Part 27 (1/2)
The old man stared at him, hesitated for a moment, then burst out, ”Why would you want to do such a thing? We were never a threat to you. We didn't believe you existed.”
”You did,” Gignomai said.
”I was a crazy old man,” the old man replied. ”I was a joke. Children came and asked me about the place where I grew up because they thought I was funny. They didn't believe what I told them.”
”But it was true,” Gignomai said.
The old man shook his head. ”I realised a long time ago,” he said, ”it was all for the best. I was comfortable, and they were happy. Now you've changed everything, and these people want weapons. You do realise what they want them for, don't you?”
Gignomai nodded. ”I'm sorry,” he repeated. ”It's just one of those things that had to be done.”
The old man sighed. ”I don't understand,” he said. ”I can see no possible benefit, to your people or to mine. Quite the reverse. Do you want my people to fight the colonists on behalf of the met'Oc? Is that what you have in mind?”
Gignomai shook his head. ”That's the last thing I want,” he said.
”Then it makes no sense,” the old man roared at him. ”You will pardon my stupidity, but I can see no advantage to be gained from starting a war between my people and the colonists. There are so many more of us than you, and your people have no weapons, only farm tools and axes. It makes no sense. Unless,” the old man added, his head slightly on one side, ”you aim to arm my people and then sell guns to your own people so they can defend themselves. I can believe there are human beings who would do such a thing, but I doubt very much that you would. For one thing, your people are so poor. And there must be easier ways to make money.”
Gignomai smiled bleakly. ”What I want,” he said, ”money can't buy. I really am sorry,” he said, ”but I knew what I was doing. If they want the snapping-hens, they can have them. At least, I can let them have a dozen. That's all I can spare right now.”
The old man was looking past him, towards the factory. ”You made them yourself,” he said.
”That's right,” Gignomai replied. ”It was a lot of work. But we got here in the end.”
The old man nodded slowly. ”All that,” he said. ”Just to make the guns?”
”Mostly,” Gignomai said. ”There were other reasons, but that was the main one. They're good copies,” he went on. ”Not pretty, like the real ones my brother has. They're just a pipe clamped to a bit of wood, with a bit of a mechanism to make the spark. But they work.”
The old man bowed his head. ”You will have to show us what to do,” he said. ”If you would be so kind as to explain to me, I will pa.s.s it on to them. I promise I'll translate accurately,” he added, with a faint grin. ”I know what would happen to me if I didn't. I'm ashamed to say I still value my life, although I really can't say why.”
”Wait there,” Gignomai said, and he left them and went to the shed that housed the drop-hammer. He'd stored the finished snapping-hens under a loose floorboard. There were sixteen left. He chose a dozen and put them in an empty grain sack, along with two hollowed-out cow horns full of powder, a five-pound bag of lead b.a.l.l.s and a handful of spare flints. He walked back and went through the loading procedure slowly and carefully with the old man, loading four of the pistols and making him load the fifth, to make sure he'd understood. Then he showed him how to prime the pan, close it and c.o.c.k the hammer.
”Then all you do is point it and pull this lever here,” he said. ”That releases the hammer, which hits the steel, which strikes a spark, which sets off the powder in the pan. Simple as that.” he handed the c.o.c.ked pistol to the old man, who looked at it nervously. ”If you don't want to fire it, give it to one of them.”
The old man shook his head. ”You do it,” he said. ”They need to see you do it. Otherwise...”
Gignomai shrugged, took back the snapping-hen, pointed it at a tree trunk and pulled the trigger. When the smoke had cleared, he went forward to inspect the damage. He'd missed the tree he was aiming at-it was about five yards away from where he'd been standing-and hit the one next to it. He poked his little finger into the bullet hole, up as far as the second joint.
Dalo Tavio's eldest son fell through the rotten floor of a hayloft into the firewood store below. He broke his left arm and leg, and the splintered end of a branch left sticking out from a badly trimmed log punched a hole in his face on the left side next to his nose. Remarkably, the boy wasn't killed. When his father tried to move him, the branch snapped off, leaving an inch of wood trapped in the bone. It was generally accepted that the wound would go bad and the boy would die, but the boy's mother insisted on sending to town and asking the mayor for help. If anybody knew what to do, she felt, it would be him. Tavio, who'd known Marzo Opello all his life, doubted this but couldn't bring himself to say so. Also, he vaguely remembered hearing that Opello's nephew was training to be a surgeon. He filled the cart with straw and put the boy in it, and drove straight to town, arriving in the early hours of the morning.
”Not my nephew,” the mayor told him. ”My niece.”
Tavio looked at him as though he'd been drinking (which of course he had, but no more than usual). On the other hand, he thought, the boy will probably die in any event, and we've come all this way. ”Fine,” he said. ”Call her.”
