by Talbot Mundy
“Go then!” Caswallon answered, making his voice gruff lest it should tremble. “Lud’s luck go with you! And know this: Come what may — come rumor, and though all the world and Caesar swear you have played us false, we will believe in you!”
“Tide!” That was Sigurdsen’s voice from the poop. “Tide and a fair wind!”
There came a whistle in-between-decks, where the captains of the oar- banks piped all rowers to the benches; then a clatter as the oar-blades rattled on the ports.
“Haul short!” Sigurdsen again. And then a sing-song and a clanking at the capstan.
Tros led the way on deck. Extravagantly he had ordered the purple sails bent for the occasion. His eyes went aloft to where the Northmen lay on the yards to shake them loose. He turned his back on Orwic, because Fflur wept on the young man’s shoulder, and he knew what agonies of shame and nervousness that scene imposed on a British aristocrat. Orwic’s funny little peaked helmet had been pushed over one eye, and he was biting his moustache. Caswallon laughed, which brought a curse to Orwic’s lips, but Tros leaned overside and shouted at the crew of fishermen who were bringing alongside the barge on which the druid, Caswallon and Fflur were to go ashore.
“Easy! Easy, you lubbers! If you scrape my paint — Out fenders there!” He had spent a goodly percentage of Caesar’s gold on sulphur and quick-silver to make the ship’s sides splendid with vermilion.
There had to be more embracing before Fflur went overside. The British had a sort of ritual of parting. It broke all restraint. But Tros, for the sake of the crew, preserved his air of grandeur.
He stood the whole deck crew at quarters and saluted with a burst of trumpets and a roll of drums as Fflur and Caswallon went down the ladder. Then he turned to face the druid, for the druid waited.
There came a silence on deck and aloft. The druid, with his eyes on Tros, drew out the golden sickle from his girdle. He was mild-eyed, but the eyes were bright with fasting and with having contemplated stars and Mysteries.
“In the midst of danger thou shalt find the keys of safety,” he repeated. “Win Rome in Gades!”
Then the sickle, flashing in the sunlight, moved in mystic circles over Tros’s head, severing whatever threads of hidden influence might bind him to the sources of disaster. Upturned, it received, as does the new moon, affluence and wisdom; reversed, it outpoured blessings on his head. Point first, it touched his breast above the heart, invoking honesty and courage; presently it passed in ritual of weaving movements before eyes, ears, nose, lips, hands and feet, arousing all resourcefulness, then tapped each shoulder to confer the final blessing. Then the druid spoke:
“Offspring of Earth, Air, Fire, Water and the Nameless, go forth accoutered. As a sun’s ray, go thou forth! A light amid the darkness! A land among the waters! A friend among the friendless, and a serpent! Be a strength amid the weakness! Be a man amid the elements! Whereso thy foot shall tread, be justice done! Whatso thy tongue shall speak, be truth unveiled! Be strong! Be of the gods who give and guide and not of them who snare and take away! That voice within thee, judge thee! Be thy hand the servant of thy soul!”
Blessing ship and crew with arms upraised, lips moving to the said-to-be- forgotten Word, the druid turned and went, all keeping silence until, like some white-haired pilot of the years, he had descended to the waiting barge.
“Up anchor!” Tros roared. Then, as the clanking capstan brought the cable in, “Make sail there! Sheet her home!”
The purple sails spread fluttering and bellied as the ship swung slowly on the tide before the light breeze. On the poop Tros raised his baton. Drums and cymbals crashed. The oars went out in three long banks on either side. Cymbals for the “ready” and then crash of brass and alternating drum-beat as the water boiled alongside and the great ship leaped ahead, her serpent’s tongue a-flicker in the sun.
“I am a man! I live! I laugh!” Tros told himself as he eyed those purple sails and turned to wave his hand toward the barge that danced amid the gulls along the white wake astern.
CHAPTER 68. Off Gades
Sent I a fool on my errand? It was I who sent him. Counted I not on his folly? That is my fault. Though he suffer for it, it was I who sent him. It is I who pay, unless I counted on his folly to decoy an adversary, who might have been cautious unless he perceived he had a fool to deal with.
