The Ship That Sailed The Time Stream Part 27

There was not a single bunk with a mattress in it.

Every book, chart, binoculars, dividers, pencil, was gone from Joe's cubicle. Tools and spare parts were miss- ing from Rose's engine lockers.

Cups, plates, pots, spoons, knives, and forks had dis- appeared from the galley, along with the stove lids.

Not a can of food remained in stores. The lazarette had been emptied of the last grain of rye. Gorson and Cookie's empty foot lockers were gone. Even the port- hole curtains had departed.

"I can't run the ship this way," Joe said. "

"You'll run it this way or go back to your oar!"

"Then let's go," Joe said, and turned to leave the ship.

The Roman captain lost his air of certainty. "You want to be chained to that oar again?" he asked.

"Why promise what I cannot do? You've stolen too many pieces."

The Roman bit his lip and pondered. "Can you run it alone if I bring things back?"

"I don't know. Get every last sc.r.a.p back aboard and I'll try."

The Roman thought a moment. He suspected that if he could just understand some of this gadgetry it could be very useful. Burning her for iron, on the other hand, would scarcely pay his docking fees in Piraeus. "Which things do you need?" he asked.

Joe shrugged. "Each man in my crew has his own skill. I cast a horoscope and tell them which star to follow. They work the ship."

The Roman's face was settling back into the planes and angles of Roman intolerance. "And you alone can- not make this ship go?"

"I didn't say that," Joe said hastily. "But it will take longer. What do I need? How the h.e.l.l should I know?

I need everything. Do I get it or not?"

The other surveyed him a moment in frosty inde- cision. "All right," he finally grunted. "But none of your own men and no tricks." He rattled orders in a Greek too fast for Joe and nautae began overhanding the hawser. Joe glanced at the electric winch and shrugged.

Why run down batteries? After much heaving and grunting the Alice nuzzled up under the galley's stern.

The Roman captain climbed up the ladder.

Joe glanced at the sun. Another couple of hours day- light, he guessed. Since losing the s.e.xtant he'd had no way to set his watch. He glanced at it.

Why, the dirty thieving sons of b.i.t.c.hes!

It wasn't much of a watch but to Joe's father it had represented considerable sacrifice on the day his son graduated. In memory of this Joe had kept it long past the day when he could have afforded something better.

He thought fleetingly of his father-how hard the old man had worked, how easily the world had swindled him out of his meager earnings. And now the world had gotten away with his graduation present to his only son!

Joe squinted at the galley and decided it was time to stop seeing both sides of every question. He turned his attention to the six nautae who chattered to each other in some kind of Greek.

Jerking a peremptory thumb, he strode to the Alice's bow. "Down this hole," he growled. "Don't pile the anchor line on deck, you miserable philosophers." He poked a couple of feet through the deck eye and stood back. Nautae stared. "Get on the ball!" Joe roared, and drove his fist into the nearest nose.

Blood spouted and the sailor dropped into a crouch.

Joe stood erect, arms folded across his chest. The nauta knew a captain when he saw one. He shrugged and went to work.

The galley turned and lowered sail. Oars flashed raggedly as exhausted men took up the beat. The Alices people were still chained to them. What was he going to do?

They would have to wait until the stores were back aboard. Trying not to worry about Raquel, he went below.

The Romans had lifted the floorboard over the en- gine. Joe began studying the maze of pipes and valves, trying to figure out the short cuts Rose had taken when he shut off the galley stove. Why, he wondered, weren't history teachers required to know more of practical mechanics?

They were nearly in the harbor now so he guessed he could safely open the valves which allowed sea water into the heat exchanger and out of the exhaust. How much fuel was left? The day tank gla.s.s showed half full, enough for two or three hours running. He opened the valve at its bottom and waited to see if anything around the engine started dripping. So far so good.

The lifter bar was up. Better leave it that way until the engine was spinning. What shape were the bat- teries in? Would it start?

