All dead now, Howie thought, remembering his shipmates. They weren’t true Christians but they were friends. Then abruptly he recognized Joe’s voice speaking in an unknown tongue. He was alive!
The young skipper was not a true Christian either but his quiet competence always made Howie think wistfully of the father he had never known. He felt better already. Mr. Rate had coped with everything so far—he would cope with this. But how soon?
The she-devil squirmed and Howie was reminded of their desperate position. He discovered that her dress had crawled higher than it had any business crawling. He tried to move away and again his hand contacted forbidden fruit, round and firm like half a melon. Again her knees jabbed at his clotted nose.
Howie fought his arms down past the she-devil’s body until he could encircle her flailing legs. There was no room to retreat, so he advanced, squeezing with all his strength. Still she struggled. Knees pummeled his cheeks like calking mallets. The she-devil would not stop kneeing him I It was almost as if she didn’t want him to touch her. There was only one move left: Howie bit.
His incisors met in a particularly tender place just above the kneecap and the flailing immediately stopped. She lay stiff, trembling slightly like a newly saddled filly. Howie moved a cautious hand. Maybe he could find that confounded skirt and pull it down.
But the farther his hand moved the more softly interesting things became. I won’t pull it down just yet, Howie decided. If he was to fight the Devil it would be well to familiarize himself with the Devil’s weapons.
The she-devil squirmed again, shifting position with a thoroughly delightful wriggle. Tingling fire passed through Howie’s virgin loins. I’ll move my hand just a little farther, he decided. At that instant sheet lightning flashed through his closed eyes. Sparks and pinwheels banked billiard-like round the inner corners of his skull and he gave a yelp of outraged surprise. It wasn’t only his nose she’d smashed; it felt like the treacherous she-devil had bitten off the tip of his big toe! He froze, waiting for someone to tear up the floorboard and discover them, but after several minutes it appeared that no one had heard. There was a long, thoughtful silence while Howie dwelt on many things.
Even as Joe Rate, he came to the belated conclusion that this she-devil was less freewheeling than would appear at first glance. She had not, Howie suddenly realized, the slightest intention of seducing him. The knowledge left him shaken to the very core of his being, for if she were defending her virtue then Howie’s wandering hand had sinned him into a very tight corner. How could he ever make amends to God and Mother for attempting to lead this fair flower astray?
Why, she could probably be led down paths of righteousness and become a true Christian! But that was beside the point. He had wronged this girl. There was but one way to make amends. He would marry her.
The thought shocked him but there was no avoiding it. Come to think of it, hadn’t St. Paul suggested it was better to marry than to bum? Howie could no longer hide even from himself the ardor with which he burned. It would not be pure sacrifice on his part, he decided.
But if he were to marry this fair flower he must first save her from the Infidel. A wave of shame swept through Howie as he realized that his betrothed was witness to this shameful, rodentlike cowering in darkness. He felt the strength of God flowing into him. It was time to act. But what was he to do? Why was Mr. Rate taking so long?
Joe and the imam still faced each other across the minuscule cabin. “What kind of a weapon is it?” the imam asked.
Joe took the pistol reluctantly from his belt. “Fire burns in a closed place,” he explained. “The smoke pushes a piece of lead out of this tube.”
“Ingenious,” the old man said. “How far will it throw?”
Joe thought a moment, trying to remember if the Arabs used yards. Probably not. He spread his arms wide and said, “Fifty times this distance.” He tossed the pistol into the drawer below his bunk with a careless gesture.
The old man was impressed. “I should like to visit your country.”
“So would I,” Joe added with a sad smile.
The imam grinned wolfishly. “You can bamboozle Sidi Ferroush with yams about a far continent, but I have talked with a man who went there. It is a worthless land, filled with howling savages and strange sicknesses. I do not think you were blown off course. Nor do I think you are lost. You have charts and you have bits of crystal ground Archimedes fashion. No.” The imam laughed his short hard cackle. “I believe in God but I do not expect to see Paradise through a burning glass.”
