The Queen of Zamba

VI.

"What for?" said Victor Hasselborg, looking as innocent as a plush teddy bear.

"You shall learn. Here, drop that sword! You think not that we let prisoners go armed, do you?"

"But somebody might steal—"

"Fear not; we'll set the seal of the dasht upon your door, so that if acquitted you'll find your gear intact. Not that you will be. Hasten, now."

The dasht, thought Hasselborg, must somehow have found out about his alteration of that letter from Gois. He was given little time for reflection, though, for they bundled him out of the hotel and onto a led aya. Then they set off at breakneck speed through the city, yelling "Byant-hao!" to clear their way.

The jail, about a block from the ducal palace, looked like—a jail. The jailer proved a wrinkled individual with one antenna missing.

"How now?" cried this one. "The gentleman from Novorecife, I'll be bound! Ye'U wish one of our better chambers, won't ye? A fine view of Master Rail's countinghouse, and the rates no higher than in some of the more genteel inns, heh heh. What say ye, my fine lad?"

Hasselborg understood that he was being offered a cell to himself if he could pay for it, instead of being tossed in the general tank. He took the jailer up on his offer with only a slight haggle. While the jailer and the black-clad one fussed with papers, an assistant jailer led Hasselborg to his cell. This contained a chair, which was something, and being on the second story had fair lighting despite the smallness of the barred window. More importantly from Hasselborg's viewpoint, it seemed fairly clean, though he would still have given a lot to know whether the previous tenant had anything contagious.

He asked: "What's the head jailer's name?"

"Yeshram bad-Yeshram," replied the assistant jailer.

"Will you please tell him I should like to see him at his convenience?"

The jailer arrived with disconcerting promptness, saying: "Look ye, Master Kavir, I'm no monster joying in the sufferings of my wards, like the giant Damghan in the legend, nor yet a saintly philanthropist putting their welfare ahead of my own. If they can pay for extras to lighten their last hours, why, say I, why not let 'em have 'em? I had Lord Hardiqasp in my personal charge for thirty ten-nights ere they headed him, and before they took him away he said: 'Yeshram, ye've made my captivity almost a pleasure!' Think of it! So fear not that if ye treat Yeshram right, obey the rules, not try to escape, not form seditions with the other prisoners, and pay your way, ye'll have little to complain of, heh heh."

"I understand," said Hasselborg. "Right now I most want information. Why am I here at all?"

"That I know not precisely, save that your indictment reads 'treason'."

"When am I to have a hearing? Do they let you have lawyers?"

"Why, as for your hearing, know ye not that ye're to be tried this afternoon?"

"When? Where?"

"The trial will take place in the chambers of justice, as of always. As to the precise time, I can't tell you; perchance the trial's beginning even now."

"You mean one doesn't attend one's own trial in Rüz?"

"Of course not, for what good would that do? Anything the prisoner said in his defense would be a lie, so why ask him?"

"Well then, when the trial's over, can you find out what happened?"

"For a consideration I can."

Left alone, Hasselborg wondered whether to unmask himself as an Earthman. They would be at least a little more careful how they treated him. Or would they? At Novorecife they had specifically warned him not to count on any interplanetary prestige. Since the Interplanetary Council had ordered a policy of strict nonimperialism and noninterference in Krishnan affairs, the native states did pretty much as they pleased to the Ertsuma in their midst. Sometimes they pleased to treat them with honor, and at other times they looked upon them as legitimate prey. When people protested some particularly atrocious outrage upon a visiting Earthman, the I.C. blandly replied that nobody compelled Earthmen to go there, did they?

Moreover, such a revelation might jeopardize the success of Hasselborg's mission. Altogether he decided to stick to his role of Krishnan artist for the time being, at least until all its possibilities had been exhausted.

The jailer reported back: "It seems ye came hither with some letter from an Ertsu at Novorecife, saying ye be an artist or something. Well, now, that would have been all right, only this morning, while ye were out hunting with the dasht, who comes in but a messenger from this same Ertsu, with another letter. This letter would be about some other matter, some different thing entirely, ye see, but at the end oft the Ertsu puts in one little sentence, something like: 'Has that Mikardando spy I sent on to you with a letter of introduction arrived yet, and if so what have ye done with him?' That makes the dasht suspicious, the gods blind me if it don't, and he takes the original letter—the one ye brought—and looks it over carefully, and sees where it looks like as some knave's rubbed out part of the writing and put in some new words over the old. Tsk, tsk, ye spies must think our dasht a true simpleton."

