by Alex Raymond
“Eh?” Captain Norlag looked away, tugging at the knot of his head scarf. After clearing his throat, he leaned closer to Flash. “I’ll be completely frank with you, sir. I did intend perhaps to see what they would offer me for your companion. These are lean times, you must know, and lion men, despite their surly ways, are good workers. They usually fetch a handsome price. You, however, sir, I never considered selling to any—”
“Are you planning to continue toward the capital?”
The captain hesitated. “Well, yes,” he said finally. “We have a consignment to pick up twenty miles further down river.”
“Let me discuss the situation with my companion.”
“Do you mean to tell me that nappy rogue is a partner of yours, sir?”
“He has to be part of any deal I make with you,” answered Flash. “He’ll help me decide whether the people I represent will wish to do business with you.”
Norlag said, “Very well, so be it. How many of these, uh, items do you think you might be able to provide me with?”
“How many can you sell?”
He sucked in his breath. “Are you saying, sir, there is no limit to the quantity?”
“If I can get you one, I can get you a dozen.”
“A dozen? May the gods bless me! Why, with a dozen of these, a man . . .” He gave a throaty chuckle.
“Now as to price,” said Flash.
“Well, sir, you must realize that I’m to be taking all the risks. Suppose I were to offer you twenty percent of whatever I make?”
“No, we usually get at least sixty,” said Flash. “Though perhaps I can talk them into accepting fifty percent.”
“Fifty?” The captain slapped his rough hand against his forehead.
“You won’t get weapons like this from anyone else on Mongo.”
After a few thoughtful snorts through his broad nose, the captain said, “Very well, sir, we shall call it fifty. Here is the hand of Captain Norlag on it.”
When Flash returned to the little cabin below deck, the lion man asked him, “What transpired twixt you and our worthy captain?”
Flash said, “I think if I can keep bluffing him for a while longer, we won’t get sold to the slavers.”
There were banners flying in the town square, musicians in crimson cloaks played festive tunes, vendors sold bright novelties, and there was even a little food to be had. But the people stood silent on the rose-colored cobblestones of the square. Thin, threadbare people. They made no pretense of enjoying themselves. Here and there a highly polished Royal Policeman laughed and joked, but none of that rang quite true. By a half hour before the scheduled time for the executions, even the police had grown silent. All around the high wooden gallows silence reigned.
Dr. Zarkov had a good view of everything. He was stretched out on the flat stone roof of a two-story inn across the square from the wide scaffold. He was dressed again in his worksuit, so as not to connect the sorcerers with what he planned to do. In his hand, he held his pistol.
Beside him, wearing now a farmer’s guise, was Brother Anmar. “I still have grave misgivings,” he whispered.
“You can ride out and wait for me beyond the town, as the others have done,” said Zarkov softly. When necessary, he could talk in a whisper.
“No, when you outlined your idea I told you I would help you,” said Anmar, “though I am beginning to regret having given you permission to try this. You are a very persuasive fellow. Yet we don’t want to lose a mind such as yours.”
“I guarantee you,” said Zarkov in a louder whisper, “that I will be using my brain for quite a while to come. Ming and his bully boys aren’t going to be dangling Zarkov at the end of a rope in the foreseeable future.” He inched forward frowning. “Let’s see now. They’ve got the prisoners in that gray stone building down there, to the rear of the gallows.”
“Yes, with five policemen guarding it on the outside.”
Zarkov shrugged. “Three in front and two in back,” he said. “So if we hit the back side of the place we’ve got only two to worry about right off the bat.” He scrutinized the town square further. “They seem to have just one airship as far as I can tell. That’s it there in the courtyard to the rear of the jailhouse.” He rubbed at his bearded chin. “Simplest thing is to put the ship out of commission. Could use it for the prisoners to get away in, but it might take too long for me to show them how to use the damn thing.”
“You know how to operate a type of airship you’ve never seen before?”
