Chapter IV

Even as Gion vanished, Kurland exploded into action. His shoulders knotted and he exerted every available ounce of strength in a ferocious test of his wrist lashings. But their dead passenger had been an expert. They held fast. Writhing over on his side, he doubled himself and his body tensed, steel-hard muscle and powerful bones and sinew against the Marward's treacherous bonds. For long moments, as they whirled and swayed deeper into the darkening tunnel beneath the rocky hills of Jupiter, he pulled and strained evenly at his leg ropes.

* * * * *

Here, too, Heywood had done with professional skill his bravo's work, but he had lavished no such care on the makeshift raft designed for the last journey he had not thought to take himself. The rough board holding Kurland's boots bent upward, cracked, bent double, and split lengthwise. He jerked his legs free.

Hooking his boots under a second plank, he slid his bare feet from the sleek black leather. Twisting about, he clamped a body-scissors on the gasping Irene Francinet. His powerful back muscles doubled, coiled upon themselves, lifting her inert figure from the dark water running over the partially submerged planks where she lay bound. They creaked, straining, as he exerted a pitiless pressure on her bowed ribs and chest. The steady leverage of her body slowly twisted loose the outer planks of the raft, and split two of them cleanly from the rough framework.

Gasping, he let her fall, then swung her again in her loosening bonds, letting her drop down against his own chest.

"Quickly," he snapped. "Your hands to my wrists! Before the ropes swell."

She pressed herself against him, wet and cold in the gathering darkness, fumbling with the ropes still holding him fast which had given him the tremendous leverage to break her own bonds. It was a struggle between her slim fingers and the expanding Jovian fibers of the cords, but he had been in time. She undid the knots and a moment later he had torn his hands free and sat up. With one swift move he slipped her gag off and ripped at her remaining bonds. Board after board tore free and shot off into the darkness, and when he had unfastened the last of the thin ropes holding her, stuffing them under his gun belt, there was little of the raft Heywood had thrown together but the big door they crouched on and a tangle of crazily-angled planks astern where the dead jackal's booted leg still thrust up stiffly from the swirling waters.

"Here!" Kurland bit at her, thrusting a broken shaft of wood into her chilled, numb fingers. "Paddle, girl, if you want to see the Sun again!" And he dug in on his side with another fragment of the plank he had broken.

Irene bowed, exerting what strength her long, drug-induced sleep from the planetoid and consequent imprisonment had left, trying her best to keep up with Kurland's long, plunging strokes. The raft's wild career into the depths of the Montral mountains was checked, then halted. They watched the distant circle of light marking the tunnel entrance, hoping against hope that its faint glimmer of phosphorescent light might not fade and dwindle once more. For a moment the raft held, then slowly inched backward against the current, lurching perilously through the dashing tunnels of the underground river.

Kurland glanced swiftly about. An element of his success both as peaceful racketeer and hunted outlaw had been his ability to subordinate his naturally sanguine temperament to the circumstances of the moment. He realized the awkward craft must collapse long before it was forced upstream to the quay from whence it had been launched. And should it hold, it was only too evident the paddlers could not. He tossed aside his board and stood up, drawing her up beside him.

"You can swim?" he asked. It was more a statement than a question, for the proud corps of Recorders were the pick of the Solar System's trained agents.

"Yes," she replied. "Can we make it?"

He tossed her the end of the thin rope he pulled from beneath his belt. "Knot that on your wrist, Recorder. We've travelled so many miles together, I'd not be parted on this last one."

She bowknotted the line, then poised, shivering and soaked, drenched with the brackish river water, stained with Heywood's blood. He looked at her, seeing in the dusk the slim, beautiful lines of her body under the torn white robe. She flung him a glance, impatient, tense.

"Ready, Kurland. We're drifting."

"Ride the eddies," he warned, his arm tightening for an instant about her half-bare shoulders. "We'll hug the wall." He bent for a moment, seizing the dead man's boot and plunging his arm beneath the surface. In his hand when he arose was the jackal's blue-black glare-pistol. Holstering it, he pressed her hand, swung forward, and launched himself flatly into the stream, her white body streaking at his side. They emerged near the rocky wall where the swirling riffles were white in the shadowy dusk and the ragged teeth of the overhead rocks bit wickedly down at them as they swam. The raft turned about two or three times, then sped silently downstream into the bowels of the planet, bearing the dead Heywood to the unknown tomb he had meant for them.

* * * * *

Thereafter, it became a nightmare neither could ever quite remember nor forget. Rocks battered them. Shallow water, giving a moment's respite from effort, made the struggle upstream seem the harder. Foam and spray blinded them. Eddies spun them crazily in the dark. Narrow sluices tore at them forcing them relentlessly back into the depths. Only the rope connecting their arms saved both on more than one occasion, and within yards of the entrance it parted. Kurland's powerful arm closed about Irene, the renewed light from the nearing tunnel-mouth bright on her upturned face. He grinned down at her from the tangled black hair framing his shadowed face.