He looked about the tiny compartment and breathed a silent prayer of thanks. The can of starting ether was still there, one of the few things the Romans hadn't pilfered. Nothing was dripping so he decided to leave all valves open. Was everything right now? Water valve open, exhaust gate valve open, lifter bar up . . . The engine should roar into life as soon as he switched in the starting batteries and dropped the lifter. Forgetting anything?

Holy h.e.l.l! Abruptly, he realized what was wrong.

They would have made good their escape this morning

if line hadn't fouled the screw. No wonder the galley hadn't been able to tow the Alice! How many hundred feet of line draped in tangled festoons from the yawl's screw?

A tuba blatted and he felt the Alice lose way. Moments later they tied to the pinnacle and the Alice was warped up alongside. The korax was lowered to her deck again and a working party started transferring the loot back.

Joe spent the next couple of hours frantically sorting and directing packers to deposit things somewhere near their proper place. It would take weeks to get things where they belonged. He suspected the Romans were holding out everything small enough to hide.

Eventually the double column ceased flowing back and forth across the korax. Joe s.n.a.t.c.hed a mattress and a couple of blankets and stuffed them into his cubicle.

He was thinking guiltily about the Alice's men still chained to oars.

Morning came and his problems were still there.

Nautae munched round loaves of bread. "Where's mine?"

Joe asked. They started to give him the stupid treat- ment again but something about the young man's stance made the mangle-nosed one reconsider. He produced Joe's loaf from the folds of his himation. Joe wolfed down his bun-much harder than he'd expected-and wondered if one was all the others had eaten. Probably.

Roman efficiency would make a galley slave's breakfast indivisible and as small as the difference between life and death.

He had to do something soon or he would be back pulling an oar without another chance. No use teaching Romans the fine points of sailing into the wind. The Roman captain expected a miracle that could be ac- complished only with the diesel. He turned abruptly to the nautae and stopped. He wanted to ask if there was a diver among them but couldn't remember the Greek. Come to think of it, he didn't remember the

word in Latin either. "Scitisne nature?" he finally asked.

They looked Greek and Greeks used to skindive for sponges. The man whose nose he'd flattened seemed to be some kind of a leader. "You," Joe said. "Down to the bottom and bring me a rock."

He was given the stupid act again. It worried Joe.

Maybe they really didn't understand Latin. But sweet reasonableness was not characteristic to commanders of this period. Joe pushed the man overboard.

The nauta hit the water with arms and legs going like windmills. A second later he came up gasping. "Swim, d.a.m.n it!" Joe growled. The nauta was putting on a good act. He choked and swallowed water before go- ing down again. Several seconds pa.s.sed this time before his head broke water and the Greek's pasty complexion finally convinced Joe. Disgustedly, Joe tossed a line.

The Greek was too far gone to grab it.

"Everything happens to me," he growled, and jumped in. A moment later he had the line secured around the unconscious nauta and those aboard dropped their stu- pid act long enough to pull them in.

It took several minutes of Holger-Nielsen pumping before the Greek finally coughed and vomited a half gallon of water along with his breakfast. "Go back aboard the galley," Joe said when the Greek sat up.

"Stay there and tell the skipper to send me a-" d.a.m.n it, what was the word for diver? "-someone who hunted sponge." The nauta nodded sickly and vomited once more before crossing the korax.

Joe waited but there was no sign of a replacement for the waterlogged nauta. "d.a.m.n them all," he grunted and went to sorting the Alice's stores. Somewhere there had been a diving outfit. The air tanks were long since empty but with the faceplate Joe might be able to hack away a few strands of nylon between breaths.

But where was the faceplate?

He found the tanks and regulator buried in a pile

of gear dumped in the Alice's c.o.c.kpit, but the face mask was still gone.

The more Joe thought about it the madder he got.

He swung himself onto the korax and marched across, down the catwalk and aft to the quinquereme's p.o.o.p- deck. "Where's the magister of this bucket?" he roared.

The oarmaster appeared and rasped something in Greek. Joe stiffened his arms to keep from killing the man who'd whipped him. "I defecate on your meta- physical tongue," he said. "Can't you speak Latin?"