“Don’t see why not,” answered Zarkov. “Now, where are their horses? Ah, yes, in that stable off to the side of the jailhouse. And what’s that parked near the mouth of the street we want to use—a hay wagon, isn’t it? Good.” The doctor, in a low crouch, began working his way back across the roof.
He swung over the edge away from the square, let go, and dropped down to a second floor balcony. The small balcony groaned when Zarkov’s bulk hit it. He leaped from there to catch hold of a clay drain pipe. On the stones of the alley, he waited for Anmar to make a similar descent.
“Remind me to give you a list of exercises that’ll limber you up,” said Zarkov when the sorcerer was beside him. “Ten minutes a day, guaranteed to work.”
“My schedule at present leaves little time for recreation,” Anmar replied, after catching his breath.
Zarkov concealed his pistol again in a side pocket. “Let’s get going.”
Sticking to the alleys and sidestreets he’d checked out from above, the doctor led Anmar around to a position near the rear of the jailhouse. The street he’d chosen for an escape route was empty, most of its shops and houses closed up.
“Now for a small distraction.” Zarkov withdrew a short red cylindrical object from another pocket. “You get over behind the hay wagon, brother. When we come galloping by, you give it a hefty shove to block the road for a bit.”
“We?”
“Me and the prisoners,” said Zarkov. “Are you in good enough shape to get the wagon rolling?”
“You’ve nothing to fear on that score.”
“If I can’t swipe an extra horse for you, you’ll have to ride tandem with me. We shall see.” So saying, Zarkov left the sorcerer to edge along the empty street.
One of the police guards was leaning with his hips against the wrought-iron stair rail which led up to the rear door of the jail. The other, hardly more than a boy, was pacing a few yards in front of the snubnosed police airship.
When the boy turned toward the other guard, Zarkov ran zigzagging for the ship. He made it and jumped up on the wing. The body of the ship hid him now from the two Royal Police.
He lit the rescue flare he’d been clutching in his hand and tossed it beneath the ship.
Ten seconds later, an enormous hissing began. Red and yellow sparks started to spurt out wildly from under the craft.
“By all the gods” exclaimed the young guard. “What’s wrong?” He trotted up to the ship, tugged out his keys and opened the cockpit door. “What should I turn off?”
“Excuse me, young fellow.” Zarkov gave him a careful chop to the neck and the boy slumped. The nose of the ship still masked his doings.
Shoving the unconscious guard up into the aircraft, Zarkov climbed in. After a swift survey of the controls, he said, “Simple. Extremely simple.” He laughed, snapping his big fingers. “Ah, well take care of a couple birds with one stone.”
He activated the ship and ran it smack into the rear wall of the jail.
The other guard, who had been watching the ship and the profusion of sparks, was able to throw himself off the stairs just before impact.
The blunt nose of the police ship made a sizable hole in the backside of the jailhouse. An instant after the crash, Zarkov was out of the aircraft and scurrying through the hole.
A puzzled, wide-eyed sergeant, staring at the fresh debris and trying to put on his gold helmet, didn’t notice Zarkov until the burly scientist was a foot in front of him, “What means . . . ?
”
Zarkov knocked him out. There was a ring with two dozen keys at the man’s belt. “No time for that,” decided Zarkov.
He darted down a corridor and located the cell area. “Stand back from the door, gents,” he told the five prisoners.
The blaster crackled, the cell door disappeared.
“Okay,” Zarkov told them,” everybody out into the stableyard. Pick a mount and hightail it down the street. Head out of town.”
“Do you really think,” asked one of the prisoners, “we have a chance to gain our freedom?”
“I guarantee it,” bellowed Zarkov. “Now get moving. I have to revive the sergeant and tell him a little something.”
CHAPTER 13
The attack came a few minutes after sunset.
By day’s end, the barge was moving through a swampy stretch of land. Mist rose up between the trunks of the dark trees on both sides of the narrowing river. There was only a deadly jungle silence outside.
