Balsca did not like Captain Woodfoot. Balsca had not liked any ships' officers since he had been summarily flogged ten years back for pilfering grog from ship's stores aboard a ship of the line in the Mallorean navy.
Balsca had nursed his grievance from that incident until he had found an opportunity to jump ship, and then he had gone in search of kindlier masters and more understanding officers in the merchant marine.
He had not found them aboard The Star of Jarot.
His most recent disillusionment had come about as the result of a difference of views with the ship's bosun, a heavy‑fisted rascal from Pannor in Rengel. That altercation had left Balsca without his front teeth, and his vigorous protest to the captain had evoked jeering laughter followed by his being unceremoniously kicked off the quarterdeck by a nail‑studded leg constructed of solid oak. The humiliation and the bruises were bad enough, but the splinters which festered for weeks in Balsca's behind made it almost impossible for him to sit down, and sitting down was Balsca's favorite position.
He brooded about it, leaning on the starboard rail well out of Captain Woodfoot's view and staring out at the lead‑gray swells surging through the straits of Perivor as The Star of Jarot beat her way northwesterly past the swampy coast of the southwestern Dalasian Protectorates and on around the savage breakers engulfing the Turrim Reef. By the time they had cleared the reef and turned due north along the desolate coast of Finda, Balsca had concluded that life was going out of its way to treat him unfairly, and that he might be far better off seeking his fortune ashore.
He spent several nights prowling through the cargo hold with a well‑shielded lantern until he found the concealed compartment where Woodfoot had hidden a number of small, valuable items that he didn't want to trouble the customs people with. Balsca's patched canvas sea bag picked up a fair amount of weight rather quickly that night.
When The Star of Jarot dropped anchor in the harbor of Mal Gemila, Balsca feigned illness and refused his shipmates' suggestion that he go ashore with them for the customary end‑of‑voyage carouse. He lay instead in his hammock, moaning theatrically. Late during the dog watch, he pulled on his tarred canvas sea coat, the only thing of any value that he owned, picked up his sea bag and went on silent feet up on deck. The solitary watch, as Balsca had anticipated, lay snoring in the scuppers, snuggled up to an earthenware jug; there were no lights in the aft cabins, where Woodfoot and his officers lived in idle luxury; and the moon had already set. A small ship's boat swung on a painter on the starboard side, and Balsca deftly dropped his sea bag into it, swung over the rail, and silently left The Star of Jarot forever. He felt no particular regret about that. He did not even pause to mutter a curse at the vessel which had been his home for the past six years. Balsca was a philosophical sort of fellow. Once he had escaped from an unpleasant situation, he no longer held any grudges.
When he reached the docks, he sold the small ship's boat to a beady‑eyed man with a missing right hand.
Balsca feigned drunkenness during the transaction, and the maimed man ‑who had undoubtedly had his hand chopped off as punishment for theft‑ paid him quite a bit more for the boat than would have been the case had the sale taken place in broad daylight. Balsca immediately knew what that meant. He shouldered his sea bag, staggered up the wharf, and began to climb the steep cobblestone street from the harbor. At the first corner, he made a sudden turn to the left and ran like a deer, leaving the surprised press gang the beady‑eyed man had sent after him floundering far behind. Balsca was stupid, certainly, but he was no fool.
He ran until he was out of breath and quite some distance from the harbor with all its dangers. He passed a number of alehouses along the way, regretfully perhaps, but there was still business to attend to, and he needed his wits about him.
In a dim little establishment, well hidden up a dank, smelly alleyway, he sold Captain Woodfoot's smuggled treasures, bargaining down to the last copper with the grossly fat woman who ran the place. He even traded his sea coat for a landsman's tunic, and emerged from the alley with all trace of the sea removed from him, except for the rolling gait of a man whose feet have not touched dry land for several months.