— from The Log of Tros of Samothrace
HOW to put into a port controlled by Romans, with part of his crew composed of two hundred and fifty deserters of Caesar’s army, without falling foul of Caesar’s letters of proscription was a problem that Tros left to the gods to clear up for him, although he already had a hint of the solution in his mind. Meanwhile, there was work a-plenty — head winds and off-shore winds, flat calms with a heavy ground-swell that made the bucking rowers grunt, and squally weather in which whales played all around the ship, nearly causing a mutiny because he would not let Jaun Aksue and his Eskualdenak turn aside to hunt them.
“Thus we kill whales. With a spear we slay them. It is easy. We will slay two. You may tow them into Gades, making haste because the sharks will follow, eating at their undersides. The dead whales float, I promise you, and they are worth much money. Romans buy the meat; the traders buy the bone; the Spaniards buy the skin for sandals, shields, mule-harness—”
“Let live,” Tros answered. “I hunt bigger fish.”
“Aye, but you pay us nothing. Give us a chance to turn the whale meat into money, that we may drink in Gades. I tell you, Lord Tros, we haven’t tasted red wine since the sour, thin stuff that Caesar fed to us. We Eskualdenak are noblemen, who like to get drunk now and then.”
But one of the things that Tros had learned in many foreign ports was the difference between a crew mad drunk on its own earned money, and the same crew equally drunk on its master’s bounty.
“You shall drink at my expense in Gades,” he remarked, and the tawny- haired soldier of fortune swaggered forward where he discussed with his companions the pros and cons of taking the ship away from Tros and hunting whales until she was full of the bone and blubber.
But for three days and three nights waves, tide, current and the wind fought Tros for the mastery. No sight of sun, no stars nor moon, nothing to gage direction by except the shrieking wind and — now and then when he dared it — thunder of the surf against high cliffs.
But Tros only approached the lee shore twice to find a headland that he recognized, and that was after he had left the dreaded rocks and isles of Finis Terrae far astern.
Twice — yet he made his landfall. He hove the ship to, within sight of Gades Bay in the late afternoon of the eleventh day out from Vectis, sending three men to the mastheads to keep watch for Roman ships. He covered the serpent’s head with ‘paulin lest the setting sun should glitter on its gold-leaf and attraction attention. His ship was notched against the western sky, but her vermilion top-sides merged into the sunset splurge, and it was possible her masts might not be seen if none was actually watching for them.
Seated at the table in the cabin he clipped a piece of parchment from a roll, mixed gum with sepia from cuttlefish, chewed the point of a pen to his liking and sent for Orwic.
“Lud love me, Tros, but the land smells good!” said Orwic, making himself easy on Tros’s bunk.
“Can you speak the Roman tongue?” Tros asked him.
“You know I can’t. When I was a boy I learned a few words from a Roman trader who was cast up on the beach. He was killed soon afterwards for taking liberties with women. Even in the battle on the beach last year I couldn’t remember a word of it. I wanted to yell the wrong commands to Caesar’s men and confuse them until our chariots could ride them down and—”
Tros interrupted, leaning forward with an elbow on the table. “Gaulish? Can you speak that with a Gaulish accent?”
“Near enough. You know as well as I do that we Britons speak the same tongue as the Gauls. What ails you, Tros? Your eyes look like a madman’s. Are you shipsick?”
Orwic barked delightedly.
“Friend Tros, I would swim to Gades, just for the feel of good earth!”
“This is a worse risk than a swim. Fail — there is a low hill behind Gades, outside the city wall, where cross-roads meet. The hill bristles with dead trees that bear ill-smelling fruit. The Romans flog a man before they crucify him, flog him until his intestines hang and—”
“Rot me talk of failure!” Orwic answered. “Tell me what shall be if I succeed.”
“Tchutt! I must go myself. I need a cautious man.”
“Lud’s belly! Tros, you shall not! Listen! Who has better right than I to run a risk for my friends in Britain?”
