Surely some Jangali men must have come from Verrino originally! Yet it was a truism that new allegiances thrust out old.
"Don't worry about your home town. The jungle protects Jangali adequately from attack."
"Exactly!"
Poula wagged a finger. "Until the day when the Sons come sailing upstream—picking off one town then the next!"
"She's right, you know," said Birthmark.
Moustache subsided somewhat. "So we're to pack our bags, and garrison Guineamoy?"
"Yes," she said.
"While the Guineamoy guild make lots of pistols and things, for us to go to war with?"
"We haven't time to mince words or be diplomatic, Sir. Yes, yes. It's the only way. Guineamoy are prepared to tool up to make swords and pistols. And explosive bombs which you can catapult from a boat deck, or drop from a balloon. And incidentally," she added, "please don't think too harshly of Yaleen. She did tell us about their guns and how the Sons govern the West; that's useful."
But I wondered whether she was defending me personally, or simply the honour of the guild. . . .
"Almost as useful," snapped a 'jack with a vein-smashed drinker's face, "was what she told them about us! And about the poison those Barbra weirdos use."
I winced. I did manage to stare back at him, though perhaps my face was as flushed as his.
"We'll need to discuss your proposal," said Moustache. "We'll give you an answer tomorrow."
"Guineamoy already agreed," said Poula.
"Maybe that's because they're closer to the action, and a bit more exposed? And maybe the almighty river guild promised to remit their cargo fees for the next couple of years?"
Poula snorted. "Next you'll be fretting in case we charge you for troop transport!"
She didn't actually answer his question, though. This, I thought, was foolish. If the 'jacks sailed to Guineamoy, sooner or later they would discover whether there was anything in this wild surmise. And who would fight with a stout heart if they even suspected that they were being diddled?
Yet who was I to criticize?
"Tomorrow," repeated Moustache. He stood up, in one smooth scissoring action. Other 'jacks followed suit.
"Wait. One thing more. We haven't discussed the motives of the Sons enough. Their beliefs."
"So? You can turn that one loose on the savants and nitpickers up Ajelobo way."
"We may indeed."
"Marvellous! That'll amuse us while we're on guard duty, and exploding ourselves and dying messily. I wonder how many cords of wood they'll need to print their fantasies?"
Poula remained patiently sitting. Reluctantly a few 'jacks sat down again. Not Moustache, though.
"You have to know what your enemy thinks," she said. "One key to this is, what the black current is."
"What it was, you mean."
"Is still! Coiled up as it is, within the Precipices."
"Who cares? Sod all effect it has on the river now."
"Yet it still reaches into all of us, who are of the river," Poula said patiently.
Moustache looked blank.
"I assure you of that, Mister 'Jack. May I vomit if I lie, or betray."
"What on earth are you talking about? What's wrong with you?"
Poula was shivering. Her face had blanched. She bit her lip. Moustache stared hard at her then nodded—as though persuaded, of something at least. Abruptly Poula fainted and keeled over. Her neighbour tended her, tucking a cushion under her head.
"Okay, so I'm impressed," said Moustache. "What conclusions am I meant to draw?"
Tamath took over again. A little too slickly for my taste, as though this incident—genuine though I knew it to be—had been rehearsed beforehand. "And the key to the current/' she said, "must be in its head. Where else? Tambimatu tell us that its mouth gapes open." I mistrusted her tone mightily. "An open gateway is an invitation."
"To be swallowed?" Moustache laughed. "Maybe its mouth just stuck in that position. Maybe it's dead."
"In that case, Poula would not have felt so sick and fainted."
"Poo to that," said the florid-faced 'jack. "Some folk believe an idea strong enough, they can make their own hair fall out."
Yet Moustache looked impressed despite himself. "So the thing has a key stuck in its throat. What of it?"
"We will send someone through that open mouth to investigate. We will send the only person who claims to have talked to it. We'll send her."
Me.
I'm sure if Poula had been conscious she would have announced this with less vindictive relish.
Moustache guffawed. "Heh heh! That's one better than sending her up a jacktree without a line."
But the 'jack with broken veins looked troubled. "Hang on a bit! Is it in our interests to have that thing meddled with? I say leave well alone! After a bite to eat, it might revive."
