As had been true then, so now someone shook him out of sound sleep. As had been true then, it was Agum now. What he said, though, was something any caravan guard might have said on any journey through Zuabu: “Master merchant’s son, we’ve caught a thief.”
Sharur yawned till he thought his head would split in two. “Why tell me about it? Give the fellow a beating and send him on his way. He’ll try to steal from the next caravan that comes through, but he won’t try stealing from us again.”
“Master merchant’s son, we were going to do as you say, the very thing, but then the wretch had the nerve to claim Enzuabu ordered him to steal from us, and that the god would punish him if he failed.” Agum made a small, unhappy sound. “What with all that’s gone on this trip, we thought you had better see him.”
With a sigh, Sharur got to his feet. He did not bother pulling on his kilt, but followed Agum naked to the fire beside which three more guards were holding down the thief. Yet another guard fed dry reeds and small dead bushes into the fire to build it up and throw more light on the Zuabi.
He was a small, skinny man, supple as a ferret and with a face to match. “He looks as if he’d steal from us whether Enzuabu ordered him to do it or not,” Sharur remarked to Agum.
“So he does,” Agum agreed. The guards holding the man shook him till the teeth rattled in his head. Agum put a growl in his voice: “You cursed river leech, you tell the master merchant’s son the lies you’ve been grizzling out to the rest of us.”
“Yes, lord,” the Zuabi said, as if Agum were his ensi. “I am a thief. I am the best of thieves. Would Enzuabu have chosen me were I less? Would Enzuabu pull a plow with a hen, or make a pot out of beer? I was suited to my god’s purpose, and his voice sounded in my mind, summoning me to his temple, that he might give me orders there. I obey my god in all things. I went to the temple, and he gave me orders there.”
“And what were the orders he gave you?” Sharur asked.
“Lord, he told me a caravan of Giblut was encamped outside Zuabu, in such-and-such a place at such-and-such a distance. He told me to rob this caravan of Giblut. He told me you Giblut oppose the gods, and that robbing you Giblut is only right and proper because of this. He told me your caravan had in it rich goods of your city, and that robbing it would profit him and me alike.”
Sharur scowled. The thief had been caught before he could rob the caravan. How could he know what goods it had, unless Enzuabu told him? Unless Enzuabu told him, would he not think it had goods from the. mountains of Alashkumi? His words were too much like those Sharur had heard from gods and demons for comfort.
“You have not robbed us,” Sharur said. “What will Enzuabu do with you, now that you have failed?”
“Lord”—the thief shuddered in the grasp of his captors— “he will smite me with boils, and with carbuncles he will smite my wife and my concubine and my children.”
In a judicious voice, Sharur said, “Would it not be fitting, then, to send you away from this place, to send you back to Zuabu, to let your own god punish you as you deserve? In some cities, the gods punish thieves who succeed. Only in Zuabu does the god punish-thieves who fail.”
Agum and the other guards laughed. The thief wailed. “Have mercy on a man who sought only to obey the command of his god!” he cried.
“You would have tried to rob us anyhow,” Agum said roughly. “You deserve your boils, and may your concubine get a carbuncle on her twat.”
The guards laughed again. But Sharur held up a hand, and the laughter stopped. If Enzuabu had sent out the thief, Enzuabu deserved the punishment. And, deliciously, Sharur saw how he might give it, “Let him up,” he said.
Startled, the guards obeyed. Even more startled, the thief rose. Sharur rummaged in a pack until he found a necklace of painted clay beads, as near worthless as made no difference. He laid it on the ground and turned his back.
“Here,” he said. “Steal this. Lay it on Enzuabu’s altar. You will have obeyed your god. He cannot smite you with boils, nor your wife and your concubine and your children with carbuncles.”
When he turned around again, the necklace was gone. So was the thief. From out of the night came a soft calclass="underline" “My blessings upon you, lord, whatever—” Whatever Enzuabu might say? The thief was wise to stop speaking when he did. But he would not stop thinking. In the silence, Sharur nodded slowly, once.
4
“It is Sharur, the son of Ereshguna!” the Gibli gate guard exclaimed. He bowed to Sharur, who led the caravan as it returned to his home city. “Did you fare well in the Alashkurru Mountains, master merchant’s son?”
One of Sharur’s bushy eyebrows rose. His mouth twisted into a wry smile. “I am back from the Alashkurru Mountains. I am back in Gibil. Is that not faring well, all by itself?”
The gate guard laughed. “Right you are, master merchant’s son. Not enough copper, not enough silver, not enough gold to make me want to visit those funny foreign places, not when I live in the finest city in Kudurru, which means the finest city in the world.” He stood aside. “Not that you want to hear me chattering, either, no indeed.” His voice rose to a shout: “Enter into Gibil, city of the great god Engibil, Sharur son of Ereshguna, you and all your comrades!”
Sharur would sooner have entered Gibil quietly, with no one knowing he was there until he came to his family’s house in the Street of Smiths. He had not got any of what he wished on this disastrous journey, and knew ahead of time he would not get to enjoy a quiet entrance, either.
Where the Zuabut were known throughout the land between the rivers for their nimble fingers, the men of Gibil were known for their nimble minds. They buzzed round the caravan as flies buzzed round a butcher shop, calling out greetings to Sharur and to the donkey handlers and guards they knew, and, most of all, calling out questions: “Did you make a profit?” “How big a profit did you make?” “How much copper did you bring back?” “Any of that finegrained red wood that smells good?” “Carved jewels, master merchant’s son?” “Are the Alashkurrut really ten feet tall?” “Did frozen water fall out of the sky on you?” It went on and on and on.
As Sharur had asked of them, the caravan crew said as little as they could. Giblut were also known throughout the land between the rivers for talking to excess, but neither Sharur nor the donkey handlers nor the guards lived up to that part of their reputation. That the men were to receive the last installment of their pay at Sharur’s home helped persuade them to hold their tongues.
Some of the Giblut assumed that quiet meant the caravan had not done so well as they would have expected. They were right, but Sharur gave no sign of it. Some assumed the quiet meant the caravan had done far better than expected. They were wrong, but Sharur gave no sign of that, either. Arguments broke out between pessimists and optimists, distracting both groups from the caravan.
Not everyone in Gibil used shouted questions to try to learn how much wealth the caravan had brought to the city. One of the fanciest Gibli courtesans simply pulled off her semitransparent shift and stood magnificently naked in the street, saying without words, If you can afford me, here I am. With his men, Sharur stared longingly and walked on.
Word of their return ran through the city ahead of them. By the time they reached the Street of Smiths, the workers in bronze had come forth from their smithies, sweat streaking through smoke stains on their torsos. Their questions were the same as those of the other Giblut, but more urgent, as the answers were more immediately important to them.