Rebels of Gor (58 page)

“What did you find?” I asked.

“In only three of the four tents are slaves available for public purchase,” he said.

“Then she is in the fourth tent,” I said, “that not open to the public.”

“At present,” said Haruki.

“And where is that tent?” I asked.

“It is isolated, remote, near the perimeter of the camp,” said Haruki.

“She is there,” I said.

“I did not see her, of course,” said Haruki.

“No matter,” I said. “She is there.”

“I have been told the way,” said Haruki, pointing.

“Excellent,” I said. “That is the route taken by the recent search party. We shall follow it.”

“What if it turns back?” said Pertinax.

“That is unlikely,” I said, “for it would be examining the same path twice, once going, once coming.”

“But what if it should turn back?” asked Pertinax.

“We will follow it in a tandem fashion,” I said, “with an ample interval amongst ourselves. Thus we will not appear together, or not obviously. He at point, he first in our group, should be able, easily, and at a distance, to detect the approach of a squad of searchers, and will be able to signal us, enabling all of us, if all goes well, to disappear amongst the tents. If the evasion is successful, we will rejoin, near the point of scattering.”

“I will go first,” said Haruki. “I have been told the way.”

“I fear Pertinax and I will be conspicuous,” I said, “as we are clearly barbarians.”

“Do not fear too much,” said Pertinax. “We are not all that conspicuous. There are several deserters in the camp, barbarian mercenaries, fled from the holding of Temmu. I have been in the camp for five days, unquestioned.”

“Things have changed,” said Tajima. “Many who have been unquestioned, Pani and others, may now find themselves questioned.”

“Well, then,” said Pertinax, “it is only a slave. Let us give up the whole matter.”

“No,” said Tajima.

“Ah,” said Pertinax, triumphantly. “Then she is important to you.”

“Not at all,” said Tajima, annoyed. “Not in the least.”

“Why, then?” asked Pertinax.

“For the same reason I would buy her,” said Tajima.

“And what is that?” asked Pertinax.

“She has pretty legs,” said Tajima.

“We may still be questioned,” said Haruki.

“Sometimes,” I said, “the best answer to a question is a dagger thrust between the ribs.”

“I miss my garden,” said Haruki.

Chapter Forty-Two

What Occurred in the Slave Tent

“I am sure that is the tent,” said Haruki.

“I hear no whimperings, no plaintive cries of distress,” said Pertinax.

“They are slaves,” said Tajima, “not free women.”

“They have been warned to silence,” I said. “Ichiro, can you speak with authority?”

“I fear not, Commander
san
,” said Ichiro. “I can speak loudly.”

“That often suffices,” I said.

“I shall enter first,” said Tajima.

“No,” I said. “You, Haruki, and myself, might be recognized.”

“Surely none here, at this far point, would know us,” he said.

“We can not be sure of that,” I said. “Recall the procession of Kazumitsu and Yasushi, in which they paraded their prisoners. Similarly, we three were publicly penned.”

“What am I to do, Commander
san
?” asked Ichiro.

“First,” I said, “it would be well to reconnoiter, to find out what forces are to be dealt with.”

“Two Ashigaru are at the entrance,” said Ichiro.

“There will be at least a whip master inside,” I said.

“There may be others inside, as well,” said Pertinax.

“Ichiro,” I said. “Approach the entrance, demand to see the whip master, proclaim that you have come on behalf of the camp lord, Lord Akio, who plans a pleasure feast and will require the services of, say, four slaves, which you are authorized to select.”

“I fear, Commander
san
,” he said, “even if I speak loudly, he will require some certification of the genuineness of this request.”

“Of course,” I said, “but, in the meantime, you will note the interior of the tent, and, in particular, the presence of any additional guards.”

“What, then?” asked Ichiro.

“You will profess anger, threaten the whip master, insult him, deplore his incompetence, and vainly strive to convince him to allow you to proceed with your mission, the selection of a handful of feast slaves. He will be uneasy, but will remain adamant, as he must, at which point you will turn about, assuring him you will return shortly with the required authorization, in writing.”

“He will be able to read?” said Ichiro.

“Presumably he, or another,” I said. “It seems there would have to be at least one person on the premises capable of reading written orders.”

“It could be done with pass signs,” said Pertinax.

“Let us hope not,” I said. “But if that is the case, then Ichiro will invent a pass sign, discover it is no longer current, that a mistake has been made, or such, and, again, will assure the fellow of his quick return, with everything in order.”

“If all goes well,” said Ichiro, “I shall then rejoin you.”

“Yes,” I said, “and if all does not go well, we will sell our lives dearly, as Pertinax would be likely to suggest, as there would not seem much else to do.”

* * *

“Master!” cried Nezumi.

“I have the key,” said Tajima.

