Boli had a fresh company of marids with him who swiftly and efficiently took Jan in hand.
“Take care,” said Boli. “Your heads answer for it if he gets away.”
A sedan chair was borne to them by four humans and into its cushioned depths sank Boli. He raised his handkerchief and flourished it and the party moved off.
Dread began to settle heavily over Jan. What had possessed him to first frighten the wits out of a sailor and then upset a whole boatload of guard sailors, to say nothing of almost drowning the port captain, M’Lord Boli? What unplumbed possibilities did this swaggering, brawny body of his contain that he had never before felt? And would he do something the very next minute to make his doom absolutely certain—if it weren’t already so?
He was almost treading on the heels of the last two chair bearers. And suddenly it occurred to him that all he had to do was take a slightly longer step and into the street M’Lord Boli would go, perfumed handkerchief and all. Ah, yes, and just ahead there was a lovely, wide mud puddle where horses had been tethered not long before. What a bed for M’Lord Boli that hoof-churned muck would be. Just a slightly longer step and—
“I won’t!” yelled Jan.
M’Lord turned around in astonishment. “What was that?”
“Nothing,” said the miserable Jan.
On they marched and finally negotiated the mud puddle. Jan sighed with relief when they got to the far side and on dry pavement once more. He took courage at that. It seemed that a sharp exertion of willpower would cause this Tiger to fade away. And God knew that one more misstep would put M’Lord Boli into an even higher howl for his head.
He took an interest in the town and found that the mixed lot of the population was very, very unbalanced where wealth and position were concerned. ifrits were to be seen at rare intervals and each time they were being borne in splendid carriages which were invariably driven by humans in livery.
Too, the silken-robed proprietors of these great stores, when seen standing outside, were all of the jinn. Although human beings were not without some small finery here and there, not one actually wealthy person was to be found. The police were all marids, resplendent in green cloaks and towering, conical white hats. Marids did not seem to be servants but monopolized all the minor positions of responsibility.
Here and there men turned to gaze after the marching guard with curiosity. Sometimes men saluted the port captain and he daintily waved his handkerchief back. Sometimes marids held up traffic to let the procession through and then glowered ferociously upon the prisoner as he slogged past.
Once or twice people yelped, “It’s Tiger!” and gaped helplessly until the company was out of sight. Jan recognized them but didn’t recognize them. One he knew for sure was a tavernkeeper on the waterfront. The other, a buxom female, he knew not at all. He was afraid there were tears in her eyes.
Far ahead, shimmering in the heat, Jan could see a large square opening out. It was easily a mile on the side and parklike trees enclosed a great lake. Too, there were barracks and a parade ground and, set far back, was a low, domed edifice which was deceptive. It appeared to be a normal building at first, done with the usual swoops and curves. But the closer one got, the bigger it got until, from across the huge square, it had the proportions of a mountain. The dome was seemingly solid gold and the sun on it made a man’s eyes sting. The balconies were evidently masses of precious stones—or else they were all on fire. The fountains which geysered so brightly before it went a full hundred feet into the air and even then did not reach a height as great as the top of the steps in front—steps down which a cavalry division could have charged with ease.
Humans began to be less and less in evidence. This park was evidently the haunt of military men, all of them marids except the officers who were ifrits. Their gaudy uniforms fitted them loosely, held close only by sword belts. The men were in scarlet and the officers too, except that the ifrits had a great golden bird of prey a-wing across their breasts and three golden spikes upon their shining helmets.
Coming away from the palace was a small party of men in azure. They too had golden birds upon their tunics, but from the roll of their walk and the curve of the swords at their sides it was plain that here was a party of naval officers on its way back to the harbor.
Coming abreast of the group, Jan glanced wonderingly at them. He had not yet gotten used to seeing fangs glittering in each jinni’s face and these fellows looked especially ferocious. It almost startled him out of his wits when one, more fearsome than the rest, cried out in a voice which bespoke a mortal wound.
“Tiger!” cried this ifrit. And then, tearing his luminous orbs away from the man, he held up an imperious hand. “Stop, I’d speak to your prisoner.”
