Watson, Ian - Black Current 01 (29 page)

 
          
"Wait.
One thing more.
We haven't discussed the motives of
the Sons enough.
Their beliefs."

 
          
"So?
You can turn that one loose on the savants and nitpickers up Ajelobo way."

 
          
"We
may indeed."

 
          
"Marvellous!
That'll amuse us while we're on guard duty, and exploding ourselves and dying
messily. I wonder how many cords of wood they'll need to print their
fantasies?
"

 
          
Poula
remained patiently
sitting
.
Reluctantly
a few 'jacks sat down again.
Not Moustache, though.

 
          
"You
have to know what your enemy thinks," she said. "One key to this
is,
what the black current is."

 
          
"What
it
was,
you mean."

 
          
"Is still!
Coiled up as it is, within
the Precipices."

 
          
"Who
cares? Sod all effect it has on the river now."

 
          
"Yet
it still reaches into all of us, who are of the river," Poula said
patiently.

 
          
Moustache
looked blank.

 
          
"I
assure you of that, Mister 'Jack. May I vomit if I lie, or betray."

 
          
"What
on earth are you talking about? What's wrong with you?"

 
          
Poula
was shivering. Her face had blanched. She bit her lip. Moustache stared hard at
her then nodded—as though persuaded, of something at least. Abruptly Poula
fainted and keeled over. Her neighbour tended her, tucking a cushion under her
head.

 
          
"Okay,
so I'm impressed," said Moustache. "What conclusions am I meant to
draw?"

 
          
Tamath
took over again.
A little too slickly for my taste, as though
this incident—genuine though I knew it to be—had been rehearsed beforehand.
"And the key to the current/' she said, "
must
be in its head. Where else? Tambimatu tell us that its mouth gapes open."
I mistrusted her tone mightily. "An open gateway is an invitation."

 
          
"To
be swallowed?" Moustache laughed. "Maybe its mouth just stuck in that
position. Maybe it's dead."

 
          
"In
that case, Poula would not have felt so sick and fainted."

 
          
"Poo
to that," said the florid-faced 'jack. "Some folk believe an idea
strong
enough,
they can make their own hair fall
out."

 
          
Yet
Moustache looked impressed despite himself. "So the thing has a key stuck
in its throat. What of it?"

 
          
"We
will send someone through that open mouth to investigate. We will send the only
person who claims to have talked to it. We'll send
her."

 
          
Me.

 
          
I'm
sure if Poula had been conscious she would have announced this with less
vindictive relish.

 
          
Moustache
guffawed.
"Heh heh!
That's one better than
sending her up a jacktree without a line."

 
          
But
the 'jack with broken veins looked troubled. "Hang on a bit! Is it in our
interests to have that thing meddled with? I say leave well alone! After a bite
to eat, it might revive."

 
          
The
'jack with his cherry stain broke in. "Let's face it: what's going on is
an invasion.
An invasion by barbarians—who'll probably like
you and me just as much as they like the ladies here.
If jumping into
the thing's mouth helps us any, I say we should welcome it."

 
          
"Another
reason for honouring Yaleen with this special mission," added Tamath, with
a nasty smile, "is that she seems to have a certain talent for survival.
For popping up again.
For being regurgitated."

 
          
Which did nothing to diminish the very hollow feeling I had in my
tummy. . . .

 
          
The
next day the 'jacks did give their answer, though I wasn't present myself; and
the answer was yes. Yes, they would transform their guild into an army to
defend Guineamoy. Yes, they would liberate Verrino. Not try to. They
would
liberate it. When a 'jack decided
to fell a tree, that tree fell.

 
          
So
a day later the
Blue Guitar
set sail
for Tambimatu with everyone on board in relatively cheerful mood. Now that
Tamath had won a victory or two, she was more relaxed. And when she told the
crew the purpose of our trip—that I had volunteered to enter the worm's
head—they eased off in their attitude to me. ("Just so long as we don't
have to pilot her personally," observed Zemia, who was up and about now
and hobbling on a crutch. "No, no," Tamath hastened to assure her.
"The black ketch will carry Yaleen.") Even Hali softened her heart
towards me, and became less abrasive.

 
          
Ah,
my chance to save the guild!
To be a heroine, pure and
simple.
Or a dead one.

 
          
During
that voyage I often found myself recalling my glimpses of the lunatic head: the
blind eyes, the mouth dripping glue ... I tried not to dwell on this, but I had
time on my hands. I was forbidden to undertake any strenuous duties—just in
case I broke a leg, accidentally on purpose.

 
          
So
I spent my spare hours reading the
Blue
Guitars
small library of Ajelobo romances, studying the antics of their
heroines and heroes in disbelief. Nobody ever asked
them
to stuff themselves down a giant dripping gob. Now that some
days had lapsed since the plan was mooted, it seemed the height of craziness to
try to communicate with the worm by this means. What would
you
think if a bug tried to make friends with you by leaping into
your mouth? The venture seemed ever more like some primitive rite of human
sacrifice; oh yes, I found a fine example of
that
in one romance—though naturally the heroine rescued her
boyfriend in the nick of time.

