Chapter VI: Part 6

"Island on the horizon," she said. "And many glittering white objects placed before it."

Green refrained from comment. But he had a hard time concealing his excitement, which grew with every turn of the wheels. He paced back and forth, stopping now and then to shade his eyes and look long at the white towers. Finally, as they got so near that he could no longer be mistaken about their size or the details of their peculiar structure, he could contain himself no longer.

He whooped with joy and kissed Amra on the cheek and danced around and around the foredeck while the women stared with embarrassment and concern and the children giggled, all wondering if he'd gone mad.

"Spaceships! Spaceships!" he howled in English. "Dozens of them! It must be an expedition! I'm saved, saved! Spaceships, spaceships!"

24

They were a magnificent sight, those many cones pointing their skyscraping noses upward and their spreading landing struts sinking into the soft earth! Their white eternum metal gleamed in the sun, dazzling the spectator who happened to catch their radiance full in the eyes. They were glorious, embodying all the vast wisdom and skill of the greatest civilization of the Galaxy.

No wonder, thought Green, that I dance and howl while these people look at me as if I'm mad, and Amra, tears in her eyes, shakes her head and says something to herself. What can they know of the meaning of those splendors?

What, indeed?

"Hey," shouted Green, "Hey! Here I am! An Earthman! Maybe I look like one of these barbarians, with my long hair and bushy beard and dirty skin, but I'm not. I'm Alan Green, an Earthman!"

Of course, they couldn't have heard him at that distance, even if somebody had been standing beneath the spaceships to hear him. But he howled with sheer exuberance, not worrying about wasting his breath and making himself hoarse.

Finally Amra interrupted him.

"What is the matter, Alan? Have you been bitten by the Green Bird of Happiness, which sometimes flies over these plains? Or has the White Bird of Terror nipped you while you slept last night upon the open deck?"

Green paused and looked steadily at her. Could he tell her the truth, now he was so near salvation? It was not that he was worried about her or the others stopping him from making contact with the expedition. Nothing could stop him now, he was sure of that.

It was just that he hesitated to tell her that he would be leaving her. The idea of hurting her was agony to him.

He started to speak in English, caught himself, and switched to her language. "Those vessels--they have brought my people from across the space between the stars. I came to this world in just such a vessel, a spaceroller, you might say. My ship crashed, and I was forced to descend upon this--your--world. Then, I heard that another ship had landed near Estorya and that King Raussmig had put the crew in prison and was going to sacrifice them during the Festival of the Sun's Eye. I had little time to get to Estorya before that happened, so I talked Miran into taking me. That was why I left you, that...."

He trailed off because he did not understand the expression upon her face. It was not the great hurt he'd expected, nor the wild fury he thought might result from his explanation. If anything, she looked pitying.

"Why, Alan, whatever are you talking about?"

He pointed at the line of spaceships.

"They're from Terra, my home planet."

"I don't understand what you mean by your home planet," she replied still pityingly. "But those are not spaceships. Those are the towers built by the Estoryans a thousand years ago."

"Wha-what do you mean?"

Stunned, he looked at them again. If those weren't starships he'd eat the yacht's canvas. Yes, and the wheels, too.

Under the swift wind, the 'roller swept closer and closer while he stood behind Amra and thought that he'd break into little pieces if his tension didn't find some release.

Finally it did find an outlet. Tears welled in his eyes, and he choked. His breast seemed as if it would swell up and burst.

How cleverly the ancient builders had fashioned those towers! The landing struts, the big fins, the long sweeping lines ending in the pointed nose, all must have been built with a spaceship as a model. There was no escaping such a conclusion; coincidence couldn't explain it.

Amra said, "Don't cry, Alan. Your people will think you weak. Captains don't weep."

"This captain does," he replied, and he turned and walked the length of the yacht to the stern and leaned over the taffrail where no one could see him as he shook with sobs.

Presently he felt a hand upon his.

"Alan," she said gently. "Tell me the truth. If those had been ships on which you could leave this world and travel into the skies, would you have taken me along? Were you still thinking that I was not--not good enough for you?"

"Let's not talk about it now," he said. "I can't. Besides, there are too many people listening. Later, when everybody's asleep."

"All right, Alan."

She released his hand and left him alone, knowing that that was what he wanted. Mentally, he thanked her for it, because he knew what it was costing her to exercise restraint. At any other time, in a like situation, she would have thrown something at him.

After he had calmed down somewhat he returned to the helm and took over from Miran. From then on he was too busy to think much about his disappointment. He had to report to the port officer and tell his story, which took hours, for the officer called in the others to hear his amazing tale. And they questioned Miran and Amra. Green anxiously listened to the merchant's account, fearful that the fellow would disclose his suspicions that Green was not what he claimed to be. If Miran had any such intentions, however, he was saving them for their arrival in Estorya itself.

The officers all agreed that they had heard many wonderful stories from sailors but never anything to match this. They insisted upon giving a banquet for Miran and Green. The result was that Green got a much-needed and desired bath, hair cut and shave. But he also had to endure a long feast in which he had to stuff himself to keep from offending his hosts and also was forced to enter a drinking contest with some of the younger blades of the post. His Vigilante could handle enormous amounts of food and alcohol, so that Green appeared to the soldiers to be something of a superman. At midnight the last officer had dropped his head upon the table, dead drunk, and Green was able to get up and go to his yacht.