Ichiro had done his work well. There were five to deal with, two Ashigaru at the entrance, two more within the tent, and the whip master, who was an officer and warrior. It was a large tent. Within it were housed some forty slaves. The tent, as most such large, long tents depended on several poles to support its roof, and was further secured by a number of tent pegs, or, as the Americans will have it, stakes, and ropes outside. While Haruki kept watch, Tajima and I kicked, loosened, and drew up several of the tent pegs or stakes, at the back of the tent, which would produce a sagging at that point. These tent pegs, or stakes, were large, pointed, rounded pieces of wood, most of which were something like a foot and a half in length, and two to three horts in diameter. I mention these measurements as it may make more clear the application to which they were shortly to be put. When two Ashigaru came about the tent to investigate the local collapse of canvas they encountered Haruki, apparently bewildered, who called their attention to the loose ropes and sagging canvas, not that this situation really required his exposition. I fear they might have been unkind to Haruki, but they had little opportunity to do so, as Tajima and I, armed with the tent pegs, or stakes, if you will, approaching from different sides, struck them, from behind, heavily. It was shortly thereafter that the other two Ashigaru came to look into the matter, perhaps curious to know what was delaying their fellows. Behind the tent, they encountered Haruki, seemingly bewildered, indicating the two mysteriously prone Ashigaru, whom our new arrivals, the other two Ashigaru, quickly joined. Meanwhile Ichiro had entered the slave tent and had his companion sword, easily handled at close quarters, at the throat of the officer. We joined Ichiro and the officer, both now well within the tent, as soon as we had dragged the four Ashigaru to the back of the tent, outside, and tucked them under the sagging canvas. We then slipped into the tent under the canvas, as well, as that was most convenient. The whip master was reluctant to supply the master key to which the ankle locks of the slaves would answer but it was easily rifled from his person. He was then conducted to the rear of the tent, which was half collapsed, where he beheld four unconscious Ashigaru. He did not have long to behold them, however, as, thanks to another blow of a peg, or stake, such things having been brought within the tent, wielded now by Tajima, he joined them, to share for a more or less indefinite time their untroubled condition. We left Haruki to bind and gag the four Ashigaru and the officer, as it was not clear how long they would remain in their state of inert serenity. Interestingly, there was, within the tent, a canvas partition which separated the main portion of the tent, in a linear fashion, from the area where the slaves were housed. This was unusual in a slave tent, for in such a tent, given the inspection, the buying and selling, and such, of the slaves, the slaves are usually publicly exhibited, as on a slave shelf, on platforms, in cages, in cells open to the street, and such. In such venues one does not have the privacy available in a professional slave house, or in the purple booths, admittance into which is restricted. I suspect the reason for this division in the tent, by means of the canvas partition, was less to protect the slaves from roving, appraising eyes, for slaves are accustomed, as other animals, to being openly regarded, than to minimize the possibility of a particular slave being identified, even casually or accidentally. A consequence of this arrangement, of course, was that the slaves had no clear understanding of what had occurred on the other side of the partition.

As mentioned earlier, there were some forty slaves in the tent. They were in a single line, held on a common chain, anchored at each end to a large ring fixed in a heavy, trunklike piling, of which a foot or so was visible above the ground. Each was fastened to the chain in the following fashion. A portion of the chain was looped twice, closely, about the left ankle, following which the shackle, or tongue, of a padlock was threaded through two links of the chain, and snapped shut, this closing the loops. In virtue of this arrangement girls could be conveniently added to, or removed from, the chain. A further convenience was afforded by the fact that the padlocks answered to a single key, the master key.

“Oh, Master!” wept Cecily.

How I had missed her in my arms!

“Master!” cried Jane, the former Lady Portia Lia Serisia of Sun Towers, of Ar, to Pertinax. I had purchased her for Pertinax in Tarncamp, long ago, not merely for his pleasure, but that he might learn how to handle a woman, as a woman should be handled, as a slave.

“Gregory!” cried Saru, the former Miss Margaret Wentworth, of Earth, who had come to Gor, thinking to be enriched, with Gregory White, now Pertinax. Unbeknownst to her, she had been brought to Gor, requisitioned, for Lord Nishida, who wished to give such a woman, young, shapely, fairly complexioned, blond-haired, blue-eyed, and beautiful, as a gift to Lord Temmu, his shogun. Whereas there was no dearth of beautiful women, both free and slave, in the islands, her complexion, and her hair and eye coloring, would be unusual at the World’s End.

“On your bellies, all of you, facing away, hands at your sides, palms up,” I said.

The slaves, well trained to obey free persons, instantly, and unquestioningly, complied, with the exception of Saru, who struggled to her feet and held out her hands to Pertinax. “Gregory!” she sobbed. “Gregory!”

“Must a command be repeated?” said Pertinax. The repetition of a command is commonly a cause for discipline, unless there is a serious reason to suppose that the command has not been heard, or has not been understood. In this case, it seemed clear the command would have been both heard and understood. Failure on the part of a female slave not to respond instantly and unquestioningly to a command can mean the whip for her.

“Oh, of course, Gregory,” she said, smiling, and quickly assumed the prescribed position.

She extended her left ankle behind her, lifting it a little, to facilitate access to the padlock which held her in place.

“I know why Nezumi is here,” said Tajima. “But how is it that these other three, your Cecily, and Pertinax’s Jane, and the fair-haired slave, Saru, are here, as well?”

“It is unlikely it is a coincidence,” said Haruki. “The three slaves, and the other, were associated. Recall the supper of Lord Yamada.”

“Yes,” said Tajima, uncertainly.

“Ichiro,” I said, “when you first approached the whip master on the ruse of acquiring slaves to serve a pleasure feast, did he express surprise or skepticism?”

“No, Commander
san
,” said Ichiro. “His concern pertained only to the assurance of an authorization.”

“When recently in the tent of the camp lord,” I said, “Lord Akio remarked that Lord Yamada may not always be shogun.”

“Interesting,” said Haruki.

“At the time of Lord Yamada’s supper,” said Pertinax, “Lord Akio slew the would-be assassin, despite the fact that the fellow had already been subdued by Ashigaru.”

“That preventing an interrogation which might have proved illuminating,” I said.

“You think Lord Akio plots against Lord Yamada?” said Tajima.

“I think it is obvious,” I said.

“But Lord Yamada is his shogun,” said Tajima.

“The code of the warrior,” I said, “is sometimes easily put on and off, as easily as one of the splendid garments of Lord Akio.”

“The slaves, and the shogun’s daughter, were all witness to this,” said Pertinax.

“Perhaps, then, that is why they have been kept together,” said Haruki, “that they might be supervised and controlled, or, if one wished, disposed of without difficulty.”