“I should never have left the hot dry climate where we lion men are meant to live.” Tun was looking through the porthole. “And wherefore did I, you may well ask. It was in order to attempt to raise . . . hey!”
Flash crossed to him. “What is it?”
The shaggy man stuck his head further out into the growing darkness. His long tail swept to and fro. “Dark shapes in the water, coming toward this barge.”
“I don’t see anything,” said Flash, taking a look.
“They’re beneath the surface,” said Tun. “Unless I’m much mistaken, we’re about to be visited by—”
“Mermen!” cried a voice up on deck.
Tun sprinted to the locked cabin door, hit against it with his shoulder. “I’ve encountered these devils before. A vicious lot I can assure you.”
“They can breathe under water?”
“Aye,” answered the lion man as he hit the door once again. “They live beneath the sea, and some tribes inhabit these wretched swamps. They ofttimes raid ships and barges, seeking both plunder and sport. They are amphibians and can live upon the land when they so wish.”
The door opened suddenly outward, Tun went hopping into the small stairway.
Captain Norlag was huddled there. “We are beset with mermen.” He held out Flash’s pistol. “I cannot for the life of me fathom the working of this weapon. Can you show me? And hurry, sir, hurry!”
An agonized scream sounded on the foredeck. Thumping, splashing footsteps echoed.
Flash took the pistol and then noticed that the captain had his rucksack strapped to his back. Without warning, he grabbed the captain by the neck, pulling him down the stairs. “I’ll take my belongings back.”
Norlag stumbled and fell.
Flash ripped the rucksack free, then heaved the captain into the prison cabin. “Slide the bolt,” he told Tun.
“Done. And now?”
Flash flipped him one of the spare blaster pistols. “I’ll show you how to work this thing.”
“We are to help these scoundrels repel the mermen?”
“We . . .” Flash spun.
A large, scaly shape was hurtling itself down the stairwell at him. The merman was pale green in color, his muscular body covered with fine glistening scales. His head was more reptilian than human, with a row of fluttering gills beneath each ear hole. His mouth was open in a snarl which revealed his sharp, narrow teeth. In his scaly right hand, he held a dagger.
Flash moved swiftly aside.
The charging merman, splashing the foul-smelling swamp water which still clung to his body, thudded down to where Flash had been an instant earlier.
“Drop the knife,” Flash ordered, his gun trained on the merman.
“Nay, fool!” The merman sprang for him.
The gun crackled.
Before the merman hit the floor again, the upper part of his body had disintegrated.
“Aye,” exclaimed Tun, looking from the remains to the pistol in his own hand. “This is a powerful weapon indeed.”
Quickly Flash showed him how to use the gun. “If we leave the barge,” he asked, “can you guide me to the capital?”
“That I can, though you still have well over two hundred miles to go, my friend.”
“We’ll take our leave now, then.”
“As good a time as any,” agreed the lion man. “I’ve never thought a river barge the best mode of travel.”
Up on the deck were five more mermen fighting with the barge crew.
As Flash and Tun emerged from the stairwell, the nearest merman was about to slit the throat of a young member of the crew.
Shoving the blaster into his belt, the lion man leaped. He kicked the knife out of the scaly hand. He grabbed the startled green man, spun him once high above his head before flinging him over the port rail. “I’ll save the gun for real emergencies.” Tun was laughing a deep chesty laugh. “Ah, and here’s another slimy lad looking for trouble.”
Tun, in a great bounding step, reached another pair of combatants. Here, a merman had a stocky crewman pinned to the deck, a two-pronged knife raised above his head. “Back into the ooze with you, my boy,” roared the lion man, his tail flicking like a whip.
He yanked the merman up by the throat. The merman, screaming in protest, went sailing high over the starboard rail. His flying body was finally lost in the thickening mist.
“Stay back,” warned Flash.
A third scaly merman was stalking toward the laughing lion man. He dived at Tun’s back, knife in hand. Flash thrust his blaster in his waistband. He leaped, caught hold of the man’s shoulders. “You may as well join your friends,” he said. He pulled the merman backwards, thrusting a knee into his spine.