Unfortunately he had to carry the fat merchant out on his shoulders. Outside the banquet room he found a few rickshaw boys standing around a fire, huddled together, waiting for a customer so drunk he wouldn't fear thieves or ghosts. He gave one of them a coin and told him to deliver Miran to the yacht.

"What about yourself, honored sir? Don't you wish to ride home, too?"

"Later," said Green, looking up past the fort and at the hills behind it. "I intend to take a walk to clear my head."

Before the rickshaw men could question him further he plunged into the darkness and began striding swiftly toward the highest peak upon the island.

Two hours later he suddenly appeared in the moonlight-drenched windbreak, walked past the many vessels tied down for the night and crawled aboard his own yacht. A glance around the deck convinced him that everybody was sleeping. He stepped softly past the prostrate forms and lay down by Amra. Face up, his hands behind his head, he stared at the moon, a thoughtful expression upon his face.

Amra whispered, "Alan, I thought you were going to talk to me tonight."

He stiffened but did not turn his head to look at her.

"I was, but the officers kept us up late. Didn't Miran get here?"

"Yes, about five minutes before you did."

He rose on one elbow and looked searchingly at her. "_What?_"

"Is there anything strange about that?"

"Only that he was so drunk he'd passed out and was snoring like a pig. The fat son of an _izzot_! He must have been faking! And he must have...."

"Must have what?"

Green shrugged. "I don't know."

He couldn't tell her that Miran must have followed him up into the hills. And that if he had the fellow must have seen some very disturbing things.

He stood up and gazed intently at the dark forms stretched out here and there. Miran was sleeping upon a blanket behind the helm. Or was pretending to do so.

Should he kill him? If Miran turned him in to the authorities in Estorya....

He sat down again and fingered his dagger.

Amra must have guessed his thoughts, for she said, "Why do you want to kill him?"

"You know why. Because he could have me burned."

She sucked her breath in with a hiss.

"Alan, it can't be true! You can't be a demon!"

To him the accusation was so ridiculous that he didn't bother to answer. He should have known better, because he was well aware of how seriously these people took such things. However, he was thinking so furiously about what he could do to forestall Miran, that he completely forgot about her. Not until he heard her muffled sobs did he come out of his reverie. Surprised, he said, "Don't worry. They're not going to burn me."

"No, they're not," she said, choking on every other word. "I don't care if you _are_ a demon. I love you, and I'd go to hell for you or with you!"

It took him a few seconds to understand that she did believe he _was_ a demon and that it made no difference to her. Or, rather, she was determined to ignore the difference. What a sacrifice of her natural feelings she must have made for him! She, like everybody upon this world, had been trained from childhood to develop a fierce disgust and horror of devils and to be always upon her guard for them when they appeared in human form. What an abyss she had to cross in order to conquer her deep revulsion! In a way, her feat was greater than crossing the chasm between the stars.

"Amra," he said, deeply touched, and he bent down to kiss her.

To his surprise she turned her face away.

"You know my lips don't belch fire, like the devils' in the legends," he said, half-jestingly, half-pityingly. "Nor will I suck your soul into my mouth."

"You have already done that," she said, still not facing him.

"Oh, Amra!"

"Yes, you have! Else why should I follow you when you deserted me to run away on the _Bird_? And why should I still want to follow you, to be with you, even if those towers had turned out to be your what-do-you-call-'em? and you had sailed away into the skies on them? Why would any decent human woman want to do that? Tell me!"

She, too, rose on an elbow, her face now turned to him. He scarcely recognized her, her features were so twisted and her skin was so livid.

"A hundred times during this voyage I've wished you would die. Why? Because then I wouldn't have to think about the time to come when you would leave this world forever, leave _me_ forever! But when you were in danger, then I almost died, too, and I knew I didn't really wish your death. It was just wounded pride on my part. And I couldn't face the moment of your departure! Or the fact that you must come from a superior race, a people more like gods than demons!

"Oh, I didn't know what to think! Whether you were a devil, or a god, or just a man who was somehow more of a man than any I knew. I could ignore such things as your wounds healing up faster than they should and scar tissues disappearing. But I couldn't ignore your knowledge that Aga would be killed if she touched that wall in the room on the cannibals' island. Nor the fact that your teeth grew back in after they were knocked out during the escape from the island. Nor your too obvious interest in those two demons held prisoner in Estorya. Or...."

"Not so loud, Amra," he interrupted. "You'll wake everybody up."

"All right, all right. Better to keep quiet and pretend to be stupid. But I can't, I'm not built that way. So ... what are you going to do, Alan?"

"Do? Do?" he repeated miserably. "Why, somehow or other I'm going to free those two poor devils and escape in their spaceship."

"Devils? Then they _are_ demons!"

"Oh, no, that was just a manner of speaking. I said poor devils because of what they must have gone through in that barbarous prison. They might as well have been in the hands of the cannibals as at the mercy of the priests of this wretched planet."

