The Magic Labyrinth

by Philip José Farmer

  SECTION 4

  On the Not For Hire:

  New Recruits and Clemens' Nightmares

  13

  * * *

  De Marbot's eyes proved that the resurrection machinery did not always work perfectly.

  Jean Baptiste Antoine Marcelin, Baron de Marbot, had been born in 1782 with brown eyes. Not until long after Resurrection Day did he find out that they had changed color. That was when a woman called him Blue-eyes.

  "Sacre bleu! Is it true?"

  He hastened to borrow a mica mirror which had recently been brought in a trading boat – mica was rare – and he saw his face for the first time in ten years. It was a merry face with its roundness, its snub nose, its ever-ready smile, its twinkling eyes. Not at all unhandsome.

  But the eyes were a light blue.

  "Merde!"

  Then he reverted to Esperanto.

  "If I ever get within sword range of the abominable abominations who did this to me . . .!"

  He returned fuming to the woman who lived with him, and he repeated his threat.

  "But you don't have a sword," she said.

  "Must you take me so literally? Never mind. I will get one someday; there must be iron somewhere in this stony planet."

  That night he dreamed of a giant bird with rusty feathers and vulture's beak which ate rocks and the droppings of which were steel pellets. But there were no birds at all on this world, and if there had been there would have been no oiseau de fer.

  Now he had metal weapons, a saber, a cutlass, an epee, a stiletto, a long knife, an axe, a spear, pistols, and a rifle. He was the brigadier general of the marines, and he was very ambitious to be full general. But he loathed politics, and he had neither interest nor ability in the dishonorable game of intrigue. Besides, only by the death of Ely S. Parker could he be general of the marines of the Not For Hire, and that would have saddened him. He loved the jolly Seneca Indian.

  Almost all the post-paleolithics aboard were over six feet, some of them huge. The paleolithics had small men among them, but these, with their massive bones and muscles, did not have to be so tall. De Marbot was the pygmy among them, only five feet four inches high, but Sam Clemens liked him and admired his feistiness and courage. Sam also liked to hear stories of de Marbot's campaigns and to have people under him who had once been generals, admirals, and statesmen. "Humility is good for them, builds their character," Sam said. "The Frenchy is a first-rate commander, and it amuses me to see him ordering those big apes around."

  De Marbot was certainly experienced and capable. After joining the republican army of France when he was seventeen, he rose rapidly in rank to aide-de-camp to Marshal Augereau, commanding the VII Corps in the war against Prussia and Russia from 1806 to 1807. He fought under Lannes and Massena in the Peninsular War, and he'd gone through the Russian campaign in the War of 1812 and the terrible retreat from Moscow, and, among others, the German campaign in 1813. He'd been wounded eleven times, severely at Hanau and Leipzig. When Napolean returned from his exile at Elba, he promoted de Marbot to general of brigade, and de Marbot was wounded at the bloody battle of Waterloo. De Marbot was exiled by the Bourbon king, but he returned to his native land in 1817. After serving under the July monarchy at the siege of Antwerp, he was rewarded some years later by being made a lieutenant general. From 1835 to 1840, he was in the Algerian expeditions, and at the age of sixty was wounded for the last time. He retired after the fall of King Louis Philippe in 1848. He wrote his memoirs, which so delighted Arthur Conan Doyle that he used him as the basis of his fictional character, Brigadier Gerard. The main difference between the literary and the real-life character was that de Marbot was intelligent and perceptive, whereas Gerard, though gallant, was not very bright.

  When he was seventy-two years old, the brave soldier of Napoleon died in bed in Paris.

  It was a measure of Clemens' affection for him that he had told him about the Mysterious Stranger, the renegade Ethical.

  Today the riverboat was docked while Clemens interviewed volunteers for a post aboard. The hideous events after the right-bank stones had failed were two months behind the crew, and The River was now free of the stench and jampack of rotting bodies.

  De Marbot, clad in a duraluminum helmet topped by a roach of glue-stiffened fish-leather strips and a duraluminum cuirass, looking like the popular conception of a Trojan warrior, walked up and down the long line of candidates. His job was to pre- interview them. In this way, he could sometimes eliminate the unfit and so save his captain time and work.

