The Queen of Zamba

IV.

Hasselborg thought he was a dead man, until he realized that his hidden mail shirt had stopped the point and that his foe's blade was bent up into an arc. Then his highly educated reflexes came to his rescue. He braced himself and pushed back against the push of the sword, wrapped his left arm around the blade, and heaved upward. The soldier's sword flew out of his hand, to turn over and over in the air as it fell.

The soldier's mounted companion shouted: "Ao!" but Hasselborg had no time to devote to him. His right hand had been seeking a pocket. As he stepped forward, the dagger in his opponent's left shot out to meet him. Even faster, Hasselborg's own left seized the fellow's wrist and jerked it forward and to the side, so that the soldier took a step that brought him almost body to body.

Then, Hasselborg's right hand came out of his jacket pocket with the knuckle duster. A right hook to the jaw landed with a meaty sound, and the soldier's knees buckled. After another punch, Hasselborg dropped the brass knucks and snatched his own dagger, forgotten till now.

A blow from behind knocked him to his knees over the body of the soldier. That lance! He rolled over, dragging the feebly struggling soldier on top of him, and found the man's neck with the point of the dagger.

The shomal was mincing around as its rider tried to get into position for another lance thrust, which he found difficult now that Hasselborg was using his companion for a shield. Hasselborg yelled:

"Lay off, or I'll slit your pal's throat!"

"Gluck," said the soldier. "He's killing me!"

The mounted man pulled back a pace. Hasselborg got to his knees again, still holding the dagger ready.

"Now what'll I do with you?" he said.

The soldier replied: "Slay me, I suppose, since you dare not let me go."

"I can't." He was thinking of a scheme which, though corny, might work on the naive Krishnans.

"Why not?" The soldier's lugubrious expression and tone brightened at once.

"Because you're the man."

"What mean you?"

"My astrologer told me I'd get into a fight with a guy like you, whose death horoscope was the same as mine. When were you born?"

"Fourth day, eleventh month of the fifty-sixth year of the reign of King Ghojasvant."

"You're it, all right. I can't kill you because that'd mean my own death on the same day, and conversely."

"Mean you that if I slay you I doom myself to death on the same day?" asked the man gravely.

"Exactly. So we'd better call it off; follow me?"

"Right you are, Master Kavir. Let me up."

Hasselborg released him and quickly recovered his own weapons lest the soldiers start more trouble. However, his victim pulled himself up with effort, tenderly rubbing the places where he had been struck.

"You all but broke my jaw with that brass thing," he grumbled. "Let me look at it. Ah, a useful little device. See, Kaikovarr?"

"I see," said the other soldier. "Had we known you wore mail under that coat, Master Kavir, we'd have not wasted our thrusts upon it. 'Twas hardly fair of you."

Hasselborg said: "It's just as well, though, isn't it?

Looks as though we'd have to be friends whether we want to or not, because of that horoscope."

The dismounted soldier said: "That I'll concede, as the unha said to the yeki in the fable." He sheathed his weapons and walked unsteadily to his kneeling shomal. "If we let you go with your goods, you'll make no mention of our little now-difference?"

"Of course not. And likewise if I hear you're in trouble, I'll have to try to help you out—what's your name, by the way?"

"Garmsel bad-Manyao. Hear this: It was reported that you were asking questions at Asteratun's Inn last night—a rash deed in Rüz, though with that letter I suppose you're in order." He turned to his companion. "Let's be off; this place is ill-starred for us."

"The gods give you a good journey!" said Hasselborg cheerfully. They growled something hardly audible and trotted away.

No doubt Qam had reported him to these birds, Hasselborg thought as he watched them grow small in the distance. This local spy-mania would complicate matters. If questions were dangerous ipso facto, he couldn't walk in on the local shamus for a cozy chat as to the whereabouts of Fallon and his paramour.

He finished his lunch, the excitement of his recent encounter subsiding as he pondered his next move. Then he resumed his ride, still thinking. To do a good job, he reflected, he should have a tum-tum tree, but Krishna seemed to lack them.

Hours later, as he approached Rosid, men could be seen working in the cultivated strips. He also passed side roads and more traffic, people walking or riding and driving the remarkable assortment of saddle and draft animals domesticated on Krishna. Some of these beasts pulled carriages of ingenious or even fantastic design.

