The Green Odyssey Part 8

"What do you want?" he asked her. She was mewing and striking gently at him.

She padded toward the doorway to the outside, so he imagined that she wished him to follow her. Grasping his cutla.s.s, be walked after her and out to the tunnel that led to the cave mouth. Not until then did he hear the booming of cannon, far away.

The cat meowed plaintively. Evidently, she'd heard cannonfire before and had not liked the results.

Once out of the cave he stopped to look up at the sun. It was on its downward path from the zenith. About four o'clock in the afternoon. He'd slept about ten hours.

Unable to see much from where he stood, he climbed up the rocks outside the cave and soon stood upon the very top of the hill, a little tableland about ten feet square. From there he commanded as good a view of the island as anyone could get.

Tacking around the periphery of the island were three long, low, black-hulled 'rollers with over-large wheels and scarlet sails. Occasionally a lance of red spurted from one of the vessel's ports, a boom reached Green's ears a few seconds later and he would see the iron ball climb up and up, then fall toward the village. A tree around the clearing would lose a limb, or a spurt of dust would show where a ball landed in the clearing itself. Two of the long houses had big holes in their roofs. The village itself was deserted, as no one with good sense would have remained there. None of the cannibals were visible, but that wasn't surprising, considering how thick the woods were.

Green hoped the Vings would land soon and clean out the savages. That would leave him and his party a clear field, unless the pirates investigated the cave in the same day. If they didn't, then the refugees could leave the island and take to the plains under cover of the night.

Anxiously, Green traced the path that led from the hilltop where he stood and wound down to the village. It was a narrow trail and he often lost sight of it. But always there was a difference in the shading of the tree tops along the trail and the rest of the forest. With his eye he could follow the shading to the village and beyond, toward the back or western part of the island.

It was here that he came across the first sign of hope he had had since the wreck of the Bird of Fortune. It was a small break in the vegetation, which ran uninterrupted to the very edge of the island, a shelf of seemingly smooth earth, almost hidden from him by the slope of the terrain. Indeed, he could barely make it out and might have missed it altogether, but he saw the masts of three small 'rollers projecting from above the slope and followed them down toward the hulls. All three were yachts, obviously not of islander make. Beyond the stolen craft were the uprights of davits. These were behind a wall of branches, camouflage for anybody outside the island but visible to those on the inside.

It was all Green could do to keep from whooping with joy. Now he and his party wouldn't have to cast themselves on foot on the dangerous plains. They could sail in comparative safety. Now, while the cannibals were cowering helplessly under the bombardment Green could lead his people through the woods to the yachts. When dusk came and the island began moving again they could lower a yacht from the davits and set sail.

He went back to the cave entrance, where he found everybody awake, waiting for him.

He told them what he'd seen and added, "If the Vings come aboard we'll take advantage of the confusion and escape."

Miran looked at the sun and shook his head. "The Vings won't attack now. It's too close to dusk. They'll want a full day for fighting. They'll follow the island tonight. When dawn comes and the island stops they'll board."

"I bow to your superior experience," Green said. "Only I'd like to ask you one thing. Why don't the Vings launch their small craft at night and land boarding parties from them?"

Miran looked surprised. "No one does that! It's unthinkable! Don't you know that at night the plains abound in spirits and demons? The Vings wouldn't think of taking a chance on what the magic of the savages might unloose against them in the darkness."

"I knew of the general att.i.tude, but it had slipped my mind," admitted Green. "But if this is so, why did you all wander about this place the night the Bird was wrecked?"

"That was a situation where we preferred the somewhat uncertain possibility of stumbling across demons to the certainty of being killed by the cannibals," said Miran.

"To be honest," said Amra, "I was too scared to think of ghosts. If I had I might have stayed where I was.... No, I wouldn't either. I've never seen a ghost, but I had seen those savages."

"Well," said Green, "all of you might as well make up your mind that, come ghosts, demons, or men, we're walking through the dark tonight. All those too scared will have to stay behind."

He began issuing orders, and in a short time he had the sleepy-eyed, bedraggled and dirty-looking party ready. After that, he turned to watch the bombardment.

By then it had largely ceased. Only occasionally did one of the vessels loose a single cannon shot. The rest of the time they spent in tacking back and forth and in running up close to the very edge of the island.