“Come along!” M’Lord roared at his guard. “Commander, you speak to a royal prisoner. Have a care!”
But the guard couldn’t very well walk straight over a commander in the navy, and as the commander had stepped in close to Jan, they had to stop. Boli raged.
“What’s this?” said the naval officer. “By the Seven Swirls of the Seven Saffron Devils, Tiger, what are you into now?”
“Come along!” roared Boli. And to the officer, “Sir, I’ll have your sword for this! I tell you he’s a royal prisoner and not to be spoken with by anyone. Answer him, prisoner, and I’ll rip out your tongue with my bare hands!”
“Shut your foul face, lover of slime,” said the officer. And to Jan, “Tiger, I told you that if you got into trouble to come to see me. This confounded law which makes it impossible for you to have rank of any kind has got to be changed! You wouldn’t revolt if you had any status. What’s up?”
“Damn it, sir!” cried Boli, leaping out of his sedan chair and waving the handkerchief like a battle flag. “Get back before I’m forced to order a stronger means!”
The officer, knowing well he was out of bounds, fell back slowly, looking the while at Jan. “Don’t forget, Tiger. If they don’t let you go, send the word and I’ll be up here for you with my bullies if necessary. We haven’t forgotten what you did for us on the Isle of Fire.”
But the guard was moving off and Jan was pushed along with them. He was dazed by being known by men he did not know. And suddenly it came to him that now was the time to trip those bearers. Out went his foot but in the nick of time he tripped himself instead of sending Boli hurtling down those steep steps.
“Come along,” snarled M’Lord, all unwitting of his close squeak.
Jan, breathing hard and thankfully, made haste to pick himself up and follow after.
They went through two immense doors, guarded on either side by silver beasts which towered fifty feet above them. Like ants they crawled along the polished floor of a hall which could have berthed a frigate with ease.
Ahead, two doors, so tall that the neck cracked before eyes could see the top of them, barred the way with their black bulk and before them stood a crimson line of marids, larger than most, and leaning now upon silver pikes.
The chair bearers stopped. The guard stopped. Boli raised himself importantly. “M’Lord Boli, captain of the port, with a prisoner to be thrown upon royal clemency!”
“M’Lord Boli,” said the major of the guard, “enter.”
The great doors swung back without, it seemed, any hand touching them, and between them stalked the company.
Ahead Jan saw a white throne rearing up thirty feet from the floor, hung with tassels of gold and set with diamonds. Behind it, full fifty feet across, hung the great scarlet flag with its golden bird spread upon it.
The hall, which would have housed the biggest building in the town, was peopled scatteringly by brightly clothed courtiers and officers.
The blaze of the throne was such, under the onslaught of the sun which poured through the wall-sized stained-glass windows, that Jan could not see the person in it. But as the procession drew near he was startled to find two lions chained with silver at its base, lions as large as camels, who eyed the approaching Bo
li with wet chops and licked their lips over the prisoner as an afterthought.
Above them reared the throne itself and Jan, blinking in the blaze, beheld the queen.
She was taller than these other ifrits. Taller and uglier. Her arms were matted with black hair which set strangely against the soft silk of her white robe. Her hairy face was a horror, her lips spread apart by upper and lower fangs like tusks. On either side of her jeweled crown were black pointed ears like funnels. Her nose was mostly nostril. Her eyes were as big as stewpans and in them held a flickering, leaping flame which scorched Jan to his very soul.
He looked down, unable to stand the blaze. He looked down as he marched nearer behind M’Lord Boli. He looked down as the last two sedan bearers topped the double step which surrounded the throne. He looked down and saw their heels.
Suddenly there was nothing he could do about it. As he mounted, himself, he lurched a trifle. With horror he found that he deliberately caught at the scabbard of the guard on his right and—oh, quite accidentally—lifted it between the legs of the carrier.
The bearer lurched. His comrade, thrown out of step and balance, lurched. The two men forward, feeling the chair go back, surged ahead just as the two in the rear also strove to stop the sudden motion.