"Yes, that's what you really think of us, isn't it? That we're all murderous, dirty and stinking savages."

"Oh, not all of you," he replied. "You're not, Amra. By any standards, you're a wonderful woman."

"Then why can't...?"

She bit her lip and turned away from him. She would not humble herself by asking him to take her with him. It was up to him to make the offer.

Green did not know what to say, though he knew that it was necessary to say something at once.

He just could not make up his mind as to how she would fit into Earth civilization.

How could he teach her that if somebody whom you didn't like differed with you, you just didn't try to tear them apart? Or that if the person you hated was too powerful for you to settle matters with personally you didn't resort to professional assassins?

How could he teach her to love the same things he did, the music and literature of his own culture? Her roots were in an entirely different culture. She couldn't possibly understand what he understood, thrill to that which thrilled him, catch the subtleties that he caught, see what lay behind the nuances of his civilization. She'd be a stranger in a world not made for her.

Of course, he thought, there were plenty of women upon Earth and her star-colonies who didn't share his culture, even if they'd been brought up in it. But their case was simply a matter of taste. And they could still share a certain amount with him, just because they'd breathed the same atmosphere and talked the same words as he. Not that he would have cared to live with them, because he wouldn't. But Amra, desirable in so many ways, just would not understand what was taking place around her or in the minds of those she would have to live with.

He looked down at Amra. Her back was turned, and she seemed to be breathing the easy breath of deep sleep. Though he doubted very much that she could be sleeping, he decided to accept things as they looked. He wouldn't answer her now, though he knew that when morning came her eyes would be asking the same question, even if she didn't voice it.

At least, he thought, she'd been diverted from her curiosity about what he'd been doing that night. That was something. He didn't want anybody to know about that. Not until the time for action came.

Provided, that is, that he could do anything even then. He'd discovered certain things tonight that could mean his salvation if he could utilize them.

That was the rub, as some poet or other had once said.

Wondering just who had originated that saying, he fell asleep. Woolgathering had always been a favorite occupation of his when people left him alone to do it. That was the rub. They didn't.

25

Shortly after dawn the yacht set sail and sped toward Estorya, a hundred miles west. The breeze was a strong thirty-five miles an hour, precursor of the violent winds that roared across the Xurdimur during the rainy season. Green set every inch of sail he had and took over the helm himself. Steering was not as simple as it had been, for traffic was getting heavy. In an hour he saw no less than forty 'rollers, ranging in size from small merchants not much larger than his own craft to tremendous three-decker 'rollers-of-the-line from far-off Batrim, convoying even larger merchant vessels, high-pooped and richly decorated. Then, as they came to within fifty miles of their destination, small pleasure yachts appeared in increasing numbers. And by the time they saw the white rocket-shaped towers that stretched from horizon to horizon, Green was sweating at the manner in which craft were shooting back and forth in front of him.

Miran said, "The entire nation is surrounded by these white towers and by many fortresses interspersed between them. Inside the great circle of towers the Estoryans have many rich farms on the plains. The city proper, however, is built on three roaming islands that were captured by their magic many centuries ago."

Green raised his eyebrows at this information. "Indeed? And where is the vessel that brought the two demons down from the skies?"

Miran looked blankly at the Earthman, though he knew well enough that he was keenly interested in the so-called demons.

"Oh, it is located close to the palace of the king himself, but not on the hills. It landed on the plain."

"Hmm. And the strangers will be burned during the Festival of the Eye of the Sun?"

"If they have lived, they will be."

Green didn't like to think about their dying. If they had, then his problem was solved. He stayed upon this planet and did the best he could here.

There was one thing he had to admit. That was that having Amra as his wife made such an event not so calamitous as it might have been. She'd keep him so interested that time would pass swiftly, even on this barbarous place.

In that case, he thought, why was he hesitating about taking her to Earth, if he got the chance? No matter where he was she'd see that life was a whirlpool of action. And she'd only begun to disclose the deeps within her. Give her an education, and what a creature might evolve!

What's the matter with you, Green? he said to himself. Don't you know your own mind? Are you so capable at handling physical events but a complete muckup when it comes to psychical? Why...?

"Look out!" cried Miran, and Green threw the helm hard aport to avoid crashing into a small freighter. The captain, standing on the foredeck behind his own helmsman, leaned over the rail and shook his fist at Green and cursed. Green cursed back but after that he didn't allow himself to begin thinking about Amra until he had steered the 'roller into the 'break.

The rest of the day he was busy getting cleared with the port authorities. Fortunately he had a letter from the officer of the island-fortress. It explained why he happened to be in possession of a foreign craft and also recommended that Green be given a chance to sign up in the Estoryan 'roller-fleet if he wished. Even so, he had to tell his story so many times to an admiring and amazingly credulous audience that it was dusk before he could get free. Outside the customs building he found Grizquetr waiting for him.

"Where's your mother?" he asked.

"Oh, she knew you'd be tied up for a long time, so she went ahead and got a room in an inn. They're very hard to get during the Festival, almost impossible. But you know Mother," said Grizquetr, winking. "She gets what she goes after, every time."

