Despite herself, Martha leaned forward in fascination. Among the crowd on the riverbank, circles opened up, and men were swinging lines around their heads. From them came a whirring, thuttering roar that shivered down into the bass notes and back up again, each a little out of time with the others. Bullroarers. The conch trumpet wailed, and beneath it came the beating of a drum-a massive, booming, thudding sound that echoed down from the mound and against the trees on the other side of the river. Her head came up. Faint and far, another echoed it, the same irregular staccato rhythm.
“Signal drum,” she said, touching Lisketter on the arm. “They’re sending the news upstream.”
They waited, sweating, as the sun crept lower in the sky.
She tried not to think about Jared, without much success. Poor bear. He’d be fretting so��� Lisketter paced, watching the shore.
“Why don’t they send anyone out?” she asked fretfully, slapping at her face. A red splotch appeared where the mosquito had been. “What are they waiting for?”
“Waiting for us, I think,” Martha said. Lisketter glanced at her, and she sat back against the rail. “No. This foolishness is your idea. You can force me into the boat, but you can’t make me think or talk.”
David Lisketter was thin and pale, but the wrist hadn’t festered. He pushed forward. “I’ll do it, Pam,” he said. “I’ve been studying that Mayan dictionary.”
Much good may it do you, Martha thought, but did not say. The archaeologists didn’t have a clue what language the Olmecs spoke, since they hadn’t left any written records. The theory that they’d been Mayan-speakers depended on a single very late inscription resembling the Mayan calendar. For that matter, the language ancestral to modern Mayan would be unrecognizably different in the thirteenth century B.C. Only a professional linguist would be able to tell that some barbarian dialect in Germany-to-be this night was going to turn into English in the course of the next three thousand-odd years.
There was a good deal of arguing, but eventually David Lisketter and three others lowered the boat that hung at the Bentley’s stern and tumbled down the rope ladder into it. She saw that he had a pistol strapped to his left hip; Lisketter saw in the same instant, opened her mouth, and then closed it. Silence fell as the boat approached the shore. The thudding drum on the platform rose to a crescendo and then stopped along with the conch and bullroarer; it was only then she knew how the great drum had come to dominate the scene, like the heartbeat of a giant who’d swallowed them all. Then she realized that it hadn’t stopped, not completely. The upstream echo of the rhythm went on for three seconds after the drum in the village had halted. Then true silence fell, quiet enough that the cries of the birds were the loudest things they heard. Flocks swirled in toward the treetops backlit by the setting sun. The way the river bent southward here put a tongue of jungle between them and the west.
The schooner’s lifeboat grounded among the beached canoes of the villagers. David Lisketter and his companions advanced toward the clump of brightly clad watchers, their open hands-only one, in his case-held out in sign of peace. Headdresses of plumes and fur nodded as the locals stood to meet them.
“I can’t see what’s going on,” Pamela Lisketter fretted.
“It wouldn’t do you any good if you could,” Martha muttered. You couldn’t predict what a people this alien were going to do on first contact. It all depended on how the strangers fit into the local belief structure. Did gods come from the east? Cortez had used that myth, which might or might not be present here-and-now. Or perhaps they had a belief like the Balinese, that evil came from the sea and goodness from inland. Or they might be perfectly ready to deal with strangers as humans, odd but otherwise like themselves.
A tossing confusion went through the meeting ahead. Shouts arose. Then a sound this river had never heard before: the flat snapping crack of a light automatic pistol. “What is he doing?” Lisketter cried, shrill fear in his voice.
Trying to save his life, Martha knew. It was the only reason someone like Lisketter’s brother would shoot at his precious Olmecs.
