by K. J. Parker
Stheno, Gignomai thought, hoeing turnips for nine hours in the murderous heat. Pampered son, idle pleasure. “I’m an eccentric,” he said. “Now will you please get your uncle.”
Furio’s Uncle Marzo turned the sword slowly between his fingers. “Hold on,” he said, and ground away a patch of caked rust with his thumbnail. “There’s some writing here.”
“Where?”
“On the ricasso.”
How come a simple merchant knew the correct nomenclature for the parts of a sword? “Is there? Sorry, I’ve never looked at it that closely.”
Marzo stood up and turned his chair to face the window. “I can’t quite make it out,” he said. “Eyes aren’t quite as sharp as they used to be.”
Gignomai grinned at him. “In my right coat pocket,” he said. “I don’t know if they got busted while I was fooling about.”
Marzo retrieved the eyeglasses and stood perfectly still, staring at them. “Are these…?”
“From Home,” Gignomai said. “Quite old, I believe. I’m glad they didn’t get all smashed up.”
“I’ve heard of such things, but I’ve never seen one before.”
“Try them on,” Gignomai said. “The spring clip goes over the bridge of your nose. Should stay put of its own accord,” he added. Marzo was holding the eyeglasses in place with both hands. “Well?”
“Amazing.” Marzo tentatively let go, like a father teaching a toddler to walk, then held his fingertips up to his face. “Damn it, I can see all the pores in my skin.”
“They’re also quite good for reading,” Gignomai said. “Go on, try it.”
Marzo picked up one of the stolen books—Callicrates on Mechanisms, the one that had lost its cover when Gignomai got wedged in the hole. “Unbelievable,” he said. “I haven’t been able to see stuff that clearly for ten years.”
“Must be hard in your line of work, if you have trouble reading.”
“Worst thing is my own handwriting,” Marzo said. “Actually, I’ve never seen as well as this, not ever.” He took the eyeglasses off his nose but didn’t put them down on the table. “I don’t suppose you’d consider…”
“Selling?”
Marzo nodded hopefully.
“No.”
“Ah well.” Marzo laid the eyeglasses down, but didn’t quite let go of them. “Just thought I’d ask.”
“You can have them. As a present.” Gignomai laughed, as Marzo’s mouth dropped open. There was someone he never thought he’d see lost for words.
“You’re sure?”
“Of course. My way of saying thank you for your hospitality.”
(“You’re mad,” Furio said later. “He’d have paid a fortune for them.”
“Maybe,” Gignomai replied.
“No maybe about it. He hates not being able to read. He’d have given anything…”
“Which still wouldn’t be enough. But I could tell he was determined to have them, even if he had to steal them or swindle me. Now I’ve got a friend instead of an enemy.”)
“So,” Gignomai said, when he judged Marzo had had long enough to revel in his new possession. “What does the writing on the sword say?”
“Oh, right.” Marzo bent close. “Hey, it’s really easy with these. It says Carnufex in civ Pol and then a date: 973. Carnufex,” he repeated.
“Oh, I know about him,” Gignomai said. “My father’s got a Carnufex, it’s a really famous make. He gave us all a lecture about it when we were kids.” He frowned. “I don’t suppose he knew this one was a Carnufex too.”
Marzo was turning the pages of a book he’d taken from his pocket. “Carnufex,” he said. “Flourished AUC 962 to 981, premises in Foregate, value range A plus.” He turned to the back of the book, then whistled.
“You’ve got a book of sword values?”
“Heirlooms, antiquities and objects of virtue,” Marzo replied, showing Gignomai the cover. “Got it from a freighter captain year before last. God knows what I thought I’d ever need it for.”
But Gignomai thought of Marzo walking out onto his porch each morning and looking in the direction of the Tabletop, that treasury of wonderful things from another place and time, and had a fairly shrewd idea. After all, one day the met’Oc might push their luck too far, and whoever was there to loot the ruins would need a buyer. Fair enough, he thought. People die, things move on. “What does the book say it’s worth?”