The sun was nearing the horizon in one of the marvelous Krishnan sunsets when the cheerful sight of a row of gallows trees, complete with corpses, told Hasselborg he was entering the outskirts of the city, reminding him of the verse:

"The only tree that grows in Schotland Is the bonnie gallows tree—"

In the distance, the sun touched the onion-shaped domes of the city proper with orange and red.

Hasselborg spotted another house, bigger than the suburban bungalows, with an animal skull over the door.

This time the innkeeper proved a silent fellow who made no effort to introduce Hasselborg to his other guests. These guests huddled in small groups and talked in low tones, leading Hasselborg to suspect that he'd stumbled upon a place frequented by questionable characters. That bulky fellow in the corner with the horn-rimmed glasses, for instance, might be another innocent passerby; or again he might be a plainclothes cop keeping an eye on Rosid's underworld.

Hasselborg got a wall seat. He ate a palatable if still mysterious meal alone, until a young man who had been idling at the bar came over and said pleasantly; "Sarhad am I; the stars give you luck. You're new here, I think?"

"Yes," said Hasselborg.

"Mind you?" The youth seated himself beside Hasselborg before the latter could reply. "Some of our old-timers wax tiresome when they drink. Now me, I know when I've had enough; too much spoils your hand in my trade. Foul weather we've had, is't not? Hast seen old sourpuss's daughter? Some hot piece, and they do say she's—"

He rattled on like that until the hot piece herself brought his dinner. Since she was the first Krishnan female he had had a chance to scrutinize from close range, Hasselborg took a good look. The girl was pretty in a wide-cheeked, snub-nosed, pointed-eared way. Her costume, what there was of it, showed the exaggerated physical proportions that Terran artists depicted on girl-calendars. Hasselborg wondered idly whether the artists had first got the idea from photographs of Krishnan women. The Krishnans were obviously mammals even if they did lay eggs.

Sarhad dropped a chopstick. "A thousand apologies, master," he said, squirming around and bending to pick it up.

Something aroused Hasselborg's ever-lively suspicions, and he slid his right hand towards his dagger. A glance showed that Sarhad, while fumbling for his eating-spear with one hand, was busily exploring Hasselborg's wallet with the other.

Hasselborg grabbed Sarhad's right arm with his left hand, whipped out his dagger with his right hand, and dug the point into the young man's lower ribs, below the edge of the table.

"Bring your hand out empty," he said softly. "Let me see it."

Sarhad straightened up and looked at him, his mouth opening and closing like that of a goldfish whose water needs changing, as if thinking that he ought to say something but not knowing quite what. Then his left hand moved like a striking snake and drove the point of a small knife into Hasselborg's side, where the mail-shirt stopped it.

Hasselborg pushed his own dagger until Sarhad said: "Ohe! I bleed!"

"Then drop your knife."

Hasselborg heard it fall, felt for it with his foot, and kicked it away. All this had happened so quietly and quickly that nobody else appeared to have noticed.

"Now, young master," said Hasselborg quietly, "we're going to have a little talk."

"Oh, no we're not! If I yell, they'll be all over you."

Hasselborg made the head-motion meaning "no" and said: "I think not. Dips operate alone, so you have no gang; and you'd be dead before they could interfere and so would get no satisfaction from my demise. Finally, the brotherhood of criminals considers it an unfair business practice to commit a crime in a hideout like this for fear of bringing danger upon all. Do you follow me?"

The youth's naturally greenish complexion became even more so. "How know you so much? You look not like one of the fellowship."

"I've been places. Keep your voice down and keep smiling." (Hasselborg emphasized the point with a dig of the dagger.) "This inn caters to the brotherhood, doesn't it?"

"Surely, all men know that."

"Are there others in Rosid?"

"It's true. The big robbers frequent the Blue Bishtar, the spies collect at Douletai's, and the perverts at the Bampusht. While if you'd have an orgy of the rramandu drug, or crave to feast on the flesh of men, try the Ye'mazd."

"Thanks, but I'm not that hungry yet. Now, I want to know about local police methods—"

"So the haughty stranger has a game—"

"Never mind that; I'm asking the questions! Who's the chief of police?"

"I know not your meaning… ao! Prick me not; I'll answer. I suppose you'd wish the commandant of the city guard—"

"Is that part of the army?"

