Poul Anderson: Flandry of Terra

Inyanduma swept a sailor’s muscular hand about the room. “You see our legislative leaders, Captain. When the Lightmistress ‘phoned you were hither-bound, we supposed it was because of his Excellency’s slaying, which had been broadcast ‘round the globe. It’s a grave matter, so I gathered our chiefs of council, from both the House of Men and the Congress of Women.”

A rustling and murmuring went about the green columns, under the green sea. There was withdrawal in it, and a sullen waiting. These were not professional politicians as Terra knew the breed. These were the worthies of Jairnovaunt: aristocrats and shipowners, holding seats ex officio, and a proportion of ships’ officers elected by the commons. Even the nobles were functional-Tessa Hoorn had inherited not the right but the duty to maintain lightships and communications about the reefs called Little Skua. They had all faced more storms and underwater teeth than they had debate.

Flandry said evenly: “My visit concerns worse than a murder, sir and gentles. A resident might be killed by any disgruntled individual, that’s an occupational hazard. But I don’t think one living soul hated Bannerji personally. And that’s what’s damnable!”

“Are you implying treason, sir?” rumbled Inyanduma.

“I am, sir. With more lines of evidence than one. Could anybody direct me to a family named Umbolu?”

It stirred and hissed among the councillors of Jairnovaunt. And then a young man trod forth-a huge young man with a lion’s gait, cragged features and a scar on one cheek. “Aye,” he said so it rang in the hall. “I hight Derek Umbolu, captain of the kraken-chaser Bloemortein. Tessa, why brought you a damned Impy hither?”

“Belay!” rapped Inyanduma. “We’ll show courtesy here.”

Tessa exclaimed to the giant: “Derek, Derek, he could have flown to us in an hour! And we meditate nay rebellion-” Her voice trailed off; she stepped back from his smoldering gaze, her own eyes widening and a hand stealing to her mouth. The unspoken question shivered, Do we?

“Let ‘em keep ‘way from us!” growled Derek Umbolu. “We’ll pay the tribute and hold to the bloody Pax if they’ll leave us and our old ways ‘lone. But they don’t!”

Flandry stepped into collective horror. “I’m not offended,” he said. “But neither do I make policy. Your complaints against the local administration should be taken to the provincial governor—”

“Yon murdering quog!” spat Derek. “I’ve heard about Brae, and more.”

Since Flandry considered the description admirable (he assumed a quog was not a nice animal) he said hastily: “I must warn you against lese majeste. And now let’s get to my task. It’s not very pleasant for me either. Captain Umbolu, are you related to an Imperial marine named Thomas?”

“Aye. I’ve a younger brother who ‘listed for a five-year hitch.”

Flandry’s tones gentled. “I’m sorry. It didn’t strike me you might be so closely related, Thomas Umbolu was killed in action on Brae.”

Derek closed his eyes. One great hand clamped on the hilt of his sheath knife till blood trickled from beneath the nails. He looked again at the world and said thickly: “You came here swifter than the official news, Captain.”

“I saw him die,” said Flandry. “He went like a brave man.”

“You’ve nay crossed space just to tell a colonial that much.”

“No,” said Flandry. “I would like to speak alone with you sometime soon. And with his other kin.”

The broad black chest pumped air, the hard fingers curved into claws. Derek Umbolu rasped forth: “You’ll nay torment my father with your devilments, nor throw shame on us with your secrecy. Ask it out here, ‘fore ‘em al|.”

Flandry’s shoulder muscles tightened, as if expecting a bullet. He looked to the Commander. Inyanduma’s starred face was like obsidian. Flandry said: “I have reason to believe Thomas Umbolu was implicated in a treasonable conspiracy. Of course, I could be wrong, in which case I’ll apologize. But I must first put a great many questions. I am certainly not going to perform before an audience. I’ll see you later.”

“You’ll leave my father be or I’ll kill you!”

“Belay!” cried Inyanduma. “I said he was a guest.” More softly: “Go, Derek, and tell Old John what you must.”

The giant saluted, wheeled, and stalked from the room. Flandry saw tears glimmer in Tessa’s eyes. The Commander bowed ponderously at him. “Crave your pardon, sir. He’s a stout heart… surely you’ll find nay treason in his folk… but the news you bore was harsh.”

Flandry made some reply. The gathering became decorous, the Lightmasters and Coast-watchers offered him polite conversation. He felt reasonably sure that few of them knew about any plottings: revolutions didn’t start that way.

Eventually he found himself in a small but tastefully furnished bedroom. One wall was a planetary map. He studied it, looking for a place called Uhunhu. He found it near the Sheikhdom of Rossala, which lay north of here; if he read the symbols aright, it was a permanently submerged area.

A memory snapped into his consciousness. He swore for two unrepeating minutes before starting a chain of cigarettes. If that was the answer-

The inner moon, though smaller, raised the largest tides, up to nine times a Terrestrial high; but it moved so fast, five orbits in two of Nyanza’s 30-hour days, that the ebb was spectacularly rapid. Flandry heard a roar through his wall, switched on the transparency, and saw water tumbling white from dark rough rock. It was close to sunset, he had sat in his thoughts for hours. A glance at the electric ephemeris over his bunk told him that Loa, the outer satellite, would not dunk the hall till midnight. And that was a much weaker flow, without the whirlpool effects which were dangerous for a lower-case lubber like himself.

He stubbed out his cigarette and sighed. Might as well get the nasty part over with. Rising, he shucked all clothes but a pair of trunks and a ‘lung; he put on the swimshoes given him and buckled his guns-they were safely waterproof-into their holsters. A directory-map of the immediate region showed him where Captain John Umbolu lived. He recorded a message that business called him out and his host should not wait dinner: he felt sure Inyanduma would be more relieved, than offended. Then he stepped through the airlock. It closed automatically after him.

Sunset blazed across violet waters. The white spume of the breakers was turned an incredible gold; tide pools on the naked black skerry were like molten copper. The sky was deep blue in the east, still pale overhead, shading to a clear cloudless green where the sun drowned. Through the surfs huge hollow crashing and grinding, Flandry heard bells from one of the many rose-red spires… or did a ship’s bell ring among raking spars, or was it something he had heard in a dream once? Beneath all the noise, it was unutterably peaceful.

No one bothered with boats for such short distances. Flandry entered the water at a sheltered spot, unfolded the web feet in his shoes, and struck out between the scattered dome-and-towered reefs. Other heads bobbed in the little warm waves, but none paid him attention. He was glad of that. Steering a course by marked buoys, he found old Umbolu’s house after a few energetic minutes.

It was on a long thin rock, surrounded by lesser stones on which a murderous fury exploded. The Terran paddled carefully around, in search of a safe approach. He found it, two natural breakwaters formed by gaunt rusty coraloid pinnacles, with a path that led upward through gardens now sodden heaps until it struck the little hemisphere. Twilight was closing in, slow and deeply blue; an evening planet came to white life in the west.