"Yes, I'm afraid so. Well, where's this inn?"

"It's clear across town, but it's within sight of the wall that's built around the demons' skyship."

"Wonderful! Rooms must be twice as difficult to get there as on the edge of town. How did Amra do it?"

"She gave the innkeeper three times his asking price, which was high enough. And he found a pretext to quarrel with a man who had long ago reserved a room, threw him out and gave it to us!"

"Ah? And where did she get this money?"

"She sold a ruby to a jeweler who kept shop close to the 'break. He's sort of shady, I guess, and he didn't give Mother what the ruby was worth."

"Now, where would she get a ruby or any kind of jewel?"

Grizquetr grinned crookedly but delightedly. "Oh, I imagine that a certain fat one-eyed merchant-captain who shall remain nameless must have had one or two rubies within that bag he keeps inside his shirt."

"Yes, I can imagine. The question that alarms me is how did she get it off Miran? He'd sooner lose a quart of blood than one of his precious jewels. And he'd notice its loss quicker than he would the blood."

Grizquetr looked thoughtful. "I really don't know. Mother didn't say."

He brightened with a smile and said, "But I'd _like_ to know how she did it! Maybe she'll teach me some day."

"She seems to have a lot to teach both of us," said Green.

He sighed. "Well, I'm eternally indebted to her. No getting out of it. Let's call a rickshaw and see what kind of a place she has selected."

Once both had settled in the high-backed chair of their vehicle, and the two men who pulled it had begun their slow trotting through the crowded streets, Green said, "Have you any idea where Miran is?"

"Some. He was detained by the port-officers, too, because he had to explain what had happened to his 'roller. Then he called a rickshaw and left in a big hurry. He had an officer with him. Not a naval officer. A soldier from the palace, one of the King's Own."

Green felt a sinking sensation. "Already? Tell me, does he know where we are staying?"

"Oh, no. When I saw him coming out of the customshouse, I hid behind a bale of cotton. Mother had told me to stay out of his sight. She explained how treacherous he is, and how he hates you because he thinks you brought all his bad luck upon him."

"That's only the half of it," Green replied. He was silent for a while, thinking, his gaze roving idly over the crowds. There were many foreigners in town, sailors from every nation that had a border on the Xurdimur, pilgrims who belonged to the far-flung cult of the Fish Goddess and had come here for the Festival. The majority, however, were Estoryans, a fairly tall people, brown or red-haired, green or blue-eyed, with big noses, thick lips and a slight epicanthic fold. They spoke a guttural polysyllabic semi-analytic language. They wore broad-rimmed hats shaped like open umbrellas, tight-necked shirts with long stringties and pants that were skin-tight from crotch to knee, then ballooned out into many ruffles. Little bells tinkled on their ankles, and the women carried canes. All had a fish, a star, or a rocket-shaped tower tattooed on their cheeks.

Along the narrow winding street were many little shops, flowering with a variety of articles. Green was intrigued by the magical charms being hawked everywhere. Many of these were little towers, replicas of the large ones that encircled the country. On Earth they could have passed for toy spaceships. He bought one. It was made of white-painted wood and was about seven inches long. The big flaring fins and landing struts were well reproduced, but there weren't any of the fine details that he could have found in such a toy on Earth. There were no holes in the stern or nose for the drive-exhaust or any indications of doors or detector apparatus.

He gave it to Grizquetr and leaned back to do some more thinking. The charm hadn't disappointed him, because he had not expected any more than what he'd seen. If, in the beginning, those models had been furnished with every little detail, the passage of many thousands of years would have seen them blunted and reduced to their present state of fuzzy symbolic images. Time ate down to the skeleton of things.

He wondered how the charm could have survived up to the present, because it surely must have been over twenty thousand years ago that the prototype, the real spaceship, disappeared and man sank back to savagery again. Then, why had this lasted here, whereas it had not done so on other planets, Earth included?

Abruptly, he noticed that his rickshaw had stopped.

"A procession of priests, going to the palace of the King, where they will spend all night preaching to the demon," said one of their rickshaw boys. He yawned and stretched. "I suppose that it will be a fine burning, since the priests have predicted that the sun will shine at high noon. They are safe doing that, as it has not failed to shine on Festival Day for a thousand years."

Green leaned forward, his hands gripping the sides of his chair, and said, "Demon? You meant demons, didn't you? Weren't there two of them?"

"Oh yes, there were. But one died two days ago. Hung himself, I heard, though I can't swear to it since the priests have released no details. The holy ones have been giving the demons a rough time."

"Demons?" said Grizquetr, snorting with disbelief and disgust. "Doesn't the very fact that one killed himself prove they're not fiends? Everyone knows that a demon can't kill himself."

"Quite true, my small friend," replied the taxi man. "The priests have admitted their error. They are truly sorry--so they say."

"Then aren't they letting the other man loose?"

"Oh no. Because _he_ may still be a demon. Tomorrow, at high noon, the prisoner goes under the Sun's Eye and there meets the only death a demon may know. _By fire he was born, by fire he shall perish._ Chapter Twenty, Verse Sixty-Two. Or so I remember the High Grauchning saying in his sermon yesterday. Myself, I'm not much for reading. Too busy making a living, running my legs off, killing myself so my wife and kids may eat and have clothes on their backs."