"But of course; what think you? Or else the captain of the night watch. They've but now elected a new one, Master Makaran the goldsmith."

"Hm-m-m. Is there any central office where they keep records of your colleagues and other matters having to do with the law?"

"I suppose the archives of the city court—"

"No, not records of trials. I mean a file of records of individuals—with a picture and description of each one, a list of his arrests, and the like."

"I've never heard of aught like that!" cried Sarhad. "Do they thus at the place whence you come? A ter-rible place it must be, in all truth; not even Maibud god of thieves could make an honest living, let alone a poor mortal cutpurse. How manage they?"

"They get along. Now, where can I buy some artist's supplies?"

The youth pondered. "Oho, so you're one of those who falsify copies of old pictures? I've heard of such; fascinating work it must be. You'd not like an assistant, would you?"

"No. Where—"

"Well, let me see, keep you along Novorecife Pike until you pass through the city wall, then continue for two blocks to the public comfort station, then turn right for one block, then left for half a block, and you'll see the place on the left. The street's called Lejdeü Lane. I remember not the name of the shop, but you can tell it by the—you know, one of those things painters hold in one hand while they mix their hues on it—over the door."

Hasselborg said: "I suppose you could enjoy your meal better without my dagger pricking your skin. If I put it away, will you be a good boy?"

"But surely, master. I'll do aught that you command. Are you absolutely sure you crave no partner? I can show you your way about here, as Sivandi showed Lord Zerre through the maze in the story—"

"Not yet," said Hasselborg, who thought he could trust Sarhad about as far as he could knock him with a feather. He ate with his left hand, keeping his right ready for trouble.

When he finished, he hitched his wallet around and said: "Has anybody around here heard of another stranger from Novorecife coming this way about ten ten-days ago? A man about my height—" He went into his description and produced the sketches.

"No," said Sarhad, "I've seen none like that. I could ask around, though I doubt 'twill help, because I keep close track of new arrivals myself. I make the rounds of the inns, and watch by the city gates, and keep myself generally informed. Little goes on in this city that Goodman Sarhad knows not of, I can tell you."

Hasselborg let him chatter until he finished. Then, rising, he said: "Better get that prick taken care of, chum, or you'll get infected."

"Infected? Ao!" Sarhad for the first time noticed the darkened stain on his jacket. "The cut's nought, but how abut paying me for my coat? Brand-new; only the second wearing; just got it from Rosid's finest tailor—"

"Stow it; that's only a fair return. The stars give you pleasant dreams!"

Next morning Hasselborg, not trusting these great clumsy locks, checked his belongings to make sure nothing had been stolen. Then he set out afoot. The city gate was decorated with heads stuck on spikes in what Hasselborg considered questionable taste. A couple of spearmen halted him. They let him through after he had waved the letter to the dasht and signed a big register.

He stolled through the city, taking in the sights, sounds, and smells—though the last could not very well be avoided, and caused him to worry about picking up an infection. He was almost run down by a boy-Krishnan on a scooter and then had to jump to avoid a collision with a portly man in the robe, chain, and nose-mask of a physician, whizzing along on the same kind of vehicle.

At the artists' shop, he asked for some quick-drying plaster—he meant plaster of Paris but did not know the Gozashtandou for it—and some sealing wax. With these purchases he returned to his hotel, signing out again at the gate. The calendar girl, having let herself in with a pass key, was doing his room. She gave him a good-morning and a smile that implied she would be amenable to further suggestions. Hasselborg, having other fish to fry, merely gave her the cold eye until she departed.

When alone, he put on his glasses, lit his candle, and got out his bachelor sewing kit and his little Gozashtandou-Portuguese dictionary. With the plaster he made molds of the three big waxen seals on his letter to the dasht. Then he broke open the seals, carefully so as not to tear the stiff glossy paper, and detached the fragments of the seals from the ribbon that enwrapped the letter by heating the needle from his kit in the candle flame and prying the wax loose from the silk.

He held the letter towards the light from the little window and frowned in concentration. When he had puzzled out the Pitmanlike fishhooks of the writing, he saw that it read:

Julio Gois to the Lord Jam, Dasht of Ruz:

I trust that my lord's stars are propitious. The bearer is a spy from Mikardand who means you nought but ill. Treat him even as he deserves. Accept, lord, assurances of my faithful respect.