The Hand of Zei

CHAPTER FOUR

The next he knew, Chask was shaking him.

"Sir," said the boatswain, "the wind drops and the galleys press upon our wake!"

Barnevelt sat up, blinking. Now that he noticed, the motion of the ship did seem less and the noise of wind and wave lower.

He went out. Although they were still bucking a swell from the north, the swells were smooth from lack of wind to ruffle them. There was just enough breeze to keep the sail filled. Chask had already put a full crew back on the oars.

Behind them, the galley loomed about as distant as when Barnevelt had gone into the cabin. No doubt the Shambor had drawn farther ahead after he went in and then lost some of her advantage with the dying of the wind. Moreover the second galley, which they had seen the previous day, was now in sight again, te masts alone visible save when a wave lifted the Shambor to an unusual height.

Without wind, the galleys would soon catch them. Ahead, no sign of the northern shores of the Banjao Sea appeared. Yet the sun was high; it must be around noon.

"Tell 'em to put their backs into it," said Barnevelt.

Chask replied, 'They do what they can, sir—but lack of water robs their sinews of their accustomed strength."

The reckoning indicated that, though Palindos Strait was not yet in sight, it must lie not far below the horizon. Careful estimates showed that they could just nip through the strait ahead of the following ship.

Chask said, "Then we shall be in the Sadabao Sea, but what will that avail us? For yon cut-throats will follow us even to the harbor of Damovang."

"True," said Barnevelt, frowning over his chart. "How about running ashore and taking to the woods?"

"Then they'll put ashore, too, to hunt us down, and with hundreds to carry on the search there's little doubt in my mind of its outcome. What else would ye?"

"How about doubling around one of the headlands of the Strait and hiding in a cove while we're out of sight?"

"Let's see, sir." Chask pointed a stubby finger at the chart. "The easterly shore of the Sadabao Sea, along here, is rocky and hard to draw nigh to without staving your bottom. The westerly has some rock, much open beach, and few places to hide. Fossanderan may have such coves upon its northern flank, but never will ye persuade ordinary seamen to go ashore on that accursed isle."

"Oh, foof! Are they afraid of the mythical beast-men?"

"No myth, Captain. At least I've heard the sound they say is the drums of these demons. And myth or no, the men would not obey."

Barnevelt went out again, to be greeted by a chorus of hoarse cries: "Water!"

"Water, Captain!"

"Water, we pray!"

"We demand water!"

The galley was crawling up once more. The wind had now ceased entirely save for an occasional light puff. The sail flapped limply, reminding Barnevelt of Chask's prediction of a week's calm.

He gave orders to ration out the men's noon sip of water, which he hoped would quiet them. Instead, they only grumbled the more for its paucity.

The galley was now all visible again, her oars rising and falling with mechanical precision now that the sea was comparatively smooth. The second galley, too, was closer.

A sailor in the bow called, "Land ho!"

There is was: a cluster of wooded peaks—the hills of Fos-sanderan. Barnevelt went back into the cabin to correct his reckoning and lay his course for the eastern channel. Zei watched him wordlessly with large dark eyes.

He ran over his jestimates again. This time it looked as though the galley would overhaul them in the throat of the eastern channel of the Strait. Then why keep trying? The usual hope for a miracle. The galley just might spring a seam or have a mutiny at the last minute…

Too bad the western channel wasn't deep enough to float the Shambor, so that he could lure the galley on to the bottom.

Well, wasn't it? With three moons in conjunction at full, Krishna would have record tides. And, while the tides in these seas were usually nothing much, because of the limited size of the seas and the complicated tidal patterns engendered by Roqir and the three moons, on this one occasion the tidal waves should all be in phase, producing a tide of Earthly dimensions.

Barnevelt got out the handbook he had bought in Novo-recife. The sight reminded him of Vizqash bad-Murani, the Krishnan clerk who had sold him the book. Vizqash had then tried to betray him into the hands of a gang of kidnappers or slayers on a picnic; had later, in the guise of a masked gentleman, started a riot in the tavern at Jazmurian; and finally had turned up as a pirate of the Sunqar, to ruin Barnevelt's neat getaway with Zei and Shtain.

