Part 30 (1/2)
”He is of average description. He wears garments, covers his head with a hat and is shod with shoes.”
The innkeeper reflected. ”I cannot recall this gentleman. Sir Fulk of Thwist came at noon; he is grossly corpulent, and a large wen protrudes from his nose. A certain Janglart arrived during the afternoon, but he is tall and thin as a switch, very pale and a long white beard hangs from his chin. Mynax the sheepdealer is average in quality, but I have never known him to wear a hat: always he uses a cylindrical sheepskin casque. No one else took rooms for the night.”
”No great matter,” said s.h.i.+mrod. It was probable, he thought, that the shybalt had perched the long night through on a high gable rather than enduring the confinement of a room. ”My friend will arrive in due course.”
s.h.i.+mrod followed Fonsel upstairs to the chamber, which he found satisfactory. Returning downstairs, he went out to the front of the inn and seated himself at a table, where he took his supper: first, a dozen sardines sizzling and crackling from the grill, next a platter of broad-beans and bacon with an onion for relish, along with a hunch of new bread and a quart of ale.
The sun sank into the sea. Patrons entered and left the inn; none aroused s.h.i.+mrod's suspicions. The shybalt might well have done its work and departed, thought s.h.i.+mrod. His attention must then inevitably focus upon Melancthe, who lived in a white villa less than a mile up the beach and who had previously acted at the behest of Tamurello, for reasons never made clear to s.h.i.+mrod. Apparently, he had never been her lover, having preferred her sibling Faude Carfilhiot. The relations.h.i.+p might or might not have pleased Desmei-had she been alive and aware. It was, s.h.i.+mrod reflected, truly a tangled skein of barely plausible possibilities and shocking realities. Melancthe's role, rather than having been clarified by events, was as ambiguous now as ever, and probably not even known to herself. Who had ever plumbed even the most superficial level of Melancthe's consciousness? Certainly not himself.
Twilight descended upon Ys of the Ocean. s.h.i.+mrod rose from his table and set off along the harbour road, which after leaving the docks struck off to the north beside the white beach.
The town fell behind. Tonight the wind was gone from the sky and the sea was calm. Listless surf rolled up the beach, creating a dull soothing sound.
s.h.i.+mrod approached the white villa. A chest-high wall of whitewashed stone enclosed a garden of asphodel, heliotrope, thyme, three slim cypresses and a pair of lemon trees.
The villa and its garden were well known to s.h.i.+mrod. He had seen them first in a dream, which recurred night after night. In these dreams, Melancthe had first appeared to him, a dark-haired maiden of heart-wrenching beauty and contradictions beyond number.
On this particular evening Melancthe seemed not at home. s.h.i.+mrod walked through the garden, crossed the little strip of tiled terrace, rapped at the door. He awoke no response, not even from the maid. From within came no glow of lamps or candle. Nothing could be heard but the slow thud of the surf.
s.h.i.+mrod left the villa and returned down the beach to the town square and the Sunset Inn. In the common room, he found an inconspicuous table beside the wall and seated himself.
One by one, s.h.i.+mrod scrutinized the occupants of the room. In the main, they seemed local folk: tradesmen, artisans, a few peasants from the surrounding countryside, a few seamen from s.h.i.+ps in the harbour. None were Yssei, who kept themselves apart from the ruck of the townspeople.
A person sitting solitary a few tables away attracted s.h.i.+mrod's attention. He appeared stocky of physique, but of middle stature. His garments were ordinary: a peasant's smock of coa.r.s.e gray weave, loose breeches, buskins with pointed curled-over toes and triangular ankle-tabs. Pulled down upon his shock of brown hair was a narrow-brimmed black hat with a tall back- sloping crown. His face was bland and still, enlivened only by the glitter and constant s.h.i.+ft of his small black eyes. On the table before him rested a full mug of ale, which he had not tasted. His posture was stiff and queer: his chest moved neither in nor out. By these and other signs, s.h.i.+mrod knew that here sat Zag zig the shybalt from Xabiste, uncomfortably disguised as a denizen of Earth. s.h.i.+mrod noticed that Zagzig had carelessly failed to divest himself of the moth's middle two legs, which jerked and stirred from time to time under the gray blouse. The nape of Zagzig's neck also glistened with moth-scale, where he had failed to provide himself a proper integument of human skin.
s.h.i.+mrod decided that, as usual, the simplest of available options was the best: he would wait and watch and discover what eventuated.
