On Deck 21, Vyann paused.
‘There is an apartment for you here,’ she said. ‘My apartment is three doors further along, and Roger Scoyt’s is opposite mine. He or I will collect you for a meal shortly.’
Opening the door, Complain looked in.
‘I’ve never seen a room like this before,’ he said impressed.
‘You’ve had all the disadvantages, haven’t you?’ she said ironically, and left him. Complain watched that retreating figure, took off his grimy shoes and went into the room.
It held little luxury, beyond a basin with a tap which actually yielded a slight flow of water and a bed made of coarse fabric rather than leaves. What chiefly impressed him was a picture on the wall, a bright swirl of colour, non-representational, but with a meaning of its own. There was also a mirror, in which Complain found another picture; this one was of a rough creature smirched with dirt, its hair festooned with dried miltex, its clothes torn.
He set to work to change all that, grimly wondering what Vyann must have thought of such a barbarous figure. He scrubbed himself, put on clean clothes from his pack, and collapsed exhausted on the bed — exhausted, but unable to sleep; for at once his brain started racing.
Gwenny had gone, Roffery had gone, Wantage, Marapper, now Fermour, had gone; Complain was on his own. The prospect of a new start offered itself — and the prospect was thrilling. Only the thought of Marapper’s face, gleaming with unction and bonhomie, brought regret.
His mind was still churning when Master Scoyt looked round the door.
‘Come and eat,’ he said simply.
Complain went with him, watching carefully to gauge the other’s attitude towards him, but the investigator seemed too preoccupied to register any attitude at all. Then, looking up and catching Complain’s eye on him, he said, ‘Well, your friend Fermour is proved an Outsider. When he was making for the ponics, he saw the body of your priest and kept straight on. Our sentries had an ambush for him and caught him easily.’
Shaking his head impatiently at Complain’s puzzled look, Scoyt explained, ‘He is not an ordinary human, bred in an ordinary part of the ship, otherwise he would have stopped automatically and made the genuflections of fear before the body of a friend; that ceremony is drummed into every human child from birth. It was your doing that which finally convinced us you were human.’
He sank back into silence until they reached the dining-hall, scarcely greeting the several men and women who spoke to him on the way. In the hall, a few officers were seated, eating. At a table on her own sat Vyann. Seeing her, Scoyt instantly brightened, went over to her and put a hand on her shoulder.
‘Laur, my dear,’ he said. ‘How refreshing to find you waiting for us. I must get some ale — we have to celebrate the capture of another Outsider — and this one won’t get away.’
Smiling at him, she said, ‘I hope you’re also going to eat, Roger.’
‘You know my foolish stomach,’ he said, beckoning an orderly and beginning to tell her at once the details of Fermour’s capture. Not very happily, Complain took a seat by them; he could not help feeling jealous of Scoyt’s easy way with Vyann, although the investigator was twice her age. Ale was set before them, and food, a strange white meat that tasted excellent; it was wonderful too, to eat without being surrounded with midges, which in Deadways formed an unwanted sauce to many a mouthful; but Complain picked at his plate with little more enthusiasm than Scoyt showed.
‘You look dejected,’ Vyann remarked, interrupting Scoyt, ‘when you should be feeling cheerful. It is better here, isn’t it, than locked up in a cell with Fermour?’
‘Fermour was a friend,’ Complain said, using the first excuse for his unhappiness that entered his head.
‘He was also an Outsider,’ Scoyt said heavily. ‘He exhibited all their characteristics. He was slow, rather on the weighty side, saying little… I’m beginning to be able to detect them as soon as I look at them.’
‘You’re brilliant, Roger,’ Vyann said, laughing. ‘How about eating your fish?’ And she put a hand over his affectionately.
Perhaps it was that which sparked Complain off. He flung his fork down.
‘Rot your brilliance!’ he said. ‘What about Marapper? — he was no alien and you killed him. Do you think I can forget that? Why should you expect any help from me after killing him?’
Waiting tensely for trouble to start, Complain could see other people turning from their meal to look at him. Scoyt opened his mouth and then shut it again, staring beyond Complain as a heavy hand fell on the latter’s shoulder.
‘Mourning for me is not only foolish but premature,’ a familar voice said. ‘Still taking on the world single-handed, eh, Roy?’
Complain turned, amazed, and there stood the priest, beaming, scowling, rubbing his hands. He clutched Marapper’s arm incredulously.
‘Yes, I, Roy, and no other: the great subconscious rejected me — and left me confoundedly cold. I hope your scheme worked, Master Scoyt?’
‘Excellently, Priest,’ Scoyt said. ‘Eat some of this beastly indigestible food and explain yourself to your friend, so that he will look at us less angrily.’
‘You were dead!’ Complain said.
‘Only a short Journey,’ Marapper said, seating himself and stretching out for the ale jug. ‘This witch doctor, Master Scoyt here, thought up an uncomfortable way of testing you and Fermour. He painted my head with rat’s blood and laid me out with some beastly drug to stage a death scene for your benefit.’
Just a slight overdose of chloral hydrate,’ said Scoyt, with a secretive smile.
‘But I touched you — you were cold,’ Complain protested.
‘I still am,’ Marapper said. ‘It’s the effects of the drug. And what would be that beastly antidote your men shot into me?’
‘Strychnine, I believe it’s called,’ Scoyt said.
‘Very unpleasant. I’m a hero, no less, Roy: always a saint, and now a hero as well. The schemers also condescended to give me a hot coffee when I came round; I never tasted anything so good in Quarters… But this ale is better.’
His eyes met Complain’s still dazed ones over the rim of the mug. He winked, and belched with charming deliberation.
‘I’m no ghost, Roy,’ he said. ‘Ghosts don’t drink.’
Before they had finished the meal, Master Scoyt was looking fretful. With a muttered apology, he left them.
‘He works too hard,’ Vyann said, her eyes following him out of the hall. ‘We must all work hard. Before we sleep, you must be put in the picture and told our plans, for we shall be busy next wake.’
‘Ah,’ Marapper said eagerly, clearing his bowl, ‘that is what I want to hear. You understand my interest in this whole matter is purely theological, but what I’d like to know is, what do I get out of it?’
‘First we are going to exorcise the Outsiders,’ she smiled. ‘Suitably questioned, Fermour should yield up their secret hiding place. We go there and kill them, and then we are free to concentrate on unravelling the riddles of the ship.’
This she said quickly, as if anxious to avoid questioning on that point, and went on at once to usher them out of the dining-room and along several corridors. Marapper, now fully himself again, took the chance to tell Complain of their abortive search for the Control Room.
‘So much has changed,’ Vyann complained. They were passing through a steel companionway whose double doors, now open, allowed egress from deck to deck. She indicated them lightly, saying: ‘These doors, for instance — in some places they are open, in some closed. And all the ones along Main Corridor are closed — which is fortunate, otherwise every marauder aboard ship would make straight for Forwards. But we cannot open or shut the doors at will, as the Giants must have been able to do when they owned the ship. As they stand now, so they have stood for generations; but somewhere must be a lever which controls them all. We are so helpless. We control nothing.’