by John Rickham
“Help me.” I appealed to Fiona. “What was it, exactly, that Gallint said on that wire?”
“I can tell you,” Carson said. “In use, be grasped it in his right band, or paw, and touched his subject with his left hand. Those are the words.”
Now I felt a singular reluctance to do the obvious. I was still holding only the insulating sheath. I didn’t want to touch that gem, but there was no visible choice. I transferred the thing to my left fingers, squeezed more, and took the whole gem, now free of its cover, in my right hand. And nothing! Not so much as a tingle. It felt quite cold. I clenched it firmly, then stretched out my left and touched the old man on the shoulder.
It was the most electrifying sensation one could ever imagine. I felt instantly godlike, magnified above all men, intoxicatingly powerful yet immensely calm and serene, as if sonorous choirs sang in the distance at my glory. Light and sight, sound and sensation, all were refined a thousand times and wonderful as never before. I felt power flowing through me from that thing in my hand and into the old man I was touching. By some magical extension of my senses I felt his aches and pains, his fatigues and weariness, all wash away and vanish, and he stood straighter, more erect, even younger. And I knew, without knowing how, the right moment to break contact with him, when the healing process was complete. That moment was less dramatic than the beginning. Now the blaze of glory faded slowly, everything dimmed gradually, and it was like waking from a wonderful dream only some of the inspiration remained like an echo. And I slid the fiery gem back into its sheath again, shaken by the whole thing. I heard Carson let out a long breath of relief.
“That’s quite a talisman, Noble. It seems to have fixed him up in no time. Gallint wasn’t kidding at all!”
Truly, the old man was transformed, was full of vigor and dignity. And the pack was transformed too. The air filled with yelpings and howlings as they began to line up in ragged order, to be touched. We moved off to one side to watch and it was a sight I shall never forget. Counting women and young ones, the pack numbered more than a hundred. Women and children came first, to stand and be touched, to howl and go bounding away, visibly enlivened and renewed in health and vigor.
“Poor things!” Fiona murmured. “No wonder they came seeking help. They are completely dependent on the old man and that stone. What did it feel like, Man?”
“I can’t possibly tell you. I’ll try, later. Right now I'm still dazed by it. Power—it seemed to surge from that thing right through me!”
“You’re doing all right,” Carson declared. “If you haven’t got the old man’s confidence, then it can’t be done. We’ll have to talk to him as soon as the ceremony is over. Meanwhile, I hope he won’t mind, but I’m going to squat.”
I was only too glad to agree, and we three made ourselves reasonably comfortable by the slope. I was not fatigued, in fact I couldn’t recall when I’d felt more full of energy, but my mind was completely in chaos, so much so that I didn’t notice until she had nudged me delicately a time or two, that a young female was offering me a heavy bunch of what Iooked like some kind of green grapes. I murmured to Fiona, and she looked, howled a question, and said, “They’re for us. To eat. Her name’s Lowloo. Attractive thing!”
She was, indeed. I managed her name, and the appropriate noise for gratitude, and she scampered off to come back with more, this time a bulky thing not unlike a melon, but with a tougher covering. Carson solved the problem of opening it by setting it on the ground nearby and carving it apart with his beamer set for narrow. The inside was rich yellow stuff with plenty of juice and a most appetizing smell. The grapes were good too, very sweet indeed. Lowloo came to kneel by me and I offered her a piece, but she refused.
“Carnivores,” Carson murmured, watching me. “Makes you think, though. It seems they know the kind of food we eat. Which would argue that the old wise ones had that much in common with us.” His use of the word carnivore helped my wits a little, and I made friends with Lowloo exactly as I would have done a dog, by scratching her gently between her shoulder blades. She liked it, and said so by a throaty growl of pleasure and snuggling against my knee.
“You’ve made a conquest,” Fiona commented, puffing a slight edge on her voice, and I had to grin. But then we saw that the ceremony was over and the old man had seated himself on the turf outside his hut.
“Protocol.” Carson chuckled. “He’s the chief. We have to go to him on his own ground. Come on!”