Green scarcely heard the garrulous rickshaw man, so shocked was he at the news. Had he been too late? What if the man who'd died was the pilot and the other one unable to handle the ship?

The rest of the ride he was sunk in such deep gloom he hardly saw any of the many sights that Grizquetr kept pointing out. But he did rouse when the boy said, "Look, Father, there's the King's palace, on top of the hill! Beyond that is the ship of the demon. You can't see it from here, but you will tomorrow when you go to the burning."

"Don't be so heartless," said Green, but he looked carefully at the great marble structure that rambled all over the hill. Somewhere below that, probably filled with dirt, undoubtedly forgotten, was just such an entrance as he'd found on the island of the cannibals. He'd also discovered a similar one upon the fortress of Shimdoog, the night before when he'd gone exploring and Miran had followed him.

The palace, he thought, looked quite romantic and beautiful, enveloped in a dim red haze cast by the setting sun, which lay directly behind it. Probably it would look different in the harsh glare of day, when the dirt and garbage would be so apparent.

The area in which Amra had rented the room was one which had once belonged to the rich and the noble but had decayed when the aristocracy moved their homes elsewhere. The inn before which the rickshaw boys stopped was a three-story pile of granite blocks. It had an enormous porch and six huge pillars in the images of the Fish Goddess. Green could not help admiring the building even in its present state of decay, because he knew that it must have cost a fortune to build it. The granite would have had to be transported by 'roller across the Xurdimur, since there would be no stone in this neighborhood. He imagined that the landlord charged high rents and that Amra must have paid a pretty price indeed if she'd given him three times the usual amount. One thing you could say for her, when she traveled she did it in style.

The caryatids of the Fish Goddess also interested him, and at another time he'd have examined them closely by the light of the torches in the hands of the servants standing by them. The cult of the Goddess indicated that the original Estoryans must have migrated from the oceanside to the center of the vast and level plains. And here they must have built this imposing city, which was to become such a great focus of trade. Its central location made it a great clearing house for goods from every country bordering the Xurdimur.

He wondered whether it was pure accident that they had brought with them the charms in the shapes of spaceships? And if they'd also accidentally discovered that towers modeled after the charms would stop the roaming islands?

Whatever the answer, it lay buried in the prehistoric.

"Hurry up," said Grizquetr, pulling on Green's hand. "Mother has a surprise for you, but don't tell her I told you."

"That's nice," replied Green absently, his mind still upon the news of the Earthman's death. Hang it all, why must he always be kept in suspense, must always be improvising from moment to moment, always in the dark, never knowing what was coming next nor what he was going to have to do? Oh, for one day of peace and assurance!

"Father!"

"What, what?" said Green, startled out of his reverie and stopping halfway up the steps to the porch. Suddenly something black and small launched itself at him and landed on his shoulder.

"Lady Luck! Why are you shivering so?"

"Better run, Dad!" said Grizquetr. "There's Miran coming out of the door! And soldiers behind him!"

He ended with a wail, "_Motherr-r-r-r!_"

The sight of Amra, Inzax, and the children being marched out between musketmen was enough for Green. He turned away and spoke softly but savagely.

"Keep your backs to them! Don't look back! We're far enough away in the dark so they might not recognize us. Especially in this crowd!"

A minute later he and the boy and the cat were looking around the corner of a large building. They saw the soldiers commandeer a rickshaw and put the prisoners in it. Then four of them walked behind the vehicle as it was pulled away.

"They--they'll be put in the Tower of the Grass Cat," said the boy, shaking with fury. "Oh, that devil Miran! That fat old devil! He's the one who's accused Mother of witchcraft! I know! I know!"

"He didn't accuse her," said Green, "but me. She's guilty through association with me. Well at least we'll know where they are for a while."

"There go Miran and the soldiers back into the hotel."

"Waiting for us," said Green. "They'll have a long wait. Well, let's go. First things first. We'll buy a ticket, see the ship. I have to know where it's located, what type it is, et cetera. Luckily I've enough money on me to do that. But we'll be broke then. You have any?"

"Ten _axar_."

"That's not much, but it's enough to pay for a rickshaw ride to the windbreak."

At the box-office, Green bought two tickets, then walked up the steep flight of steps with Grizquetr. At the top he found himself in a large group standing on a platform beneath a wooden roof. This was for the curious who wanted to get a preview of the demons' vessel. Tomorrow the gates would be opened to admit a vast crowd, who would sit on the hard wooden seats of the amphitheatre that had been built fairly close to the ship.

The ship itself was an Earth naval vessel, a two-man scout. It pointed its needle nose upward, resting upon eight jetstruts, gleaming in the moonlight. Its naval insignia, a green globe crossed with rocket and olive branch, was a smudge in the shadows. Nevertheless he could make it out. He felt his breast swell and he choked with homesickness.