CRASH! And down went M’Lord Boli in a heap of howling guards. Shot, he was, like a catapulted rock, straight out of his chair and directly between the huge lions! There sounded a concerted scream in the hall. The guards, falling this way and that, had no time to see the horrible death which was even now bending dually to scoop up their fat morsel of a master.
But Tiger!
He leaped over the sprawling men. He charged up the second double step which put anyone in reach of the giant beasts. And the very instant the mouth of the first opened to gulp Boli’s trunk down raw, the mouth of the second was gaping to finish the other half.
But Tiger!
He leaped astraddle the port captain and let out a mighty roar. With his left he smacked the left-hand lion resoundingly upon the nose. With his right he almost pulled the long tongue out of the mouth of the right-hand lion. And when they jerked back in astonishment at such audacity, back leaped Tiger, hauling Boli swiftly by the baggy seat of His Lordship’s pants.
Tiger lifted Boli to his jellied legs and made a great show of dusting him off, though the crack of the dusting was unseemingly loud.
“Your Royal Majesty!” cried Tiger. “You’ll please forgive this man’s clumsy antics. He feeds his bearers on very bad rum to make them trot the faster and it’s the quality, not the quantity, of the fare which made them stumble. I swear, Your Royal Highness, if the smugglers in your Royal Realm don’t stop paying off Our Lordship the port captain in such filthy bellywash, they’ll be the death of him as you can very well see! Are you all right, sir?” he said solicitously to Boli. “Ah, yes, not a drop of grease on the outside and so no fang struck home. By the way, Your Royal Highness, I happen to be a prisoner of the port captain here, and I think he is very anxious to get on with his business of having my head and so, pray give him leave to speak. There, M’Lord, talk up, talk up and don’t keep the noble jinni waiting!”
Boli had up enough pressure in him to splatter himself all over the hall. But such was his terror of the queen that he suddenly lost his rage, vowing that Tiger’s death would be none too quick to suit him. He took a grip on his vocal cords, and though when he tried them out they squeaked alarmingly, he strove to hold forth.
“Your Royal Highness, I know not the crime of . . . of . . . this . . . this . . .”
“It’s the lions,” said Tiger helpfully. “They breathed too much gas into him. Go ahead, M’Lord, pray cough up the letter my captain gave you.”
A slaying scowl swept over M’Lord’s fat face but forthwith he dug out the sea-worn message and, via a courtier whom the lions considered indigestible, gave it to the queen.
Her black-haired hands wrapped about it so that their curved talons clicked against one another. She looked for some time at Tiger and then broke the seals. She read with great attention and then with growing alarm. She had been, when Tiger tripped Boli, on the point of uproarious laughter but now thunderclouds settled over her visage and her great round eyes flashed lightning.
“Has he spoken to anyone, you bungling clown?”
Boli shivered so that waves went through him like a shaken pudding. “N-N-No, Your Royal Highness. Only . . . only a fish peddler’s wife.”
“What’s this? What’s this? Find her. Find her at once and throw her into the dungeon for observation. Oh, woe take you, miserable milksop! A goat could run my port the better! Did not his captain charge you with the seriousness of his detention? Had you no idea of the enormity of the trust given into your hands? Doddering imbecile! Go wave your stinking perfume in the faces of the waterfront harlots and take the stain of your filthy boots from my polished halls! Begone!”
At the voice which made the whole gigantic room shake, Boli shook as a tree in a gale. He backed hastily, tripping over the double step, falling against some of his men and then, more swiftly, backed at express speed with his guard clear across the hall until the great black doors clanged shut in his face to blank him from view.
“I ought to have his head,” snarled the queen. “I, Ramus the Magnificent, to be served in such a chuckleheaded fashion!” She fixed her eyes then upon Jan who, quite empty of any Tiger now and only aware that he was asking for death if he so much as blinked, stood with bowed head before her. She grunted like a pig and then made a motion toward her guard with her heavy gold scepter.
“Take him away! Put him in the strongroom in the left wing and let no man speak to him, human or jinn. And you, General, as fast as horses can travel, as fast as ships can sail, bring me that vile troublemaker Zongri!”