Well, the next hour was tedious in the extreme. For one thing, the old man seemed dull and stupid until Fiona managed to get it across to him that we wanted to know about the old ones, and the hoard of gems. Then, with an effort, he got out his talisman once more and this time held it horizontal between both palms—and he was as different again as one could imagine. It was as if the gem had the power to multiply intelligence. While Fiona and he struggled with difficulties of translation, Carson took the chance to murmur to me, “You realize, Noble, that just one gem like that would be worth a fabulous sum on the market?”
“I know, and that just as a gem. Lord only knows what the potentials are otherwise. It’s some kind of metabolic amplifier I would guess.”
“Gaunt’s score is mounting, as far as I’m concerned. He knew what he was talking about. And he mentioned a hoard of various things: alien artifacts, gems, Lord-only-knows-what new lines in technology. I don’t wonder this drew Clan—and Acco Zeb. If only we can find it!”
Eventually Fiona called us in on the discussion. She looked beat, but satisfied. “I haven’t been able to get much more out of him than we already had on the wire,” she told us, "it seems to be some kind of ritual story, handed down from one generation to another. But we have a stroke of luck with the island, Hlowlee”—and I saw the old man duck, also Lowloo, as she made the sound—”because, it seems, they visit the place regularly, again as a ritual.”
“When?” Carson demanded.
“That’s the point. The visit is due now. That’s what they were upset about. Seemingly, the power of the talisman starts to run out after a certain time, and that’s when the chief has to visit the island and recharge it. And he couldn’t, because his arm was injured. You sec, he swims!”
I was still reeling from the idea of a thirty mile swim in that sea-and-sky nightmare, as Carson said, “Recharge? I wonder. Can you ask him, ‘Top of high hill,’ or words to that effect?”
She yelped and wailed at the old man for a while and he became agitated. It was a good guess. The stone was some kind of solar cell, and the island hilltop was the nearest place where the Verlan could expose it to direct sunlight. That much was fine, but then we ran into protocol complications within the pack itself. Fiona gave us a running commentary. Important above everything was the touching-stone itself, and its power, but there was a difficult decision to make. Was the old chief still fit enough to make the swim there and back, or had the time come for him to relinquish his supremacy to a younger man. Apparently he had such a man all ready and standing by—and I should point out here that we kept running into difficulties with names until we learned that what we thought were proper names were merely offices. From that time on, we called the old man “chief’”and his assistant “seconds” and we had no more confusion, The others, so far as I know, had no names nor family lines at all. “Lowloo” simply meant young and attractive female, which was accurate enough. Anyway, Carson cut through the dilemma neatly by suggesting that we offer transport on our craft to both the old man and his assistant.
That was easy enough to say, but a strain on Fiona’s talking powers, and it wasn’t until she dragged me in as a figure of confidence that there came an agreement. Then, of course, it became necessary to recall the pack and pass the word on to them. All told, I made it nine hours by my watch before we set back to the craft, and I was thoroughly weary of the whole thing. Carson, however, was jubilant, and complimentary to me.
“You deserve all the credit, Noble,” he said. “That stunt of yours with the old ma
n made all the difference.”
I couldn’t see it. Some people have a natural knack with animals, and I happen to be one of them. Any good kennel-man could have done as much.
The return journey, especially the bit across the flat plain to the cliff top, was something I would rather forget. Taking Carson’s advice, we traveled that part on all fours and backward, which is about the slowest and most awkward method of traveling I have ever struck. It was preferable to being caught up and howled away by the howling gale, but only just. By the time we reached the edge and started down, I was aching in places that I never knew I had muscles to ache, and Fiona was ready to drop, probably would have done so a time or two had we not clung desperately to each other all the way down.
