Ride the Star Winds

by A Bertram Chandler

  He extricated himself, with some difficulty, from the smothering folds of the deflating gasbag. He was, he realized, armed only with a galley knife and practically naked; he had stripped himself to his underpants to keep his deterrent fire going. As long as he was airborne he had not felt the cold as he had been traveling at the same speed as the wind. Now that breeze on his bare skin was very chilly.

  He made his way toward the lights of the village, finding the going difficult in the fast-gathering darkness. At last he stumbled onto a road. Then he made better progress.

  There was nobody abroad. He walked past the slave barracks—the refugee barracks, he corrected himself—and heard the sound of voices and of Oriental music and smelled the enticing aromas of exotic cookery. Now he was hungry as well as cold.

  He kept on until he was in the village itself. There was the inn. He saw the sign—THE TORCH OF LIBERTY. It was then that he thought that some of Grimes’s famous luck had rubbed off on himself. The parents of Miguel, one of his crew aboard the Met. Service tender, were innkeepers. The name of their cantina was The Torch of Liberty. Like their son, they were members of the OAP, the Original Anarchist Party. Raoul knew that there must be many Torches Of Liberty throughout Liberia—but somehow he was sure that this was the right one.

  He went round to the back door.

  He knocked cautiously.

  He went on knocking.

  At last the door opened and Miguel was standing there, demanding, “Who is it? What do you want?”

  “I still can’t get over the fantastic coincidence,” said Raoul.

  “No fiction writer,” Grimes told him, “would dare to use the coincidences that are always happening in real life. But go on.”

  Miguel was on leave.

  Miguel saw to it that Sanchez was fed and clothed and plied with restorative drinks. He listened to the pilot’s story. He was of the opinion that the planetary authorities should be ignored and that Grimes should be rescued from the island as secretly as possible. The best way of achieving this, he said, would be to “borrow” one of the Met. Service tenders from Port Libertad and fly directly to the site of the wreck.

  Meanwhile, Sanchez learned, already the news had been put about that Governor Grimes and his small entourage had perished in an airship crash. Searches had been mounted—but not one of them had covered the Unclaimed Territory. The Met. Satellites were making continual photographic surveys of Liberia—but the processing of the films was being carried out by Bardon’s people. Almost certainly the fire on the island had been seen from orbit but it was being ignored.

  Miguel and Raoul flew to Port Libertad in Miguel’s ’copter. Both of them in Met. Service uniform, they attempted to take over one of the tenders. But the spaceport guards—Bardon’s people—were suspicious. One of them had recognized Sanchez. There had been shooting, a chase. The two men had split up. Perhaps Miguel had escaped; Sanchez hoped that he had. Raoul, by this time little more than a mindless, hunted animal, had run up the ramp into the after airlock of one of the deep space ships in port. . . .

  Agatha Prinn took up the tale.

  “I was just strolling ashore,” she said. “I’d just gotten as far as the airlock, in fact, when I heard shooting. I wondered what the hell was going on. And then this young man came bolting up the ramp, brushing past me. I was curious, naturally. And, having been to this world before, I was inclined to think that anybody in trouble with the authorities couldn’t be all that bad. So I told my second mate—he was shipkeeping officer—to keep an airlock watch and to swear to any police or guards or whatever that no strangers had come aboard while, in my own quarters, I heard young Raoul’s story.

  “And what a story it was!

  “As you know, Commodore, we tramp masters neither know nor care who heads the governments of the various worlds that we visit. We deal only with Customs, Immigration and Port Health officials. We never meet Prime Ministers or Presidents or Governors. At first I couldn’t believe that you were the Governor Grimes of Liberia. But it all tied in. Jug-handle ears, ex-Survey Service officer, ex-owner-master, ex-commodore of privateers.

  “I’ve already told you that I’ve been to this world before, more than once. On any planet, this one included, I like to take one of my boats for a sightseeing cruise around. I log it as Boat Drill, of course. So the Port Authorities didn’t feel it worth their while to make close inquiries when, this morning, I told them that I was about to go on my usual sightseeing tour.” She laughed. “As a matter of fact one puppy, laughing himself sick over his alleged humor, did ask me to keep my eyes skinned for Governor Grimes and Fat Susie.”