Barnevelt had no doubt, now, that all these events were connected. The Morya Sunqaruma, he was sure, had had their eye on him ever since the Amazonas had landed him at Novorecife. He grinned at the thought that the very book that Vizqash had sold him might be the means of frustrating the fellow's knavish tricks.

The book, along with the rest of Barnevelt's gear, had been soaked when the Earthman had fallen through a hole in the terpahla during his flight. He found that he had to pry the pages—actually one long strip of paper folded zigzag—apart with care to avoid tearing them. Once opened up, however, the book was found to include not only tables for computing the revolutions of the moons, but also a table showing how much time the tidal waves caused by each luminary led or followed the movement of that moon in various places.

Majbur, Jazmurian, Sotaspe, Dur… Here it was, Palin-dos Strait. Barnevelt whooped when he saw that here Kar-rim's tide lagged behind that moon by less than a Krishnan hour, and the tides of Golnaz and Sheb by even smaller amounts.

"Chask!" he yelled.

Although Chask looked dubious, he had to admit that there was nothing to do but try the western channel, especially as they should hit it a little past noon. Then, and a little past midnight, were the times of the highest tides.

The Shambor swung to port and crept towards the channel, while the galleys crept towards the Shambor. The wooded hills of the peninsula that came down to the Strait from the west now rose into view. As they plodded over the glassy sea, the land rose higher until it looked as though the island were part of the mainland. Then, as they came still closer, the western passage opened out.

Still the galleys lessened their distance. Barnevelt looked back with a shiver. Would they have to duck another barrage of bolts and missiles?

One of the sailors called out, " 'Tis no use, Captain. We're spent!" Others joined the chorus of defeatism: "They'll take us long ere we reach sanctuary…"

"Let's give up on terms…"

"Shut up, all of you!" said Barnevelt. "I got you out before…"

At that moment a sailor—not Zanzir, but an older and bigger fellow—began to harangue the crew. "This haughty captain cares nought for you, but only for his royal doxy. Let's throw them to the fish…"

Barnevelt at the start of this speech drew his sword and walked towards the man. The latter, hearing his approach, spun round and reached for his knife. Others among the crew did likewise.

Barnevelt made his last two steps running and, before the mutineer could either stab or throw, struck the side of his head with the flat of his rapier. The man staggered side-ways, across the deck, through the gap in the rail left by the galley's catapult missile, and over the side. Splash!

"Anybody else?" he asked the crew.

Nobody answered. He walked up and down the catwalk, peering at the rowers. One whom he judged to be shirking he whacked on the bare back with the flat of his sword.

"Lay into it, you!"

They passed a rock. Barnevelt said, "Chask, take the tiller. Put a couple of men in the bow to take soundings. I'll go aloft—oh-oh!"

"What, sir?"

"Our new rig has no ratlines. Get me a hammer, some spikes, and a length of rope."

Presently Barnevelt, his implements dangling from him, began to shinny up the mast. It was a foul job, since all he had to climb by were the rope rings holding the luff of the sail to the mast, and these provided poor purchase. When he was about two-thirds of the way up, he drove a couple of spikes into the.mast and looped his rope from them to make a crude boatswain's chair. Though neither safe nor comfortable, he could now at least judge depths from the varying shades of green of the water ahead. From behind came the thump and splash of the galley's oars.

"A point to port," he called down. "Little to starboard. Steady as you go…"

Any minute the ship might touch ground, probably snapping him off his perch. He kept peering for patches of dark water. A slight tidal current through the Strait to northward helped the Shambor along.

When he found a good channel, he snatched a look aft. The galley was still coming up, also picking its way, and a couple of hoda behind it came its sister ship. The cries of men taking soundings in the galley drifted up to the Shambor like an echo of the calls of her own leadsmen in the bow, except that the figures were different.

Barnevelt concentrated on a bad patch, where pale-green shoals seemed to block his way completely.

A sudden outburst of yells came up to his ears, "She's aground! The pirate ship has struck!"

Ha! he thought, his scheme had worked. Still he dared not take his eyes off the water ahead. He'd feel foolish indeed if he lured the pirate aground only to strand himself a minute later.