The 'jack with his cherry stain broke in. "Let's face it: what's going on is an invasion. An invasion by barbarians—who'll probably like you and me just as much as they like the ladies here. If jumping into the thing's mouth helps us any, I say we should welcome it."
"Another reason for honouring Yaleen with this special mission," added Tamath, with a nasty smile, "is that she seems to have a certain talent for survival. For popping up again. For being regurgitated."
Which did nothing to diminish the very hollow feeling I had in my tummy. . . .
The next day the 'jacks did give their answer, though I wasn't present myself; and the answer was yes. Yes, they would transform their guild into an army to defend Guineamoy. Yes, they would liberate Verrino. Not try to. They would liberate it. When a 'jack decided to fell a tree, that tree fell.
So a day later the Blue Guitar set sail for Tambimatu with everyone on board in relatively cheerful mood. Now that Tamath had won a victory or two, she was more relaxed. And when she told the crew the purpose of our trip—that I had volunteered to enter the worm's head—they eased off in their attitude to me. ("Just so long as we don't have to pilot her personally," observed Zemia, who was up and about now and hobbling on a crutch. "No, no," Tamath hastened to assure her. "The black ketch will carry Yaleen.") Even Hali softened her heart towards me, and became less abrasive.
Ah, my chance to save the guild! To be a heroine, pure and simple. Or a dead one.
During that voyage I often found myself recalling my glimpses of the lunatic head: the blind eyes, the mouth dripping glue ... I tried not to dwell on this, but I had time on my hands. I was forbidden to undertake any strenuous duties—just in case I broke a leg, accidentally on purpose.
So I spent my spare hours reading the Blue Guitars small library of Ajelobo romances, studying the antics of their heroines and heroes in disbelief. Nobody ever asked them to stuff themselves down a giant dripping gob. Now that some days had lapsed since the plan was mooted, it seemed the height of craziness to try to communicate with the worm by this means. What would you think if a bug tried to make friends with you by leaping into your mouth? The venture seemed ever more like some primitive rite of human sacrifice; oh yes, I found a fine example of that in one romance—though naturally the heroine rescued her boyfriend in the nick of time.
We passed Port Barbra without putting into port. Soon we were approaching Ajelobo, source of those fantasies which had delighted me once; Ajelobo, whose wiser residents would soon be set the nut to crack, of whether we were free individuals or puppets. To gnaw at this nut, while 'jacks died for freedom's sake; I could appreciate Moustache's sarcasm. No doubt Ajelobo savants would still be debating when a tide of Sons rolled up the river to answer them with steel and fire. Long after I'd been digested as a worm's breakfast.
With Ajelobo half a league ahead, Tamath came to where I was lounging in a deck-chair; she was rubbing her hands contentedly.
"Signal just came. The first lot of 'jacks are sailing. Isn't that great?"
"Great," I agreed. "And what happens when they've won Verrino? Will they go back to chopping wood? Will they disband of t
heir own accord?"
"If the current doesn't return, I suppose we'll need a garrison in every town from the Bayou northwards. For a while, at least."
"For a while—or forever? We'll need a standing army, Guildmis- tress, and our river guild to serve it. That's quite a change."
"In that case we might have to invade the west, and depose those Sons."
"That's no answer, either. What price the rules of marriage afterwards? What of the wander-weeks for girls? What of men staying put? What of The Book? All down the drain."
"Yaleen, you're forgetting the economic power of our guild."
"And you're forgetting how that power depends on us having a monopoly! I don't see any way back to where we were before. Paradise is lost, because the worm has gone."
"In that case," said Tamath tightly, "it had damn well better come back. You'll see to that, won't you, dear? Then you'll be promoted to 'mistress, just like me."
"Oh sure, I'll see to it. Dead easy, really! I just pat it on its snout, gaze soulfully into its eyes and ask, 'Is 00 sick, Wormy? What medicine makes 00 well? Me? Am I oo's medicine, Wormy? Tell-ums, then!'"
Tamath slapped me briskly on the cheek, and strode away. Soon there was cheering on deck, and up aloft, as she shouted out the decoded signal.