  “And now you’ve found him,” said Grimes.

  “And now I take you and your people back to Agatha’s Ark. I’ve plenty of spare accommodation. I’ll keep you out of sight until we lift—and then you can use my Carlotti equipment to bleat to your bosses back on Earth about what’s been happening.”

  “Why can’t I bleat now?” asked Grimes.

  “Because it’s not legal for any ship to use deep space radio while in port. You should know that. You’re Governor, aren’t you?”

  “Mphm. Well, if you don’t mind, Agatha, I’d like you to take us back to the Residence. I’m still Governor—and I want to play hell with a big stick as long as I’m in office. There’s Major Flattery for a start. I shall demand that he be arrested and put on trial. There’s the dreamweed trade. There’s . . . Oh, I could go on and on . . .”

  “You can go on and on, Commodore, once you’re up and clear from Liberia.”

  “But that wouldn’t be the same, Agatha. Look at what happened in New South Wales. Governor Bligh was deposed—and then what could he do? He got no support from his Lieutenant Governor in Tasmania. He returned to England and was, to all intents and purposes, swept under the mat. Oh, Major Johnston was, eventually, brought to trial but received little more than a rap over the knuckles—and that after leading an armed mutiny!

  “I have to stay here.

  “I have to exert my authority. I have to show Estrelita and her boyfriend Bardon who’s boss.”

  “As you please, Commodore,” said Agatha Prinn. “I wish that I could be of some real help—but Agatha’s Ark is no longer a privateer. The only arms aboard her are a few privately owned laser and projectile pistols.”

  “Just take me back to the Residence,” said Grimes, “and I’ll play it by ear from then on.”

  Chapter 40

  They managed to scamper the short distance between the wreck and the ship’s boat without being attacked by anything. Once inside the small craft they made a careful search and were relieved to find that no hostile lifeform had taken up residence while the boat had been left unattended. Then, with Agatha Prinn at the controls, they lifted from the island and set course for the Residence.

  Captain Prinn wanted to deliver Grimes at his own front door but he talked her out of it. It would be better, he said, if he and the others were dropped within easy walk of the gubernatorial palace: that way they could make entry without their being expected by Jaconelli and Smith. Too, Agatha would not be liable to reprisal by the authorities if there were nothing to associate her with the Governor.

  “But they must know,” she protested. “They must know that I was one of your captains on the privateering expedition.”

  “They should know,” he told her, “but they almost certainly don’t. If they had associated you with me they would not have allowed you to go flapping off by yourself all over Liberia. Thanks to my father I’m something of a student of history—and I know that very often Military Intelligence has been a contradiction in terms.”

  They timed their arrival for the beginning of evening twilight. Raoul took the controls and dropped the boat to a field just off the road running up the hill to the Residence. They disembarked—Sanchez first, then Su Lin, finally Grimes. All of them were armed with weapons supplied by Captain Prinn—laser pistols for the pilot and the girl, a Minetti automatic for Grimes. Only Sanchez
was wearing anything approximating a disguise, a uniform (which fitted quite well) borrowed from one of Agatha’s Ark’s junior officers.

  “Let me know if I can do anything more, Commodore,” said the tramp captain.

  “You’ve done plenty already, Agatha. But if things go too badly wrong you can put in a full report to Rear Admiral Damien once you get clear of this world.”

  “I’ll do that.”

  Surprisingly she took him in her arms and kissed him. He found himself wishing that he could carry on from there but there was no time. Besides, Su Lin was looking in through the open airlock doors, an amused expression on her face.

  He broke away.

  “Thank you for everything, Agatha.”

  “It was nothing. And, good luck, John. The very best of luck.”

  Grimes jumped down to the damp grass.

  He stood with the others and watched the boat lift, watched her running lights dim and diminish as she continued her interrupted voyage to the spaceport.