A jerk of the mast told him the Shambor had touched, too. "Pull hard!" he shouted. "A hair to starboard!"

The oars dug in and the Shambor came free. Ahead lay all the dark-green water anyone could ask.

Barnevelt drew a long breath and looked back again. The galley was backing water furiously, the sea foaming about her oar blades. Behind her the second galley, in response to flag signals, had turned to starboard and now showed her profile heading east.

Barnevelt guessed that the second ship had received orders to go around by the eastern channel and try to catch the Shambor in the Sadabao Sea. Therefore it would not do to sail blithely on for Qirib as if their worries were over. Once the second galley sighted them in the open sea, they'd be in the same fix as before, without any shallow strait or north wind to rescue them.

What the Shambor needed was a hiding place where the water supply could be replenished. The men were not exaggerating their exhaustion. Barnevelt's own throat felt like something dug out of an Egyptian tomb. If his own sailors for superstitious reasons were afraid to land on Fossanderan, the pirates would probably feel the same way.

He told Chask, "Hard to starboard, and find me a cove on the north side of Fossanderan that might be the mouth of a stream."

"But Captain…"

"That's where we're going!"

Chask, shaking his head, swung the ship east. As they emerged into the Sadabao Sea, the promontories of Fossanderan hid the stranded galley. The breeze freshened a little. Sailing with the wind on the beam, they made good time along the rocky, wooded shores.

After most of a Krishnan hour, Barnevelt said, "That looks like a good place; a little valley that ought to have a stream."

"Say not I failed to warn you, sir," said Chask, and turned the Shambor shoreward.

At once the men, who had been very quiet since the mutineer had fallen overboard, set up an outcry: "The haunted isle!"

"Our mad captain's taking us to the home of the demons!"

"All's lost!"

"He must be a demon himself!"

"Anywhere but that!"

"We'd liefer forgo water!"

Again Barnevelt faced them down, though the oarsmen relaxed their efforts until they were merely dipping their oars in the water. That, however, made little difference, because the breeze wafted them shoreward.

"The first man who backs water without orders," said Barnevelt, "gets this. Zeil Come out. We're going ashore. Get out the buckets."

The Shambor nosed gently into the embayment until tree branches swept the deck and swished against the rigging. Chask ordered the sail and the anchor dropped and then hurried forward. Barnevelt dropped off the bow into knee-deep water and caught Zei as she climbed down.

He shouted, "Fresh water!" and pointed to where a little trickly stream spread itself out thinly over a small sandy delta. The men scurried to the bow to leap off also, drink, and fill buckets for the ship's water tank, which they passed to others on deck. Although he was as thirsty as they, a quirk of vanity made Barnevelt hold off from drinking untl everyone else had done so. He turned a grin to Zei.

"We'll tell old Qvansel his three moons did save our skins— not by occult astrological forces, but by the good old force of gravity."

Chask came ashore last. He walked up to Barnevelt swinging an axe, and said, "I like this not, Captain. We should all be armed in case the beast-men appear. Yet with the crew in its present temper 'twere folly to serve out arms to 'em. Besides, we're low on stove wood, and methought…"

Barnevelt said, "I haven't heard any spirits of the waste and weald moan— Hey, what goes on?"

In a concerted movement, all the sailors rushed back to the Shambor and scrambled aboard. Before Barnevelt and Chask could even reach the ship, they were hoisting the anchor and backing water vigorously. The ship started to move.

Barnevelt and Chask seized the anchor before it disappeared over the gunwale and pulled on it, as though two men could counteract the thrust of fourteen vigorously wield-ed oars. Suddenly the tension in the anchor rope ceased, and Barnevelt and Chask sat down with a splash. Somebody had cut the rope.

As Barnevelt sat foolishly in the shallow water, the Shambor receded rapidly, the sailors jeering: "Fare thee well, Captain!"

"May the demons give you pleasant dreams!" And Zanzir, loudest of all: "We thank you for the fine ship, Captain. We'll make our fortunes in't!"

There was no use swimming after the Shambor, which backed out into open water, hoisted sail, and swung round to head off northeast, close-hauled. Soon she was out of sight, leaving Barnevelt, Zei, and Chask on the doubtful shores of the island of Fossanderan.