 
          
We
passed Port Barbra without putting into port. Soon we were approaching
Ajelobo,
source of those fantasies which had delighted me
once; Ajelobo, whose wiser residents would soon be set the nut to crack, of
whether we were free individuals or puppets. To gnaw at this nut, while 'jacks
died for freedom's sake; I could appreciate Moustache's sarcasm. No doubt
Ajelobo savants would still be debating when a tide of Sons rolled up the
river to answer them with steel and fire.
Long after
I'd
been digested as a worm's breakfast.

 
          
With
Ajelobo half a league ahead, Tamath came to where I was lounging in a
deck-chair; she was rubbing her hands contentedly.

 
          
"Signal
just came. The first lot of 'jacks are sailing. Isn't that great?"

 
          
"Great,"
I agreed. "And what happens when they've won Verrino? Will they go back
to chopping wood? Will they disband of their own accord?"

           
"If the current doesn't return,
I suppose we'll need a garrison in every town from the Bayou northwards.
For a while, at least."

 
          
"For a while—or forever?
We'll need a standing army,
Guildmis- tress, and our river guild to serve it. That's quite a change."

 
          
"In
that case we might have to
invade
the
west, and depose those Sons."

 
          
"That's
no answer, either. What price the rules of marriage afterwards? What of the
wander-weeks for girls? What of men staying put? What of
The
Book?
All down the drain."

 
          
"Yaleen,
you're forgetting the economic power of our guild."

 
          
"And
you're forgetting how that power depends on us having a monopoly! I don't see
any way back to where we were before.
Paradise
is lost, because the worm has gone."

 
          
"In
that case," said Tamath tightly, "it had damn well better come back.
You'll see to that, won't you, dear? Then you'll be promoted to 'mistress, just
like me."

 
          
"Oh
sure, I'll see to it. Dead easy, really! I just pat it on its snout, gaze soulfully
into its eyes and ask, 'Is 00 sick, Wormy? What medicine makes 00 well? Me? Am
I oo's medicine, Wormy?
Tell-ums, then!'"

 
          
Tamath
slapped me briskly on the cheek, and strode away. Soon there was cheering on
deck, and up aloft, as she shouted out the decoded signal.

 
          
With
watering eyes I returned to my romance,
The
Cabin Girl and the Cannibal
One by one I tore out pages, folded them into
darts and launched them over the rail. Soon we had a little paperchase behind
us; though nothing much compared with the expanse of water.

 
          
Tambimatu
again! The Precipices soaring up through the clouds; spinach
puree
humping up against a town which couldn't see beyond its own roofs nodding
together . . . Jewels and muck.

 
          
I
blew my accumulated cash, upwards of sixty fish, on a splendid diamond ring. If
I was doomed to plunge into foul saliva, I might as well be properly dressed
for the occasion—if only on one finger.

 
          
The
guild had other notions of how I should costume myself for the encounter.
Somebody must have had a fine sense of irony: the guild had prepared a sort of
diving suit.

 
          
"For
your protection, Yaleen," explained Maranda, the squat, bland
quaymistress; she who had skippered us to the Precipices and back, the year
before. On a table in her office rested a glass helmet, a tight pigskin bodice
with a brass collar to clamp the helmet to, and lots of straps on the back; and
a tough belt with a padlock of a snaplink.

 
          
"Why
not naked, rubbed with costly oils and unguents?" I'd found the
"unguent" in
The Cabin Girl and
the Cannibal
It sounded sexy.

 
          
"You
might need air, Yaleen. We've considered the way your brother crossed the
river. See this valve here, in the glass? You'll carry several compressed air
bottles linked in series on your back— enough for two hours. The finest
craftsmen in Tambimatu have made them. The bottles are going through final
trials right now."

 
          
"Are
they of gold and silver?"

 
          
"And
there'll be a long rope fixed to this harness, so we can pull you out."

 
          
"Oh,
won't I just be the fly on the angler's line! Shouldn't I have a hook in my
ribs? So you can winch the whole worm out of its hidey-hole, when it bites?
Then the good boat
Nameless
can tug
it downstream all the way to Umdala."

 
          
"I'm
glad to see you've braced your spirit for what may prove something of an
ordeal."

 
          
"Ordeal?
Gosh, I'm used to it! The only thing that
mildly worries me is
,
how will it
hear
me through the helmet?"

 
          
"You
can set your mind at rest on that score. If there's no result, we'll send you
in again without a helmet. Now here's the lamp you'll use. . . ."

 
          
At
least this time, unlike my first trip to the head of the river, we would be
dispensing with any banquets or solemn hoo-hah. Who needed them? For some
curious indefinable reason I felt quite off my food—and as for solemnity,
whatever flip badinage I might utter, you can believe I felt solemn enough
inside.
In the pit of my tummy.