He avoided the harbor with its press gangs and cheap grog shops and chose instead a quiet street that meandered past boarded‑up warehouses. He followed that until he found a sedate workman's alehouse where a buxom barmaid rather sullenly served him. Her mood, he surmised, was the result of the fact that he was her only customer, and that she had quite obviously intended to close the doors and seek her bed ‑or someone else's, for all he knew. He jollied her into some semblance of good humor for an hour or so, left a few pennies on the table, and squeezed her ample bottom by way of farewell. Then he lurched into the empty street in search of further adventure.
He found true love under a smoky torch on the comer.
Her name, she said, was Elowanda. Balsca suspected that she was not being entirely honest about that, but it was not her name he was interested in. She was quite young and quite obviously sick. She had a racking cough, a hoarse, croaking voice, and her reddened nose ran constantly. She was not particularly clean and she exuded the rank smell of a week or more of dried sweat. Balsca, however, had a sailor's strong stomach and an appetite whetted by six months' enforced abstinence at sea. Elowanda was not very pretty, but she was cheap. After a brief haggle, she led him to a rickety crib in an alley that reeked of moldy sewage. Although he was quite drunk, Balsca grappled with her on a lumpy pallet until dawn was staining the eastem sky.
It was noon when he awoke with a throbbing head. He might have slept longer, but the cry of a baby coming from a wooden box in the corner drove into his ears like a sharp knife. He nudged the pale woman lying beside him, hoping that she would rise and quiet her squalling brat. She moved limply under his hand, her limbs flaccid.
He nudged her again, harder this time. Then he rose up and looked at her. Her stiff face was locked in a dreadful rictus ‑a hideous grin that made his blood run cold. He suddenly realized that her skin was like clammy ice. He jerked his hand away, swearing under his breath. He reached out gingerly and peeled back one of her eyelids. He swore again.
The woman who had called herself Elowanda was as dead as last week's mackerel.
Balsca rose and quickly pulled on his clothes. He searched the room thoroughly, but found nothing worth stealing except for the few coins he had given the dead woman the previous night. He took those, then glared at the naked corpse lying on the pallet. "Rotten whore!" he said and kicked her once in the side. She rolled limply off the pallet and lay face down on the floor.
Balsca slammed out into the stinking alley, ignoring the wailing baby he had left behind him.
He had a few moments' concern about the possibility of certain social diseases. Something had killed Elowanda, and he had not really been all that rough with her. As a precaution, he muttered an old sailors' incantation which was said to be particularly efficacious in warding off the pox; reassured, he went looking for something to drink.
By midaftemoon, he was pleasantly drunk and he lurched out of a congenial little wine shop and stopped, swaying slightly, to consider his options. By now Woodfoot would certainly have discovered that his hidden cabinet was empty and that Balsca had jumped ship. Since Woodfoot was a man of limited imagination, he and his officers would certainly be concentrating their search along the waterfront. It would take them some time to realize that their quarry had moved somewhat beyond the sight, if not the smell, of salt water. Balsca prudently decided that if he were to maintain his lead on his vengeful former captain, it was probably time for him to head inland. It occurred to him, moreover, that someone might have seen him with Elowanda, and that her body probably had been found by now. Balsca felt no particular responsibility for her death, but he was by nature slightly shy about talking with policemen. All in all, he decided, it might just be time to leave Mal Gemila.
He started out confidently, striding toward the east gate of the
city; but after several blocks, his feet began to hurt. He loitered outside a warehouse where several workmen were loading a large wagon. He carefully stayed out of sight until the work was nearly done, then heartily offered to lend a hand. He put two boxes on the wagon, then sought out the teamster, a shaggy‑bearded man smelling strongly of mules.
"Where be ye bound, friend?" Balsca asked him as if out of idle curiousity.
"Mal Zeth," the teamster replied shortly.
"What an amazing coincidence," Balsca exclaimed.
"I have business there myself." In point of fact, Balsca had cared very little where the teamster and his wagon had been bound. All he wanted to do was to go inland to avoid Woodfoot or the police. "What say I ride along, with you ‑for company?"
"I don't get all that lonesome," the teamster said churlishly.