"I think they are trying the temper of the island's inhabitants," Green said. "They don't know whether the woods conceal a hundred savages or a thousand, or whether they're armed with cannons and muskets or just with spears. They want to draw fire, so they can get an estimate of what they're facing."

He turned to Miran. "Which reminds me, why is it that the natives don't use guns? They must have a chance to get their hands on many from the wrecks."

The fat merchant shrugged and rolled his one good eye to indicate that he didn't really know but was making a guess.

"Probably they've a taboo against using firearms. Whatever the reason, they're evidently suffering because they neglect them. Look how few they are. Only fifty men! They must have lost quite a few through raids from other savage tribes, both from those who live upon the plain itself and from those who live on other roaming islands. They're down to the point now where they must die out within a generation, even without help from such as those," he said, pointing to the Ving 'rollers.

"Yes, and I suppose that during the daytime, when the island is stopped, gra.s.s cats and dire dogs board it. These must take their toll of the humans."

He gazed again at the red sails and wheels of the Vings. "I'd think that those pirates would take every island they could and would use them as bases from which to operate."

"They do," said Amra. "For a generation now the Vings have been scouring the plains, locating the islands and exterminating the savages on them. Then they've fortified the islands, so that you might say that today the Xurdimur is dominated by them. But there's a drawback to an island as a harbor. No large 'roller may get very close except in the daylight. They have to put out to gra.s.s every night and follow their base at a safe distance until dawn. However, though the Vings are well established on many roamers, they're often attacked by the navies of various nations and sometimes driven off. Then the nation that takes possession of the island has a nice little base. And, of course, quite often they use it to launch heir own piratical ventures against the craft of countries at peace with them.

"Oh, the Xurdimur is a land where every man's hand is against the other, and the devil take the ones with short sail! A man may make his fortune or break his heart, all in a night's work. But, then, you know that only too well."

Green interrupted, "We'll leave them, and the natives, too, when moonlight gets here. I only hope that there aren't other Ving craft in the neighborhood."

"What the G.o.ds will, happens," replied Miran. His sad face rejected the belief that if he, the favorite of Mennirox, could come to grief, then Green could expect even worse.

When dusk came, Green walked from the cave into the dark and hard rain. Behind him came Amra, one hand upon his shoulder, the other supporting Paxi. The rest were stretched out in a line behind her, each person's hand on the shoulder of the one ahead.

The black cat was underneath Green's coat, riding in a large pocket of his shirt. She had made it plain to him that where he went, she went. And Green, to avoid a big fuss and also because he was beginning to feel very affectionate toward her, allowed her to come along.

The descent from the hilltop was an anxious and stumbling trip. Green, after ten minutes of groping along the path, had to acknowledge he did not know where he was. So many windings had the path taken that he did not know whether he was going east, north, south, or in the right direction, west.

Actually, it didn't really matter, as long as it brought him to the edge of the island. He could skirt the edge until he arrived at the fleet craft that would give them a chance for flight.

The trouble was in finding that rim. He was afraid that it would be possible to wander in circles and figure eights until moonlight. Then, though they'd be able to orient themselves, they'd also be exposed to the view of the cannibals. And if they found themselves, say, at the eastern edge, their journey around would be perilous indeed.

Occasional lightning flashed, and then he could make out his immediate environment. These brief revelations weren't much help. All he could see were the solid-seeming walls of tree trunks and bushes.

Suddenly Amra spoke. "Do you think we're getting close?"

lign=justify cla.s.s="i"> He stopped so suddenly that the entire line lurched into him. Lightning burst again, quite close by. The cat, curled in his coat pocket, spat and tried to shrink into an even smaller ball. Absently, Green patted her from outside the coat. He said, "Your name is Lady Luck. I just saw the village. Now we're getting some place. I really needed that referent."

He wasn't worried about the inhabitants of the village. All were undoubtedly cowering under the roofs of their long houses, praying to whatever G.o.ds they worshiped that they would not send the lightning their way. There would be little danger if the whole party were to walk through the center of the village. He planned to take no chances at all, however, and ordered everybody to follow him around the clearing.