  Near the middle of the line he saw four men who seemed to know each other well. He stopped by the first, a tall muscular dark man with huge hands. His color and very wavy hair could only mean that he was a quadroon, and he was.

  At de Marbot's polite inquiry, he said that his name was Thomas Million Turpin. He'd been born in Georgia sometime around 1873 – he wasn't sure just when – but his parents had moved to St. Louis, Missouri, when he was young. His father operated the Silver Dollar, a tavern in the red-light district. In his youth Tom and his brother Charles had purchased a share of the Big Onion Mine near Searchlight, Nebraska, and worked it, but, failing to find gold after two years, had roamed the west for a while before returning to St. Louis.

  Turpin had settled down in the District and worked as a bouncer and piano player, among other things. By 1899 he was the most important man in the area, controlling the music, liquor, and gambling. His Rosebud Cafe, the center of his little empire, was famous throughout the nation. Downstairs it was a tavern-restaurant and upstairs a "hotel," a whorehouse.

  Turpin, however, was more than a big-time political boss, he was, according to his own statement, a great piano player, though he admitted he wasn't quite as good as Louis Chauvin. A frontiersman in syncopated music, he'd been known as the father of ragtime in St. Louis, and his "Harlem Rag," published in 1897, was the first ragtime piece published by a Negro. He'd written the famous "St. Louis Rag" for the opening of the world fair there, but that had been postponed. He died in 1922, and since he'd been on the Riverworld had wandered up and down.

  "I hear there's a piano on your boat," he said, grinning. "I'd sure like to get my hands on them ivories."

  "There are ten pianos," de Marbot said. "Here. Take this."

  He handed Turpin a wand of wood six inches long and incised with the initials: M.T.

  "When you get to the table, give this to the captain."

  Sam would be happy. He loved ragtime, and he once had said that he couldn't get enough players of popular music on his boat. Moreover, Turpin looked big and capable. He had to be to have bossed the rough black red-light district.

  The man behind him was a wild-looking Chinese named Tai-Peng. He was about five feet ten inches tall and had large glowing green eyes and a demonic face. His black hair hung to his waist, and three irontree blooms were stuck in its crown. He claimed in a loud shrill voice to have been a great swordsman, lover, and poet in his time, which was that of the T'ang dynasty in the eighth century A.D.

  "I was one of the Six Idlers of the Bamboo Stream and also of the Eight Immortals of the Wine Cup. I can compose poetry on the spot in my native Turkish, in Chinese, in Korean, in English, in French, and in Esperanto. When it comes to sword-play, I am as quick as a hummingbird and as deadly as a viper."

  De Marbot laughed and said he didn't choose the recruits. But he gave the Chinese a wand and moved on to the man behind Tai-Peng.

  This was a short man, though still taller than de Marbot, dark-skinned, black-eyed, fat, and with a bulging Buddha's belly. His eyelids were slightly epicanthic, and his nose was aquiline. His clefted chin was massive. He, he said, was Ah Qaaq, and he came from the eastern coast of a land which de Marbot would call Mexico. His people had called the area in which they lived the Land of Rain. He didn't know exactly when he lived according to the Christian calendar, but from his talks with a scholarly man it must have been around 100 B.C. His native tongue was Mayan; he was a citizen of the people that
later cultures had called Olmec.

  "Ah, yes," de Marbot said. "I have heard talk of the Olmecs. We have some very learned men at the captain's table."

  De Marbot understood that the "Olmecs" had founded the first civilization in Mesoamerica and that all others in pre-Columbian times had derived from it, the later Mayas, the Toltecs, the Aztecs, what have you. The man, if he was an ancient Mayan, did not have the artificially flattened head and the squint-eyes so favored by that people. But on reflection de Marbot realized that these, of course, would have been rectified by the Ethicals.

  "You're that rarity, a fat man," de Marbot said. "We of the Not For Hire lead an extremely active life, no room for indolents and overeaters, and we also require that the candidate have something special to qualify him."