Marzo hesitated; then maybe he felt the unaccustomed pressure of the spring clip on his nose, prompting him to be grateful and honest. “In good condition, thirty-eight thousand.” His voice was a whisper, like an old woman at prayer.
“So let’s knock off a third for the damage,” Gignomai said briskly. “That’s, what…”
“Twenty-five thousand, three hundred.” Marzo said immediately.
“And you’ll probably have to go halves with your buyer,” Gignomai said calmly, “and I’ll go halves with you. Say twelve thousand for round numbers. Deal?”
“I haven’t got twelve thousand thalers,” Marzo said.
“I know.” Gignomai shrugged. “There isn’t that much money in the entire colony. On the other hand, I’m stuck here till the spring, I can’t go home, and everything I own is lying on that table.” He paused for a moment, then said, “I’m sure we can come up with some sort of arrangement, don’t you think?”
Marzo looked at him blankly. “You can stop here as long as you like,” he said. “No charge. I thought you knew that.”
“Because I’m Furio’s friend?”
“Yes.”
Gignomai nodded. “Let’s just say I don’t like being beholden. Anyway,” he added quickly, “I’m not planning on staying here. No offence, but I’m not comfortable here.”
Marzo kept his face straight. “I imagine it’s not what you’re used to.”
“You could say that,” Gignomai replied. “For one thing, the roof doesn’t leak. For another, I don’t have to share my living space with my lunatic brother. I didn’t mean comfortable in that sense.” He stopped; he hadn’t meant to say any of this. “I mean, I’m not comfortable being in the colony. Or up there on the hill. I want to go somewhere else.”
“Where?” Marzo was looking at him. “There isn’t anywhere.”
“Yes there is. Outside.”
He could tell that Marzo was forming a diagnosis: bang on the head, exposure, and when had he last eaten? “You can’t,” he said. “There’s the savages.”
“Who’ve never done us any harm,” Gignomai replied levelly. “Actually, I meant to ask you about them. What do you know?”
“Very little, now you mention it.” Marzo frowned. “I mean, they’re…”
“Savages.” Gignomai nodded. “Which means, not like us. But I’m not like you, and we seem to be able to get along without violence.”
“They’re afraid of us, that’s why.”
“Hardly.” Gignomai smiled at him. “How many men in the colony? Two hundred? And no weapons, thanks to the government back Home.”
“There used to be a garrison.”
“Years ago,” Gignomai pointed out, “before you were born.”
“Not quite,” Marzo said. “They left when I was a kid. But—”
“They may be savages,” Gignomai said, “but they’re not blind. I expect they can count. And there’s thousands of them, and I’m prepared to bet they’ve got weapons.”
“Not like ours.”
“We haven’t got any. Apart from that,” he nodded at the sword, “and Luso’s box of toys, and the snapping-hens. If the savages wanted to wipe you out, it’d take them a day. But they haven’t, not in seventy years.”
Marzo shook his head. He looked unhappy about the turn the conversation had taken. “Because we keep ourselves to ourselves,” he said. “Only for that reason. If you go trespassing on their territory…”
But Gignomai smiled. “You know,” he said, “that’s more or less what my mother used to tell me. Don’t even think of leaving the Tableto
p, she said. They hate us, the people in that town. You set foot on the plain and they’ll tear you apart. You know what? She was wrong. Admit it,” he added, with a gentle grin, “you haven’t given the savages a thought in years.”
Marzo scowled at him, then nodded. “You’re right, of course,” he said, “once I’d given up hope of ever being able to sell them anything. They’re no use to anybody and they don’t bother us. They might as well not be there.” He ran a hand through what was left of his hair. “But that’s a whole different matter from going and living with the buggers,” he said. “For one thing, they don’t even stay put.”
“Nomadic is the word you’re looking for,” Gignomai replied. “And I don’t want to go and live with them.”
“But you said—”
Gignomai shook his head. “I said I don’t want to go back to the Tabletop and I don’t want to stay in the colony. Since there’s no ship till the spring, that just leaves Outside. That’s a far cry from going to live in a cart with the savages.”
