Robert Silverberg - The Face of the Waters

“A very determined man. Stubborn, strong, completely unscrupulous. Totally sure of himself.”

“Crazy?’

“That I can’t say.”

“I bet you could,” Dag Tharp put in. “You think he’s out of his fucking head.”

“That’s very possible. Or then again, not. Sometimes it’s not easy to tell the difference between singlemindedness and insanity. A lot of geniuses have seemed like madmen, in their times.”

“You think he’s a genius?” Henders asked.

“Not necessarily. But he’s unusual, at least. I’m not in a position to say what goes on in his mind. He may well be crazy. But he can give you perfectly rational-sounding reasons for what he’s doing, I’d be willing to bet. This Face of the Waters thing may make perfect sense to him.”

Felk said, “Don’t pretend to be so innocent, doc. Every lunatic thinks that his lunacy makes perfect sense. Isn’t a man in the world who ever believed he was crazy.”

“Do you admire Delagard?” Henders said to Lawler.

“Not particularly.” Lawler shrugged. “He’s got his strong points, you have to admit. He’s a man of vision. I don’t necessarily think his visions are very admirable ones.”

“Do you like him?”

“No. Not in the slightest.”

“You’re straightforward on that, anyway.”

“Look, is there a point to all this?” Lawler asked. “Because if you’re simply having a good time sitting here over a bottle of brandy telling each other what a miserable bastard Delagard is, I’d just as soon go to bed, okay?”

“We’re just trying to find out where you stand, doc,” Dann Henders said. “Tell us, do you want the voyage to continue the way it’s been going?”

“No.”

“Well, what are you prepared to do to change things?”

“Is there anything we can do?”

“I asked you a question. Asking me a question back doesn’t amount to an answer.”

“You planning on a mutiny, are you?”

“Did I say that? I don’t remember saying that, doc.”

“A deaf man could hear you saying it.”

“A mutiny,” Henders said. “Well, now, what if some of us did try to take some active role in deciding which way the ship ought to be travelling. What would you say if that were to happen? What would you do?”

“It’s a lousy idea, Dann.”

“You think so, doc?”

“There was a time when I was just as eager as you are to make Delagard turn the ship around. Dag knows that. I spoke to him about it. Delagard was to be stopped, I told him. You remember that. Dag? But that was before the Wave brought us way the hell out here. Since then I’ve had plenty of time to think about it, and I’ve changed my mind.”

“Why?”

“Three reasons. One is that this is Delagard’s ship, for better or for worse, and I don’t much like the notion of taking it away from him. A moral issue, you might say. You could justify doing it on the grounds that he’s risking our lives without our consent, I suppose. But even so I don’t think it’s a smart idea. Delagard’s too tricky. Too dangerous. Too strong. He’s on guard all the time. And a lot of the others on board are loyal to him, or afraid of him, which amounts to the same thing. They won’t help us. They’re likely to help him . You try any funny stuff with him and you very likely will find yourself regretting it.”

Henders” expression was a wintry one. “You said you had three reasons. That was two.”

Lawler said, “The third is the thing that Onyos was talking about the other day. Even if you grabbed the ship, how would you make it take us back to Home Sea? Be realistic about it. There’s no wind. We’re running out of food and water faster than I want to think about. Unless we can somehow pick up a westerly wind, the best we can hope for at this point is to keep on heading toward the Face on the chance that we’ll be able to reprovision ourselves when we get there.”

Henders gave the mapkeeper a quizzical look. “You still feel that way, Onyos?”

“We’re pretty far in, yes. And right now we do seem to be becalmed most of the time. So I suppose we really don’t have a lot of choice but to continue on our present course.”

“That’s your opinion?” Henders asked.

“I suppose it is,” said Felk.

“Continuing to follow a lunatic who’s leading us toward a place we know nothing about? One which very likely is full of all sorts of dangers that we can’t even begin to imagine?”

“I don’t like that any more than you do. But like the doctor says, we need to be realistic. Of course, if the wind should change—”

“Right, Onyos. Or if angels should come down from the skies and bring some nice cool fresh water with them.” There was a long prickly silence in the small cramped room. At length Henders looked up and said, “Okay, doc. This isn’t accomplishing anything. And I don’t want to take up any more of your time. We were just inviting you in for a friendly little drink, but I can see how tired you are. Good night, doc. Sleep well.”

“Are you going to try it, Dann?”

“I don’t see how that concerns you one way or another, doc.”

“All right,” Lawler said. “Good night.”

“Onyos, would you stick around for a little while?” Henders said.

“Whatever you want, Dann,” Felk said.

The mapkeeper sounded as though he was ready to be convinced.

A bunch of fools, Lawler thought, as he went to his bunk. Playing at being mutineers. But he doubted very much that anything would come of it. Felk and Tharp were weaklings, and Henders couldn’t deal with Delagard by himself. In the end nothing would be done, and the ship would stay on course for the Face. That seemed the likeliest outcome of all this planning and scheming.

Somewhere in the night Lawler heard noises from above, shouts, some heavy pounding, the sound of feet running across the deck. There was an angry yell, muffled by the deck planking above him but nevertheless clearly a cry of rage, and he knew that he had been wrong. They were doing it after all. He sat up, blinking. Without taking the time to dress, he rose and made his way into the passageway and up the ladder.

It was almost dawn. The sky was grey-black; the Cross was low in the sky, hanging in that weirdly askew fashion that was its way in these latitudes. A strange drama was being enacted on deck, near the fore hatch. Or was it a farce?

Two frantic figures were chasing each other around the open hatch, yelling and gesticulating as they ran. After a moment Lawler focused his sleep-blurred eyes and saw that they were Dann Henders and Nid Delagard. Henders was doing the chasing, Delagard the fleeing.

Henders had one of Kinverson’s gaffs clutched in his hand like a spear. As he followed Delagard around the perimeter of the hatch he stabbed the air with the weapon again and again, with the clear intent of putting it through the ship-owner’s back. There had already been at least one hit. Delagard’s shirt was torn; Lawler saw a thin jagged line of blood seeping through near his right shoulder, like a red thread sewn into the fabric, widening with every moment.

But Henders was going it alone. Dag Tharp stood near the rail, goggle-eyed, motionless as a statue. Onyos Felk was close by him. In the rigging were Leo Martello and Pilya Braun, frozen also, looks of astonishment and awe on their faces.

“Dag!” Henders yelled. “For Christ’s sake. Dag, where are you? Give me a hand with him, will you.”

“I’m here—over here—” the radioman whispered, in a hoarse husky tone that could barely be heard five metres away. He stayed where he was.

“For Christ’s sake,” Henders said again, disgustedly. He shook his fist at Tharp and leaped wildly toward Delagard in a frantic lunging attempt at reaching him. But Delagard managed—only barely—to elude the sharp tip of the gaff. He looked back over his shoulder, cursing. His face glistened with sweat; his eyes were inflamed and bright with fury.