"What happened at the trial?" asked Hasselborg.

"Oh, now, the dasht presented his evidence, and the lawyer for the defense said he could find nought to be said in your favor, no indeed he couldn't, so the court sentenced you to be eaten in the game, day after tomorrow."

"You mean they're going to stick me in an arena with that yeki I helped catch?"

"Surely, surely, and great joke the dasht thought it, heh, hen. Not that I have aught against you, Master Kavir, but it do seem like the gods taking a hand to blow up a man with his own firework, now don't it? But take it not too hard, lad, all must go when their candle's burnt down. Truly sorry am I to lose so fine a guest so soon, however; truly sorry."

I weep for you, the Walrus said; I deeply sympathize, thought Hasselborg. He said: "Never mind that. What happens at this game?"

"A parade, and fireworks, and a show at the stadium—races afoot and mounted, boxing and wrestling, you being eaten, and finally a battle between some tailed Koloftuma and some of our own condemned criminals with real weapons. That'll be an event worth waiting for; too bad ye'll not be there to see it!"

Although not a vain man, Hasselborg felt a slight pique at not being deemed good enough for the main attraction. "What's this game in celebration of?"

"Oh, now, some astrological conjunction; I mis-remember which. They come along every few ten-nights, that is the well-omened ones do, if ye believe in that star-gazing foolishness, and the apprentices quit work to riot in the streets and the dasht stages a big party for his court with a circus for the common folk."

"Do I fight this critter with weapons?"

"Oh, my honor, no! Ye might hurt the beast or even slay it. Time was when the victim was given a wooden pretend sword for the amusement of the people, but one of them—an Ertsu 'twas, too—hurt the eye of the favorite yeki of the dasht, so he ordered that thereafter they should be sent in with nought in their hands, heh heh. Tis quite a sight; blood all over the place."

Hasselborg leaned forward intently. "Did you say an earthman was eaten at one of these celebrations?"

"Aye, to be sure he was. What's so singular about that? 'Tis true it's been said in Ruz that the dasht ought to give special consideration to the Ertsuma, because, forsooth, 'tis rumored that they have weapons of such might that one of their fireworks would blot Rosid off the face of the planet. But the dasht will have nought oft, saying, so long as he's Dasht of Ruz he'll see that justice is administered in the good old Ruzo way—nobles to have precedence over commoners, commoners over foreigners, and all over slaves. That way every wight knows where he stands and what he faces; start making exceptions, and where's justice? For isn't consistency the essence of justice? Though I be no doctor of laws, meseems he has the right of it, now don't he?"

Hasselborg looked at the ceiling in thought. Evidently the fact of his being an Earthman, if made known, might prove more a liability than an asset. "Yeshram, what would you do if you had… let's say a half-million karda?"

"Ohe! Think ye to befool me, Master Kavir? Ye've no such sum on your person, for we looked into that when ye came hither. That's a dasht's ransom. Let's talk sense, lad, in the little time ye have left."

"I'm serious. What would you do?"

"Truly I know not. Quit this dirty post, surely. Buy up some estates and have a try at being a gentleman. Perhaps even get my eldest male-chick knighted in time. I know not. There's hardly a limit to what one could do with so vast a sum. But tantalize me not or

I'll take it ill."

"Even if I don't have that much on me, I might be able to get hold of it."

"So? Tell me not that besides being a spy and a picture painter, ye're a spinner of fine tales of fire-breathing dragons and invisible castles to boot?"

"No, this is no romance. I've got a letter of credit on deposit at Novorecife that's worth that amount, and if somebody could get me out of here I'd naturally be willing to pay liberally."

Now the jailer was thoughtful. "But how could I get this money? How can I be sure 'tis there to be had?"

"You'd have to send somebody to fetch it. Let me see—I know who'd be glad to go—a trooper of the highway patrol named Garmsel bad-Manyao. If you can get word to him, he'll ride day and night to Novorecife with a draft from me on that letter."