Marzo shook his head. “As I told you,” he said, “I haven’t got twelve thousand thalers; there isn’t that much money in the country. What did you have in mind?”
“Lumber,” Gignomai replied promptly, “and provisions and some tools and other stuff. All things I know you’ve got.”
“What for?”
“What for?” Furio asked.
Gignomai lay back on the bed. His head was hurting, and he found it hard to think. “My future,” he said. “Basically, what I want to do when I grow up.”
“Gig…”
“All right.” Gignomai sighed tragically and sat up, wincing as his head twanged. “This colony,” he said, “it is a disaster.”
“I wouldn’t say that,” Furio said mildly. “It’s not bad here. There’s worse places.”
“How the hell would you know?”
“From what people say,” Furio replied, pouring water into a cup. Gignomai waved it away; Furio drank it himself. “Men off the ships.”
“You’ve talked to them?”
“They talk to people in the town; I hear it from them. Come on, it’s not evidence in court, but I get the general idea. Compared to a lot of places, it’s not so bad here. Specially for us,” he added, with a slight grimace. “Running the store, I mean. We’re pretty much top of the heap.”
“Heap’s about right,” Gignomai said. “This is a terrible place. Nobody’s here because he wants to be. You know that, don’t you.”
Furio looked at him. “I want to be here,” he said.
“You were born here. So was your uncle. Ask him why his father came here.”
“I know about that,” Furio said. “He got into debt back Home, it was prison or the colony. I think he chose quite well, in the event.”
“Better than prison, yes. But he didn’t choose to come here, he was sent. That’s why he stayed, and that’s why you can’t go Home. Even when your uncle sells the sword and makes his fortune, he’s stuck here.”
Furio grinned. “I don’t know about that,” he said. “He reckons a few thousand could buy us all out of here, and then we’ll be—”
But Gignomai shook his head. “He’s dreaming,” he said. “You think that if money could buy you out of this shithole, my family’d still be here? We’ve tried all that.”
“You haven’t got any—”
“We’ve got friends at Home who have. Well, we used to have friends. It’s been so long. I know Father’s still trying, I read some of his letters, but the people who used to be our allies have forgotten about us. Understandably.”
Furio sighed. “All right,” he said, “it’s a dump. So what?”
“It needn’t be,” Gignomai said (and either his headache had suddenly gone or he was too engaged to notice it). “It could be anything we like.”
For a moment or so, Furio didn’t understand, and Gignomai began to wonder if he’d overestimated his friend’s intelligence. Then Furio said, “That’s just plain stupid.”
“Is it?”
“You can’t just take over a whole—”
Gignomai shook his head. “Who said anything about taking over? I’m talking about…” He hesitated. There was a word, but he wasn’t quite sure it was what he meant. “Independence.”
“Oh, come on!”
“Think about it.” He hadn’t meant to shout, but as it turned out, it had the desired effect. Furio closed his mouth and looked straight at him. “What’s wrong with this place? Not the land, not the climate, not the savages. It’s this stupid, useless weight you’ve got to carry around with you all the damn time. Indentures, monopolies, tariffs, the Company practically owning everything. You’ve got seventy farms raising beef that nobody here gets to eat, and you aren’t allowed to make so much as a spoon; you’re forced to buy it all from Home at extortionate prices. You’re all stuck here, by law, but a bunch of people you’ve never met five hundred miles away dictate how you all live. You can’t have weapons, so you have to put up with my appalling family beating you up and stealing your chickens.” He paused, and made himself say the next bit. “You don’t think the people back Home couldn’t have put down the met’Oc fifty years ago, if they’d wanted to? No, they left them there to keep you people down. To give you someone on your own doorstep to hate, so you wouldn’t think about who’s the real cause of all your troubles. They’re screwing you lot into the ground, and you’re all so dead you just let them do it. That’s why it’s a dump, Furio. That’s what’s wrong with it.”