“Zongri?” ejaculated the general. “You mean Zongri of the Barbossi Isles? But how is this? Thousands of years ago—”
“Silence!” roared Ramus the Magnificent. “Bring him to me!”
“Your Royal Highness,” said an espionage agent, stepping slyly forward, “this Zongri but yesterday arrived here in Tarbutón. I know where he is to be found.”
“You serve me well. Go with the general and show him the way. I must have that fool!”
“Your wish is our law, Your Royal Highness,” said the general, backing out.
“Commander, you know the ship of Captain Tombo?”
“Yes, Your Royal Highness,” said the officer.
“Take him a suitable present for service so discreet. A fine present. See the treasurer.”
“Yes, Your Royal Highness.”
She sank back on her throne with a worried scowl and then, glancing after the guard which escorted Tiger away, growled something to herself and burned the message in the incense cup at her elbow.
Jan, backing perforce, did not miss the gesture. “God,” he groaned, “it’s as bad as that. Damn the day I first set eyes upon that copper jar.”
Chapter Six
Zongri
The strongroom depended mainly for its strength upon its extreme height from the ground. It was no more or less than the topmost room in a turret so lofty that it was not unusual for clouds to obscure the earth of a morning. But Jan had seen too much of late to be so very amazed with the furnishings of the place or at the fact that it was very strange to be imprisoned in such splendor.
Money was no fitting measure for the furnishings. On the floor, to soften the alabaster, lay great white rugs of wool, thick as soup tureens. The walls were covered with shimmering cloth of gold into which amazing battles had been deftly worked. A sergeant could have drilled a squad on the bed and a bosun could have bent a mains’l on the posts. This last occupied the center of the room and a circular series of steps surrounded it, making it into a sort of fort of its own. All around the walls ran a ledge so softly cushioned that a man could quite easily have drowned in it and, instead of chairs, chaise longues of a graceful pattern stood face to face and yet side by s
ide, so as to offer easy means of conversation.
The scarlet-cloaked marids posted themselves on the landing outside and bolted the door with twelve bars of iron, flattering even the strength of Tiger’s brawny body. Disconsolately Jan wandered through the room. At one side a silver staircase spiraled steeply up through the roof and, thinking he might find a way out, Jan mounted it and thrust back the trap at the top. A gale almost blew his hair off but he went on through to find that he stood upon the highest level of the palace except for the golden dome and he was almost even with that. The platform itself was hardly like an ordinary turret top. The floor was mosaic and the parapet was all green tile. Seats were handy at every side but Jan was interested more in escape than scenery.
Going to the edge, he leaned hopefully over. He recoiled at the height. Below, a squad of men were red ink dots on the pave. But he did not give up. Around he went, examining all sides of the hexagonal structure, but nowhere did he find the slightest semblance of a ladder, nor did he think he could have navigated it if he had. He sighed and walked back toward the trap, but now that he knew escape to be impossible, he was willing to give some small attention to his prison roof and he was somewhat startled to find, all about him, mounted astrological instruments of a pattern extinct these thousands of years. They were all in gold and silver and pivoted on glittering diamonds and so delicately balanced that the slightest touch on the mother-of-pearl handles swung them swiftly, and yet a slight turn of the same handle fixed them instantly.
Jan was instantly taken with the beauty of an astrolabe on which were engraved fanciful representations of the Zodiac. The rete, he noticed with a start, gave a very creditable star map, not at all antiquated, for it showed Polaris as the North Star. Until that instant he had supposed himself dropped back a few hundred years, but no! Polaris was its modern one and one-fourth degrees from true north! From a very pretty object this astrolabe became a vital part of his life. He thought hard for a moment, recalling the sun’s position for the date, and as he paced about he beheld a large chronometer under glass. He had all the data he needed. He swung eagerly back to the astrolabe and measured the altitude of the sun. He then observed the sun’s place in the Zodiac and turned the rete until the position matched the circle on the plate’s observed altitude. Quickly he made a line from that point to the circle of hours on the outer edge, holding his breath lest the answer be wrong.