of the other ships; you know that as well as I do."

  "I don’t. That galley is big-and remember how much old Barcus’ ship could carry. Gold doesn’t take up much room."

  "It’s heavy, though."

  "Not that heavy. Come on; you know it’s the only thing to do."

  "David had a point there— if we stick with him we could come out of it pretty well, and on the good side of Pharoah to boot."

  "You mean you really swallowed that? What else could you expect him to say? Here you are with a chance to get all the gold you could spend in a lifetime, and you start to find objections to taking it
. I thought you were a man!"

  Nimshi was a man, and a much more intelligent one than Sargon. Even so, his companion’s remark almost made him lose his temper. He managed to resist the urge to strike the AsSyrian— fortunately for him; Sargon would have used his sword without stopping to think-but he did not succeed in getting full control of his feelings in time. He talked without thinking, and as usual regretted it later.

  "All right, you walking knife-edge! I’m three times the man you are, and you'll admit it when the rest of those galley-crewmen are trying to pry your share of the gold away from you. That’s when you'll be asking me what to do!" Sargon did not bother to resent this remark; he was satisfied at getting his friend to commit himself to the plan of piracy.

  Neither of them had paid the least attention to Gizona during this discussion, but the boy realized they soon would. He was a little worried, but not much; they had planned so much in his hearing without worrying about betrayal that one more item probably wouldn’t bother them. If it did, of course-if they did start to worry about his telling Captain David of their plans-he knew what they would do. However, he had other things in mind.

  Just what was the captain up to? Why had he told such a bare-faced lie? He must have expected to be believed, since he did not know of Gizona’s eavesdropping so long before. He must have had some reason for "revealing’ the location of the Land of Gold— Nimshi's question had been an excuse, but the captain didn’t have to say so much; he might merely have said that it was too far for foot travel. Mention of a river, and even which bank the natives lived on, could only have been due to some hidden plan of David’s. Gizona tried to think what it could be; something was stirring in the back of his mind, but it refused to take shape for him. This was different from pulling out memories.

  His thoughts were interrupted by an order from Nimshi.

  "Gizona! The time has come for you to get back to a little spying. Captain David is not stupid; he must know that we'll at least think about throwing in with the men on the galley. You keep your eyes open from now on for anyone you think may be watching us especially closely, and if you spot one check to see whether he reports to the captain." He chuckled. "There are going to be so many spies spying on each other around here that no one will have time to eat— Sargon and I on the soldiers, David on us, you on David. I trust you to see that no one carries it any farther and spies on you."

  "Can’t stop it if they do," replied Gizona, "but I can see that they don’t learn anything about me."

  "Don’t feel too sure of that. You’ve been wrong before, young fellow." Gizona had no answer to that, though he felt that there ought to be one. It made him uneasy.

  He became even more uneasy during the following weeks, while the ships were dragged ashore and their hulls; scraped he was unable to find any signs of spying either on him or on his masters, and Nimshi and Sargon refused to believe he could be right about this. They insisted that someone must be watching and that Gizona was losing his ability to spot them. Gizona, though sure in his own mind that he could recall every face that had looked at any of them twice, began to lose confidence in himself. How far this might have gone cannot be said, since about the time the first shoots of grain were appearing in the fields the men had burned clear and planted Nimshi made a remark which removed all the trouble.

  He didn’t mean to be helpful; he was very annoyed with Gizona about that time, since he was on the point of telling his plans to some of the other soldiers and wasn’t sure whether he dared to or not. If anyone betrayed him after he had really started a mutiny the captain could, and undoubtedly would, sink him in the lagoon in full armor— or more probably, Nimshi reflected, with a couple of rocks, since the armor was valuable. The Judean was therefore a bit tense, and he was in no mood to accept the boy’s assurance that the captain was not spying-that he had not talked more than once with any of the galley soldiers, and that none of the Syrian Sun’s crew had been paying attention to Nimshi himself.

  "You’re crazy!" he insisted. "I keep telling you that David has more brains than you’ll ever see again. Leaving us unwatched after he told us what he did would be like giving us the galley and telling us to get along to the Land of Gold!"