We had more trouble trying to persuade the two Verlan males to come aboard the craft. They were very timid. It wasn’t until Carson and Fiona had gone aboard and below decks, and then made themselves visible through the transparent forward canopy that I could persuade the pair of them to tread on the restless deck and perch forward in the bows. It was pointless to go further and try to talk them inside. Lowloo, oddly enough, was much more reasonable. With no more than a hesitant whimper or two, she followed me down the ladder and inside, and then went sniffing all around in eager curiosity, although never venturing very far away from my side. I think it was because she was younger than the other two, and trusted me implicitly. It amused Fiona to repeat her jibe that I had made a conquest, but I managed to cut that kind of barbed comment altogether by pointing out that I could do a deal worse. “At least,” I said, “she trusts me, and she doesn’t talk back!”
“Oh, well”—she shrugged—”if it’s a slave you want!”
“She responds to the right treatment. If you’d ever read Kipling, the Just So Stories, you’d know that in every animal there’s at least one place it can’t scratch itself. You scratch it there, and you make a friend. It’s as simple as that. With Lowloo it is just between the shoulder blades, see?”
“Smarty! I suppose if you find the right place to scratch me, it will have the same effect?”
“Cool it, you two!” Carson ordered, grinning. “We’re away. Keep your eye on those two up forward, see if they give us any lead. I have a fix on the location of the island, but I’m deliberately running a few points off, just to see. Watch ‘em, will you?”
Sure enough, after about ten minutes of surging through the heaving water the old man grew agitated again and waved his arm away to the side, pointing. Carson veered a little, then a little more, until the Verlan was satisfied, then consulted his gyro and nodded.
“Did he hit it?” Fiona demanded.
“Right on the nose. Sense of direction, plus. I only hope he has other gifts to match this. Like being able to point us straight at the treasure.”
“Did you expect something like this?”
Carson gave me a grin. “Pure jam. Not that I’m complaining because it fell into our laps. Fortune. Like you being sympatico with dogs.”
“That,” I said, “was nothing.”
“You may think so, but it could make all the difference to us. You go grab some sleep. At this gait we should make the island in about four hours.”
His guess was accurate enough. By the time he called us, we were running Out of the thick of the haze. Before us loomed the black mass of the island, stark and forbidding, with a blunt peak standing high above lesser ones. Remembering the paw shape as seen from above, I realized that we were approaching from what would be the “wrist” direction.
“Fine so far,” Carson murmured. “But now we have to find a place to park this craft. No problem for the swimmers, but we need a bay of some sort.”
“There must be something,” Fiona declared. “I can’t see the ancient wise ones swimming, can you?”
We were too low in the water for a good view, so I asked Carson to switch on the outside pickups and went up on to the deck, then up on to the cabin roof. The conical peak that had looked smooth and regular from a distance, was rough and jagged now at close range. There was a frothy lace of surf at its foot. The two Verlan exchanged growls and then plunged over the side to swim on ahead as Carson reduced speed.
“Small break in the surf ahead,” I reported. “See that waterspout? That’s too narrow for us, but if you look away to starboard there’s a bigger one, big enough for us.”
We nosed gently into a small cove, a natural harbor, slowed, and I took the bow rope and leaped ashore to secure it. Much to my surprise I found, exactly where it would be needed, a weather stained ringbolt, the shank solidly sunk into the black rock. I made fast quickly and ran aft where Fiona was hauling out the stem line.
“Hang on to that a minute,” I said, and ran past her, using my eyes. And I found another, the duplicate of the first, but set at a distance that spoke of some craft half as long again as ours. We barely had enough line to make fast either end. Carson came to look, and scowl in thought.
“White metal alloy, and old. A long time since they were used. I don’t like this at all.” He looked up to the high edge where the two Verlan were waiting for us, then stared all around, and shook his head again. “Ghosts are talking to me. What we find, others can find too. I don’t like it. I would just as soon not be caught all neatly tied up and trapped here.”
I had nothing constructive to say, but Fiona demanded, ”What else can we do? We would be crazy to pass up an ideal berth like this, just because you have breezes along your spine!”
“I know!” he agreed. “It sounds crazy. Tell you what.” He looked around again, calculatingly. “This stuff is easy enough to walk on, it’s all steps. I’ll leave you two here, to see what you can find Out from the old man, while I take a trip further along the coast. No more than five or six miles, I promise. Either I find another billet, and walk back to join you, or I don't, and bring the boat back here, right? No more than two hours, at the outside. Fair?”