He could see Furio keeping his temper like a calm stockman restraining an unruly steer. “So what do you want?” Furio asked quietly. “Revolution? Fighting in the streets?”
Gignomai laughed; he couldn’t help it. “Don’t be bloody stupid,” he said. “There’s nobody to fight. That’s what’s so pathetic. It’s so simple, don’t you see? You don’t need a civil war. What you need—”
“Well?” Furio snapped.
“A factory,” Gignomai said, and Furio just stared at him. “Just a big shed, basically, next to a river, for choice, so you can have a waterwheel for your motive power. Forges, a lumber mill. Make the stuff people here need so they don’t have to buy it from Home. That’s it. That’s all it’d take.”
“But it’s against the—”
“Law, yes. So fucking what? Furio, people here don’t want much, but what they do want, they need. Tools, household stuff, clothes. Things you can’t live without, just things. But the trouble is, things matter, things make all the difference in the world. I learned that,” he added, “going back for the sword. Or take those eyeglasses I stole for your uncle. They make the difference between him being half blind and being able to read. Just two glass discs and a bit of wire, and it’s changed his life. Things are the only difference between us and animals, Furio, and we can make them, out of trees and plants and bits of brown stone you can pick up in the marshes. And we can turn this dump into a good place to live, and nobody’ll have to fight anybody else.”
Furio just looked at him, till Gignomai was tempted to say something just to break the silence. But then Furio said, “Home won’t let us. It’s against the law.”
“Ah.” Gignomai grinned. “That’s the whole point—it isn’t. Not if we don’t do it here. Not if we do it Outside, where Home’s got no authority.”
“That’s rubbish,” Furio said. “If people buy the stuff, they’re breaking the law too.”
“Difference of scale,” Gignomai replied calmly. “You can send fifty men to close down a factory, but you’d have a real job on your hands going round every farmhouse in the colony confiscating illegal spoons. No, all that’ll happen is the farmers won’t send quite so much beef to the docks. Result? The Company won’t send us trade goods, assuming that’ll bring us to our senses. But it won’t, of course, because we won’t need their stuff any more. Eventually, the Company’ll decide this operation isn’t cost effective and they’ll get their beef somewhere else. And then we’ll be left alone—exactly what
we want.”
“They’ll find out,” Furio said, “about the factory.”
“In time, I guess they will,” Gignomai said.
“And then they’ll send soldiers.”
“Not if the factory’s under the protection of the savages.” Gignomai waited for an objection, but none came; Furio was too stunned to say anything. “A war with the savages is exactly what Home doesn’t want. They’d have to send a regular army, hundreds of men, horses, supply chains. Ruinously expensive, and always the risk of a disaster if their army got wiped out. A government could fall because of something like that. They don’t know anything about the savages. They wouldn’t want to get into a situation that could go really bad on them.”
“But what makes you think…?”
“Easy.” Gignomai smiled. “We pay rent. We make stuff the savages want and give it to them, and all they’ve got to do is let us sit on a tiny corner of their land. Come on, Furio, it’s perfect. The colony gets rid of Home, everybody gets the stuff they need—even the savages, so they’re doing well out of it. Everybody gains, nobody gets hurt. What could be better than that?”
Furio was still looking at him, which made his hands itch. He wanted to smack the absence of convinced admiration off Furio’s face. “Nobody here knows the first thing about making things.”
“Wrong.” Gignomai pointed at the table. “See those books there? Everything you need to know. Including scale diagrams and lists of materials.”
Furio looked at the table. “Just three books.”
“Yes.” Gignomai grinned. “You can add them to the list of things that make all the difference. Give me those books and five men who can saw a straight line and we can build a factory.”
He could see Furio didn’t believe that, not entirely. But instead, Furio said, “Fine. So why the hell would you want to do all this?”
That question. He gave the only answer he had. “I’m a met’Oc,” he said. “We do big stuff. Or we used to,” he added, “before we got stuck here. And this is the only big stuff to be done in this place, unless you’re Luso and you equate achievement with a row of heads stuck on pikes. So, I want to do it.”