"What did they say when they saw we weren't here?"
"I explained that you two had gone ashore and might not be back until morning, and they'd have to comb all the taverns to flush you out. Then, I said we were wearing our oldest clothes, and it wouldn't be fitting to come before the High Priestess in such condition. I don't know which argument carried the most weight; but they went away, stating they'd be back at sun-up to escort us. I was to tell Captain Sarf to delay his sailing until it's been decided whether to let the Earthlings continue their journey."
"Sarf'll love that," said Reith.
"If he finds out," said Marot. "Perhaps the beautiful Alicia will forget to pass the word. You know women." He winked.
"Aristide," said Reith, "I never suspected you of being such an intriguer."
Marot shrugged. "What is a diplomat but an honest man sent abroad to lie for his country?" He turned to Alicia. "But, my dear, why did they not seize you and carry you off? They could have held you as a hostage to assure our appearance."
"I don't know. I suppose the warrant was based on the original dossier for the expedition, and that mentions only you two. I'd be listed in Foltz's dossier."
"Proving," said Reith, "that bureaucracy works the same everywhere."
At sun-up, a priest of Bákh and six guards appeared at the foot of the gangboard. Longshoremen were already loading bundles and cases of cargo; but at the sight of priestly vestments, they hastily stepped aside. The intruders marched up to the deck, where Sarf awaited them.
"Where are they?" barked the priest.
"Whom seek ye, sir?"
"Feign not stupidity! Where are the Terrans you have aboard, who yestereve were summoned by Her Holiness?"
"Oh, the, Terrans!" said Sarf. "They've gone ashore. So eager were they to see Her Holiness that they waited not for their escort. They thought to meet you on the way."
"A likely tale!" sneered the priest. "Search this vessel, men!"
For an hour the guards prowled, opening bundles, peering under benches, and poking into comers. Reith, curled up below deck in total darkness, could hear them tramping about, gabbing and prying. His sack, tied at the top, stood amid the other sacks of ore, as did the sacks containing his companions and Marot's fossils.
Sounds, muffled by the canvas, implied that a couple of the guards were investigating the ore sacks. Reith caught snatches of speech: "Nay; this one, too, holds nought but lumps of stone ..." "How shall we know the petrified bones from the ore? In this light, all look alike ..." "If we catch the Ertsuma, we'll make them tell us. Go on, open another ..." "Oh, Hishkak! That's my tenth, with never a sign of Terrans or their bones ..."
Presently these sounds died away. Straining his ears, Reith heard faintly from above the voice of the guard: "Your Reverence, we've searched every nook and cranny in vain."
"Opened you all those bags in the hold?"
"Aye, sir; we examined every one. There were at least fifty."
The priest's voice was heard directed at the imperturbable captain: "Bákh curse you! Why detained you not these suspects?"
"None so commanded me, Reverend Sir; and none told me that the Earthmen were suspects."
"This whole investigation hath been bungled. Sending out that easygoing old fool Behorj, and failing to hale the alien female back to the Temple when Qásh had her cornered on this tub ..."
The voice sank to a mutter and then to silence. Booted footsteps on the gangplank told of the guards' departure.
"Fergus!" came a faint, high voice, muffled by the heavy cloth. "I'm smothering!"
"For God's sake, Lish, shut up! They may come back. We stay mousey quiet until the ship's at sea again."
He heard a little snort of suppressed laughter. "Some sea!"
Another endless hour dragged past. Overhead could be heard the footfalls of longshoremen, the shouting of orders, and the sounds of crates and other containers being moved.
At last these sounds quieted, and Reith heard the gong strokes that signaled the ship's departure. Hard on the last sonorous stroke came the sound of running feet and an excited, unintelligible rush of speech.
The slight motion of the boat on the bosom of the current and the faint creaking of her timbers showed that the Morkerád was at last under way. Wind thrummed against the sail. Footsteps approached, and the lashing atop Reith's sack was untied.
"Ye may come up for air now," said Captain Sarf, grinning.
Alicia and Marot, their hair disordered, stood blinking in the half-light from the hatchway overhead, while their sacks lay crumpled about their feet.
"Many thanks," said Reith. "If I can ever do you a favor ..."
"The biggest favor whereof I bethink me," said Sarf, "is to go quietly back to Novorecife, boasting to none how ye gulled the mighty priesthood of Bákh. If ye did, the story would spread and make life chancy for me, the next time I put in at Jeshang."
"I promise." When Alicia and Marot had added their pledges, Sarf said: "Come up on deck and greet our new passenger. Ye'll find her friendlier than that sour-faced pietist."
On deck, they found a young Krishnan female carrying a box with a handle, which Reith recognized as a portable incubator. The captain introduced her as Qa'di bab-Gavveq.
"Ah, how thrilled am I to meet true Terrans!" she gushed. "Oft have I heard tales of their ways and wonders, but hitherto I've seen them only at a distance."
"Enchanted!" said Marot, kissing the girl's hand. "Whither are you bound, may I ask?"
"Jazmurian, sir. I do pursue the father of my egg here. This liverless wight hath fled thither to escape the wedding that he promised."
"What will you do when you locate him?" murmured Marot.
"I shall obtain a court order, binding him to pay the child's support and to post a bond lest he think to slip away again. I am not without friends, and I'll show the losel!"
She launched into a catalogue of the iniquities of her seducer. After a few minutes of this verbal downpour, Reith and Alicia glided quietly away, leaving Marot to bear the brunt of her confidences.
"Fergus," said Alicia, "I thought you ought to know."
"Know what?"
"When Sarf untied you, you said you'd be glad to do him a favor. Well, I said something similar. He told me I could indeed do him a favor—in the bunk in his cabin tonight."
"Yes?" said Reith, his face studiously immobile.
"I turned him down."
"Why?"
"Why! Fergus, you stupid idiot! Having just found you again, do you think I want to ruin my chances for good and all? Don't tell me you wish I'd taken up with the captain's offer. That would be cruel."
"I didn't mean that at all." He slid an arm about her waist. "In fact I'm delighted. I have my share of old-fashioned jealousy, too. On the other hand, you're a free, single, independent woman who, as you've said, can do as you like."
Unexpectedly, Alicia began to cry, burying her face in his shirt. Alicia was not one to cry easily. "All right, throw my past up to me!" she sobbed.
"But I didn't—"
"Oh, yes you did! You're thinking: here's this dame I was once silly enough to marry, who's been screwed by all and sundry. Now she's dangling the hook in front of my nose, with her personal person as bait—"
"Nothing of the sort. I've told you—"
"But for now anyway, you're my one-and-only whatever-it-is, as long as you want me. What would you call an ex-spouse with whom one is having a love affair?"
"Let me think. Ah! Before I left Terra, a fad word was going round: 'amorex,' meaning one who is a lover of his or her former spouse. Okay! You're my amorex, darling. Give me a kiss and dry those tears. There, now!"
"I was never promiscuous, and I was never unfaithful while we were married. I was forced to let that old professor and King Ainkhist and Warren Foltz take their pleasure of me; so you could call it constructive rape ..."