  They walked up the road.

  They met nobody.

  They did not use the front entrance to the Residence but went round to a back door, to what Grimes thought of as the tradesmen’s entrance. Surprisingly, there they were met. Wong Lee, the old butler, seemed to have been expecting them. He bowed and said, “It is good that you are back, Excellency.”

  “I’m pleased to be back,” said Grimes. “Too right I am.”

  He followed the old man through the maze of corridors. They came at last to the Governor’s quarters. The sitting room was empty but there were voices coming from the adjoining office. One belonged to Smith, the ADC, the other to Jaconelli, the secretary. They seemed to be having a party. There was a clinking of glasses and the speech of each man was slurred.

  “Flattery’s got his step up to half-colonel,” Smith was complaining, “but there’s no hint that I shall get my captaincy.”

  “But you didn’t actually do anything,” said Jaconelli. “Flattery did do something. He got that bastard Grimes out of our hair for keeps. And that poisonous tart Sue Ellen or whatever her name was . . .”

  “What’ve you got against her?”

  “She wouldn’t play, that’s what. Anyhow, they’re all out of our hair. Grimes, the uppity tart and that upstart of a ferry skipper . . .”

  “No, they’re not,” said Grimes, stepping into his office with his Minetti out and ready.

  That was just the start.

  There were the soldiers of the guard to be disarmed and locked up. They were not so easy to deal with as Smith and Jaconelli had been. There was actually gunfire while Sergeant Martello, holed up in Smith’s office, got through on the telephone to Colonel Bardon, quite bravely ignoring Grimes’s finally successful attempt to shoot out the lock. (Sanchez’s prior attempt, using his hand laser, had succeeded only in fusing this into a mass of metal that held the door as firmly as in its original state.)

  Martello got up from his seat at the desk to face the intruders. He was a big, paunchy man, almost bald and with little, porcine eyes in his fat face. His hand went to his holstered weapon, then he thought better of it. He raised his hands reluctantly above his head.

  “All right,” he growled. “You’ve won—for the time being. But the Colonel will soon fix your wagon . . .”

  “That will do, Sergeant!” snapped a voice from the telephone screen. “You have my permission to surrender to the pirate. You will be released very shortly.”

  Martello moved to one side, away from the scanner.

  Grimes looked into Bardon’s angry face.

  “Colonel Bardon,” he said, “you are to place yourself under arrest. Before you do so, however, please see to it that Major—or should I say Lieutenant Colonel?—Flattery is clapped in irons.”

  “It’s you who’s under arrest, Grimes. Do you want to hear the charges? Whilst under the influence of drugs or alcohol you, in charge of a dirigible airship, deliberately collided with another such vessel owned by the Terran military establishment on Liberia, causing considerable structural damage. Returning to the Residence, you have threatened officers, non-commissioned officers and enlisted men of the Terran Army with firearms and illegally incarcerated them. A man in your employ, one Raoul Sanchez, attempted to steal a shuttlecraft from the Port Libertad spaceyard. A woman in your employ, one Su Lin, murdered a laborer under the protection of Senor Eduardo Lopez.

  “A pirate, sir, is obviously no fit person to be appointed as governor of a civilized planet.”

  Grimes laughed.

  “You must have suspected, Bardon, that I just might get out of the mess that your precious Flattery left me in—otherwise you wouldn’t have been so ready with all those charges! But I must correct you on two points. One—I was a privateer, not a pirate. Two—I rather doubt that this is a civilized planet.”

  “Are you giving yourself up, Grimes?”

  “Are you putting yourself under arrest, Bardon?”

  “Don’t argue with him!” There were two faces in the screen now; the other one was that of the President. “Send your soldiers to take the Residence. Now—or as soon as you can get them out of the whorehouses and grogshops!”

  “I’ll send Flattery to bomb the bloody place!” growled Bardon.

  “You will not. The building—and it cost plenty!—is Liberian property. And what about your own men imprisoned there?”

  “They wouldn’t be much loss,” Bardon said.