Orwic leaned across the table. His face flushed. He looked as handsome as Apollo.
“Some man,” Tros said, “who will take care. No hot-head can succeed in this adventure.”
“Tros, I blow cold! I am as crafty as a fox! I forswear horsemanship! I never rode a horse! I never drove a chariot! I am a tortoise! Burn me this great creaking lumber-wain of a tin-bellied boat, and set me on dry land! I am a paragon of caution! Dumb I am, a lurker in shadows, a rap-a-door-and-run man! Tros, there is none aboard this ship who can do half as well!”
Tros knew it, but he kept the knowledge to himself and let Orwic do all the persuading.
“I need a modest man. The gods love modesty,” he said with the air of a money-lender refusing to do business.
“I am modesty!” said Orwic.
“You!” Tros leaned back in his oaken chair and laughed. “Modest? Three nights gone I heard you praying that the storm might cease, instead of praising the sea’s splendor and returning thanks for guts enough to ride it out!”
“It was the Northmen prayed,” said Orwic.
“Aye. But who bade them? Who paid them? Who gave Skram, the skald, a gold-piece for his pains? I saw you.”
“Tros, you see too much. Our British gods are of field and river. These Northmen are sailors and their gods are—”
“Cripples!” Tros exploded. “Rot me such a god as likes to see good seamen on their knees! There are gods in Gades, Orwic, but they’ll go their own gait. It’s for the man who does my work tonight to suit their whimsies, not they his.”
“Well, I will be whimsical,” said Orwic. “The gods shall like me very well.”
He stooped and scooped up sand out of the box that was kept in readiness to put out fire, and heaped six handfuls of the wet stuff on the table. Then he smoothed it out.
“So, draw me Gades. Show me the house I must find.”
“Conops knows the house,” said Tros, but he drew, none the less, with his forefinger, beginning with a circle for the city wall, then marking the five gates and making dots to represent the forum, the temple of Venus and the gladiators’ barracks, with a veritable maze of streets between.
“This is the governor’s house. Avoid it as you would death! Now, from the western gate due eastward, do you see? Then this way, to the right, to a point about midway along the street. Turn your back to the west, and forward. The house of Simon the Jew stands nearly at the apex of a triangle that has for base the street between the forum and the gladiators’ school.
“It is a house built half of timber, half of mud, smeared with a yellow plaster that will make it look like stone by night. Simon is a rich Jew with the privilege of armed slaves — quite a few of them. There will be dozens of dogs in the street and the Gades dogs are bad, I warn you. There used to hang a lantern on a chain from the front of Simon’s house to the wall opposite. The citizenry have used that chain a time or two to hang night prowlers. None can approach the house unseen because the lamp has several wicks and casts a bright light.”
“I will walk up brazenly,” said Orwic.
And you will find the brassiest-faced Jews in Europe ready for you! They live in the narrow streets nearby and look to Simon to protect them with his influence. They’ll swarm out with stones in their hands at the first bleat from Simon’s slaves. But there’s worse than they. The city is patrolled by armed slaves who belong to the municipium The place is ten times better policed than Rome, and there’s a law against being out at night without being able to prove lawful business. It is no light task I set you. I think I had better leave you here and go myself.”
“Tros, I tell you, I go! I will be safe enough in a Roman costume. They will take me for some gallant pursuing a love affair.”
“In the Jews’ quarter? I think not,” said Tros. “A man may buy a Jewess in the open market almost anywhere where slaves are sold, but no man in his senses goes philandering near a ghetto after dark! The Jews can fight! And if you beat on Simon’s door, his slaves will rush out and cudgel you.”
“Conops shall beat the door,” said Orwic. “While the slaves beat Conops, I will slip into the house.”
“Cockerel! I wouldn’t lose Conops for his weight in money!”
“Very well. I can wait until dawn outside the house and—”
“No. By morning Simon must have visited my ship. Now listen. Try to forget you are Caswallon’s nephew and a prince of Britain. Only remember you are charged with secret business. If you try to show how smart you are, the gods will raise a wall of circumstance around you that will test your wits to the extremity. Go modestly, and they will modify the odds. Bear that in mind. Now, muck me this sand away — so. To the floor with it. Let that Jaun Spaniard clean it up. The rascal rots with laziness. Now, I will write the letter.”