The jailer made the negative head-motion. "I see difficulties, lad. We'd have to fake a delivery, ye see, and that means letting more people into the scheme and paying them off. Then, too, no matter how fast this soldier friend of yours rode, he couldn't make Novorecife and back by the time you were down the yeki's gullet. Moreover, if ye didn't appear for the games, the dasht would have my head for it, or at least my post. No, I couldn't chance it, especially I couldn't chance it before I had the money in hand. Once I had it in hand, of course, I'd defy any wight but the dasht himself."

After they had brooded in silence a while, the jailer resumed: "Perhaps I can get you through the games alive, despite all. Yeshram has a scheme. If ye'll give me the draft now, I'll do my best, and if I fail, ye'll have no use for gold anyway, will ye now?"

Hasselborg, disinclined to trust the jailer so far, countered: "Tell you what. I'll write you a draft for a quarter-million karda now, and another other quarter-million when I get out."

"But how know I ye'll pay me the second half, once ye're free and fleeing with the eshuna baying on your track?"

"How do I know you'll get me out once you get your hands on the first instalment? Wouldn't you be happier with me inside the yeki and so unable to expose our little deal? Not that I distrust you, Master Yeshram, but you see how it is. You trust me, I trust you. Whereas if we fail to agree and I get eaten, you'll have nothing but what I've got on me, which won't set you up in any baronial splendor."

They haggled for an hour before Hasselborg won his points. Yeshram, for instance, wanted a half-million net, while Hasselborg insisted on a half-million gross, out of which Yeshram would have to pay such other bribes as proved necessary.

Finally Hasselborg wrote his draft, saying: "What's this scheme of yours?"

"I mislike to tell you, since a secret known to many is no secret at all, as it says in the Proverbs of Nehavend. Howsomever, do but face the beast boldly and ye'll find him perchance less inclined to devour you than is his wont."

Then Hasselborg had the excruciating experience of waiting for two Krishnan days and nights until the time neared for his execution. He tried to read a textbook on Gozashtando law, which Yeshram furnished him, but found it tough going—the law here was mostly precedent, and Hasselborg was not fluent enough in the written language yet to read it with any ease. He paced, smoked, ate little, and spent half-hours gazing sentimentally at Alexandra's tiny handkerchief.

He also kept sending the assistant jailer out to ask if there were any news from Trooper Garmsel yet. He knew there would not be but could not help hoping for a miracle. He got some small comfort out of the fact that he had exercised enough self-control to strike this bargain with Yeshram for less than half the total amount his letter of credit had been good for; there had been a time, when Yeshram was hesitating, when he'd been strongly tempted to throw the entire amount at the jailer, although he knew that would be money wasted.

The second afternoon after his arrival, Yeshram came in, saying: "Be ye ready? Courage, my master. No, no, for the hundredth time, no news. Garmsel would need a glider towed by trained aqebats, like Prince Bourudjird in the legend, to have got back by now. Why shake ye so? I run a risk like unto yours, don't I?"

They loaded Hasselborg into a kind of cage on wheels and drove it across the city to the stadium. Armed men let him out and led him to a room under the tiers of seats, where they watched him silently while noises of the entertainments filtered in from outside. One said to the other:

"The crowd's in a bad mood today."

"A dull performance," said the other man: "They do say the dasht has been too much wrapped up in his love-life to put the care he should upon the events."

Then silence again. Hasselborg lit a Krishnan cigar and offered one to each of his guards, who took them with a grunt of thanks.

More waiting.

At last a man stuck his head in the door and said: "Time!"

The guards nodded to Hasselborg, one saying: "Leave your jacket here. Stand up and let us search you." After a last-minute frisk, they led him into one of the tunnels connecting the dressing rooms with the arena.

At the end of the tunnel was a heavy gate of crisscrossed iron bars. A man swung it open with a creak. Hasselborg looked back. The guards had a tight grip on their halberds in case he should get any funny ideas about bolting.

Hasselborg, seeing no alternative, stuck his thumbs into his belt and strolled out into the arena with elaborate unconcern.

The place reminded him of some of the bowls he'd played football in years before as a college undergraduate; he had played fullback. This arena was a bit too small, however, for football; more like a bull ring than a North American athletic theater. The seats pitched down at a steep angle. The floor was sunk a good twenty feet below the lowest tier of seats so that there would be no question of a mighty leap into the audience. In front of the first row of seats, guards paced a catwalk. Could he somehow get one of those halberds and do a pole vault up to the catwalk? Not likely, especially for one who, while something of an athlete in his day, had never practiced pole-vaulting.