  Ah Qaaq said in a high voice, though not as high as the Chinese's, "The fat cat may look soft, but it is very strong and very quick. Let me show you."

  He took the handle of his flint-headed axe, a piece of oak eighteen inches long and two inches thick, and he snapped it as if it were a sugarstick. Then he picked up the head and let the Frenchman heft it.

  "About ten pounds, that one, I'd say," de Marbot said.

  "Watch!"

  Ah Qaaq took the axehead and hurled it as if it were a baseball. Eyes wide, de Marbot watched it soar high and far before it struck the grass.

  "Mon Dieu! No one but the mighty Joe Miller could throw that as far! I congratulate you, sinjoro. Here. Take this."

  "I am also an excellent archer and axeman," Ah Qaaq said quietly. "You won't regret taking me aboard."

  The man behind the Olmec was exactly his height and had a squat Herculean physique. He even looked like Ah Qaaq with his eaglish nose and rounded clefted chin. But he had no fat, and though he was almost as dark, he was no Amerindian. His name, he said, was Gilgamesh.

  "I have arm-wrestled Ah Qaaq," Gilgamesh said. "Neither of us can defeat the other. I am also a great axeman and archer."

  "Very good! Well, my captain will be pleased with your tales of Sumeria, of which I'm sure you have plenty. And he will also be pleased to have a king and a god aboard. Kings he's met, though he's not been too happy with most of them. Gods, well, that's a different story. The captain has never met a god before! Here. Take this!"

  He moved on, and when he was out of sight and earshot of the Sumerian – if he was one – laughed until he rolled on the grass. After a while he got up, wiped off the tears, and resumed his interviewing.

  The four were accepted with six others. When they marched up the gangplank onto the boiler deck, they saw Monat the extra-Terrestrial standing by the railing, his keen eyes sweeping over them. They were startled, but de Marbot told them to go on. He would explain all about the strange creature later on.

  The recruits did not meet Monat that evening as planned. Two women quarreled about a man and started shooting at each other. Before the argument was settled, one woman was badly wounded and the other had jumped off the boat, her grail in one hand and a box of possessions in the other. The man decided to leave also since he preferred the woman who'd done the shooting. The boat was stopped, and he was let off. Sam was so upset that he called off the introductions in the grand salon until the next day.

  Sometime that night, Monat Grrautut disappeared.

  No one had heard a cry. No one had seen anything suspicious. The only clue was a bloodstain on the aft railing of the A deck promenade, and that might have been an oversight by the clean-up squads after the battles over the left-bank stones.

  Clemens suspected that one of the four new recruits might have been responsible. These, however claimed steadfastly that they were asleep in their bunks, and no one had any evidence to refute them.

  While Sam pondered the case and wished he had Sherlock Holmes aboard, the Not For Hire forged ahead. Three days after Monat's disappearance, Cyrano de Bergerac flagged the boat down. Sam cursed when he saw him. He'd hoped that they would pass Cyrano during the night, but there he was, and at least fifty of the crew had also seen him.

  The Frenchman came aboard smiling and quickly kissing his male friends on the cheeks and his female friends on the mouth lingeringly. When he came into the control room, he cried, "Captain! What a tale I have!"

  Clemens thought sourly that that could be said of any dog.

  14

  * * *

  A man and a woman lay in bed. Their skins touched; their dreams were lightyears apart.

  Sam Clemens was dreaming again of that day when he had killed Erik Bloodaxe. Rather, when he had set in motion other men, one of whom had put a spear into the Norseman's belly.

  Sam had wanted the buried meteorite for its nickel-steel. Without it, he could not build the great paddlewheeled boat he envisioned so often. Now, in this dream, he talked to Lothar von Richthofen of what must be done. Joe Miller was not present, having been treacherously captured by the man who had once been king of England. An invading fleet was sailing from down-River to seize the grave of the fallen star. King John was up-River readying a fleet to sail down and grab the site of the buried treasure of nickel-steel. Sam's army was between the two and weaker than either one. His would be ground to meal between the millstones. There was no chance for victory except by making an alliance with John. Also, if Joe Miller was to get out alive, Sam would have to make a deal with his captor, King John.