The green man twisted, slashing at Flash with his knife.
Flash caught the knife hand, chopped the weapon out of it. He jerked the arm up behind the merman’s back. Then he forced the man ahead to the rail and shoved him into the river.
Before the splash sounded, a scaly arm went tight around Flash’s neck, pulling him back with choking force.
“Allow me to repay the favor,” offered Tun.
The pressure on Flash’s throat ceased.
He turned in time to see his scaly green attacker go spinning away into the night.
A moment later, there was a splash from the other side of the barge. “I do believe,” laughed Tun, “that’s the last of the mermen, going into the water on his own and saving us the trouble.”
“Let’s gather up a few supplies,” said Flash, “and then follow his example.”
Something howled, far off in the gathering dusk. A warm wind came sweeping down out of the hills, making dry leaves and twigs skitter across rocks and chalky ground. The trees were twisted, standing in tangled clusters at each side of the road. The hoof-beats of their horses sounded loud in the twilight.
“They will be safe enough where we sent them,” Anmar was saying to Dr. Zarkov.
An hour ago, they had come to a crossroads and the sorcerers and the freed prisoners had parted company—the five men who’d escaped hanging to ride on to a place of temporary sanctuary, and the scientists and Zarkov to climb into the hill country to rendezvous with the hidden aircruiser.
Talking over his shoulder, Beltor said, “A highly successful escapade, Dr. Zarkov. I am starting to fear, however, that Ming’s police may punish the other citizens of that town. They may pick five more citizens and execute them.”
The burly scientist laughed, his laugh bouncing off the huge rocks and boulders they were climbing through. “I can guarantee you that won’t happen,” he said.
“It is the kind of vicious reprisal which would appeal to Ming,” Anmar pointed out. “How can you be so certain he won’t simply order new executions?”
“Because,” said Zarkov, “he’s going to think the public killings came off exactly as planned. I only wish we had time to try this gimmick on a few other towns.”
“Gimmick?” repeated Brother Anmar. “A gimmick is . . . some sort of stratagem?”
“You bet it is.” Zarkov hunched his broad shoulders, shifting a little in the saddle. “Before I beat it out of the jailhouse—after I decked the royal cop who came in through the front door to see what all the rumpus was about—I woke up the sergeant. He’s in charge of the police in the town. Before I revived him, I made a small incision in his upper arm and then covered it over with a bandage out of my gear.”
“What exactly,” asked Anmar, “was the purpose of that?”
“It wasn’t too tough to convince him I was a powerful renegade scientist,” continued Zarkov. “After all, he could see what I’d done to his bastille. So I didn’t have any trouble making him believe I’d implanted a little something under his skin.”
“What?”
“I told him it was a tiny bomb, but powerful enough to blow him sky high,” roared Zarkov. “If he tries to remove it or even pokes it too hard, it’ll go off. And I persuaded him I could also detonate it from a distance by remote control.”
“Which you would do unless he turned in a false report about the executions?” asked Beltor.
“Right you are,” answered the doctor. “It should keep him from knocking off anyone else for a few weeks at least. After that, he may start to wonder if he wasn’t conned by Zarkov.”
“It should work at that,” said Brother Beltor.
The howling they’d heard earlier was repeated. It came from the growing darkness to their right, and a moment later from their left. They could see nothing in the darkening woods they were traveling through.
“What sort of animals are those?” asked Zarkov. “Sounds something like the canis lupus.”
“There are legends about this part of the country,” said Anmar. “I told you before that many on Mongo still believe in witchcraft and magic.”
“What is it they believe about these hills?”
“They say there is a tribe of people dwelling here,” said Anmar, “who can change themselves into wolves.”
CHAPTER 14
“Another night in this swamp and I’ll have moss growing on me,” said Tun with a prodigious yawn. He stretched his arms up over his head, swaying slightly on the huge tree branch where he’d slept.