The sky was overcast, and a dank wind whipped the pennons on the flagpoles around the upper edge of the stadium. The dasht sat in his box, wrapped in his cloak and too high up for his expression to be seen.

As the gate clanged shut behind Hasselborg, he saw a gate on the far side of the arena open and his friend the yeki issue from another tunnel.

The people in the stands gave a subdued roar. Hasselborg, facing this particular jabberwock without any vorpal sword, stood perfectly still. If Yeshram had had a bright idea, let it work now!

The yeki padded slowly forward, then stopped and looked about it. It looked at Hasselborg; it looked at the people above it in the audience. It grumbled, walked a few paces in a circle, flopped down on the sand, yawned, and closed its eyes.

Hasselborg stood still.

The audience began to make crowd noises, louder and louder. Hasselborg could catch occasional phrases, the rough Gozashtandou equivalent of "Kill dose bums!" Objects began to whizz down into the arena—a jug, a seat cushion.

Here a couple of Gozashtanduma were punching each other; there another was throwing vegetables in the direction of the dasht's box; then some more were pushing one of the guards off the catwalk. The guard landed in the sand with a jangle, got up with an agility astonishing for one burdened with full armor, and ran for the nearest exit, though the yeki merely rolled an eye at him before shutting it again. Another guard was beating a group of enraged citizens over the head with the shaft of his halberd. Other members of the audience were prying up the wooden benches and making a fire.

"Master Kavir," cried a voice over the uproar, "this way!"

Hasselborg turned, saw that the barred gate was open a crack, and walked quickly out without waiting to see how the riot developed. One of the assistant jailers shut the gate behind him.

"Come quickly, sir." He followed the man out of the warren of passages into the street.where they put him back into the cage on wheels. Thunder rumbled overhead as the conveyance rattled on its springless wheels over the cobbles back toward the jail. They were nearly there when the rain began. The driver lashed his ayas and yelled Byant-hao!"

"We did it, heh heh," said Yeshram afterward.

"How?" asked Hasselborg, who was rigging a string across his cell to hang his wet clothes on.

"Well, now, then, I suppose 'twill do no great harm to tell you, since the deed's done and if one's betrayed all are lost. 'Twas simple enough; I bribed Rrafun the beast-keeper into keeping the yeki awake all night by squirting water into its cage. Then I prevailed upon him to let it eat an entire boar unha just before the game. So, to make a long story short, 'twas far more interested in sleep, sweet sleep, than in forcing one Mikardando spy into an already overstuffed paunch. Be ye adequately equipped for blankets? I'd not have you perish of the rheum owing me half my reward. Let's hope Garmsel makes a speedy return, ere the dasht thinks to look into his pet's curious lack of appetite."

The rest of that day passed and the night that followed it, however, without word from either the soldier or the dasht. Hasselborg tried to console himself with the thought that another of these games would not be along for some days at least, until the next conjunction— Although no doubt, if sufficiently annoyed, Jam could have Hasselborg executed out of hand.

After dinner there were sounds of voices and movement in the jail. Presently Yeshram came in with Garmsel, the latter wet and worn-looking.

"You still live, Master Kavir?" said the latter. "Thank the stars! I believed it not when this knave, my friend Yeshram, said so, for 'tis notorious that of all slippery liars he's the chief and slipperiest. At least now I'll not have to worry about my death horoscope for a time."

"What's this?" asked Yeshram. "What death horoscope?"

"Just a private understanding between Garmsel and myself," said Hasselborg, who did not want the soldier's faith in the pseudo-science undermined by the jailer's skepticism. "How'd you make out?"

"I got it," said Garmsel. "The ride to Novorecife I made in record time on my good shomal, but coming back I was slowed by having to lead three great stout pack-ayas behind me with the bags of gold. 'Tis in the foyer below, and I trust there'll be no unseemly forgetting my just recompense for this deed."

"When has Yeshram forgotten a faithful friend?" said Yeshram.

"Never, the reason being you've never had one. But come; pay me my due and I'll back to barracks to dry. Fointsaq, what weather!"

When Yeshram returned to Hasselborg's cell, the prisoner said: "Since it's still raining, wouldn't this be a good night to get me out of here?"