"Stick it, Recorder," he whispered, and felt her go limp in his arm. The title was no longer a biting imprecation. She took a breath, flung back her own tangled curls, and leaned forward into the current once more. He could not see her face. Heads down, they bent stiff arms, threshed leaden thighs, and fought again the grim river boiling into the tunnel. The open cave was full in view.

Less than an hour after they had been flung to death from its worn stones, they lay gasping on the rude quay, their hands dug into the rocky surface as though to anchor themselves forever to the solidity it represented. There were no signs of Gion or any of his men.

Kurland stirred, sat up. Irene just looked at him, not troubling to lift her head from the quay. He pulled off his torn jacket, his massive chest and powerful arms strangely white in the brilliant atomic overhead. The tangled black beard dripped upon the floor, the faint drops loud in the silence. He shook himself, getting to his feet, a wild, ragged, outlandish figure. The heavy gun swinging low on his hip gleamed blackly.

She sat up, the water running from the rags of her once-dainty gown. She ran her hands through her black hair, watching him. His face was flinty, shadowed in the brilliance.

"What now, Kurland?"

His hand stroked the gleaming butt of his gun. He looked at her, unseeing.

"Gion."

"No." Her voice was oddly flat, accented.

"We made a good bargain, Gion and I," he replied, his eyes accepting her. "The jewels for my men's lives. Now, I collect."

She came to her feet, lithe and graceful even in her ragged tatters. "Not with guns, Kurland! I can free your men. I can ruin Gion, smash his rotten empire. I'm a Recorder. My word could break him in any court from here to Pluto. The law can handle him."

"Our law is here," replied Kurland, gravely. His hand patted the black leather holster sheathing Heywood's gun.

"Outlaw guns!" she flared. "Is that your justice, here on Jupiter?"

"You have tasted Gion's!" he grimly reminded her. "Courts! Laws! And who will serve the Marward with the warrant, girl? He feeds a thousand men within this single fortress city. He rules the rest through fear."

She looked up the passage where the Marward had vanished and there was a strange and haunting look upon her lovely face.

"It will not hold them now," she said, her voice unsteady. "Gion is dead."

His face blanked. She nodded.

"Your reason?" His eyes bored into hers. Only the sibilant gurgle of the river glancing past disturbed the quiet of the ancient dungeon.

"Why did Gion send across the System to wreck the _Plutonian_?" she replied. "Perhaps to avert suspicion, yes. But I can tell you why. He had to, because the _Plutonian_ would never come to Jupiter. Because the Jewels of Orion were slipping beyond his grasp forever."

"You mean ..." Kurland began, slowly.

"They did not dare. They were exhibited on all the inner worlds, but not on Saturn, nor on Jupiter. They're unstable, crystallized gas from a galaxy a million miles beyond the belt of Orion."

"We handled them," he urged.

"In Terran atmosphere, yes. The Council dare not risk them free in anything less. Let the Cranford elements touch those jewels ..." Her shrug was expressive.

"The jewel boxes were upon his desk when I awoke," he rejoined, tugging thoughtfully at his beard.

"He had not opened them," she replied, positively. "They were his bait, to dull his jackal Heywood's wits, to speed him into carelessness. You saw his impatience to be done, to divide the spoil. He was in haste for his reward."

"Gion did not keep him waiting," replied Kurland, a grim laugh in the words. "I did not know of this."

"It is known to few, Recorders among them. I tell you that you may leave the Marward to his fate."

* * * * *

Kurland shook his head. "But not my men. His remain, and mine are outlaws by his decree. I cannot abandon them."

"I revoke your outlawry, and your men's." Her mien was imperious, and he did not demur.

"You have the power?" he asked, quietly.

"He had no authority to sentence. Authority or none, my word outweighs his, my will his law." She watched him steadily, and he smiled back, a glow about his heart at the fine, proud spirit of this woman fighting hard against his rocky will.

He took her arm. "You have a theory. Let us test it, on Gion." They moved softly into the rough-cut corridor. The lights were very old and dim with ancient grime, but the way was plain enough. Kurland grinned at her. "They did not plan on our returning."

"They did not plan on many things," she whispered, her voice suddenly venomous. "I remember nothing after Heywood stunned you, there in the _Plutonian_, until he tied me to the raft just before you came. He was kind enough to inform me that I was on Jupiter, under Gion's fortress, and could expect to die there. When he spoke of the reward he had earned by his treachery, I realized what Gion had become and how justly he might be punished."

While she whispered, they had swiftly stolen along the stone tunnels cut long ago by the Jovians for the first wild troops of Earth. Kurland unerringly led the way, following the dusty trail of footsteps he himself had earlier trodden under the guns of the Marward and his agent. Suddenly he paused, feeling a rough projection under his palm still warm. He pushed, and a clumsy panel gave, swinging in to reveal a deep, shadowy pit sinking far down into the depths of the rocks, extending upward until it was lost in the darkness. He thrust in his head. Above him the twinkling stars glimmered down through the opening of the rough volcanic blow-hole, or vent. Directly opposite the panel, a plank leading to its open port, his own black fighter sat poised nose-up, and locked in shining modern cradles below were three lesser craft, dark and wearing no colors.