With watering eyes I returned to my romance, The Cabin Girl and the Cannibal One by one I tore out pages, folded them into darts and launched them over the rail. Soon we had a little paperchase behind us; though nothing much compared with the expanse of water.
Tambimatu again! The Precipices soaring up through the clouds; spinach puree humping up against a town which couldn't see beyond its own roofs nodding together . . . Jewels and muck.
I blew my accumulated cash, upwards of sixty fish, on a splendid diamond ring. If I was doomed to plunge into foul saliva, I might as well be properly dressed for the occasion—if only on one finger.
The guild had other notions of how I should costume myself for the encounter. Somebody must have had a fine sense of irony: the guild had prepared a sort of diving suit.
"For your protection, Yaleen," explained Maranda, the squat, bland quaymistress; she who had skippered us to the Precipices and back, the year before. On a table in her office rested a glass helmet, a tight pigskin bodice with a brass collar to clamp the helmet to, and lots of straps on the back; and a tough belt with a padlock of a snaplink.
"Why not naked, rubbed with costly oils and unguents?" I'd found the "unguent" in The Cabin Girl and the Cannibal It sounded sexy.
"You might need air, Yaleen. We've considered the way your brother crossed the river. See this valve here, in the glass? You'll carry several compressed air bottles linked in series on your back— enough for two hours. The finest craftsmen in Tambimatu have made them. The bottles are going through final trials right now."
"Are they of gold and silver?"
"And there'll be a long rope fixed to this harness, so we can pull you out."
"Oh, won't I just be the fly on the angler's line! Shouldn't I have a hook in my ribs? So you can winch the whole worm out of its hidey-hole, when it bites? Then the good boat Nameless can tug it downstream all the way to Umdala."
"I'm glad to see you've braced your spirit for what may prove something of an ordeal."
"Ordeal? Gosh, I'm used to it! The only thing that mildly worries me is, how will it hear me through the helmet?"
"You can set your mind at rest on that score. If there's no result, we'll send you in again without a helmet. Now here's the lamp you'll use. . . ."
At least this time, unlike my first trip to the head of the river, we would be dispensing with any banquets or solemn hoo-hah. Who needed them? For some curious indefinable reason I felt quite off my food—and as for solemnity, whatever flip badinage I might utter, you can believe I felt solemn enough inside. In the pit of my tummy.
I was to transfer to the black ketch immediately. Departure time was set for a day hence.
So out to the moored ketch I was rowed by an apprentice, the oars dabbling like ducks on a pond. As our rowboat neared the ketch, a face peered over the gunwale: a face as ruddy as the sun through morning mist, a red orb topped with straw—and the sun rose a little in my heart.
"Peli! Peli, it's you!" I cried.
A moment later I was scrambling up the ladder, boarding. Peli from Aladalia! The water-wife with the warbling voice!
For five seconds we simply stared at one another. Then Peli cried.
''Why, let me take a look at you!" and did just the opposite, rushing to embrace me and thump me about the shoulders to check that I was solid. I laughed and laughed; so did she.
"Oh, it's so good to see you!" I gasped, when we untangled. "But what are you doing here? Surely you haven't been stuck in Tambimatu ever since—"
"What, faithfully dragging the river for your body? No fear! Mind, I gave that skinny bitch what-for. The one who wanted you overboard. Don't know if you heard me. . . ."
"I was a bit busy at the time . . . No, but I did hear you cry out. And I felt your fingers trying to save me."
"Bless you, when 1 saw you leap on this gunwale and scuttle along the boom!"
"Did you sail to the current again, this Eve past?"
"No, I was in Ajelobo. The guild summoned me here. I'd been with you last time, that's why. Thoughtful of them, eh? The crumb of comfort. Some of the other 'sisters who'll be with us, they sailed to the head this time. And I can tell you they're definitely a better bunch than that tight-nosed lot we had. The only fly in the ointment is old Nothing-Bothers-Me—she's the skipper."
"I know. I've just come from her office. She's been working overtime, welding me a wedding costume. It sure looks tight. That old worm had better not put me in the way of a baby."