Teucer came down in her nightdress, with two fat brown books under her arm. Tavio held a lantern over the cart while she examined the boy. He was deeply impressed at how calm she was about it, although there was something about her manner that disturbed him a little-too calm, maybe, and almost as if she was enjoying herself. She told her uncle and her cousin Furio how to lift him out of the cart without hurting him more than necessary, and she really did sound as though she knew what she was talking about. They laid the boy on the kitchen table, and Teucer carried out a closer examination.
”The leg shouldn't be a problem,” she said. ”The arm's an awkward break and it won't mend quite right, but I'll do the best I can. The piece of wood in his skull will probably kill him unless I can get it out.”
Tavio, who'd felt mostly frozen up till then, felt as though he'd been hit across the face. But the girl was clearly something else. If he'd closed his eyes and ignored the pitch of her voice, he could have believed he was talking to a man. ”Can you do that?” he asked. ”Get it out, I mean.”
”I don't know,” she said. ”Really, it's more of a woodworking problem than a medical one, and I'm not a carpenter. But there's something similar in the book. Give me five minutes and I'll look it up and tell you.”
She walked away, taking a candle and one of the books into the mayor's office and closing the door behind her. There was a long moment of silence. Then Marzo Opello said, ”You shouldn't judge her by her manners. She was brought up back Home; she doesn't really know how to talk to people.”
Tavio said, ”Does she know about this stuff?”
”From books,” Marzo replied. ”If you like, I can send for the horse doctor. But by the time he gets here-”
”My son's not a horse,” Tavio said. ”G.o.d help the man who marries her, but I think she knows what she's doing.”
”He's your son,” Marzo said.
Furio Opello withdrew at this point, muttering something about boiling some water. Tavio said, ”Where did she get the books?”
”They came from the met'Oc library,” Marzo replied. ”So they should be pretty good. I tried reading one once, but I couldn't make any sense of it. She reckons she can understand them, though. She patched up young Furio when he cut himself a while back. Made a fair job of it, too. You can hardly see the scar.”
Tavio sat down on a chair. ”I suppose the met'Oc know all about this sort of thing,” he said. ”Maybe we could ask them to come out.”
Marzo shook his head. ”Young Luso knows a bit about cuts and bonesetting,” he said, ”but otherwise they do the best they can, like the rest of us. I don't think they read all those books. They're just for having, not reading. Besides, the met'Oc wouldn't come down here just to heal a farm boy.”
Teucer came out of the office, with the book closed around her thumb to mark the place. ”I'll need splints and bandages,” she said, ”and two feet of dry elder wood, rose honey, white wine, new bread, barley flour and turpentine. And someone's got to go out to the factory. I need a tool made, straight away.”
”I'll go,” said Furio, who'd just come in with a steaming kettle. ”What do you want them to make?”
She opened the book and handed it to him. ”Gignomai will be able to understand the sketch,” she said, pointing to a diagram in the middle of the page. It looked like a spider on a stick. ”Tell him it's got to be clean, so scrub off all the soot and firescale.
”You might as well take my cart,” Tavio said. ”Quicker than walking.”
Furio laid the open book beside him on the box, with a glove across the page to keep the place in case a b.u.mp on the road closed it. He glanced at it from time to time as he drove, trying to make out words by the dizzy light of the swinging lantern. It was something to do with a doctor digging an arrowhead out of the head of a prince, after some battle back Home a long time ago. The diagram still looked like a spider on a stick, no matter how often he looked at it.
He heard the pulse of the hammer long before he saw the glow of the furnace. By the time he reached the factory, his head was throbbing and he could barely think. He realised he was still wearing his nights.h.i.+rt, with a worn-out old stockman's coat over it.
A man walked out of the darkness and caught up the horse's head. Not anybody Furio knew. ”Where's Gignomai?” Furio said.
”Asleep. Not to be disturbed.”
”I asked you where he is, not what he's doing.”
The man shrugged, and jerked his thumb in an undecipherable direction. Furio jumped down, taking the book with him, and made for the shack where Gignomai usually slept. He saw light under the door, knocked and walked in.
”Furio.” Gignomai looked up from a book. ”What the h.e.l.l are you doing here?”
Furio explained. It was hard, having to shout over the noise of the hammer, and he had trouble expressing himself clearly. But Gignomai seemed to understand, and took the book from him, and moved the lamp closer so he could see the picture.
”Aurelio can make that,” he said. ”The awkward bit's the screw-thread, but he's got a die that'll cut one easy as anything. When do you need it by?”
”Now.”
Gignomai grinned. ”You'll have to make do with as soon as possible,” he said. ”Stay here. I'll take the book with me.”
He was gone for quite some time. Shortly before he came back, the hammer stopped.