Everyone on board had eyes glued to the shore now, difficult though the fading light made it. There was a swirling eddy in the crowd around the Americans, shouts and screams. Weapons moved, flourished overhead or driving forward; she couldn’t see precisely what they were, except in a general way. Despite the danger, Martha felt a small chilly satisfaction. She’d been waiting for something like this since Lisketter’s brother came into her library behind a gun. That gun cracked again and again, and men toppled-some of them men in elaborate cloaks, as well as the near-naked peasant spearmen. A bubble of space grew around the Americans for a second, and they took advantage of it, toppling backward into their boat and shoving off. Two dragged a third, and David Lisketter walked backward toward them, holding the gun threateningly.
Some of the Olmecs had fled-all villagers in loincloths, Martha noted, not the men in bright costumes. Others stood their ground, waving weapons and fists; several lay still, or writhed groaning on the ground. The ones still hale took fresh heart when the boat slid out into the water.
The��� priests? nobles? officers? Martha wondered; men in authority, at any rate-pushed and yelled them forward. The boat went slowly. Pamela Lisketter’s hands gripped the rail with a force that turned the fingers white as flung spears and darts beat the water around it or stuck quivering in the wood. Her brother fumbled with the pistol, reloading, then began to shoot back as the others rowed. Another Olmec toppled, but most of the bullets went astray or inflicted only wounds; it was too far, the boat too unstable, and the light too uncertain for the gun to be very deadly.
Then one of the rowers stood, screaming. A black-hafted dart sprouted between his ribs. He fell, thrashing and moaning, and the boat capsized with him. The others were thrown into the water. Lisketter screamed again and again. Others rushed aimlessly around the deck of the Bentley; a few with more presence of mind dashed below and returned with weapons. Martha intercepted one of them and snatched the gun away; it was a.22 target rifle, a bolt-action toy with a tubular magazine. She’d never done any shooting to speak of herself, but Jared had shown her some things on general principle. Men from the village danced and screamed triumph on the beach; others were manning and pushing off in canoes, emboldened by their victory over the pale wizards.
If we can beat them back, we can get out of here, Martha thought. Not even Lisketter would be crazy enough to linger after this.
Because she was looking northward, Martha was the first to see what came around the bend in the river. A moment later everyone did, as the flotilla of canoes whipped their torches into flaring life and the drums began to beat again. For a long instant she stared slack-jawed at the spectacle approaching them.
Most of the canoes were simple dugouts, holding four to twelve men. But leading them were a pair of giants, double-hulled craft with the floats eighty feet long and linked by a broad platform. Burning torches on tall poles gave detail a ghastly clarity. Each held forty paddlers to a side, standing and digging their leaf-bladed oars into the water with a chant of hi-hi-ye-YI, hi-hi-ye-YI, repeated endlessly. Flamelight glistened on the sweat-slick skin of their muscular bodies. Water coiled back from the prows, which curled up in a ten-foot figurehead carved in the form of a snarling jaguar pug face. Great drums stood on the platforms, man-high, with two drummers each beating out BOOM-ba-da, BOOM-ba-da with yard-long wooden mallets. Behind the drummers the platforms were crowded with warriors in garish cloaks and trappings, carved helmet-masks fantastically colored and sweeping up to impossibly tall plumes of flamingo and quetzal feathers. They waved spears and weirdly carved wooden club-swords and rakes edged with the teeth of sharks or with obsidian chips. At the rear of the giant catamarans hulked platforms on which the commander squatted, and above that more jaguars-this time in frozen wooden leaps. Every inch of the big canoes that she could see was carved, painted, inlaid, in a riot of grotesque imagery.
Both catamar
ans held at least forty armed men. Scores of canoes followed after.
Martha grabbed the yachtsman who had served as Lisketter’s captain. “Get us out of here!” she screamed in his ear, shaking him, tasting sour vomitus at the back of her throat. Features slack with bewilderment and fear firmed a little, and he turned and dashed for the wheel. “Shoot, you fools! Shoot!” she called to the others.
“No-we came to help-” Lisketter began.
