Tower of Zanid (8 page)

“No thank you! Is running water in hotel.”

Fallon, holding the family cake of soap in one hand, and towing Gazi with the other, wormed his way toward the nearest shower-head. The driver and his assistant had finished tightening the joints of their extensible pipe-system and now laid hold of the handles at the ends of the walking-beam that worked the pump. They tugged these handles up and down, grunting, and presently the shower-heads sneezed and began to spray water.

The Zaniduma yelled as the cold fluid struck their greenish skins. They laughed and splashed each other; it was a festive occasion. The
land
of Zanid rose out of the treeless prairies of west-central Balhib, not many hundred hoda from where these gave way to the vast dry steppes of Jo’oPand Qaath. Water for the city had to be hauled up from deep wells, or from the muddy trickle of the shallow Eshqa. There was a water-main from the Eshqa above the city and a system of shaihan-powered pumps for raising the water, but this served only the royal palace, the Terran Hotel, and a few of the mansions in the Gabanj.

Fallon and Gazi had gotten reasonably clean, and were picking their way out of the crowd, when Fallon stiffened at the sight of Fredro, on the edge of the square, with their two sufkira draped over one shoulder, focussing his camera for a shot of the crowd.

“Oy!” said Fallon. “The damned fool doesn’t know about the soul-fraction belief!”

He started toward the archeologist, pulling Gazi, when she pulled back, saying: “Look! Who’s that, Antane?”

A voice resounded through the square. Turning, Fallon saw, over the heads of the Krishnans, that an Earthman in a black .suit and a white turban had climbed up on the wall around the base of the tomb of King Balade, to harangue the bathers:

“…for this one God hates all forms of immodesty. Beware, sinful Balhibuma, lest ye mend not your iniquitous ways and He deliver you into the hands of the Qaathians and the Gozashtanduma. Dirt is a thousand times better than exposure to…”

It was Welcome Wagner, the American Ecumenical Monotheist. Fallon observed that the heads of the Krishnans were turning, one by one, toward the source of this stentorian outcry.

“…for in the Book, it says that no person shall expose his or her modesty before another. And furthermore…”

“Is
everybody
trying to start a riot?” sighed Fallon. He turned back toward Fredro, who was aiming his camera at the backs of the crowd, and hurried over to the archeologist, barking: “Put that thing away, you idiot!”

“What?” asked Fredro. “Put away camera? Why?”

The crowd; still looking at Wagner, began to grumble. Wagner kept on in his piercing rasp:

“Nor shall ye eat the flesh of those creatures ye call safqa, for it was revealed that the One God deems sin the eating of those Terran creatures called snails, clams, oysters, scallops, and other animals of the shellfish kind…”

Fallon said to Fredro: “The Balhibuma believe that taking a picture of them steals a piece of their souls.”

“But that cannot be the right I took—I took pictures at festival and nobody minded.”

Some of the crowd had begun to answer, “We’ll eat as pleases us!” “Go back to the planet whence you came!”

Fallon said tensely: “They had their clothes on! The tabu applies only when they’re stripped!”

The crowd had become noisier, but Welcome Wagner merely yelled louder. The driver of the water-wagon and his-assistant, becoming absorbed in the scene, stopped pumping. When the water ceased to flow, those who had been standing around the wagon began straggling across the square to the denser crowd that was forming around the tomb.

Fredro said: “Just one more picture, please.”

Fallon impatiently grabbed for the camera. Instead of letting go, Fredro tightened his grip upon the device, shouting: “
Psiakrew
! What you doing, fool?”

As they struggled for possession of the camera, the sufkira slid off Fredro’s shoulder to the ground. Gazi, with an exclamation of irk (for she would have to wash the garments) picked them up. Meanwhile Fredro’s shout, and the struggle between the archeologist and Fallon, had drawn the attention of the nearer Zaniduma. One of the latter pointed and cried: “Behold these other Earthmen! One of them is trying to steal our souls!”

“Oh, he is, is he?” said another.

Glancing around, Fallon saw that he and his party had in their turn become the focus of hostile glances. Around the tomb of Balade, the noise of the hecklers had nearly drowned out the powerful voice of Welcome Wagner. That crowd was working itself up to the stage where they would soon pull the Earthman down off the wall and beat him to death, if they did not kill him in some more lingering and humorous manner. Even the water-wagon driver and his assistant had gotten down off the vehicle and trailed over to see what was happening.