"Heywood came last, drifting in on gravity beams," he whispered, moving aside that she might see. "No one saw him arrive ... nor his cargo."

"What ships are those?" she asked, peering down.

"Gion's. Escape craft. The regular cradles on the open field could go, but he keeps ships here in this forgotten blow-hole, unmarked and unknown. Insurance. Trust a rat to have a way to leave the sinking ship. We'll remember them." He closed the door gently.

They slipped on. Above them the distant sounds of fortress life drifted through the deserted corridors, but in these depths they met no living thing. His hand checked her, hard on her soft arm.

"Beyond that. The room where Gion sat, watching me." His gun was out, the powerful slides poised and ready in his hand. "Wait here."

"I needn't," she replied, quietly. "You will not find him, Kurland."

He rounded the corner, paused. The rough wooden door of the room stood half ajar. A dim light burned above it, casting dark and mocking shadows across the worn grey stone. Somewhere a man whistled merrily, faded away into the distance.

They moved forward, silent, barefoot on the stone. He sighted on the door's edge, stepped forward abruptly. She saw him freeze, the gun lifting, then sway back, his body slowly relaxing. The blaster was hip-high, level, ruthless as the steel within his greying eyes. The door swung silently open at his touch.

Gion sat beyond the table, the leaden boxes piled beside him. One lay open, tilted carelessly upon its side, and across the gleaming surface of the table lay a tumbled heap of ruddy golden chains and bangles and massive, chiseled collars. Bright glints of white and blue and green sparkled cleanly through the twisted coils of hammered gold, but the white-hot glare the outlaw knew no longer blazed within the priceless settings.

The Jewels of Orion were ... gone.

* * * * *

Kurland and the girl moved forward, their eyes on Gion, sitting in silence, his hands buried wrist-deep within the tumbled fortune spilling from the leaden box. He made no move, nor spoke.

They paused, standing by the table's edge, a golden heap of ancient rings winking clean white sparks through their coils. A look of infinite wonder darkened Kurland's face as he studied Gion's.

"He has escaped us," the outlaw said. "And so easily. He never knew."

The woman nodded. "They said of him, like Midas, that he had the golden touch, that everything on which he laid his hand was his. He made it so, and came to this. A fatal gift, Kurland."

The Marward's garments stirred to a vagrant draft, shifting in a silver ripple across his massive chest. But a chest of human flesh no longer. The Orion jewels had gone, dissolved into air like dreams, and before the silent Marward lay the empty settings, flaunting their remaining simpler jewels in barren poverty, but the loss no longer troubled Gion. Beneath his simple robe his flesh shone with a thousand lustrous lights, his muscles ridged with Phidian carving in purest emerald green. His deep-sunk eyes were topaz gold, shot through with jetting bits of white, and his startled lips were purple as fire-shot jade. His massive head was translucent through and through, a vein-sprayed sculpture in Venusian glass where truant silver bubbles froze in silent thunder as they burst. His hands were coral white, the bones within curling to and fro like vagrant bits of scarlet ruby, all caught and held forever in one eternal crash of living color. The Jewels of Orion had but changed their form, burst from the ancient golden settings to plunge and explode and freeze anew in living human flesh.

Gion, Marward of Jupiter, had become himself a jewel.

Slowly Kurland sheathed his blaster.

"Our work is done, Irene. And by the Marward himself."

She looked up at him, pale-faced, dark-eyed, watchful. "I could have told him as much." Her eyes fell to the table, to the four boxes remaining unopened, then rose to his. "Must I tell you?"

He slowly picked up the boxes, weighing their priceless, deadly contents.

"My crew is caged back there in those side corridors, near those ships. We'll take them and go. There's nothing to hold us ... now." His hand touched her shoulder. "You will come with us?"

She smiled, and gestured toward the boxes that held the Jewels of Orion.

There was a pause, and his face slowly paled. But his eyes never left her. He nodded slowly, then extended the boxes to her. "A Marward couldn't hold them, and I've been an outlaw too long."

But her hands gently repulsed his offer. There was color again in her damp cheeks, a rushing glowing tide of color that warmed her cold body like wine.

"We'll deliver them to the authorities. But, until then--hold them for me, Kurland."

His eyes glittered as he laid the leaden boxes suddenly on the table and his hands were rough upon her shoulders.

"So you make an honest pirate out of me, Irene? You give me name and ship again, you trust me as you would trust any decent sailorman? Then take the consequences!" And his lips were hard and fierce on hers, his arms crushed tight about her ragged body. She stiffened, then slowly relaxed, her eyes laughing into his.

"Did I pardon you for less?"