“You’re in charge,” I said. “You’ve guessed pretty accurately this far.”
“Will you he able to find us again?” Fiona challenged, and he grinned.
“Sure, I’ll find you, as long as you don’t go climbing the mountain.”
Frankly, I was none too happy to see him back out and go booming away out of sight around the corner of the bay. He had that quality of inspiring confidence, of knowing exactly what he was doing, and I felt vulnerable with him gone. But, when I turned from watching him disappear, I saw that Fiona was already up the rock-side and standing with the two Verlan, waiting for me. Even Lowloo, whining at my side, seemed anxious to move on. A slip of a girl, my own age, devastatingly feminine, nymph-nude but for a skimpy loincloth, and enhanced by the drifting rainbow light—yet she had more courage than I had, or no nerves at all. I made haste to follow, pushing my own worries aside, but I, too, felt that there were ghosts here.
The chief and his assistant had trotted on ahead some distance, running with that peculiar crouch, and holding their fingers across their eyes against what was to them a glare. Lowloo kept by my side as we followed, The rocky surface was uneven but in no way difficult or hazardous, apart from isolated patches of moss that were slippery. To the right, the great dark bulk of the mountain rose to lose itself in haze; on our left, the sea pounded constantly at the wall.
“Where do you suppose they are taking us?” I wondered, and Fiona shrugged.
“Some pathway up the mountain, at a guess. They look excited!”
We went on for perhaps half a mile, swinging in a slow arc around the foot of the slope, when all at once I heard a low, thunderous roar, swelling up rapidly into an enormous rush of bellowing noise. A crash, and then, ahead of us, a great spout of water leaped high in the air, hung a moment, then opened out and fell back with a clatter like giant rain. We both stopped dead.
“What do you make of that?” she gasped, and in a moment it came to me.
“I saw that from out there as we were coming in. My guess was way off. I had it placed about a hundred yards
away from the harbor. There’s a kind of narrow channel or cleft connecting with the sea, I think. Come on, it doesn’t seem to bother our guides at all.”
After a moment or two of scrambling over wet rocks, we came to the edge of a great hole. It was all of fifteen feet across and so nearly circular as to look artificial. I’ve no head for heights at all, and long before I reached the rim I was down on my knees, and then on my face as I wriggled the last little bit and peered over. Fiona crawled along with me. We stared down together. It was darkish down there but there was enough fugitive light and sparkle from the restless water to give an indication.
“I make that surface to be about thirty feet down,” I said. “You can see by the turbulence that it’s connected to the sea by some channel or other.”
“Right!” she agreed; lying flat and peering. “But why did they bring us here?” She frowned a moment longer, then sat up and started howling and yelping at the two Verlan. Lowloo, perhaps wisely, had remained a few feet back, well clear. I sat back from the edge, too, and studied the surroundings, taking it for granted that we were intending somehow to pass this great hole. The seawall on the left was narrow, and I discarded that temporarily anyway, as there was a gap in it, the same gap I had seen from the sea. That left a narrow ledge to the right, about fifteen inches wide, between the rim of the hole and the sheer lift of the mountainside. I didn’t fancy it one bit, but in my experience, the longer one hesitates to dwell on a hazard, the more frightening it gets.
So I left Fiona to her interrogation, scrambled to my feet, and started away and around. It was no great effort, so long as I avoided looking down into the pit on my left hand, and the straight-up cliff-wall was smooth, with no odd obstructions to hamper me. About half way across, pacing gingerly along, I came to a recess in that wall, a square-cut cavern about three feet wide, six feet high and some five feet deep, where part of the interior rock remained to make a seat that a man could sit on. There was even a thick bar of rock across at about the right height to make a backrest. The whole thing was too weather-worn to show if it was artificial or not, and it gave me a moment of unease, but the concept of a seat was too inviting to ignore, so I scrambled in and sat.