Flesh (8 page)

The owner threw his hands up in the air in a gesture of despair.

“Come off it,” Churchill said. “I’d go from house to house on Millionaire’s Row and peddle these. But I haven’t the time. Do you want to give us twenty or not? Last offer.”

“You’re snatching the bread from the mouths of my poor children... but I’ll take your offer.”

Ten minutes later, the two starmen stepped out of the shop. They wore sandals and kilts and round hats with floppy brims. Their broad leather belts held sheaths with long steel knives, and their pockets contained eight columbias each. They held bags in their hands, and in these bags were rainproof ponchos.

“Next stop, the docks,” Churchill said. “I used to sail yachts for the rich during the summers when I was working my way through college.”

“I know you can sail,” Sarvant said. “Have you forgotten that you commanded that sailing-ship we stole when we escaped from prison on the planet Vixa?”

“I forgot,” Churchill said. “I want to size up the chances for getting a job. Afterwards, we’ll start sniffing around. Maybe we can find out what’s happened to Stagg and Calthorp.”

“Rud,” Sarvant said, “there must be more to this than just getting a job. Why boats particularly? I know you well enough to know you’re operating on more than one level.”

“Okay. I know you’re no blabbermouth. If I can find a suitable ship, we’ll get hold of Yastzhembski’s boys and take off for Asia, via Europe.”

“I’m very glad to hear that,” Sarvant said. “I thought you’d just walked out on them, washed your hands of them. But how will you find them?”

“Are you kidding?” Churchill said, laughing. “All I have to do is ask at the nearest temple.”

“Temple?”

“Sure. It’s evident that the government’ll be keeping an eye on us. In fact, it’s had a tail on us ever since we left our prison.”

“Where is he?”

“Don’t look around now. I’ll point him out to you later. Just keep walking.”

Abruptly, Churchill stopped. His way was barred by a circle of men kneeling on the road. There was nothing to keep Churchill from walking around them. But he stopped to look over the shoulders.

“What are they doing?” Sarvant asked.

“Playing the twenty-ninth-century version of craps.”

“It’s against my principles even to watch gambling. I sincerely hope you’re not planning on joining them.”

“Yes, I think that’s exactly what I’m planning on doing.”

“Don’t, Rud,” Sarvant said, putting his hand on Churchill’s arm. “Nothing good can come of this.”

“Chaplain, I’m not a member of your parish. They probably abide by the rules. That’s all I want.” Churchill took three columbias out of his pocket and spoke loudly. “Can I get into this shoot?”

“Sure,” a huge dark man with a patch over one eye said. “You can play as long as your money lasts. You just get off the ship?”

“Not so long ago,” Churchill said. He sank to his knees and laid a Columbia on the ground. “My turn for the bones, eh? Come on, babies, Poppa needs a pocketful of rye.”

Thirty minutes later a grinning Churchill walked toward Sarvant with a handful of silver coins. “The wages of sin,” he said.

He lost his grin when he heard a loud shout behind him. Turning, he saw the dice players walking toward him. The big one-eyed man was yelling at him.

“Wait a minute, buddy, we got a couple of questions!”

“Oh, oh,” Churchill said out of the side of his mouth. “Get ready to run. These guys are poor losers.”

“You didn’t cheat, did you?” Sarvant said nervously.

“Of course not! You ought to know me better than that. Besides, I wouldn’t take a chance in that rough bunch.”

“Listen, buddy,” the one-eyed man said. “You talk kinda funny. Where you come from? Albany?”

“Manitowoc, Wisconsin,” Churchill said.

“Never heard of that place. What is it, some small burg up north?”

“North by west. Why do you want to know?”

“We don’t like strangers that can’t even talk Deecee straight. Strangers got queer tricks, especially when they are shooting craps. Only a week ago we caught a tar from Norfolk who was using magic to control the dice. We knocked his teeth out and threw him off the dock with a weight around his neck. Never saw him again.”

“If you thought I was cheating, you should have said something while we were playing.”

The one-eyed sailor ignored Churchill’s remark and said, “I don’t notice no frat mark on you. What frat you belong to?”

“Lambda Chi Alpha,” Churchill said. He put his hand on his knife-blade.

“What kind of lingo is that? You mean the Lamb frat?”

Churchill could see that he and Sarvant would be considered lambs for the slaughter unless they could prove they were under the protection of some powerful frat. He didn’t mind telling a lie in a situation like this if it got him out of it. But a resentment that had been building up for the past six weeks broke into a sudden fury.

“I belong to the human race!” he shouted. “And that’s more than you can say for yourself!”

The one-eyed sailor turned red. He growled, “By the breasts of Columbia, I’ll cut your heart out! No stinking foreigner can talk that way to me!”

“Come on, you thieves!” Churchill snarled. He pulled his knife from its sheath and at the same time shouted at Sarvant, “Run like hell!”

The one-eyed sailor had also pulled his knife and came at Churchill with the blade. Churchill threw the handful of silver coins in the man’s eyes and at the same time stepped forward. The palm of his left hand struck outwards against the wrist of the other man’s knife-hand. The knife fell, and Churchill sank his blade into the bulging paunch of the sailor.

He withdrew the knife and stepped back, crouching, to face the others. But they knew dirty fighting as well as any sailor. One of them picked up a loose brick from a pile of rubble and threw it at Churchill’s head. The world grew dim, and he was vaguely aware that blood was streaming over his eyes from a cut on his forehead. By the time he regained his senses, he found his knife taken away and his arms gripped by two strong sailors.

