Гарднер Дозуа - The Good Old Stuff

“Surely, Dom Sirat,” said Frome. “Glad to.”

Sirat wagged a forefinger. “However, let me caution you against exercising your charm too strongly on my protege. An inexperienced girl like that might find a tall young Englishman glamorous, and the results would indubitably be most deplorable for all concerned

When the time came, he took his place opposite Elena Milln at the table. She said: “Let us speak English, since some of our friends here” (she referred to the ubiquitous Dzlieri guards) “know a little Portuguese, too. Oh, Adrian, I’m so afraid!”

“Of what; Sirat? What’s new?”

“He has been hinting that if I didn’t fall in with his dynastic plans, he would compel me. You know what that means.”

“Yes. And you want me to rescue you?”

“I—I should be most grateful if you could. While we are taught to resign ourselves to such misfortunes, as things earned in earlier incarnations, I don’t think I could bear it. I should kill myself.”

Frome pondered. “D’you know when he’s planning this attack?”

“He leaves the day after tomorrow. Tomorrow night the Dzlieri will celebrate.”‘ That meant a wild orgy, and Sirat might well take the occasion to copy his subjects. On the other hand, the confusion afforded a chance to escape. “I’ll try to cook up a scheme,” he told her.

Next day Frome found his assistants even more restless and insubordinate than usual. About noon they walked out for good. “Got to get ready for the party!” they shouted. “To hell with work!”

Mishinatven had vanished, too. Frome sat alone, thinking. After a while he wandered around the shop, handling pieces of material. He noticed the spoilt Galton whistle lying where he had thrown it the day before; the remaining length of copper tubing from which he had made the whistles; the big copper kettle he had never gotten around either to scrapping or to fixing. Slowly an idea took shape.

He went to the forge-room and started the furnace up again. When he had a hot fire, he brazed a big thick patch over the hole in the kettle, on the inside where it would take pressure. He tested the kettle for leakage and found none. Then he sawed a length off the copper tube and made another Galton whistle, using the spoilt one as a model.

In the scrap-sorting room he found a length of plastic which he made into a sealing-ring or gasket to go between the kettle and its lid. He took off the regular handle of the kettle, twisted a length of heavy wire into a shorter bail, and installed it so that it pressed the lid tightly down against the gasket. Finally he made a little conical adapter of sheet-copper and brazed it to the spout of the kettle, and brazed the whistle to the adapter. He then had an air-tight kettle whose spout ended in the whistle.

Then it was time for dinner.

Sirat seemed in a rollicking good humor and drank more moikhada than usual.

“Tomorrow,” he said, “tomorrow we cast the die. What was that ancient European general who remarked about casting the die when crossing a river? Napoleon? Anyway, let us drink to tomorrow!” He raised his goblet theatrically. “Will you not weaken, Elena?

Regrettable; you do not know what you miss. Come, let us fall upon the provender, lest my cook decamp to the revellers before we finish.”

From outside came Dzlieri voices in drunken song, and sounds of a fight.

The high shriek of a female Dzlieri tore past the palace, followed by the laughter and hoofbeats of a male in pursuit.

These alarming sounds kept the talk from reaching its usual brilliance.

When the meal was over, Sirat said: “Adrian, you must excuse me; I have a portentous task to accomplish. Please return to your quarters.

Not you, Elena; kindly remain where you are.”

Frome looked at the two of them, then at the guards, and went. In passing through the breezeway he saw a mob of Dzlieri dancing around a bonfire. The palace proper seemed nearly deserted.

Instead of going to his room he went into the machine-shop. He lit a cresset to see by, took the big copper kettle out to the pump, and half filled it with several liters of water. Then he staggered back into the shop and heaved the kettle up on top of the forge. He clamped the lid on, stirred the coals, and pumped the bellows until he had a roaring fire.

He hunted around the part of the shop devoted to the repair of tools and weapons until he chose a big spear with a three-meter shaft and a broad keen-edged half-meter head. Then he went back to the forge with it.

After a long wait, a hint curl of water-vapor appeared in the air near the spout of the kettle. It grew to a long plume, showing that steam was shooting out fast. Although Frome could hear nothing, he could tell by touching a piece of metal to the spout that the whistle was vibrating at a tremendous frequency.

Remembering that ultrasonics have directional qualities, Frome slashed through the matting with the broad blade of the spear until the forge-room lay open to view in several directions. Then he went back into the palace.

By now he knew the structure well. Towards the center of the maze Sirat had his private suite: a sitting-room, bedroom, and bath. The only way into this suite was through an always-guarded door into the sitting-room.

Frome walked along the hallway that ran beside the suite and around the corner to the door into the sitting-room. He listened, ear to the matting. Although it was hard to hear anything over the racket outside, he thought he caught sounds of struggle with in. And from up ahead came Dzlieri voices.

He stole to the bend in the corridor and heard: “... surely some demon must have sent this sound to plague us. In truth it makes my head ache to the splitting-point?

“It is like God’s whistle,” said the other voice, “save that it comes not from God’s chambers, and blows continually. Try stuffing a bit of this into your ears.”

The first voice (evidently that of one of the two regular guards) said: “It helps a little; remain you here on guard while I seek the medicine-man.”

“That I will, but send another to take your place, for God will take it amiss if he finds but one of us here. And hasten, for the scream drives me to madness!”

Dzlieri hooves departed. Frome grinned in his whiskers. He might take a chance of attacking the remaining guard, but if the fellow’s ears were plugged there was a better way. Sirat would have closed off his bedroom from the sitting-room by one of those curtains of slats that did duty for doors.

Frome retraced his steps until he was sure he was opposite the bedroom.

Then he thrust his spear into the matting, slashed downward, and pushed through the slit into a bedroom big enough for basketball.

Sirat Mongkut looked up from what he was doing. He had tied Elena’s wrists to the posts at the head of the bed, so that she lay supine, and now, despite her struggles, was tying one of her ankles to one of the posts at the foot. Here was a conqueror who liked to find his dynasties in comfort. “Adrian!” cried Elena.

Sirat’s hand flashed to his hip—and came away empty. Frome’s biggest gamble had paid off: he assumed that just this once Sirat might have discarded his pistol. Frome had planned, if he found Sirat armed, to throw the spear at him; now he could take the surer way.

He gripped the big spear in both hands, like a bayonetted rifle, and ran towards Sirat. The stocky figure leaped onto the bed and then to the floor on the far side, fumbling for his whistle. Frome sprang onto the bed in pursuit, but tripped on Elena’s bound ankle and almost sprawled headlong. By the time he recovered he had staggered nearly the width of the room.

Meanwhile Sirat, having avoided Frome’s rush, put his whistle to his mouth, and his broad cheeks bulged with blowing.