For once her followers ignored her. The diesel coughed and roared into life. When it did the men sitting cross-legged on the platforms at the rear of the catamarans sprang erect. They held up masks overhead in both arms, making pushing motions toward the schooner. Magic of their own, Martha thought wildly. She aimed at one of the men, remembering what her husband had told her-breathe out, squeeze the trigger-and felt the light kick of the.22 against her shoulder. The man looked up as the ceremonial mask tugged in his hands, then returned to his gestures. Martha worked the bolt and shot, again and again until the magazine was empty. She wasn’t sure if she had hit anything. The schooner lurched under her feet as the helmsman tried to take her downstream and ran up against the anchor. The Bentley swayed and dipped, throwing people off their feet. Someone with more presence of mind than most ran to the bows and leaned far overside, chopping at the mooring line with a machete.
Martha saw a warrior in the lead catamaran set an atlatl dart in his spear-thrower. The arm whipped forward and the American hung upside down, pinned to the side of the schooner like an insect in a collector’s cabinet. More of the darts whistled by in flat fast arcs, and slingstones cracked. The schooner’s engine gave a cough and died. Martha went down behind the meager protection of the low deckhouse; some impulse made her pull Lisketter down beside her. The catamarans swept in on either side, throwing grapnels pronged with wood and stone. They bound fast to the bows of the Bentley, and the rowers threw themselves flat. Over them, vaulting off their backs, came the warriors in their garb of feathers and skins and painted wood. What followed could hardly be called a fight. She saw one Olmec slam a three-pronged pick shaped like claws into an American’s shoulder, haul him close like a gaffed fish, and stab into his belly with a knife of volcanic glass. Another crewman reeled back with his chest gashed open by a shark-toothed rake.
The noise died, except for a screaming that went on and on until a warrior stabbed downward to end the annoyance. A few of Lisketter’s followers fled belowdecks. Olmecs followed them, poking ahead gingerly with their spears and holding torches high. Others scoured the deck. Martha came to her feet cautiously, holding up empty hands, trying not to shake. The onslaught had been so quick and brutal that it was hard to grasp; it seemed impossible that people who’d been whole just a few seconds before were now bleeding lumps of meat. Eyes turned toward her, and toward Lisketter where she crouched in shock-driven silence. Pride stiffened her spine; she crossed her arms on her chest, resisting the impulse to lay protective hands over her swelling belly. They can kill me, but I’m the only one who can make myself act like a disgrace, she told herself. And she didn’t think that groveling would do much good with this bunch.
The warriors seized her, and hauled Lisketter to her feet. They were hustled forward to the clearer space near the bow; there was only one other living prisoner, dazed, bruised, and battered. The Indians were laying a gangway from one catamaran to the deck of the schooner. The man from the platform at the rear stepped up onto it, and it shuddered under his tread. He was big, tall and massively built, heavy muscle moving under a generous coat of fat. Cross-straps over his shoulders held an ornate pectoral of colored woods inlaid with rosettes of stone. Over it hung a concave mirror that she recognized as polished hematite, iron ore, polished until it reflected torchlight as brightly as glass might have done. On his head was a mask-helmet in the shape of a jaguar’s head cunningly fashioned from wood, bone, and real fur, with his own thick-lipped, heavy-featured face staring out through the fanged muzzle. A cloak of jaguar skin half-hid his massive upper arms, and one hand bore a curious ceremonial weapon, four basalt claws fixed at the end of a yard-long shaft.
He walked with an odd swaying gait, each foot turned a little sideways as it went forward. Of course, Martha thought, dazed. He’s trying to imitate a panther��� no, a jaguar. Her glance darted aside. The warriors were much like the folk she’d seen on visits to the Yucatan over the years; darkish brown, of medium height, their faces almond-eyed and big-nosed; these men were tremendously lithe and muscular as well, many of them hideously scarred under their finery. She remembered how they’d advanced howling into gunfire, undaunted by death utterly mysterious and supernatural. Their commander looked different enough to be of a separate race, even discounting the obesity. Or maybe an inbred royal family? Priest-king, she decided. It was a label no more likely to mislead than any other.
