There was applause.
"Ligurious," said Claudius, turning to him.
Ligurious rose, and walked about the table, to stand before it, and near the sack.
"Many of you know me," said Ligurious, "if only by reputation, as the former first minister of Corcyrus: what many of you may not know is that I was also the secret leader of the resistance in Corcyrus to the rule of Sheila, the Tatrix. For months within her very government I strove to dissuade her from endeavors hostile to the great state of Argentum. I attempted to assert a persistent influence in the directions of harmony and peace. Alas, my efforts were frustrated, my counsels were ignored. The best that I could hope for was to prepare the way for the victorious forces of Argentum, which I managed to do. You may recall the ease with which you took the city, once the great gate was breached."
Drusus Rencius was smiling.
"In this time, of course, I was often in close converse with the Tatrix. In my efforts to convince her of the futility and madness of her policies I was in almost constant proximity to her. I think it may well be said that there is no man on Gor better qualified than I to recognize her, or to identify her for you. "Thank you, noble Ligurious," said Claudius. "Now," said he, "let Sheila's captor, the noble Hassan, of Kasra, have the honor of presenting her before us, that she may await our pleasure." It was quiet. Men looked about. "Where is Hassan?" asked Claudius.
"He is not here," said a man.
Ligurious looked down, smiling.
Claudius shrugged. "He is perhaps indisposed:" he said. "Let the sack be opened!"
Ligurious looked about himself, pleased. He scarcely bothered to note the opening of the sack, and the drawing forth of its helpless, gagged, bound, stripped occupant. She was knelt then, bound hand and foot, naked and gagged, before Claudius and the council.
Ligurious looked about. "Yes," he said, "I know her well. There is no doubt about it." He pointed at the kneeling figure, dramatically, but scarcely looking at her, directing his attention more to the audience. "Yes," he said, "that is she! That is the infamous Tatrix of Corcyrus!"
She uttered wild, tiny, desperate, muted sounds, shaking her head wildly. How well Goreans gag their prisoners and slaves, I thought.
"Do not attempt to deny it, Sheila," said he, scarcely noting her. "You have been perfectly and definitively identified."
She continued to make tiny, desperate, pleading noises. She continued to shake her head, wildly.
Tears flowed from her eyes.
Ligurious then, perhaps curious, regarded her closely. Even then, for a time, I do not think he recognized her. I think this was because of our very close resemblance, and, too, perhaps, because he found it almost impossible to believe that I was not the woman who had been drawn forth from the sack, who now knelt helplessly before Claudius and the council. Then, suddenly, he turned white. "~a it!" he cried. He crouched down, then, and took the woman's head in his hands. Her eyes looked at him wildly, filled with tears. "No!" he cried, suddenly. "No! This is not she!"
"I thought," said Claudius, "that you identified her as Sheila, perfectly and definitively."
"No, no!" said Ligurious. He was shaking. There was sweat On his forehead. "I made a mistake! this is not she!"
"Then where is she?" asked Claudius, angrily.
"I do not know!" said Ligurious, looking wildly about. "Hassan, of Kasra!" called the feast master, from near the door, announcing the arrival of Hassan in the hall.
"I am sorry I am late," said Hassan. "I was temporarily retained. I was attacked by two men. They are now outside my quarters, where I put them, tied back to back. Their arms and legs are broken."
"See that the assailants of Hassan are taken into custody and attended to," said Claudius.
"Yes, Ubar," said two soldiers, and swiftly left the room.
I saw Sheila, at the appearance of Hassan in the hall, immediately put her head down to the tiles. Hassan trained his women perfectly.
"Is this the woman you captured in Ar?" asked Claudius pointing to Sheila. Hassan walked over to her, pulled her head up by the hair and then, holding her by the arms, put her to her belly, and then turned her from one side to the other, examining lici body for tiny marks.
"Yes," he said, "this is she."
The Gorean master commonly knows the bodies of his women. They are, after all, not independent contractual partners, who may simply walk away, but treasured possessions. They receive, accordingly, careful attention. Many Women, indeed, are never truly looked at by a man until after they are owned.
He then put Sheila again on her knees before the council.
"Do you believe her to be the Tatrix of Corcyrus?" asked Claudius.
"I believe that she was the Tatrix of Corcyrus," said Hassan, "yes." "He has never seen her!" shouted Ligurious.
"She was identified by sleen," said Hassan.
"But from false clothing!" cried Ligurious. "She is not the true Tatrix of Corcyrus! But the true Tatrix of Corcyrus is here, somewhere! I am sure of it!" "How do you know?" asked Claudius.
Ligurious looked down, confused. He could not very well inform the assemblage of the exchange he had attempted to effect earlier in the throne "room. "I have seen her here in the palace, somewhere about," he said quickly. "It was she whom I thought was to be withdrawn from the "sack."
"My Ubar," said Miles of Argentum, rising to his feet, "reluctant as I am to agree with the former first minister of Corcyrus, and doubtless one of the finest liars on Gor, I think it not impossible that he may have seen Sheila about in the palace, perhaps on her hands and knees scrubbing tiles in a corridor, the type of task to which it has amused me to set her."
Men looked about, wildly, at one another.
"With your permission, my Ubar," said Miles of Argenturn. Then, suddenly, sharply, he struck his hands together twice. "Sheila!" he snapped. "Fortit!" Startled, frightened, I parted the headed curtain with my chained hands and, with the small, measured, graceful steps of a Woman whose ankles are chained, hurried to him. I knelt on the tiles before the table, before his place, my head down "Lift your head," he said.
I heard cries of astonishment.
"Go, kneel beside the other woman," he said.
"Yes, Master," I said.
"There," cried Ligurious in triumph, "that is the true Sheila, the true Tatrix of Corcyrus!"
"Do you not think you should examine her somewhat more closely?" asked Drusus Ligurious threw him a look of hatred and then came closer to me. He made a pretense of subjecting me to careful scrutiny. Then he said, "Yes, that is the true Sheila."
"Let them be identically chained," said Claudius.
Miles of Argentum gestured "to an officer. He had apparently anticipated this request.
In moments Sheila, freed of the gag and cords, wore chains. We now knelt naked and identically chained, side' by side, before Claudius, the Ubar of Argentum. Each of us had our wrists separated by some eighteen inches of chain. Each $ of us, too, had our ankles separated by a similar length of chain, only a little longer. Another chain, on each of us, ran from the center of our wrist chain to the center of our ankle chain. This central, or middle, chain was about three, and a A half feet in length.
"It is a remarkable resemblance," said Claudius', wonderingly.
"They could be twins," said a man.
"You can tell them apart," said a man. "One has shorter hair."
"That is not important," said another.
"There are other differences, too," said a man, "subtle differences, but real differences."
"Yes," said the man, "I see them now." That was he who had suggested that we might be twins.
Had we been twins we, at least, would not have been identical twins. Fraternal twins, separate egg twins, "two boys, two girls, or a boy and a girl, are not likely to resemble one another any more closely than normal siblings, except, of course, in age.