Fallon jerked Fredro’s sleeve. “Come on, you idiot. Shift-ho!”

“Where?” asked Fredro.

“Oh to hell with you!” cried Fallon, ready to dance with exasperation.

He caught Gazi’s wrist and started to lead her toward the water-wagon. A Zanidu stepped up close to Fredro, stuck out his tongue, and shouted: “
Bakhan Terraol”

The Krishnan aimed a slap at the archeologist’s face. Fallon heard the slap connect, and then the more solid sound of Fredro’s fist. He glanced back to see the Zanidu fall backwards to a sitting position on the cobbles. The scientist, if elderly, still had plenty of steam left in his punches.

The other Zaniduma began to close in, shouting and waving their fists. Fredro, as if aware for the first time of the trouble that he had fomented, started after Fallon and Gazi. The little camera swung on the end of its strap as Fredro turned as he ran, shouting polysyllabic Polish epithets.

“The wagon!” said Fallon to his jagaini.

Reaching the water-wagon, Gazi turned long enough to toss the bundle of towelling into Fallon’s hands, and swung herself up on to the driver’s seat by the hand-holds. Then she held out her hands for the sufkira, which Fallon threw to her before climbing up himself. Right after him, came the bulky body of Julian Fredro.

Fallon pulled the whip out of its socket, cracked it over the heads of the shaihans, and shouted: “
Hao! Haoga-i!
”

The bulky brutes stirred their twelve legs and lunged forward against their harness. The wagon started with a jerk. At that moment, Fallon had no particular thought of interfering in the quarrel between the citizens of Zanid and Welcome Wagner. However, the wagon happened to be headed straight for this scene of strife, so that Fallon could not help seeing that bare arms were reaching up from the crowd and trying to pull down the preacher, who clung to the top of the wall, still shouting.

Little though he really cared about Wagner’s fate, Fallon could not resist the temptation to try to cut a fine figure in the sight of Gazi and Fredro. He cracked his whip once more, yelling: “
Vyant-hao
!”

At the cry, the rearmost Zaniduma turned and tumbled out of the way as the team lumbered in among them.

“
Vyant-hao
!” screamed Fallon, cracking his whip over the heads of the throng.

The wagon drove in among the crowd, dividing it as a ship does flotsam, while the Balhibuma who had started to chase Fredro ran in behind it, shouting threats and objurgations. Under Fallon’s guidance the wagon slewed up against the wall around the tomb, like a motorboat coming in to dock, where Welcome Wagner was shakily getting to his feet again.

“Jump aboard!” yelled Fallon.

Wagner jumped, almost falling off on the far side of the water-tank. A few more cracks of the whip, and the team broke into a shambling run for the nearest exit from the
Square
of Qarar.

“
Au!
” shrieked the driver. “Come back with my wagon!”

The driver ran up alongside the wagon and began to swing himself aboard. Fallon hit him a sharp rap over the head with the butt of the whip, at which he fell back upon the cobbles. A glance to the rear showed Fallon that several others were trying to climb up also, but Fredro got rid of one by kicking him in the face while Wagner stamped on the fingers of another as he grasped one of the hand-holds. Fallon leaned forward and snapped his whip against the bare hide of yet another, who was trying to seize the bridle of one of the animals. With a howl, the Krishnan hopped away to nurse his welt.

Fallon urged the shaihans to greater speed as the wagon rumbled into the nearest street. It seemed to Fallon that half the people of Zanid must be chasing his vehicle. But with the water-tank three-quarters empty, the team made good speed, sending chance pedestrians leaping for safety.

“Where—where are we going?” asked Gazi.

“Away from that mob,” growled Fallon, jerking his thumb back toward the horde. “Hold on!”

He pulled the team into a tight turn around a corner, so that the wagon rocked and skidded perilously. Then he did another, and another, zigzagging until, despite his own familiarity with the city, he was a bit confused himself as to where he was. A few more turns and the mob seemed to have been left behind, so he let the team drop back to their six-legged trot. People along the street stared with interest as the water-wagon went by, bearing three Earthmen—two in their native costume and one nude, and an equally unclad Krishnan woman.

Wagner spoke up: “Well, say, I don’t know who you are, but I’m glad you got me out of that. I guess I hadn’t ought to have stirred up these heathens so. They’re kind of excitable.”