There was no mistaking the look in his eyes, though. Power, raw and absolute. It showed too in how the warriors bowed low as he passed. Others held the prisoners forward for his inspection. A word, and they were stripped as well, and torches brought close to examine them. The big man seemed fascinated by the strangeness of their skin and hair, pinching and tugging. When he came to Martha his eyes lit and he touched her rounded belly, smacking his lips as he did so. His teeth were filed to points; they glittered in the torchlight. The pupils of his eyes were wide, wider than the dimness would have made them. Next he turned to Lisketter.
“We came to help-” she began.
There were shocked cries from the warriors, and raised weapons. Evidently you didn’t speak until spoken to, with Big Chief Baby-Face. The back of his meaty hand smacked across her mouth, leaving blood trickling in its wake. Lisketter’s eyes went even wider with shock; she looked around, as if the blow had brought her out of a stupor and made her realize that this was real. The priest-king’s hand rose to strike again, and then froze. He gave back a step, pointing at Lisketter’s face. He shouted something in his own language, a tongue that seemed to consist mostly of “u.”
“x,” and “z” sounds.
No, not at her face! Martha thought, with a trickle of desperate hope. At her eyes, that’s what he’s frightened by.
What��� of course! Lisketter had greenish-yellow eyes, about as close as a human could get to the way the eyes of one of the big cats looked. Were-jaguar cult. Nobody knew for sure, but the Olmec myths-or at least some of them-seemed to center on a mating between a woman and a divine jaguar that produced a race of part-felines. Evidently the archaeologists and anthropologists had guessed right this time. I get off because I’m pregnant, and Lisketter because she’s cat-eyed.
Spared. Who knew for how long, and for what purpose? But every moment you were alive was one you weren’t dead��� The fat chieftain recovered his composure, enough to signal again with his claw-pick. The warriors holding the two American women dragged them back a few paces. More forced the next captive to his knees and pulled back his head. A flat-bottomed ceramic bowl was brought forward, one big enough to hold gallons. She closed her eyes and swallowed hard, heard the brief desperate gasping and a long scream cut off in a gurgle. Slowly-it was the hardest thing she had ever done-she forced the lids open again. The warriors were dragging the corpse away by its ankles-away to the catamaran, with the other bodies, those killed in the fighting. She thought she knew why. The priest-king held the flat-bottomed bowl up to his lips and drank deeply, trickles of red running down from the corners of his mouth, then passed it to his followers. Then what she had expected happened; fire on a big wooden ship was a menace they’d be unlikely to understand, not having anything with enclosed decks. Flame belched out of a porthole, and the remaining Indians poured up the companionways, yelling in panic.
The gangway thundered under the chiefs steps as he retreated to his own vessel. His followers hustled the Americans in his wake and the rest poured after. The oarsmen rose from the crouch where they had waited like statues and pushed their craft away. By then fire was licking upward from
every door and porthole, red tongues of flame casting a flickering light on the river, and the roar became loud. Martha watched motionless, ignoring the grip on her arms. Beside her Pamela Lisketter stood as silent, weeping slow tears that fell from her face. The canoes rowed for the land, with a last fierce heave by the oarsmen that sent the keels of the twin hulls riding up on the slick mud.
Out on the river the masts of the schooner fell into the blaze; there was chanting and singing ashore, dancing, fires built high in the hot insect-swarming night. Martha and Lisketter were dragged up to the earthen mound, past larger buildings of wood and thatch, past hearths being prepared for cooking. Behind a massive wood table was a cage; hands thrust them inside, and spearmen stood as guards. The giant priest-king seated himself on the table-throne, perhaps?-and sat like a statue with legs crossed. His warriors stood before him, then went to a resting posture on one knee, weight back on that heel. Their feather crests bobbed in the slight breeze, casting grotesque shadows as the feast was prepared; they and the platform-throne cut off sight of what was being done.
Island in the Sea of Time Page 37