"It won't be long now!" he said to Amra. "Pa.s.s the word back and cheer everybody up."

Half an hour later he wished he'd kept his mouth shut. It was true that he'd followed the wandering path to the cove where their boats were kept. But he'd at once drawn his breath in pain of surprise.

A lightning bolt had illuminated the gray rock walls of the cove, its broad shelf, and the high black iron davits.

But the yachts were gone!

22.

LATER GREEN THOUGHT that if ever the time came when he should have cracked up, that instant of loss, white and sudden as the lightning itself, should have been the one.

The others cried out loudly in their grief and shock, but he was as silent as the empty stone shelf. He could not move nor utter a word; all seemed hopeless, so what was the use of motion or talk?

Nevertheless, he was human, and human beings hope even when there is no justification for it. Nor could he remain frozen until the next stroke of lightning would reveal to the others the state of their leader. He had to act. What if his actions were meaningless? Mere movement answered for the demands of the body, and at that moment it was his body that could move. His mind was congealed.

Shouting to the others to scatter and look about in the brush, but not to scatter too far, he began climbing up the slope of the hill. When he had reached its top he left the path and plunged into the forest to his right on the theory that if the yachts were anywhere they must be there. He had two ideas about where they might be. One was that the Vings had spotted them and had sent in a party aboard a gig to push them over the side of the island. Thus, when the island had begun its nightly voyage it had left the 'rollers sitting upon the plain. The other theory was also inspired by the presence of the Vings. Perhaps the savages had hidden their craft because of just such an event as his first theory put forth. To do that they would have had to haul the 'rollers up the less steep slant of the cove.

At the point where he would have looped a rope around a tree and used it to pull a yacht uphill, he saw all three of the missing craft. They were nestling side by side just over the lip of the slope, their hulls hidden by brush piled up before them. Their tall masts, of course, would be taken for tree trunks by anybody but a very close observer.

Green yelled with joy, then whirled to run back and tell the others. And slammed into a tree trunk. He picked himself up, swearing because he'd hurt his nose. And tripped over something and fell again. Thereafter, he seemed to be in a nightmare of frustration, of conspiracy between tree and night to catch and delay him. Where his trip up had been easy, his trip back was a continued barking of shins, b.u.mping of nose, and tearing loose from clutching bushes and thorns. His confusion wasn't at all helped when the lightning ceased, because he'd been guiding himself by its frequent flashes. And Lady Luck, alarmed at all the hard knocks she was getting, struggled out of his shirt pocket and slipped into the forest. He called to her to come back, but she had had enough of him, for the time being, anyway.

For a brief moment he thought of the fantastic device of grabbing hold of her tail and following her through the dark. But she was gone, and the idea wouldn't have worked, anyway. More than likely she'd have turned and bitten his hands until he released her.

There was nothing to do but make his own way back.

After ten minutes of frantic struggling, during which he suddenly realized he'd turned the wrong way and was wandering away from the edge of the island, he saw the clouds disappear. With the bright moon came vision and sanity. He turned around and in a short time was back at the cove.

"What happened to you?" asked Amra. "We thought maybe you'd fallen off the edge."

"That's about all that didn't happen," he said, irritated now that he had been so easily lost. He told them where the yachts were and added, "We'll have to let one down by a rope before we can connect it to the davits. It'll take a lot of pushing and pulling, a lot of muscle. Everybody up on the hill, including the children!"

Wearily, they climbed up the slope to the top and shoved one of the 'rollers up the slight incline of the depression to the lip of the hill. Green picked up one of the wet ropes lying on the ground and pa.s.sed it around the tree. Its trunk had a groove where many ropes had worn a path during similar operations. One end he gave to half of the party, putting Miran in charge of them. The other end he tied in a bowknot to a huge iron eye which projected from the stern of the craft. Then, ordering the other half of the women to help him push, he got the 'roller over the lip and down the slope, while the rope gang slowly released the double loop around the tree in short jerks.

When the craft had halted by the davits, Green untied the rope. His next step would be to back the yacht in between the davits so that he could hook up its ropes and lift it. Fortunately, there was a winch and cable for this. Unfortunately, the winch was hand-operated and had been allowed to get rusty. It would work only with great resistance and with loud squeaking. Not that more noise mattered, for the party had made so much that only the fact that the wind was from the east could have kept the savages in ignorance of the survivors' whereabouts.

