The Virgin of Zesh & the Tower of Zanid (6 page)

VI

Pensively pulling his lip, Gottfried Bahr said, “I suppose the thing to do is to explore this island until we find someone.”

“ ’Twill not be necessary,” said Kirwan. “Here comes my gang now.”

A curious sound had reached Althea’s ears: a thin, high piping, as if someone were blowing across the tops of small bottles. There was a rustling and a waving of branches, and there burst from the vegetation a singular procession.

First came a short, stocky man with a nut-brown skin and the flat, slit-eyed face of the East Asiatic. A length of coarse brown cloth, resembling burlap, was wound about his body and held in place by safety pins. Sandals shod his feet, and a wreath of purple leaves rested upon his coarse, graying black hair. He helped himself along with a staff.

After this person came others, similarly clad. A young woman carried a bowl of fruit; a young man blew into a syrinx, producing the piping sound. There were about twenty altogether, the men bearded in varying degrees.

The wreathed man strode across the scorching sand to where the three new arrivals stood. In Portuguese he addressed them.

“Good day, senhora and senhores. Which of you is Brian Kirwan?”

“That’ll be me,” said Kirwan.

“In the name of the great Jean-Jacques Rousseau, I welcome you to the Isle of Freedom. I was formerly known as Diogo Kuroki, but here my name is Zeus. You, senhor, shall be known as Orpheus. And who are these? More recruits?”

“No,” said Kirwan, and introduced his companions.

“Oh, scientists,” said Kuroki, as though Althea and Bahr were lower organisms. “Welcome to the ranks of the natural men, Senhor Orpheus.”

The piper tootled. The girl with the bowl of fruit presented it to Kirwan. Another Roussellian produced another wreath and placed it on Kirwan’s head. Then everybody shook Kirwan’s hand as Kuroki introduced them: Senhor Hermes, Senhora Aspasia, Senhor Platon, Senhor Dionysos, Senhorita Nausikaa, and so on.

Bahr finally spoke up.
“Por favor,
Senhor Zeus, as we—Senhorita Althea Merrick and I—may be here for some time, we should like to make some arrangement for living.”

“Nobody is hindering you from living, senhor,” said Kuroki.

“I mean for eating and sleeping,” said Bahr with audible irritation.

“We do not run a hotel,” said Kuroki. “If you like, however, you may work for your keep.”

“Work?” said Bahr, frowning. “I can pay a reasonable rate . . .”

“Your money is no good to us, senhor. We are cut off from all contaminating commercial contacts here. We rely entirely upon our own efforts. What we do need is assistance in wringing a living from the soil of Zesh.”

“What sort of assistance?” said Bahr.

“That depends upon the need of the moment. For instance, the crop of badr that we planted last ten-night is just coming up, so I imagine that you would be put to weeding.”

Bahr exchanged grim looks with Althea. Kirwan, his mouth full of the tunest that he had taken from the bowl, was chattering in his horrible Portuguese with a couple of the better-looking younger women, rendering them helpless with laughter.

Kuroki raised his voice, “My children, let us return to Elysion!”

The piper began to tweetle. Kuroki, moving his staff at arm’s-length, strode majestically back toward the forest. The others fell into line.

Althea, seeing that she and Bahr would be ignored, picked up her bag and hurried to the head of the line.

“Senhor Kuroki,” she said.

The cult leader frowned. “Senhorita, it was clearly explained to you that my name is Zeus.”

“Senhor Zeus, then. We learned something just as we left the ship that should interest you.”

“Sim?”

Althea told Kuroki about the note from the sailor, disclosing the impending attack upon Zá and Zesh by the Daryava. She showed him the note. Kuroki frowned in thought for some seconds, then said, “It might or might not be true. Your sailor friend may have merely wished to seem to discharge his debt to you and so invented this tale.”

“But there were those crates of weapons . . .”

“Oh, the island nations of the Sadabao are always buying weapons from Majbur. The city is a great manufacturing center, whereas the islands are mostly without mineral resources. Moreover, senhorita, even if the story were true, I don’t think that the Dasht of Darya would dare to land on Zesh so long as we are here, for fear of becoming embroiled with Novorecife. While I try to keep our relationships with decadent Terran civilization to a minimum, I cannot deny that Terran prestige among the Krishnans is convenient at times.” Kuroki allowed a faint smile to light his impassive face.