A third, a short skinny fellow with a broken-toothed snarl, stepped up and shoved his blade straight at Churchill’s belly.

5

Peter Stagg awoke. He was flat on his back, lying on something soft, with the branches of a large oak tree above him. Through the branches he could see a bright, cloudless sky. There were birds on the branches, a sparrow, a catbird—and a huge jay which sat on its rear and dangled bare and human legs.

The legs were brown and slim and nicely curved. The rest of the body was disguised in the costume of a giant jaybird. Shortly after Stagg opened his eyes, the jay took off its mask and revealed the pretty face of a dark, big-eyed girl. She reached behind her and pulled a bugle that had been hanging from a cord from over her shoulder. Before Stagg could stop her, she blew a long wavering call.

Immediately, a hubbub arose from somewhere behind him.

Stagg sat up and turned around to face the source of the noise. It came from a mob of people standing on the other side of the road. The road was a broad cement highway running past farm fields. Stagg was sitting a few feet from its edge on a thick pile of blankets which someone had thoughtfully placed beneath him.

He had no idea of when or how he had gotten to this spot. Or where it was. He remembered only too vividly events up to shortly before dawn; after that, all was blank. The height of the sun indicated that the time was about eleven in the morning.

The jay-girl lowered herself from the branch, hung for a moment, then dropped the five feet to the ground. She picked herself up and said, “Good morning, Noble Stag. How do you feel?”

Stagg groaned and said, “I’m stiff and sore in every muscle. And I’ve an awful headache.”

“You’ll be all right after you have breakfast. And may I say that you were magnificent last night? I’ve never seen a Sunhero who could come up to you. Well, I must go now. Your friend, Calthorp, said that when you woke you’d want to be alone with him for a while.”

“Calthorp!” Stagg said. He groaned again. “He’s the last man I want to see.” But the girl had run off across the road and joined the group of people.

Calthorp’s white head appeared from behind a tree. He approached with a large covered tray in his hands. He was smiling, but it was obvious he was desperately trying to cover up his concern.

“How do you feel?” he shouted.

Stagg told him. “Where are we?”

“I’d say we’re on what used to be U.S. 1 but is now called Mary’s Pike. We’re about ten miles out of the present limits of Washington. Two miles down the road is a little farming town called Fair Grace. Its normal population is two thousand, but just now it’s about fifteen thousand. The farmers and the farmers’ daughters from miles around have gathered here. Everyone in Fair Grace is eagerly awaiting you. But you are not at their beck and call. You are the Sunhero, so you may rest and take your ease. That is, until sundown. Then you must perform as you did last night.”

Stagg looked down and for the first time became aware that he was still nude.

“You saw me last night?” He looked up pleadingly at the old man.

It was Calthorp’s turn to stare at the ground. He said, “Ringside seat—for a while, anyway. I sneaked around the edge of the crowd and went into a building. There I watched the orgy from a balcony.”

“Don’t you have any decency?” Stagg said angrily. “It’s bad enough that I couldn’t help myself. It’s worse that you’d witness my humiliation.”

“Some humiliation! Yes, I saw you. I’m an anthropologist. This was the first time I’d ever had a chance to see a fertility rite at close range. Also, as your friend, I was worried about you. But I needn’t have; you took care of yourself. Others, too.”

Stagg glared. “Are you making fun of me?”

“God forbid! No. I wasn’t expressing humor, just amazement. Perhaps envy. Of course, it’s the antlers that gave you the drive and the ability. Wonder if they’d give me just a little shot of the stuff those antlers produce.”

Calthorp placed the tray in front of Stagg and removed the cloth over it. “Here’s a breakfast such as you never had.”

Stagg turned his head to one side. “Take it away. I’m sick. Sick to my stomach and sick to my soul with what I did last night.”

“You seemed to be enjoying yourself.” Stagg growled with sheer fury, and Calthorp put out a reassuring hand. “No, I meant no offense. It’s just that I saw you, and I can’t get over it. Come on, lad, eat. Look what we have for you! Fresh baked bread. Fresh butter. And jam. Honey. Eggs, bacon, ham, trout, venison— and a pitcher of cool ale. And you can have second helpings of anything you want.”

“I told you, I’m sick! I couldn’t eat a thing.” Stagg sat silent for a few minutes, staring across the road at the brightly colored tents and the people clustered around them. Calthorp sat down by him and lit up a large green cigar.

Suddenly, Stagg picked up the pitcher and drank deeply of the ale. He put the pitcher down, wiped the foam off his lips with the back of his hand, belched, and picked up a fork and knife.

He began eating as if this were the first meal in his life—or the last.

“I have to eat,” he apologized between bites. “I’m weak as a new-born kitten. Look how my hand’s shaking.”

“You’ll have to eat enough for a hundred men,” Calthorp said. “After all, you did the work of a hundred—two hundred!”

Stagg reached up with one hand and felt his antlers. “Still there. Hey! They’re not standing up straight and stiff like they did last night. They’re limp! Maybe they are going to shrink up and dry away.”

Calthorp shook his head. “No. When you get your strength back, and your blood pressure rises, they’ll become erect again. They’re not true antlers. Those of deer consist of bony outgrowth with no covering of keratin. Yours seem to have a bony base, but the upper part is mainly cartilage surrounded by skin and blood vessels.

“It’s no wonder they’re deflated. And it’s a wonder that you didn’t rupture a blood vessel. Or something.”

“Whatever it is the horns pump into me,” Stagg said, “it must be gone. Except for being weak and sore, I feel normal. If only I could get rid of these horns! Doc, could you cut them off?”