Balsca sighed. It was going to be one of those days.
"I'd be willing to pay," he offered sadly.
"How much?"
"I don't really have very much."
"Ten coppers," the teamster said flatly.
"Ten? I haven't got that much."
"You'd better start walking then. It's that way."
Balsca sighed and gave in. " All right," he said. "Ten."
"In advance."
"Half now and half when we get to Mal Zeth."
"In advance."
"That's hard."
"So's walking. "
Balsca stepped around a corner, reached into an inside pocket, and carefully counted out the ten copper coins. The horde he had accumulated as a result of his pilferage aboard The Star of Jarot had dwindled alarmingly. A number of possibilities occurred to him. He shifted his sheath knife around until it was at his back. If the teamster slept soundly enough and if they stopped for the night in some secluded place, Balsca was quite certain that he could ride into Mal Zeth the proud owner of a wagon and a team of mules ‑not to mention whatever was in the boxes. Balsca had killed a few men in his time ‑when it had been safe to do so‑ and he was not particularly squeamish about cutting throats, if it was worth his while.
The wagon clattered and creaked as it rumbled along the cobbled street in the slanting afternoon sunlight.
"Let's get a few things clear before we start," the teamster said. "I don't like to talk and I don't like having people jabber at me."
"All right."
The teamster reached back and picked up a wicked-looking hatchet out of the wagon bed. "Now," he said, "give me your knife."
"I don't have a knife."
The teamster reined in his mules. "Get out," he said curtly.
"But I paid you?"
"Not enough for me to take any chances with you. Come up with a knife or get out of my wagon."
Balsca glared at him, then at the hatchet. Slowly he drew out his dagger and handed it over.
"Good. I'll give it back to you when we get to Mal Zeth. Oh, by the way, I sleep with one eye open and with this in my fist." He held the hatchet in front of Balsca's face. "If you even come near me while we're on the road, I'll brain you."
Balsca shrank back.
"I'm glad that we understand each other." The teamster shook his reins, and they rumbled out of Mal Gemila.
Balsca was not feeling too well when they reached Mal Zeth. He assumed at first that it was a result of the peculiar swaying motion of the wagon. Though he had never been seasick in all his years as a sailor, he was frequently land‑sick. This time, however, was somewhat different. His stomach, to be sure, churned and heaved, but, unlike his previous bouts of malaise, this time he also found that he was sweating profusely, and his throat was so sore that he could barely swallow. He had alternating bouts of chills and fever, and a foul taste in his mouth.
The surly teamster dropped him off at the main gates of Mal Zeth, idly tossed his dagger at his feet and then squinted at his former passenger. "You don't look so good," he observed. "You ought to go see a physician or something."
Balsca made an indelicate sound. "People die in the hands of physicians," he said, "or if they do manage to get well, they go away with empty purses."
"Suit yourself." The teamster shrugged and drove his wagon into the city without looking back.
Balsca directed a number of muttered curses after him, bent, picked up his knife, and walked into Mal Zeth. He wandered about for a time, trying to get his bearings, then finally accosted a man in a sea coat.
"Excuse me, mate," he said, his voice raspy as a result of his sore throat, "but where's a place where a man can get a good cup of grog at a reasonable price?"
"Try the Red Dog Tavern," the sailor replied. "It's two streets over on the corner."
"Thanks, mate," Balsca said.
"You don't look like you're feeling too good."
" A little touch of a cold, I think." Balsca flashed him a toothless grin. "Nothing that a few cups of grog won't fix."
"That's the honest truth." The sailor laughed his agreement. "It's the finest medicine in the world." The Red Dog Tavern was a dark grogshop that faintly resembled the forecastle of a ship. It had a low, beamed ceiling of dark wood and portholes instead of windows.
The proprietor was a bluff, red‑faced man with tattoos on both arms and an exaggerated touch of salt water in his speech. His "Ahoys'' and "Mateys" began to get on Balsca's nerves after a while, but after three cups of grog, he didn't mind so much. His sore throat eased, his stomach settled down, and the trembling in his hands ceased. He still, however, had a splitting headache. He had two more cups of grog and then fell asleep with his head cradled on his crossed arms.
