Part 3 (2/2)

He scowled ferociously over flowing mustaches whose tips were several shades whiter from lime bleaching.

As Joe approached he held his awkward leaning posture on the steering oar. ”Hvar ar vi?” Joe asked, hoping he

was p.r.o.nouncing the words right. Whiskers stared at him. He tried another tack. ”Danamark?” Another stare.

”Erin?”

”Angleland?”

”Scotland?”

Silence.

”Shetland? Orkney? Iceland?” Joe asked desperately.

Whiskers was losing patience. He roared something and as the sword flashed Joe suddenly understood why the man had leaned and kept his hand behind him on the steering oar. Though he had half expected some such thing, the swiftness of Whiskers' a.s.sault surprised Joe. He saw with instant clarity that the Northman would bisect him before he could begin to draw the pistol.

Then a look of blank surprise filled the skipper's broad face. He slumped back over the oar. The sword slipped from his hand and clattered to the deck. Good old Cookie, Joe thought. But he hadn't heard the rifle go off. He glanced back at the Alice and felt sudden shame at his imbecility. No wonder Cook hadn't fired.

He was standing directly in front of the Northman.

The red-bearded man arched backward over the oar and made distressing noises. As the sloppy blouse pulled tight Joe saw the knife handle protruding from Whiskers'

solar plexus.

A girl burst through the crowd of starers amids.h.i.+ps and lunged at Joe. He nearly beaned her with the revolver before he realized she was not attacking. ”Am- paro!” the girl screamed. ”Rescue me from these pagans!”

Her language was archaic but time does little damage to Mediterranean tongues. The modern day Spaniard reads the exploits of El Cid without difficulty whereas 10th Century English sounds more like German.

”For two years I am slave to these pagans. When you hailed in my language I knew the time for venge- ance had come. I made ready the knife.”

People amids.h.i.+ps were beginning to recover. Joe saw the weapons they had been hiding. In a moment they would rush him. The girl still lay at his feet, her arms around his knees. Joe guessed he was already half a G.o.d. He raised his arms like an Old Testament prophet and began a sonorous chant:

”Gorson, thou wh.o.r.eson, Get the flare gun ready At the count of five, Fire it straight up.

One.”

He bowed deeply and straightened, thrusting his arms heavenward again. ”Two.” He bowed again.

”Three, four.” From the corner of his eye he saw frantic activity on the deck of the Alice. Neptune help us if he cant find it, Joe thought-and said, ”Five!”

There was a pop and hissing roar. Under the dazzle of a parachute flare Joe saw the last of the fight go out of the Northmen.

”What cargo?” he asked the girl.

”In truth, my lord, I do not know,” he said. ”It was loaded before my mistress took me aboard.”

”Do you speak their language? Oh for heaven's sake, stand up!” He undid her clutch from his knees and pulled the girl upright. She was small and dark but there her resemblance to the capable Ariadne Battle- ment ended. The shapeless gray woolen dress would have been prim and decorous on a girl several years younger and smaller but now it bulged in all the proper places. In fact, it threatened to burst in a couple of them. Her long loose hair was of the blackest black but her face was not spoiled with the coa.r.s.eness so often found among Spanish Gypsy women. It was a demure little face with surprisingly large eyes which gazed up at Joe with the humble adoration of a c.o.c.ker spaniel.

Joe felt protective instincts starting to tingle all through him.

He remembered with something of a shock that this fragile creature had just skewered the steersman and only incidentally saved his life. ”I understand something of the pagan tongue,” she said.

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