"Ah, so near, yet so far," he murmured. "Even if I get to you, then what? What if the poor devil of a survivor turns out to be a navigator? Still, he ought to know enough to get her off the ground and into space. And from there on, with interstellar drive, we ought to be able to get home, somehow."

He sounded plaintive, even to himself, for he knew how vast space was and how complicated astromathematics was. And of course there was no guarantee that the Earthman would even be a navigator. He might just be an officer or perhaps a civilian official who was being ferried in one of the swifter small ships.

Then there was the awful possibility that the vessel might have landed here because there was something wrong with it, and that it could not rise again even if it had a full crew. In fact, that was the most logical explanation.

He sighed and turned to the boy.

"This may be for nothing, but we can't just sit down and watch. Let's take off for the windbreak."

"What are we going to do there?" asked Grizquetr, as they walked down the steps.

"Well, we're not going back to the yacht," Green answered. "Soldiers'll be waiting there to arrest us. No, we'll go to the other side of the 'break. Stealing another 'roller isn't going to get us in any more trouble than we're already in."

The boy's eyes widened. "What're we doing that for?"

"We must return to the island-fortress of Shimdoog."

"What? Why, that's a hundred miles away!"

"Yes, I know. And we won't be able to make the speed going back that we did coming. We'll have to do quite a lot of tacking to sail against the wind, and that'll eat up our time. But there's nothing else to do."

"If you say so, father, I believe you. But what is there on Shimdoog?"

"Not on. _In._"

Grizquetr was a bright lad. He was silent for a minute, so silent Green could imagine he heard the wheels turning within his head. Then he said, "There must be a cave on Shimdoog like the one on the cannibals' island. And you must have gone into it that night we stayed in the 'break. I remember waking up and hearing you and Mother say something about your being gone and about Miran following you."

Grizquetr paused, then said, "If there is a cave-entrance there, why haven't other people gone into it?"

"Because it has been declared taboo, off limits, by the priests of Estorya. It was done so long ago that I imagine that the priests themselves have forgotten why they forbade its access to men. But it's not hard to reconstruct the historical causes. Once, I suppose, the island was populated by cannibals. At the time the Estoryans captured the island they exterminated the aborigines. They found the cave mouth was a holy place for the savages. So, thinking that it held demons--and it does, in a way--they built a wall around it and set up a statue of the Fish Goddess, facing inward and holding in her hand a symbol to restrain the imprisoned fiends from breaking loose. That symbol, of course, is the same charm that is sold on the streets of Estorya, that circumscribes the country and the island of Shimdoog. It is the same as the spaceship that landed near the King's palace."

Green hailed a rickshaw and continued his account while they rode through the still-crowded streets. There was so much noise that he felt quite safe talking, provided he kept his voice soft.

By the time they had reached the northern end of the windbreak, Green had told the boy all he thought he should hear at that time. If, later on, his trip to Shimdoog proved successful he would enlighten him even more.

For the present he was concerned with the problem of getting transportation. Fortunately they found almost at once a nice little yacht with speedy lines and a tall mast. The craft must have belonged to a wealthy man, for a watchman sat close to it before a little fire just outside his shed. Green walked up to him, and when the fellow rose, his hand suspiciously resting upon his spear, Green struck him on the jaw, then followed with a hard right to the pit of his stomach. Grizquetr completed the job by hitting him over the head with a length of pipe he'd picked up off the ground.

Green emptied the handbag of the watchman and was pleased to see several coins of respectable denominations.

"Probably his life-savings," he said. "I hate to rob him, but we have to have money. Grizquetr, do you remember those slaves who were drinking and gambling outside the Striped Ape Inn? Run to them and offer them six _danken_ if they'll tow us out of the 'break. Tell them we're paying them so much because it's so late at night, and also to keep their mouths shut."

Grinning, the boy ran off. Green hauled the limp body of the unconscious watchman behind the hut, bound and gagged him and threw a tarpaulin over him.

Grizquetr returned, leading six noisy and reeling men, sturdily built, with legs and backs big-muscled from hauling 'rollers.

At first Green thought he ought to try to make them keep quiet, then decided that it would look more natural if he let them talk as loudly as they wished. There was a festive air over the city tonight, and more than one yacht was going out for a moonlight cruise.

Once out on the plain, Green threw the promised money to the slaves and cried, "Have a good time!" To himself he muttered, "Because tomorrow may be your last day." Already, he had a presentiment of what might happen if he succeeded in tonight's work. There was no telling what forces he might be unloosing. As he'd said to the boy, there were demons imprisoned in the bowels of the island of Shimdoog.

26

Just before dawn the yacht coasted to a stop outside the high stone walls of the north side of the island of Shimdoog. Green had dropped the sail and, judging his speed exactly, had steered the craft until its side was almost scraping the wall. As soon as the roller stopped, Green put Lady Luck in a bag tied to his belt and cautioned her to keep quiet. Then he began climbing up the rungs nailed to the mast. The boy followed him, and both crawled out upon the spar. Green tied one end of a long rope around the end of the spar. Then he let himself down on it to the ground on the other side of the wall.

After the boy had also descended they paused for a moment, crouched, ready to run at the first sign they'd been seen. But there was no outcry.