Joe realized dimly that he was not at his best with an open mouth but he couldn’t get around to closing it.
“You do not come from the Worthless Continent,” the old man continued. “Your ship and tools are too fine for savages. Besides, you look like Roumi—Europeans.
“If I were still young and believed in the fabulous kingdom of Prester John—But alas, I am old and a cynic. Yet, I would give the remaining years of my life to know from whence you come.”
“You’d never believe me,” Joe said.
“Probably not,” the old man conceded, “but that will not make me stop listening.”
Joe took a deep breath and began. It was a garbled account, punctuated with skippings back and forth as he remembered details, interrupted often with fumblings for words Joe didn’t know and ideas which had never existed in Tenth Century Spain.
In the last few days Joe had become more proficient in the language—really more of an uninflected Latin than Spanish. As he told his tale one corner of his mind reflected on how he was slipping into a new pronunciation with vowel sounds all different from what he’d learned in school. Abruptly, he broke off and began chanting:
“Arma virumque cano, Troiae qui primus ab oris
Italiam, fato profugus, Laviniaque venit . . .”
The imam looked at him with a slight, quizzical smile.
“So that’s how it sounded!” Joe marvelled, his face lighting with the first and only love of his life. “Latin’s a dead language in our time, you know. We could only guess at how it sounded.
“Litora multum ille et terris iactatus et alto
vi superum saevae memorem lunonis ob tram;
multa quoque et—”
He continued, rolling over Virgil’s metre with rising confidence. “No wonder the empress fainted the first time she heard it!”
“I begin,” the old man said, “to believe your fantastic tale.”
Joe looked at him.
The old man began chanting in a regular, even metre and Joe listened, tormented by a feeling that he could almost understand. The old man stopped abruptly. “It’s changed from his day to mine,” he explained. “But that’s how I think he might have sung it.”
“Again!” Joe said with mounting excitement.
The imam repeated, and abruptly the harsh syllables fell into meaning for Joe. Tears started in his eyes as he remembered Dr. Battlement. How many years would Old Prof have given to hear the Iliad in Homer’s accents?
“I see you recognize it.”
Joe nodded, not trusting himself to speak.
The imam was silent for a moment. “You have the advantage,” he finally said.
“How?”
“We are history—to be read in any book. You are the future which is read in no book.”
“I’m afraid I can tell you little,” Joe said. “And I wonder if I should tell you anything. I might change the course of history and erase my own present.”
The imam shrugged. “I will change no history. I am an old man with no hunger to gratify but curiosity. He laughed his single cackle again. “I doubt if I am important enough to be inscribed in the histories, so I won’t ask the date of my death. But you could tell me, I think, what were or will be the fates of Islam and Christendom.”
“That brings me to a problem which has plagued me since this whole thing began. What year is this?”
“376.”
The 376th year of the Hijra
, Joe calculated, would bring it to about 998 A.D. “What month?” he asked.
“The Arab month is lunar and wanders all over the seasons. At the moment I can’t remember what it would be by the Greek calendar.”
“Has the summer solstice passed yet?”
“Oh yes, 70 days ago.”
So it was late summer after all. Where, Joe wondered, had he slipped up in his navigation? He reached absently for a cigarette and belatedly realized he was violating his own order about hands out of pockets. Oh well, he philosophized, the old buzzard had seen through everything else he’d tried to pull. He lit it with a sidelong glance to see how the old imam would react to matches. The old man merely watched interestedly without comment. Joe offered him a cigarette but the old man waved it away with a typically Greek gesture. When the smoke drifted his way he coughed.
“A disgusting habit,” Joe conceded. “Let’s go on deck where the air’s fresher.”
Dr. Krom and Lapham were sleeping on the settees in the darkened galley. The oceanographer stirred and muttered an angry phrase in Hungarian. He’ll sleep better tomorrow, Joe thought. We’ll all sleep better when I pass the word. With a little luck the imam can swing an appropriation and some back corner of the Alhambra for us to carry out a few experiments. All they would have to do was keep Mr. Big happy with an invention once in a while—an improved hour glass or something fancy in the way of weapons. He wondered if he could manufacture a parachute flare out of pitch and sulfur and whatever else would be available.