  “I heard that, Colonel, sir,” put in Sergeant Martello. “Now, let me tell you that I’ve never liked working for you and your officers. If the Commodore will have me, I’ll fight for him!”

  Bardon cursed, then the telephone screen went blank.

  Grimes stared at the big sergeant, who was still standing with hands upraised, still covered by the weapons held by Su Lin, Sanchez and Wong Lee.

  Was the man sincere?

  What was his motivation?

  Grimes had . . . glimmerings. A lifetime in the Army, a failure to attain commissioned rank, a growing, festering resentment at having to take orders from officers no better soldiers than himself, quite possibly not even as good. Perhaps harsh treatment by Bardon or officers like him, unjust treatment . . .

  Perhaps—it was possible although not probable—the uneasy stirrings of a conscience.

  “All right, Sergeant,” he said, “I’ll believe you—with reservations. I’m not a soldier—so you shall be my advisor. But I’ll be obliged if you’ll hand your pistol—butt first—to Captain Sanchez. No, cancel that. Keep very still while Captain Sanchez takes the gun from its holster . . . Good. Now you can drop your hands. . . .”

  They watched him, more than half-expecting an explosion of hostile energy. But the sergeant just stood there, grinning.

  He said, “You’ll not believe this, Commodore, but as a boy I used to read space stories, pirate stories especially. I wanted to be a pirate when I grew up. Now, whatever happens, I’ll be able to say that I served under one of the famous pirate captains.”

  Grimes started to explain, for the thousandth time, the difference between a privateer and a pirate, then decided that he would be merely wasting his breath.

  Out of earshot of the sergeant he had a few words with Wong Lee.

  “Get word to the spaceport,” he said, “to Captain Agatha Prinn of the ship Agatha’s Ark. I can’t use the telephone; Bardon will be monitoring any calls made from here. See that Captain Prinn is told just what’s been happening since I got back. Then, as soon as she’s off this world, she can make a full report to Earth.”

  “Very good, Your Excellency.”

  “How many of your people can use firearms?”

  “Most of them, Your Excellency.”

  “How . . .? But no matter. Round up all the weapons you can and have men on the roof. That parapet is more than merely ornamental.”

  Chapter 41

  Grimes stood with Su Lin on the small, railed platform that was at the highest point of the low-pitched roof. They
had binoculars with them, powerful night glasses that converted infrared radiation into visible wavelengths. They swept the terrain on all sides of the Residence. Of one thing they could be certain—nothing big was out and moving, although there were small, glowing sparks representing tiny nocturnal animals.

  “How is it,” asked Grimes, “that so many of the domestic staff—if Wong Lee is to be believed—are expert in the use of weapons?”

  She said, “You must have guessed by now that the Underground—or one of the many Undergrounds—has seen to it that the Governor’s personal entourage are capable of defending him should the need arise.”

  “Mphm. But I thought that only full citizens of this world were allowed to own firearms.”

  “Ever since firearms were invented they’ve been falling into the wrong hands. Or—in this case—the right hands. Criminals or freedom fighters have always been able to get arms. When you went a-pirating it wasn’t in an unarmed ship, was it?”

  “For about the four thousandth time,” growled Grimes, “I was a privateer, not a pirate.”

  “Sorry.” The laugh following the word indicated that she wasn’t.

  Grimes broke the short silence.

  “Isn’t it time,” he asked, “that I was put into the picture? After all, should things come entirely unstuck who’ll have to carry the can back? Me, that’s who.”

  “Too right,” she said, in an imitation of an Australian accent. “But I agree. You have been kept in the dark—by everybody, from Admiral Damien on down. Liberia is on the point of blowing up. Not only is there the OAP but there are the secret organizations of the various refugees. The aim of PAT is that it shall be a controlled explosion. We may be People Against Tyranny—but we are also against Anarchy, using the word in its very worst sense, against mob rule and mindless violence. One of our requirements was a Governor who could stand as a figurehead for the rebels and who would recognize whatever sort of government is formed after the revolution.