The big moon, though dropping to the horizon, was bright enough for them to make good progress. Green led the way up a series of hills, heading in a circuitous fashion toward the highest. Twice he had to stop and warn Grizquetr about the towers ahead, where sentries were stationed. Lady Luck seemed to know she should be silent. Her eyes glowed and her teeth flashed, but she was only making a soundless snarl.

They saw the fires of the guards and heard their muttered voices, but none saw them. It was doubtful that the sentinels ever did look out, for they did not think that any man in his right senses would be roaming about in the darkness, where it was well known that ghosts and demons waited for foolish mortals.

Just before they began climbing the slope of the peak that was their goal, Green whispered. "This island is built much like the first one we encountered. I think that all of these islands are more or less similar, all being composed of a base of a mile and a half square of eternum metal or something like eternum. And all covered with rock and dirt and trees and vegetation and stocked with birds and beasts. I suppose that the original builders landscaped these craft for aesthetic reasons. After all, a sheet of metal with a few metal chambers on it doesn't look very pretty and would make a blinding glare in the sunshine."

"Uh," replied the boy, who didn't understand.

"Do you know, it's strange that I was right the first time when I sarcastically referred to the roaming islands as glorified lawn-mowers?"

"What?"

"Yes, in the beginning there must have been many more than there are now, enough to keep the vast plains looking neat and well-kept, the grass clipped, the forests prevented from encroaching well-defined limits, and so on. But when there were no longer any maintenance men to keep them going, they stopped, one by one, until at this present time there are perhaps a few hundred. Though, I don't know, there may be more. Anyway, whenever one did run down or break down for some reason or other it was soon erased by a still-functioning island."

"Erased?"

"Yes, for it's quite obvious to me that the islands not only cut grass, they kept the plains free of obstructions that weren't supposed to be there. And a dead island would constitute just such a hazard."

Grizquetr spoke in a thin voice, "Perhaps, Father, I may yet understand you. I must be stupid."

"Far from it. You'll learn in time. Anyway, I should have known what they really were when I heard the tales of the sailors. Remember that one about the big hole made by the meteorite? And how something mysterious filled it in and covered it with turf? And then there was the way that wrecked 'rollers would vanish down to the last nut and bolt and the skeletons of the dead aboard. And there was the legend of Samdroo the Tailor Turned Sailor and what he found in the metal chambers inside an island. The great white eye through which he saw what was outside the island. And the other paraphernalia. They weren't the property of a wicked magician, as the tale would have it. Any Earthman would recognize TV and radar and dials and controls."

"Tell me more."

"I will when we get over this wall."

Green had stopped before a barrier of stone, reaching at least forty feet high. A grim crown, it completely encircled the top of the hill. "Once it must have been difficult to scale, but mortar has crumbled here and there, and vines grow all the way up. Follow me. I remember exactly the path I took."

He jumped up on a little ledge, seized a thick vine and hauled himself up to another minor projection. Unhesitatingly, the boy swarmed up after him.

Panting, they reached the top, where they rested a moment and wiped the blood from their lacerated fingertips. The cat was the only one that seemed unperturbed. Silently, Green pointed out the twenty foot high statue of the Fish Goddess below, her back turned to them as she gestured at the cave mouth with the rocket-shaped charm.

For the first time Grizquetr seemed scared. Like all his fellows, he had an unhealthy awe for the supernatural. This place, so walled off, so utterly ancient-looking, so invested with all the attributes of taboo, so invocative of the horrible tales of demons and angry gods, depressed him. Only his father's seeming indifference to any fiends they might encounter kept him from turning tail and backing down the wall.

"One thing I'll bet, and that is that Miran didn't follow me this far but stayed down on the ground. With that belly of his he'd never have made it; he'd have tumbled off like a big fat bug and been squashed like one, too. Wouldn't that have been awful! However, he didn't have to go all the way with me. The very fact that I would dare to enter a taboo area is enough to condemn me. I should have slit his throat when Amra told me he'd been shadowing me. But I couldn't do it without absolutely convincing evidence, and even if I'd had that I suppose I'm too civilized to kill him in cold blood."

"You should have told me how you felt," said Grizquetr. "I would have slipped a dagger through the tallow over his ribs."

"No doubt, and so would your mother. Well, down we go."

And he set the example by throwing his leg over the edge of the wall and letting himself down, somewhat gingerly. The descent was even worse than the ascent, but he didn't bother telling the boy that. By the time he found out he'd be at the bottom.

Even so, when he reached ground, he thought that the lad couldn't be one whit more shaky than he. Forty feet was a long, long way when you were up on top looking down, especially in the moonlight.

"This is the second time I've done it, but I don't think I'd have guts enough for a third time," said Green.

"But we have to climb back out, don't we?"

"Oh, we'll have to go over it, but I hope it won't be so high by then," said Green, looking mysterious.

"What do you mean?"

"Well I hope those stones will all be tumbled to the ground. In fact, it's a necessity, if we're to do what I expect to do."

He took the bewildered boy by the hand and led him past the cold and silent statue and into the cave's entrance. "We could use a light," he said, "but a torch would have been too awkward to carry up that wall, and we can grope our way to the rooms that are lighted."