It was as if his thinking of them had brought them upon the scene. Grizquetr, who'd been stationed in a tree as a sentinel, called down, "I see a torch! It's somewhere in the woods, about half a mile away. Oh! There's another one! And another one!"

Green said, "Do you think they're on the path that leads here?"

"I don't know. But they're coming this way, winding here and there, wandering like Samdroo when he was lost in the Mirrored Mazes of Gil-Ka-Ku, The Black One! Yes, they must be on the path!"

Green began feverishly tying the davit-ropes to the axles of the craft. He sweated with anxiety and cursed when his fumbling fingers got in the way of his haste. But the tying of the four bowknots actually took less than a minute, in spite of the way time seemed to race past him.

That done he had to order off the yacht some of the women who had climbed aboard. Only the women who had to take care of very small infants and the older children were to be on that boat.

"Just who do you think is going to work the winch?" he barked at the too-eager. "Now, jump to it!"

One of the women on the 'roller wailed, "Are you going to stay on the island and leave us all alone on this 'roller in the midst of the Xurdimur?"

"No," he answered, as calmly as possible. "We're going to lower you to the ground. Then we're going back up the hill and shove the other 'rollers over the edge so that they can't be used by the savages to come after us. Well jump off and walk back to you."

Seeing that the women were still not convinced and softened by their pitiable looks, he called to Grizquetr.

"Come down! And get on the boat!"

And when the boy had run down the slope and halted by his side, breathing hard and looking up at him for his orders, Green said, "I'm delegating you to guard these women and babies until we arrive. Okay?"

"Okay," said Grizquetr, grinning, his chest swelling because of the importance of the duty. "I'm captain until you climb aboard, is that it?"

"You're a captain and a good one too," said Green, slapping him lightly on the shoulder. Then he ordered the winches turned until the 'roller was hoisted into the air a few inches. As soon as the rusty machines had groaningly fulfilled their functions he had the craft lowered over the edge and down to the plain. The transition was smoothly made; the yacht's wheels began turning; the nose lifted only slightly because of the superior pull on the ropes tied to the bow; the stern ropes were paid out a little to equalize the strain; then, obeying Green's gesture, the women aboard it pulled at the bowknots, which untied simultaneously. Not until then did he breathe a little easier, for if one or more had refused to slip loose as swiftly as another, the craft might have been pulled up on one side or dragged around by either end and thus capsized.

For a few seconds he watched the 'roller slip away, coasting on its momentum but headed at right angles to the direction of the island. Then it had stopped, and it began to grow smaller as the island left it behind. From it came the thin wailing of his daughter Paxi. It broke the spell that momentarily held him. He began running up the slope, shouting, "Follow me!"

Reaching the crest of the hill ahead of the others, he took time for a glance through the woods. Sure enough, torches bobbed up and down and flickered in and out as they pa.s.sed between tree trunks. And there were drums beating somewhere on the island.

Lady Luck shot out of the woods, leaped upon Green's knee, scaled his shirt front and came to rest upon his shoulder. "Ah, you wandering wench, you," he said, "I knew you couldn't stay away from my irresistible charm, now could you?"

Lady Luck didn't reply but gazed anxiously at the forest.

"Never fear, my pretty little one," he said. "They'll not touch a hair of my fine blond head. Nor a silky black one of yours."

By then the others, puffing and panting, had gained the top of the hill. He set them to pushing on the stern of a yacht, and in a minute they had sent it headlong down the hill. When it rushed over the edge and disappeared with a crash on the plain below they had all they could do to restrain their cheers. Small revenge for the suffering they'd had to undergo. But it was something.

"Now for the other," said Green. "Then everybody run as if the demons of Gil-Ka-Ku were on your tails!"

Grunting, they pushed the last 'roller up the little incline, then gathered their strength for the final heave that would launch it, too, upon its last voyage.

And at that moment some savages who'd been running ahead of the torch-bearers burst out of the woods.

Green took one look and realized that they would get between the edge of the island and his party. There were about ten of them; they not only outnumbered his own force but were strong men against women. And they had spears, whereas his people were armed mainly with cutla.s.ses.