He spoke as one who contemplated making magic, and for a while, for the sake of exercising Orwic’s patience, he sat listening to the murmur of the short waves overside. Then he wrote swiftly, using Greek, pausing line by line to read aloud and construe it to Orwic:
“Tros, the Samothracian, to Simon, son of Tobias, the Jew of Alexandria, in Gades, greeting.
“Be the bearer as a son to you. He is Orwic, son of Orwic, a prince of Britain, nephew to the king who rules the Trinobantes and the Cantii, my true friend. Speak to him freely.
“Knowing I have done you service in the past, whereby we both made profit, and aware you are a man of true heart and long memory, whose zeal for great enterprises is in no wise dulled by the success that has attended many efforts in the past, I urge that you should come to me with all speed, secretly, tonight, for conference concerning matters that may profit both of us.
“Lord Orwic will attend you and convey you by the shortest way in safety to my ship.
“This is my true word. So fail not.
“Tros of Samothrace.”
He sanded the letter and passed it to Orwic, who frowned at the thick Greek characters.
“Will he understand you need help? Why not tell him so?” Orwic objected.
“Because I know him!” Tros answered. “If he thought I needed help, he wouldn’t come until he had driven a hard bargain first by daylight. But if he thinks there is a stroke of business I can put his way he will come in a hurry to learn the details of it.”
“Better not tell him anything about your plans then?”
“Tell him all you know of them!” Tros answered drily and left the cabin to watch provisions being weighed out to the galley for the evening meal.
CHAPTER 69. Visitors
Why are they servants, and I master? Not being God, I know not. But I am the master. This is my ship. They, when they see a danger, fear it, whereas I fear only not to see it. They, when they see a danger, magnify it and become a danger to themselves. They lend it their wits. I lend not mine to be used against me.
— from The Log of Tros of Samothrace
THE MINUTE the sun dipped below the skyline Tros ordered, “Out oars!” and, taking full advantage of the tide, dropped anchor in pitch darkness almost within hail of a spit of land that jutted into the mouth of G
ades Bay. The moisture-laden Virazon, the sea breeze that blows all night long between spring and autumn, had not yet broken the dead calm. There was a stench of rotting seaweed from the shore, a croon of short waves on a sandy beach and, except that, silence.
There was no moon yet, but the starlight shone with milky whiteness that revealed the ghost-white city several miles away, rising tier on tier on a peninsula that was almost an island. About half a mile from where he had anchored a beacon-light flared in an iron basket, and in the distance, to the northward of the city, was a parallelogram of crimson fires that marked the outline of a Roman camp.
By lantern-light in the after deckhouse, with the ports well shrouded, Tros watched Conops get into the costume of a Greek slave.
“Now remember to act slavish!” he instructed. “Little man, much rests on you this night! To the Lord Orwic be fussily obsequious. See that he treads in no ordure near the gate. Watch that none touches him. Carry a stick to drive the dogs away from him, and use it at the least excuse. Talk Greek to him no matter that he doesn’t understand. To the gate custodians be insolent. If they ask your master’s name and business, tell them they may have it and a whipping in the bargain tomorrow morning for their impudence. In a pinch use Simon’s name, but not if you can help it, because if they learn that you are visiting Simon it might occur to them to extort a bribe from Simon by holding you both in the guardhouse until he comes.”
“Trust me, master! I know Gades. There is a place outside the city wall where dancing girls are kept before they ship them for the Asia trade. Too bad we haven’t scent of jasmine to make our clothes smell of an afternoon’s adventure! Never mind. I’ll manage it.”
Then Orwic came, jingling a purse of gold and silver coins that Tros had given him, bending to admire the fashion of a Roman pallium and tunic, loot from Caesar’s bireme.
“Walk not like a horseman!” Tros protested. “A Roman noble walks with a stride that measures out the leagues. Come, try it on deck.”