“But aren’t you going to evacuate the island?”

“Senhorita, if you knew the troubles that I have had and the bureaucratic obstacles that I have overcome in getting this colony established, you would not make such a silly suggestion. Live or die, here we will stay.”

“Do you propose to fight the Daryava, then?” asked Althea.

“Of course not. In the first place, we should only annoy them and assure our own extermination—assuming that this fanciful invasion of yours does come to pass. In the second, war is against our principles. Natural man lived in peace and friendship before he was corrupted by the evils of civilization.”

“How about warning the Záva?”

“No. We will remain strictly neutral, so that nobody can accuse us of taking sides.”

Althea fell silent. Kuroki’s statement about the peacefulness of primitive man was not in accordance either with the teachings of Ecumenical Monotheism or with the scientific account of prehistory, of which she had received a smattering. But she did not think it wise to argue with the man who controlled the food supply.

The procession wound up a steep trail from the beach to the plateau. It continued along a level, through the trees, for a half-kilometer and came out upon a large cleared area. Amid the fields, Althea saw a clump of shade trees, which had been left standing when the area was cleared. Among the bases of these trees rose a cluster of huts.

People were visible. As Kirwan had said, they were naked, but they were not dancing. On the contrary, they were busily hoeing, raking, and otherwise tilling the soil of Zesh. As Althea came closer, she saw that they were all dark brown of skin, either naturally or from long exposure to the sun. They glanced up as the procession, the piper still tootling, marched in among the huts, but returned to their work with furtive haste.

One structure was larger than the rest. As they passed its open door, Althea saw the backs of a number of children. This, she thought, must be the school and meeting house.

“Here,” said Diogo Kuroki, indicating a hut. “This one is empty. You newcomers may occupy it for the nonce.”

Althea looked at Kuroki in alarm. Such a living arrangement would complete the ruin of whatever reputation she still bore among the missionaries of Ecumenical Monotheism. She asked. “Couldn’t you put me in with one of the women?”

“Why?”

“I’m not married to either of these gentlemen.”

“Married? We don’t bother with such artificial formalities, senhorita. This is the best that we can do. If you prefer to sleep in a tree, you are welcome to do so. As soon as we get some more houses finished and Senhor Orpheus chooses a mate, he will no doubt move out. Then you and Senhor Bahr can decide what you wish to do. In any case, we do not encourage the celibate life here—”

Kuroki’s speech was interrupted by a shout. Two running cultists rounded the corner of one of the huts. The second was chasing the first with a hoe.

Kuroki shouted “Stop!” but the pair kept on without heeding, the second swinging his implement at the head of the first. As they passed out of sight around another hut, Kuroki said, “What are they fighting about this time?”

One of the girls spoke up, “They are rivals for the love of Senhora Psyche.”

“I thought Psyche was Aristotle’s mate?” said Kuroki.

“She is, but they hope to persuade her to leave him for one of them.”

“I’ll fine them a week’s leisure for behaving in such a civilized manner! He might break a good hoe. All right, you newcomers, you shall have a quarter-hour to move in. Then report to Senhor Diomedes here for work. Remember the rules: no shirking, no irregularities or non-cooperation, no unauthorized contact with Záva or other outsiders. That is all.”

The procession broke up, the participants trailing off about their various concerns. Althea, followed by Bahr and Kirwan, entered the designated hut. This was a one-room affair with a dirt floor and four crude beds. Kirwan, setting down his bag, said, “Bedad, the triumphal welcome didn’t last long.”

“It seems to me,” said Bahr, “that you will be compelled to work harder and longer here than you ever were on Earth.”

“Oh, that’s because they don’t appreciate my genius yet. Just wait.”

A quarter-hour later, the three were out in the central plaza again. Presently Senhor Diomedes, a stout, bald, and uncommonly muscular man, with a great mass of curly graying beard sweeping his hairy chest, appeared without his ceremonial cloak. Two others came with him. He said, “Senhor Orpheus, our irrigation-water supply is low, so you shall spend the afternoon filling the tank from the well bucket. Senhor Achilles will show you how.” (Kirwan groaned.) “Senhor Gottfried, your help is required by Senhor Thales, our carpenter. Senhorita Althea, the badr field needs weeding. Come along, please.”

Althea followed the overseer out to the field, where he pressed a hoe into her hand.