Green didn't waste any time in meditation. "Everybody aboard except Miran and me!" he said loudly. "Don't argue! Get in! We're riding through them! Lie flat on the deck!"

Screaming, the women scrambled over the low rail and onto the deck. As soon as the last one was on, the Earthman and Miran put their shoulders to the stern and pushed. For a second it looked as though their combined strength would not be enough, as if the party should have shoved the craft a little further over the lip of the hill before stopping.

"There's not time to get them out again to help us!" panted Green. "Dig in, Miran, get that fat into gear, shove, d.a.m.n you, shove!"

It seemed to him that he was breaking his own collarbone under the pressure and that he'd never felt such hard and cutting wood in all his life. And it seemed that the 'roller was stubbornly refusing to move until the cannibals arrived in time to save it, like the Marines. His legs quivered, and his intestines, he was sure, were writhing about like snakes, striking here and there against the wall of his belly, seeking a weak place where they might erupt through into the open air and leave this man who subjected them to such toil.

There was a shout from the warriors a.s.sembled below and a thud of their feet as they charged up.

"Now or never!" shouted Green.

His face felt like one big blood vessel, and he was sure that he was going to blow his top, literally. But the 'roller moved forward, crept slowly, groaned-- or was that he?-- and began moving swiftly, too swiftly, down the slope. Too swiftly, because he had to run after it, grab the taffrail and haul himself over. And while he was doing that be had to extend a hand to Miran, who wasn't as fast on his feet.

Fortunately Amra had presence of mind enough to grab Miran by the shoulder of his shirt and help pull. Over the rail he came, crying out in pain as his big stomach burned against the hard mahogany, but not forgetting the bag of jewels clutched in his hand.

Lady Luck had already deserted her post on Green's shoulder when he began pushing. Now she meowed softly and pressed against him, scared at the shaking of the deck and the rumbling of the wheels as the craft sped downhill.

He pulled her to him in the protection of the crook of his arm, and reared up on his elbow to see what he could see. What he saw was a spear flying straight at him. It shot by so close he fancied he could feel the sharp edge of its blade graze him, and there was nothing of his imagination about the woman's scream that rose immediately afterward. It sounded so much like Amra that he was sure she'd been hit; however, he had no time to turn and find out. An islander had appeared by the side of the yacht, and as the deck was on a level with his chest, the fellow could see them all easily enough. His arm view back, then leaped forward, and the spear he held darted straight at Green.

No, not at him, but at Lady Luck. Another warrior, a little further down the slope, screaming something, also thrust at the cat. Evidently felines were no longer taboo upon this island. The former worshipers considered that their totem had deserted them and therefore deserved death.

Lady Luck, however, had the traditional nine lives. None of the razor sharp blades came very close to her. And in the next few seconds the savages were left howling upon the slope or lying unconscious on the spot where the 'roller had struck them. The vessel sped down the steep incline, b.u.mped hard as it roared out upon the stone shelf, and flew into the air. Green flattened himself out against the deck, hoping thus to dampen the effect of the three-foot drop onto the plain.

Somehow he became separated from the deck, was floating in the air, and saw the planks rushing up at him.

There was a brief interlude of darkness before Green awoke and realized that the meeting of the deck and his face had done the latter no good at all and might have resulted in considerable damage. He was sure of it when he spit out his two front teeth. However, his pain was overwhelmed in the rush of joy at having escaped. For the island was retreating across the flat, moonlit Xurdimur while its inhabitants screamed and jumped with fury and frustration on the rim, unable to bring themselves to leap after the refugees. Home was where the island was, and they weren't going to get left behind for the sake of revenge.

"I hope the Vings exterminate you tomorrow," muttered Green. Wearily and painfully, he rose to his feet and surveyed what was left of the Clan Effenycan. Amra was unhurt. If it was she who'd screamed when the spear had pa.s.sed over Green, she'd done it from fright. The spear itself was sticking out from the base of the mast, its head half-buried in the wood.

He climbed over the side and inspected the damage done by the three-foot drop. One of the wheels had fallen off, and an axle was bent. Shaking his head, he spoke to the others, "This roller is done for. Let's start walking. We've a boat to catch."