Fallon said: “My name’s Fallon, and these are Gazi er-Doukh and Dr. Fredro.”

“Pleased to meet you,” said Wagner. “Say, aren’t you two gonna put your clothes back on?”

“When we get around to it,” said Fallon.

“It makes us kind of conspicuous,” said Wagner.

Fallon was about to reply that nothing prevented Wagner from getting off, when the wagon rumbled into the park around the Safq. Fredro gave an exclamation.

Wagner looked at the looming structure, and he shook a fist, crying: “If I could blow up that lair of heathen idolatry, I wouldn’t care none if I got blown up with it!”

“What?” cried Fredro. “You crazy? Blow up priceless archeological treasure?”

“I don’t care nothing about your atheistic science.”

“Ignorant savage,” said Fredro.

“Ignorant, huh?” said Wagner with heat. “Well, your so-called science don’t mean a blessed thing, mister. You see, I know the
truth
, so that puts me ahead of you no matter how many of them college degrees you got.”

“Shut up, you two,” said Fallon. “
You’re
making us conspicuous.”

“I will not shut up,” said Wagner. “I bear witness to the truth, and I won’t be silenced by the ignorant tongues of…”

“Then get off the wagon,” interrupted Fallon.

“I will not! It ain’t your wagon neither, mister, and I got as much right on it as you.”

Fallon caught Fredro’s eye. “
Abwerfen ihn, ja
?”

“
Jawohl!
” said the Pole.

“Catch,” said Fallon to Gazi, tossing her the reins.

Then he and Fredro each caught one of Welcome Wagner’s arms. The muscular evangelist braced himself to resist, but the double attack was too much for him. A grunt and a heave, and Wagner flew off the top of the water-tank to land on his white turban in a spacious puddle of muddy water.

Splash!

Fallon took back the reins and speeded up the shaihans lest Wagner run after to try to clamber back aboard. He took one last look back around the water-tank. Wagner was sitting in the puddle, head bowed, and beating the brown water with his fists. He seemed to be crying.

Fredro smiled. “Good for him! Crazy fools like that, who want to blow up a monument, should be boiled in oil.” He clenched his fists. “When I think of such crazy fools, I—I…” He ground his teeth audibly as his limited English failed him.

Fallon pulled up to the curb, stopped the shaihans, and set the brake. “Best leave this here.”

“Why not ride it to your house?” asked Fredro.

“Haven’t you ever heard that American expression, ‘Don’t steal chickens close to home’?”

“No. What does it mean, please?”

Fallon, wondering how so educated a man could be such a fool, explained why he would not park the vehicle right in front of his own domicile, to be found by the prefect’s men when they scoured the Juru for it. As he explained, he climbed down from the water-wagon and donned his sufkir.

“Care to drop in on us for a spot of kvad, Fredro? I could do with one after this afternoon’s events.”

“Thank you, no. I must get back to my hotel to develop my photos. And I am—ah—dining with Mr. Consul Mjipa tonight.”

“Well, give Percy Pickle-face my love. You might suggest he find an excuse for cancelling the Reverend Wagner’s passport. That bloke damages Balhibo-Terran relations more with one sermon than Percy can .make up for by a hundred good-will gestures.”

“That wretched obscurantist! I will do. Is funny. I know some Ecumenical Monotheists on Earth. While I don’t believe their teachings, or approve of their movement, none is like this Wagner. He is a class of himself.”

“Well,” said Fallon, “I suppose at this distance they don’t feel they can import missionaries specially, so they grab anybody here who shows willingness and send him out after souls. And speaking of souls,
don’t
try to photograph a naked Balhibu. At least not without his or her permission. That’s as bad as the sort of thing Wagner does.”

Fredro’s face took on the look of a puppy surprised in a heinous deed. “I was stupid, yes? Will you excuse, please? I will not do it again. A burnt child is twice shy.”

“Eh? Oh, surely. Or if you must photograph them, use one of those little Hayashi ring-cameras.”

“They do not take a very clear picture, but… And thank you again. I—I am sorry to be such a trouble.” Fredro glanced back along the street by which they had driven, and a look of horror came over his face. “Oh, look who is coming!
Dubranec
!”

He turned and walked off rapidly. Fallon said: “
Nasuk genda”
in Balhibou, then looked in the direction indicated. To his astonishment, he saw Welcome Wagner running toward him, his muddy turban still on his head.