Very, very small sigh of relief. Can’t afford to be too loud around here. They’re gone. Let’s examine the loot. The black stone urn has one handle above. It’s about eight feet tall. One, two, three: jump, and…hold…on…and…pull. And try to get to the top….There we go. Cold stone between my toes. And over the edge, where it’s filled with dirt. Pant, pant, pant.
Should be just over here, if I remember right. Dig, dig, dig. Damp earth feels good in your hands. Ow! my finger. There it is: a brown paper bag under the black earth. Lift it out. Is it all there? Open it up; peer in. At the bottom in the folds of paper: tiny scraps of copper, a few long pieces of iron, a piece of board, some brads. To this my grubby little hand adds the spool of copper wire and the U-shaped scrap of metal. Now slip it into my robe and…once you get up here, how the hell do you get down? I always forget. Turn around, climb over the edge, like this, and let yourself…Damn, my robe’s caught on the handle.
And drop.
Skinned my shin again. Someday I’ll learn. Uh-oh, Dunderhead is going to blow a condenser when he sees my robe torn. Oh, well, sic vita est.
Now let’s see if we can figure this thing out. Gotta crouch down and get to work. Here we go. Open the bag and turn the contents out in the lap of my robe, grubby hands poking.
The U-shaped metal, the copper wire, fine. Hold the end of the wire to the metal and maneuver the spool around the end of the rod. Around and around and around. Here we go round the mulberry bush, the mulberry bush, the mulberry bush. Here we go round the mulberry bush; I’ll have me a coil by the morning.
A harsh voice: And what do you think you’re doing?
Dunderhead rides again. Nothing, sir, as metal and scraps and wires fly frantically into the paper bag.
The voice: All novices under twenty must report to afternoon services without fail!
Yes, sir. Coming right along, sir. Paper bag jammed equally frantically into the folds of my robe. Not a moment’s peace. Not a moment’s! Through the garden with lowered eyes, past dour priest with small paunch. There are mirrors along the vestibule, reflecting the blue and yellow from the colored panes. In the mirror I see pass: a dour priest, preceded by a smaller figure with short red hair and a spray of freckles over a flattish nose. As we pass into prayer, there is the maddening, not quite inaudible jingle of metal, muffled by the dark robe —
Geo woke up, and almost everything was white.
Chapter Eight
The pale woman with the tiny eyes rose from over him. Her hair slipped like white silk threads over her shoulders. “You are awake?” she asked. “Do you understand me?”
“Am I at Hama’s Temple?” he asked, the remnants of the dream still blowing in at the edges of his mind, like shredding cloth. “My friends…where are they?”
The woman laughed. “Your friends are all right. You came out the worst.” Another laugh. “You ask if this is Hama’s Temple? But you can see. You have eyes. Don’t you recognize the color of the White Goddess Argo?”
Geo looked around the room. It was white marble, and there was no direct source of light. The walls simply glowed.
“My friends…” Geo said again.
“They are fine. We were able to completely restore their flesh to health. They must have exposed their hands to the direct beams of the radiation only a few seconds. But the whole first half of your arm must have lain in the rays for some minutes. You were not as lucky as they.”
Another thought rushed Geo’s mind now. The jewels…he wanted to say, but instead of sounding the words, he reached to his throat with both hands. One fell on his naked chest. And there was something very wrong with the other. He sat up in the bed quickly and looked down. “My arm…” he said.
Swathed in white bandages, the limb ended some foot and a half short of where it should have.
“My arm —?” he asked again, with a child’s bewilderment. “What happened to my arm?”
“I tried to tell you,” the woman said softly. “We had to amputate your forearm and most of your biceps. If we had not, you would have died.”
“My arm…” Geo said again. He lay back on the bed.
“It is difficult,” the woman said. “It is only a little consolation, I know, but we are blind here. What burned your arm away took our sight from us when it was much stronger, generations ago. We learned how to battle many of its effects, and had we not rescued you from the river, all of you would have died. You are men who know the religion of Argo and adhere to it. Be thankful then that you have come under the wing of the Mother Goddess again. This is hostile country.” She paused. “Do you wish to talk?”
Geo shook his head.
“I hear the sheets rustle,” the woman said, smiling, “which means you either shook or nodded your head. I know from my study of the old customs that one means yes and the other no. But you must have patience with us who cannot see. We are not used to your people. Do you wish to talk?” she repeated.
“Oh,” said Geo. “No. No, I don’t.”
“Very well.” She rose, still smiling. “I will return later.” She walked to a wall. A door slipped open, and then it closed behind her.
He lay still for a long time. Then he turned over on his stomach. Once he brought the stump under his chest and held the clean bandages in his other hand. Very quickly he let go and stretched the limb sideways, as far as possible away from him. That didn’t work either, so he moved it back down to his side and let it lay by him under the white sheet.
After a long while, he got up, sat on the edge of the bed, and looked around the room. It was completely bare, with neither windows nor visible doors. He went to the spot through which she had exited, but could find no seam or crack. His tunic, he saw, had been washed, pressed, and laid at the foot of the bed. He slipped it over his head, fumbling with only one arm. Getting the belt together started out a problem, but he hooked the buckle around one finger and maneuvered the strap through with the others. He adjusted his leather purse, now empty, at his side.
His sword was gone.
An unreal feeling, white like the walls of the room, filled him like a pale mixture of milk and water. He walked around the edge of the room once more, looking for some break.
There was a sound behind him and the tiny-eyed woman in her white robe stood in a triangular doorway. “You’re dressed.” She smiled. “Good. Are you too tired to come with me? You will eat and see your friends if you feel well enough. Or I can have the food brought — ”
“I’ll come,” Geo said.
He followed her into a hall of the same luminous substance. Her heels touched the back of her white robe with each step. His own bare feet on the cool stones seemed louder than those of the blind woman before him. Suddenly he was in a larger room, with benches. It was a chapel of Argo. But the altar at the far end, its detail was strange. Everything was arranged with the simplicity one would expect of a people to whom visual adornment meant nothing. He sat down on a bench.
“Wait here.” She disappeared down another hall.
She returned, followed by Snake. Geo and the four-armed boy looked at each other silently as the woman disappeared again. A wish, like a living thing, suddenly writhed into a knot in Geo’s stomach, that the boy would say something. He himself could not.
Again she returned, this time with Urson. The big sailor stepped into the chapel, saw Geo, and exclaimed, “Friend…what…” He came to Geo quickly and placed his warm hands on Geo’s shoulders. “How…” he began, and shook his head.