The jailer hesitated. Hasselborg read into the hesitation a feeling that now that he had the money, it might be safer to hold Hasselborg after all rather than risk his present gain in trying to double it. Careful, Hasselborg told himself; whatever you do, don't show despair or fly into a rage.

Hasselborg said: "Think, my friend. As you've said, the dasht may do some investigating sooner or later. Something seems to have interfered with it so far, and rumor tells me he's having love-life trouble. Now, when he does come around, wouldn't you rather have me far away from here, making arrangements to send you another quarter-million, than here where the dasht can lay his red-hot pincers on me and perhaps wring the truth from me?"

"Certainly, such was my idea, too," said Yeshram readily—a little too readily* Hasselborg thought. "I but pondered how to effect this desired end of ours. Ye'll want your gear, won't ye? 'Twere not prudent to leave bits of it lying about Rosid for the agents of His Altitude to find and perhaps trace you by. What stuff have ye, and where's it stowed?"

Hasselborg gave him the information.

Yeshram said: "Clothe yourself for a speedy departure, lad, and try to snatch some sleep, for the arrangements will take some hours to perfect. By which road would ye wish to flee?"

"The road to Hershid, I think."

"Then leave all to Yeshram. We'll have you out as neat as the Gavehon thief spirited away King Sab-zavarr's daughter. And if ye get clean away, when ye're feeling that wonderful relief that'll be yours, think whether Yeshram mayhap deserves not a mite extra for his trouble, heh heh. May the stars guide you."

Next to Earthmen, perhaps the most mercenary race in the galaxy, thought Hasselborg. He found that his physical organism perversely refused to sleep, however. He tossed on his bunk, paced the floor, and tossed some more. His sleeping pills were still in his room at the inn and so out of reach. Over half this interminable night must have gone past when to his delight he at last found himself getting sleepy. He threw himself down on the bed, closed his eyes, and instantly was aroused by the opening of his cell.

"Come," said a figure holding a candle.

Hasselborg jumped up, whipped his cloak around him, and strode out the door. As he got closer to the figure, he saw that it was masked and that it held a cocked crossbow in one hand. As he brushed past, he was sure that he recognized the eyes of one of the assistant jailers. The size and voice were right, too. However, no time for that now.

Below, he found another masked man standing guard with a crossbow over the jailer and his remaining assistant, both thoroughly bound and gagged. Yeshram caught Hasselborg's eye and wiggled his antennae in the Krishnan equivalent of a wink. Then out they went into the rain, where a man held three saddled ayas.

Hasselborg's companions stopped to uncock their bows and remove their masks. They were two of the assistant jailers, sure enough. All three, without a word, mounted and set off at a canter for the east gate.

Hasselborg, practically blind in the rain and darkness, hung on to his saddle, expecting every minute to be thrown out or to have his mount skid and fall on the wet stones. He concentrated so hard on keeping his seat that he did not see his companions pull up at the gate. When his own mount stopped, too, he almost did take a header.

One of his deliverers was shouting at a spearman: "Fool, where is he? Who? Why, the prisoner who escaped from the jail! He came through here! If ye caught him not, that means he's out of Rosid and away! Stand aside, idiots!"

The gate swung open. Hasselborg's escort spurred their animals to a furious run, although how they could see where they were going mystified the investigator. He bounced along behind them as best he could, barely able to make them out in the murk. A

glob of soft mud thrown up by one of their hoofs smote him in the face, spreading over his features and for a few minutes cutting him off entirely from the world. By the time he could see again, they were just visible ahead, and the, lanterns of the city gate could no longer be seen behind.

After a few minutes more of this torture, one of them held up an arm and they slowed. Before he knew it, Hasselborg came upon his buggy, parked on the edge of the road. A man was holding the head of his new aya, which was already hitched up.

"Here ye are, Master Kavir," said a voice in the dark. "Ye'll find your gear in the back of the carriage; we packed it as best we could. Waste no time on the way, and show no lights, for a pursuit might be sent after you. May the stars watch over you!"

"Good night, chums," said Hasselborg, handing over the reins of the aya he had ridden to the man who was holding the carriage. The man swung into the saddle, and all three splashed off into the dark.

Hasselborg got into the buggy, gathered up reins and whip, released the brake, and started off at the fastest pace he could manage without blundering off the road—a slow walk.