“How many of your people understand this language?” Joe asked.
“Most of them were born in Spain,” the old man said.
They made their way up into the Alice’s bows, picking their way past sleeping Moors. The helmsman and two huge Negroes who leaned on scimitars in the yawls’ waist all greeted the old man respectfully. Joe sat on the anchor winch and the imam squatted on deck beside him. All sails were drawing in the starlit night and Joe’s admiration for the Moorish helmsman increased. He took a final puff on his cigarette and began telling the old man what had happened in the world since 998.
Howie lay facing his betrothed in the darkness. The strength of God was in him but what was he to do? There was, he decided, but one thing. Mr. Rate had made it clear: Kill a few Infidels in your own private crusade. How else could he recover his tarnished honor or repair the damage his sinful, wandering hands had done?
Cautiously, he pushed up the floorboard and caught a glimpse of Dr. Krom’s bushy white head on the settee. Didn’t even throw his body overboard, Howie thought, but then the old oceanographer released a snore and he was forced into another rapid revision of his beliefs.
His betrothed hissed something and pulled the floorboard back down. If this marriage were to be successful, Howie decided, it was time for him to assert his authority. With unbounded confidence Howie pushed the floorboard up again and climbed out. He motioned Raquel to stay down by the engine but she scrambled out to stand beside him.
They faced each other in the dim nightfight, wondering what next? They couldn’t stand here forever, Howie decided. He tried the door to Mr. Rate’s tiny cubicle, and found it empty. He drew Raquel in and bolted the door before turning on the fight. Mr. Rate kept a pistol in here somewhere—the question was where? I’ll start with the top drawer, he decided, and there it was on the first try!
The pistol was loaded. But there were hundreds of Arabs aboard and only six shots. He rummaged through the other drawers but couldn’t find the extra ammunition. He had to act soon, for the strength of God was upon him and Howie had a feeling that if he waited too long it would leave him. Besides, he decided, the pistol was all wrong. The first shot would bring them all upon him. He needed a quieter weapon. “Do you have a knife?” he whispered.
Raquel looked at him blankly.
Howie made a slicing motion across his throat and pointed at her. Light dawned in his betrothed’s eyes. Her hand went inside her bodice in a lightning gesture and reappeared with a short, double edged blade. Howie held out his hand but she refused, shaking her head. He realized she was right. If God sees fit to take me I can’t leave her to a fate worse than death. He put a finger to his lips and, after turning out the light, opened the door.
The galley was still quiet. He tiptoed forward to the drawer where Cookie kept the cutlery. Rummaging through it, he picked a small paring knife, a French chef’s knife, a boning knife, and a cleaver. He turned and bumped into Raquel. “I told you to stay in the cabin,” he hissed, but again she refused to understand English.
Howie crept forward into the darkened forecastle and searched for the bunk above his empty rack. Red Schwartz awakened with a startled grunt which Howie stifled with a pillow. His eyes opened and saw Howie offering him the boning knife. Schwartz was instantly awake; he took the knife and swung his bare feet down onto the cabin sole without a word.
Howie held up the remaining knives in mute question. Schwartz put a hand over Amie Cook’s mouth and shook the gaunt Tennessean gently. Cookie sat upright, cracking his head on the upper bunk. Seeing his French knife and cleaver, he instantly picked the French knife. “Where’s Mr. Rate?” he whispered, but they didn’t answer.
“What the bastardly—” Gorson erupted when they woke him. He tore hands away from his mouth. Then he saw the cleaver and shut up.
Howie and Schwartz headed for the forward scuttle as Gorson and Cookie tiptoed for the after ladder. Why, Howie wondered, didn’t Satan’s men bother to post a man belowdecks? This carelessness could only mean that God was on Howie’s side. Gorson, pondering the same question, decided the Moors felt contempt for any men who would give up with as little fight as they had.