Fonsel the serving boy, pa.s.sing close to Zagzig with a tray, by chance jostled Zagzig's tall-crowned black hat, knocking it to the table, to reveal not only Zagzig's mat of brown hair but also a pair of feathery antennae which Zagzig had forgotten to remove. Fonsel stared with mouth agape, while Zagzig angrily clapped the hat back upon his head. He uttered a terse command; Fonsel grimaced, bobbed his head and hurried away with only a confused glance back over his shoulder. Zagzig darted glances this way and that to see who might have noticed the incident. s.h.i.+mrod quickly averted his eyes and pretended an interest in a rack of old blue plates hanging on the wall. Zagzig relaxed, and sat as before.
Ten minutes pa.s.sed. The door was pushed ajar; in the door way stood a tall man in black garments. He was spare, broad-shouldered, taut and precise of movement, with a pallid complexion and black hair cut square across his forehead and tied in a rope at the back of his head. s.h.i.+mrod studied the newcomer with interest; here, he thought, was a man of quick and ruthless intelligence. A scar across the gaunt cheek accentuated the menace of his already grim visage. From the evidence of his hair, his pallor and his manner of contemptuous self sufficiency, s.h.i.+mrod a.s.sumed the newcomer to be a Ska,* from Skaghane, or the Ska foresh.o.r.e.
*Ska: the indigenous race of Scandinavia, with traditions and records older by far than those of the Near or Far East. Three thousand years previously, a wave of Aryans, or Ur-Goths, had migrated north from the Black Sea steppes into Scandanavia, ultimately expelling the Ska, who descended first upon Ireland, where they were known to myth as the 'Sons of Partholon'. Even tually, after defeat by the Danaans, they migrated south into Skaghane
The Ska looked around the room. He glanced first at s.h.i.+mrod, then at Zagzig, then once again around the room, after which he chose a table and seated himself. Fonsel came at a run to inquire his needs, and brought him ale, sardines and bread, almost before the order had been placed.
The Ska ate and drank without haste; when he had finished, he sat back in his chair and once again appraised first s.h.i.+mrod, then Zagzig. Now he placed on the table a ball of dark green serpentine, an inch in diameter, attached to a chain of fine iron links. s.h.i.+mrod had seen such baubles before; they were caste- markers worn by Ska patricians.
At the sight of the talisman, Zagzig rose to his feet and crossed to the Ska's table.
s.h.i.+mrod signalled Fonsel to his own table. s.h.i.+mrod asked quietly: ”Do not turn your head to look, but tell me the name of that tall Ska sitting yonder.”
”I can make no sure a.s.sertion,” said Fonsel. ”I have never seen him before. However, across the room, I heard someone, in very confidential tones, use the name 'Torqual'. If this is the Torqual of evil reputation, he is bold indeed to show his face here where King Aillas would be grateful to find him and stretch his neck.”
s.h.i.+mrod gave the boy a copper penny. ”Your remarks are interesting. Bring me now a goblet of good tawny wine.”
By a sleight of magic s.h.i.+mrod augmented the acuity of his hearing so that the whispers of two young lovers in a far corner were now clearly audible, as were the innkeeper's instructions to Fonsel in regard to the watering of s.h.i.+mrod's wine. However, the conversation between Zagzig and Torqual had been muted by a magic as sharp as his own, and he could hear nothing of its content.
Fonsel served him a goblet of wine with a fine flourish. ”Here you are, sir! Our n.o.blest vintage!”
”That is good to hear,” said s.h.i.+mrod. ”I am the official inspector of hostelries, by the authority of King Aillas. Still- would you believe it? I am often served poor stuff! Three days ago in Mynault, an innkeeper and his pot-boy conspired to water my wine, which act King Aillas has declared an offense against humanity.”