  But Erik Bloodaxe, Sam's partner, had refused to consider the alliance. Besides, Erik hated Joe Miller, who was the only human he had ever feared – if you could call Joe a human. Bloodaxe said that his men and Sam's would make a stand and would smash the two invaders in a glorious victory. This was foolish boasting, though the Norseman may have believed what he said.

  Erik Bloodaxe was the son of Harald Haarfager (Harold Finehair), the Norwegian who'd united, for the first time, all of Norway and whose conquests had led to mass migrations to England and to Iceland. When Harald died circa A.D. 918, Erik became king. But Erik wasn't popular. Even in a day of harsh and cruel monarchs, he led the pack. His half-brother, Haakon, then fifteen years old, had been reared in the court of King Athelstan of England since he was one year old. Supported by English troops, he raised a Norwegian army against his brother. Erik fled to Northumbria in England, where he was given its kingship by Athelstan, but he didn't last long. According to the Norse chroniclers, he died in A.D. 954 in southern England while making a great raid there. The old English tradition had it that he was expelled from Northumbria and was killed during a battle at Stainmore.

  Erik had told Clemens that the former account was the true one.

  Clemens had joined the Norseman because Erik owned a very rare steel axe and was looking for the source of the ore from which the axe had been made. Clemens hoped that there'd be enough ore to make a large paddlewheeled steamboat in which he could go to the headwaters of The River. Erik didn't think much of Sam but took him in as a member of his crew because of Joe Miller. Erik didn't like Joe, but he knew that the titanthrop was a very valuable asset in battle. And then Joe had been made a hostage by King John. Desperate, fearful that Joe would be killed by King John and that he would lose the meteorite, Sam had discussed the situation with Lothar, the younger brother of "The Red Baron." He had made his proposal. They should kill Bloodaxe and his Viking bodyguards. After that, they could talk to John, who would see the advantage of teaming up with Clemens' force. Together, the two might be a match for von Radowitz' forces from down-River.

  Sam further strengthened his rationalizations with the thought that Bloodaxe probably intended to kill him after their enemies had been defeated. A showdown was inevitable.

  Lothar von Richthofen agreed. It wasn't treachery if you attacked a traitor. Besides, it was the only logical thing to do. If Bloodaxe was a true friend, then the case would be different. But the Norseman was as trustworthy as a rattlesnake with a toothache.

  And so the foul deed had been done.

  Yet, even though it was justified by all counts, the deed was foul. Sam had never gott
en over his guilt. After all, he could have walked away from the meteorite, given up his dream.

  With Lothar and some picked men, he had approached the hut in which Bloodaxe and a woman were humping away. The fight lasted a minute, the Norse guards being taken by surprise by a larger force. The Viking King, naked, holding his great axe, had dashed out. Lothar had pinned him to the wall of the hut with the spear.

  Sam had been about to vomit, but he thought that at least the deed was all over. Then a hand clamped on his ankle, causing him almost to faint with terror. He had looked down, and there was the dying Bloodaxe, holding him with a grip like an eagle's.

  "Bikkja!" the Norseman had said, weakly but clearly.

  That meant bitch, a word he often used to indicate his contempt for Clemens, whom he considered effeminate. "Droppings of Ratatosk," he continued. In other words, crap of the giant squirrel, Ratatosk, that raced around the branches of the world-tree, Yggdrasill, the cosmic ash which bound together earth, the abode of the gods, and hell.

  And then Bloodaxe had prophesied, saying that Clemens would build his great boat. He would pilot it up The River. But its building and its voyage would be grief and sorrow for Clemens with little of the joy he anticipated. And when Clemens at long last neared the headwaters of The River, he would find that Bloodaxe would be waiting for him.

  Sam remembered clearly the dying man's speech. It came up now again from the shadowy figure that held his foot from a deep narrow hole in the ground. Eyes in the»vague black mass in the earth burned into Clemens'.