Peli laughed, and caught my hand to admire the diamond ring. "Is this the wedding band? Won't the worm have a job slipping it on? He's a bit on the fat side."
"Oh Peli! Same old Peli. I bought the ring to make me feel good. Something has to. Well, you do. Being here."
"Hmm, not completely the same old Peli. Bit bothered, in fact. About Aladalia. I was down there in the summer, and now what's going on?" She sighed—but then her sun shone brightly again. "Oh, the hell with that. You've got enough worries for six people. And six just happens to be the number of the crew. Come meet your 'sisters!"
They were indeed a much better bunch. Three of them—Delli, Marth and Sal—had just sailed to the head and the midstream. Laudia and Sparki were veterans from way back who had been in Tambimatu when events, also, came to a head.
Laudia was a boatmistress and Sparki her boatswain. These two had been together a long time. Laudia was as blonde and elegant as Tamath, though with none of Tamath's ambitious insecurity. Sparki was dusky, diminutive and peculiarly boy-like. Peculiar, in the sense that the current hadn't thought so when she drank her slug of it. Sparki looked just the sort of person I thought the current weeded out: like a boy who had run away to the river in girl's clothes—as in one daft romance I once read, written without any knowledge of the actual facts.
Plainly enough this bosom couple were the two individuals on board most trusted by the guild; on account of their love of the river and love of each other, which were intertwined. The way of the river was the bond of their relationship; I could tell that from a dozen touches and tones of voice. Lose one; loosen the other? Perhaps. So Laudia and Sparki could be relied on to do whatever the guild required. At least I felt sure they wouldn't behave like martinets.
Five. And Peli made six. Me, seven.
Only, I wasn't crew; I was something else. I was the bucket to dip in the current's jaws.
After our supper of pork stew and rice that evening, we drank delicious strong green tea: Tambi-mate. In its storage jar Tambi- mate looked like a dollop of the local puree, dried. Generous wads were infused in boiling water in individual glass tumblers with real silver caps. Then you sucked the liquid through a thin metal pipe; and quite hard you had to suck, too. Sal, her
self from Tambimatu, did the honours. The drinks set was hers, presented by proud parents when she was chosen for the New Year's Eve trip.
We drank quite a few glasses, getting a queer untea-like buzz from the drink, a buzz quite different from tipsiness. This was a clear-headed bright elation, accompanied by a slight anaesthetizing of the body so that after a time I couldn't tell whether I'd had enough to eat, too much, too little, or nothing; and I didn't care which. If only I'd had a jar of Tambi-mate with me a year earlier! It was perfect for someone lost in a jungle, with only grubs and roots to eat, and keep down. Though I'm not sure quite how I would have heated the water. . . .
"Will you sign your glass?" asked Sal, after the fourth or fifth infusion.
"Eh?"
"Your glass. Sign it with that diamond. Delighted to see you supporting local crafts, by the way!"
''You want me to scratch my moniker on this glass because I bought a jewel in town?"
"No, of course not! I want you to do it because there'll be songs sung about you in future years, and tales told."
"If there are, let's hope I get the chance to write them, or else they'll be a pack of lies."
"You will. I know you will! In fact, start scribing now: your name, I mean." Sal giggled. "Please! For luck."
"Go on," urged Delli.
"Well, okay then." Feeling rather peculiar about this—and realizing that I hadn't escaped ceremonies after all—I tucked the glass into my lap and inscribed "Yaleen" as legibly as I could.
Sal held the glass up to the lantern to admire, tilting it about; she had to, to make any sense of the spidery scratches against the sodden leaves within.
"I've spoilt it, haven't I?"
"Oh no! Absolutely not! I'll treasure this."
I felt light and euphoric. "It's my glass gravestone," I joked. "Will you put flowers in it if I die?"
She grinned. "No, but I'll drink Tambi-mate from it. All my days."
A while later, Peli blinked repeatedly as if to bring a bright idea into focus. "Yaleen, I've been meaning to ask: why did the current call you, a year ago? It wasn't objecting to you, otherwise you'd be dead. So what was special about you? I don't mean that as a put- down—"
Watson, Ian - Black Current 01 Page 17