“—and then in 1571,” Joe continued, “a coalition of Christian states put an end to Moslem expansion at the Battle of Lepanto.” He reached absently for another cigarette and reminded himself that he had less than a pack remaining.
“Yes,” the imam probed, “and was Christendom then unified again?”
But Joe’s sailor half was watching the faint flutter which had developed in the luff of the mains’l. He glanced back just in time to see the Moor steersman go flying overboard. Someone—it looked like little Guilbeau—had the wheel and was already pulling the Alice back on course.
There was no mistaking the meaning of that sight. Joe’s muscles tensed, but instead of the adrenalin of battle he found guilt and shame coursing through him. He should have been leading this insurrection himself, instead of discussing history.
He turned, ready to throttle the old man, but the imam had also seen what happened and merely watched with a lively interest in his rheumy eyes. They stared at each other in silent surmise while Joe cursed his indecision. This was the enemyl He should throttle him and then have a go at those bescimitared Negroes who lounged in the waist
While he fluttered in indecision one of the Negroes glanced aft and saw Guilbeau at the wheel. The Negro shouted a single questioning word and abruptly an ululating fiend charged him. Still staring, Joe realized that it was McGrath. The little god shouter plunged his knife twice into the African’s midriff, then spun to the other who had finally awakened to danger and was swinging his scimitar.
Gorson and Cookie were moving forward now to cover little Howie. In the bow there was shouting and a confused melee as Moors awoke to struggle with the Alice’s men who boiled up out of the forehatch.
Joe and the imam, still stood side by side watching the fracas. The scimitar was descending and Joe could see that Howie’s brief moment of glory would end in a mercifully quick death before Gorson or Cookie could rescue him. Then the scimitar faltered and its well-aimed stroke merely mangled the god shouter’s ear. Raquel and her knife again!
Clean Turban was amidships now, shouting to rally his men. Few answered. Little Howie had disentangled himself from the Negroes who lay gasping their life out on the Alice’s deck. Shaking his head, he cast a semicircular sprinkle of blood and his wild eye fixed on the imam. “In the name of Our Lord
, Jesus Christ!” he screamed, and sprang to kill another Infidel.
Joe fought through layers of paralysis. “No!” he shouted. “No, Howie, not this one!”
But the strength of God was in Howie and he wasn’t listening. Joe pushed the old man behind him and held up his hand. “Halt, damn it!” he said, and realized how ridiculous he must look. Howie’s glazed eyes still fixed on the imam as if he could go through Joe without seeing him. Intensely aware of his own disarmed state, Joe reached for the knife and felt its tip move across his cheek bone. Howie’s hand lifted him clear of the deck without deflecting appreciably from its course toward the imam.
“No!” Joe yelled again. He whacked the heel of his free hand across the back of Howie’s neck. He swung twice more before the little steersman slumped to the deck. The old imam still watched with the same detached interest when a moment later something struck Joe from behind and he followed Howie’s downward course.
When he came to Gorson was bending over him—a grinning Gorson whose ear was nearly as mangled as Howie’s, and who dripped blood from a gash paralleling his collarbone, “What happened?” Joe mumbled; then he remembered the imam.
“All our people are alive,” Gorson said.
“And the Moors?”
Raquel crowded through the Alice’s men. “The imam lives,” she said. “He told me he was born Christian.”
“How many others?” he asked.
“Two surrendered.”
Joe wondered if Clean Turban was among them. He caught sight of the imam. “And Sidi Ferroush?” he asked.
The old man shook his head. “The helmsman was his son. He preferred to die fighting.”
All’s fair in love and war, Joe tried to tell himself, but he couldn’t rid himself of the sickness within him. “It was not of my doing,” he said, looking at the aged imam.
The old man’s eyes glinted understanding. “You are almost as poor a captain as I am a priest,” he said. “But neither of us chose the role we play in God’s little farce.”
With silent thanks that none of the Alice’s men understood, Joe struggled to his feet and nearly collapsed again from the throbbing at the back of his head.
The Ship That Sailed the Time Stream Page 7