Wonder why the passageway wasn't lighted, too? he thought. Or had this cave been added by the savages who used to live on the island, so that the _sanctum sanctorum_ would have to be approached through darkness? Perhaps it was, the primitives having constructed such a chamber so that the initiate into the religion could go through darkness both literal and symbolical and come into a light that also embraced both worlds? He didn't and couldn't know; he could only guess.

But I can take advantage of what I do have on hand, he said to himself, gritting his teeth with determination.

The dust beneath his feet gave way to clean metal. They rounded a corner and found themselves in a chamber much like the one upon their first island, except that this had furniture. A skeleton lay in the middle of the floor, face down. The back of the skull exhibited a great hole.

"He may have been here for a thousand years or more," said Green. "I'd like to know his story. But I never will."

"Do you think the Goddess killed him?"

"No, nor the demons either. It was the hand of man struck him down, my boy. If it's violent death you're trying to explain, don't drag in the supernatural. There's enough murder in the hearts of humankind to take care of every case."

In the third room Green said, "There's no wall of dust to stop us. The ionic charges haven't stopped working. Notice how clean everything is. Ah, here we are! Before the door!"

Grizquetr looked puzzled. "Door? I see only a blank wall."

"That's all I saw too," said Green, "and that is all I would ever have seen, if it hadn't been for the tale of Samdroo."

"Let me tell you how you got in!" chattered the boy excitedly. "I know what you were thinking of, what you did. You stood before the wall and you made a sign like this on it!"--He traced a rough outline of a rocket against the cool white metal--"and the wall suddenly slid to one side, and you had an entrance. See!"

A whole section had moved noiselessly into the wall, leaving a round doorway.

"Yes, I remembered the story of Samdroo and, though it was ridiculous to think that it would work, I did what the Sailor did. Remember that the cannibals were after him, and he ran into the cave and came to just such a blank wall. And he, wishing to protect himself against the evil spirits that he was sure lived in the cave, traced the sign that is supposed to prevent them from touching a man. And the door slid open and he plunged on into the chambers of the wicked magician, the savages howling frustratedly after him.

"And," continued Green, "I did just what he did, and the sign proved to be an _Open, O Sesame_ for me."

"A what?"

"Never mind. The point is that the ancient maintenance men must have used just such a gesture to open the door, or else used it in conjunction with other means. And if they did, then they must also have been repair technicians for the ships that landed here. Perhaps the sign of the rocket was a secret symbol for their guild. I don't know, but it sounds reasonable."

Ignoring the boy's flood of questions, he walked into a great room. It was more bare than he'd expected when he had found it the first time; it contained four machines or their fuel supplies, all concealed in four large square metal containers. In the center of the room was a chair and an instrument panel. The panel contained six TV windows, several oscilloscopes, and dials whose purpose he didn't know. But the controls attached to the arms of the chair seemed simple enough.

"The only trouble," he said, "is that I don't know where the activating switch is. I tried to find it the other night and couldn't. Yet, it must be so obvious that I'll feel like a fool when I do locate it."

Vainly he pulled at the little levers set in the arms.

"My failure to activate this was the main reason I returned to the yacht and sailed on to Estorya. Of course, I had to go and find out just what the situation was and get a good idea of my plan of campaign. Perhaps if I'd stayed here and taken a chance on going into the city blind, we'd have been better off. At least, your mother wouldn't now be in prison, and we wouldn't have the additional worry of rescuing her."

He rose from the chair and began pacing back and forth.

"How ironic if I'd come this far and could get no farther! But then, what else could I expect? It's up to me to solve this, and I'm not infallible, omniscient. It should be functioning as of now. I know that the ring of rocket-shapes has got it paralyzed so it can't act. Nevertheless, unless it's blown a fuse, gone neurotic from frustration, or just worn out, there should be some indication that it is still in operation."

"What do you mean?" said Grizquetr. "How can the island be paralyzed?"

Green stopped pacing to gesture at the radarscopes. "See those? Well, there should be some funny lines squiggling across it, or little dots moving, or arcs sweeping across it. They would be indicating the shapes of things in the immediate neighborhood outside the island, and the lay of the land. Thus, I imagine that in the ancient days, when it spotted a rocket shape, which would then have been a genuine spaceship and not a mockup, it would have detoured around it. The whole island was, in one of its functions, a field attendant, a scavenger. It removed anything from the plain that wasn't supposed to be there. There's why they now attack 'rollers and crush them and disintegrate the parts that fall beneath their bases. That also explains why the island is trapped by a ring of rocket-shaped towers. The radar detects a complete circle and, being unable to molest any object shaped like a rocket, it squats in one place until it runs down or the rocket shapes are removed.

"Of course, it worked automatically. But there were controls for a man to operate it when there was a special job to do or if he had to take it to another place it ordinarily wouldn't go when on automatic. These controls must be the ones.

"The question is, does the island switch itself off and on at certain intervals, scanning the area around it to see if the inhibiting objects have gone? If so, there's no telling how long we may have to wait before its next sweep. And we just can't afford to wait!"