  "You may be right, sir— "

  "I am right, and you know it!"

  "I only know that I haven’t caught anyone watching you or Sargon or me. I'll keep on trying."

  The Judean was not satisfied, but had nothing really helpful to suggest. As a matter of fact, Gizona was not paying him very much attention; for something Nimshi had said had jarred the boy’s thoughts into action and enabled him to fit together some facts which had been in his memory for quite a while.

  "-giving us the galley and telling us to get along— "

  "I don’t trust either of them as far as I could throw an anchor— "

  "We must bear in mind the galleys, whose crews we could not trust— "

  "Accidents might happen— "

  It was plain enough, with that conversation back in his mind; he wondered why he had never thought of it before. The Phoenicians wanted the galley to leave; this was the purpose in David's hiring Nimshi and Sargon. He had dropped a baited hook; that gold-greedy pair had swallowed it without dreaming that there might be a line attached.

  Gizona wondered what actually was up the river the captain had mentioned. There must be something, or David would have suggested in some way that the Land of Gold was back up the coast to the north. He certainly did not want to run into the galley later on. There must definitely be a river, and the Phoenicians must know enough about it to feel sure that if the galley went any distance up it she would be a good long time coming back.

  Gizona felt strongly that he did not want to be aboard that ship.

  Unfortunately, what he wanted or did not want was not going to interest anyone but Gizona himself. If he were to stay off that galley, he would have to make all the arrangements; and that was not going to be easy. Sargon and Nimshi intended to go on it-they had their plans made. As soon as she was back in the water, they intended to have her soldier crew steal every scrap of food remaining in the fleet and head for the river to the south, leaving the Phoenicians to live on whatever they could scratch from the surrounding country.

  The one ray of hope lay in the fact that the pair of rascals had not yet dared to do any recruiting for their scheme; none of the galley soldiers knew about it. Just possibly, use might be made of that fact. As Gizona thought it over, he became more and more sure that it could.

  And, since he was away from his masters by that time, he began to grin. Then he found a quiet spot under a tree, sat down, made himself comfortable, and began to fill out the details of his plan.

  The first thing was to delay Nimshi’s start at spreading word of his plan among the soldiers. That should be easy; Gizona could report that he had found a spy after all. Nimshi in his present frame of mind would believe him, and stop everything until he could decide what to do about it. If Gizona were to suggest that the spy were one of the soldiers it would be particularly effective.

  That problem could be checked off.

  Then there would be work to do on the soldiers themselves. There were two jobs here; they had to be persuaded to go, as the Phoenicians wanted, but they had to go without Nimshi and Sargon. That meant either getting the galley crew interested in something that did not interest Gizona’s masters, or afraid of something which did not bother the pair, or convinced in some way that the two were undesirables who were better left behind. The first two methods looked rather difficult at first sight, but if he used the third Gizona might find his owners murdered some fine morning. It was a hard decision to make; he was a couple of days making it.

  In the meantime, though, he had started the first step. Nimshi and Sargon had been told that a certain soldier on the galley crew had been seen talking to one of David's officers. Gizona felt that saying he had talked to David himself might be too easy to disprove. The officers did not keep to themselves quite so
much. The soldier the boy had picked for hero in this deception was named Lukos and was one of the tallest and strongest on the crew; he hoped that would keep Sargon from luring the fellow into the woods and trying to get rid of him the quick way. Of course, if that happened, Gizona could always find another subject for his story; but he disliked unnecessary violence. He had suffered too much of it himself.

  Nimshi, as expected, had immediately ordered the boy to concentrate on this "spy" and learn everything possible about him. That, naturally, left Gizona free to do just about as he pleased, especially to spend time with the soldiers. He was quite satisfied with himself; things were happening just as he had thought they would. He remembered, of course, that in the past he had been feeling much the same just before something happened to make him feel pretty foolish, but somehow he couldn’t make himself worry about such possibilities this time.

  Watching his soldier automatically meant spending a good deal of time away from the ships, for the galley crew had been required to do their share of field work. There was some grumbling among the soldiers turned farmers, but so far no open refusal to work had taken place. Most of them did realize that the work was necessary if anyone was to eat when the present supplies were gone.