"Ahoy, mate. Closing time," the Red Dog's proprietor said some time later, shaking his shoulder.
Balsca sat up, blinking. "Must have dropped off for a few minutes," he mumbled hoarsely.
"More like a few hours, matey." The man frowned, then laid his hand on Balsca's forehead. "You're burning up, matey," he said. "You'd better get you to bed."
"Where's a good place to get a cheap room?" Balsca asked, rising unsteadily. His throat hurt worse now than it had before, and his stomach was in knots again.
"Try the third door up the street. Tell them that I sent you."
Balsca nodded, bought a bottle to take with him and surreptitiously filched a rope‑scarred marlinespike from the rack beside the door on his way out. "Good tavern," he croaked to the proprietor as he left. "I like the way you've got it fixed up."
The tattooed man nodded proudly. "My own idea," he said. "I thought to myself that a seafaring man might like a homelike sort of place to do his drinking in ‑even when he's this far from deep water. Come back again."
"I'll do that," Balsca promised.
It took him about a half an hour to find a solitary passerby hurrying home with his head down and his hands jammed into his tunic pockets. Balsca stalked him for a block or so, his rope‑soled shoes making no sound on the cobblestones. Then, as the passerby went by the dark mouth of an alleyway, Balsca stepped up behind him and rapped him smartly across the base of the skull with his marlinespike. The man dropped like a pole-axed ox. Balsca had been in enough shipboard fights and tavern brawls to know exactly where and how hard to hit his man. He rolled the fellow over, hit him alongside the head once again just to be on the safe side, and then methodically began to go through the unconscious man's pockets. He found several coins and a stout knife. He put the coins in his pocket, tucked the knife under his broad leather belt, and pulled his victim into the alley out of the light. Then he went on down the street, whistling an old sea song.
He felt much worse the following day. His head throbbed, and his throat was so swollen that he could barely talk. His fever, he was sure, was higher, and his nose ran constantly. It took three pulls on his bottle to quiet his stomach. He knew that he should go out and get something to eat, but the thought of food sickened him. He took another long drink from his bottle, lay back on the dirty bed in the room he had rented, and fell back into a fitful doze.
When he awoke again, it was dar
k outside, and he was shivering violently. He finished his bottle without gaining any particular relief, then shakily pulled on his clothing, which he absently noted exuded a rank odor, and stumbled down to the street and three doors up to the inviting entrance to the Red Dog.
"By the Gods, matey," the tattooed man said, "ye look positively awful."
"Grog," Balsca croaked. "Grog."
It took nine cups of grog to stem the terrible shaking which had seized him.
Balsca was not counting.
When his money ran out, he staggered into the street and beat a man to death with his marlinespike for six pennies. He lurched on, encountered a fat merchant, and knifed him for his purse. The purse even had some gold in it. He reeled back to the Red Dog and drank until closing time.
"Have a care, matey." the proprietor cautioned him as he thrust him out the door. "There be murdering footpads about, or so I've been told ‑and the police are as thick as fleas on a mangy dog in the streets and alleys in the neighborhood."
Balsca took the jug of grog he had bought back to his shabby room and drank himself into unconsciousness.
He was delirious the following morning and he raved for hours, alternating between drinking from his jug of grog and vomiting on his bed.
It took him until sunset to die. His last words were, "Mother, help me."
When they found him, some days later, he was arched rigidly backward, and his face was fixed in a hideous grin.
* * *
Three days later, a pair of wayfarers found the body of a bearded teamster lying in a ditch beside his wagon on the road to Mal Gemila. His body was arched stiffly backward, and his face was locked in a grotesque semblance of a grin. The wayfarers concluded that he had no further need of his team and wagon, and so they stole it. As an afterthought, they also stole his clothes and covered the body with dead leaves. Then they turned the wagon around and rode on back to Mal Zeth.
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