“Now,” he said, “you simply walk down one row and up the other, and wherever you see any plant but a shoot of badr you hoe it up. Go ahead—
hey,
that’s a badr plant you destroyed! Be careful!”

“I can’t tell the difference,” said Althea, to whom the mass of little green and brown and purple things all looked alike.

“I shall explain.” Senhor Diomedes picked up the little seedling that Althea had ignorantly hoed up and pointed out its physical attributes, compared with those of the weeds. “Now, when you come to one of these,” he said, pulling up another plant, “you must tear it up by the roots. It’s so viable that, if even a bit of root is left, it will grow again. This kind you must collect and burn, because it will take root again if left lying on the ground. This kind you must be careful with, because it shoots out little poisoned darts when disturbed. They can make you quite sick. This one has a bladder that bursts, releasing a horrible stench, but it will not injure you . . .”

After more instruction, Althea thought that she had the hang of the job. Diomedes said, “Good; I knew you were an intelligent—
look out!
You’re getting too close to the badr, stupid!”

“Sorry,” said Althea. “How long must I keep at this?” The hoe was already feeling heavy.

“Until sunset. A bell will ring.”

Althea let a small sigh escape. “That seems like a long working day.”

“My dear young lady, did you think a colony like this can thrive on a pre-industrial basis with
less
work than in a mechanized society? On the contrary, we have to work twice as hard to attain a much lower standard of living. We work from sunrise to sunset, with not more than one day in ten off, and hope that diseases or flocks of aqebats won’t destroy our crops and starve us out.”

Althea looked at the man. “What were you before you came here?”

“My name was Aaron Halevi, and I was the assistant manager of the Bank of Israel in Tel-Aviv. My wife ran away with an Egyptian weight-lifter, and here I am—
hey!”
Diomedes bounded up and down, his pot-belly quivering. “Never whack at a stone that way! You’ll break your hoe, and they’re hard to replace. You pick the stone up and carry it to the edge of the field.”

“Where do you get your tools?”

“We trade them from the Záva for falat-wine. They are building up quite an industry on their island. Hey, look there! You missed a weed!”

“Sorry. I thought Zeus said you were entirely self-sufficient?”

Halevi shrugged. “We do our best, but there’s no local ore and no blacksmith.”

“Do you like this better than the bank?” asked Althea.

“No comparison! Here one can be a natural man, free—that is.” He lowered his voice, “It would be free if Zeus weren’t such a damned autocrat. Someday,” added Diomedes darkly, “there will be changes. Now, are there any more questions?”

“N-no, I think I know the job.”

“You could work more comfortably without those silly clothes, you know.”

“I suppose so, but as a missionary I can’t follow your suggestions.”

“Oho, so that’s it! I’m a Neo-Buddhist myself. Call me if you need me.”

Diomedes-Halevi strode off. Presently, Althea heard his penetrating voice raised in reprimand from another part of the farm. She concentrated on her weeds.

###

It seemed as though the long Krishnan day would never end. Diomedes dropped by once to see how she was doing, grunted approvingly, and waddled off.

When Roqir’s disk finally touched the horizon, a bell rang from the village. The other workers streamed back toward the huts. Althea found Bahr and Kirwan washing their faces in their hut. Kirwan, who now wore the himation of the cult, was loud in his complaints.

“Glory be to Peter and Paul, I told ’em all about meself, but did it make any difference? Devil a bit! ‘You work for your keep, me lad,’ says the boss, so here’s the great Brian Kirwan, a descendant of the high kings of Tara, sweating away like a bogtrotting peasant all afternoon. Just look at those blisters!”

“Look at mine!” said Bahr. “All day I have been pushing a saw and a plane, which I had not for forty years touched.”

Althea spoke up. “I don’t want to complain, but if everybody’s going to brag about their blisters, here are mine.”

“Ah, the black shame of it,” said Kirwan. “And you a delicately nurtured young lady! However, there’s one cure for that. In yonder bag are two bottles of the rarest old Irish poteen which I’ve been saving for such an occasion. I’ve dragged ’em clear from Earth, and with the freight rates what they are you’ll practically be drinking liquid gold.”

He began to rummage. After he had gone through the bag carefully several times, without finding the bottles, he leaped to his feet, fists clenched, shouting curses like a madman and stamping the earthen floor like a child in a tantrum. His screams and roars brought Diogo Kuroki to the hut.