For its own part, the Crab was doing very little. To be more precise, it was doing precisely nothing; and looked for all the world like a statue of itself.
Justina was startled to see the chips of glass, the rags of silk and other junk coliaged across the Crab’s carapace. The Empress did not receive regular intelligence reports on the hermit of Jod because fear made people give the thing the widest berth possible. It was the imperial startlement which prompted her first question:
‘Blood of the Gloat! What has happened to you?’ ‘What has happened to me?’ said the Crab. ‘I appear to have been disturbed by a crowd of uninvited visitors led by the daughter of a Yudonic Knight. That is w hat has happened to me.’
‘That’s not what I meant,’ said Justina. ‘I meant — oh, never mind. I have to talk to you about something important.’
‘Nothing is important,’ said the Crab.
Whether the Crab really believed this is a moot point, and my own opinion is that it did not. However, rather than arguing the point, Justina began to pour out her sorrows. She told the Crab all about the depredations of Dui Tin Char and the uncertainties which now attended her grip on life and power alike.
While Justina was thus lecturing the Crab, a juvenile delinquent arrived to see what had drawn this great crowd to the domicile of Injiltaprajura’s most distinguished eremite. The delinquent was Shabble.
‘Hello,’ said Shabble brightly. ‘What’s going on?’ ‘Hush,’ said Ch egory Guy, who had ceased his slow-motion wrestling with the delectabl e Olivia Qasaba.
‘But why?’ said Shabble.
To this, Chegory made no answer.
So Shabble drifted closer.
‘… and after all,’ said the Empress Justina, ‘it was you who imposed the present peace upon Injiltaprajura. When Dui Tin Char moves against the pink palace, that’s really an offence against your dignity.’
‘Dignity,’ said the Crab heavily, ‘is a vanity. I am not partial to the vanities.’
‘There’s more to it than questions of vanity,’ said the Empress, with a note of desperation in her voice.
And she went on to elaborate.
While the Empress was elaborating, an ant of the red and biting kind (a very Ebrell Islander in its humours) was doing its best to circumnavigate Shabble’s surface. As Shabble had temporarily made Shabbleself a mirror, this surface reflected the tense and anxious spectators, notably the hard-bitten Yilda (a woman somewhere between the ages of forty and sixty), the corpse-master Uckermark (he of the many tattoos) and the conjuror Odolo (he of the olive skin and the hooked nose).
Shabble, who was no respecter of persons (or of much else, for that matter) rubbed Shabbleself against Justina’s neck in order to be rid of the ant. This was a merciful way to dispose of this nuisance, since Shabble could just as easily have heated Shabbleself until the ant was burnt alive, or (alternatively) could have made Shabbleself’s surface as cold as ice (or colder), thus freezing the poor thing.
Unfortunately the insect, when let loose upon the neck imperial, failed to appreciate either the honour which had been done to it or the dangers of its present position; and, irritated or enraged by some ant-style emotions which it is beyond the power of the historian to elucidate, the small hymenopterous insect launched a sanguinary assault upon the mistress of the pink palace.
Now it happens that Justina Thrug was great in mercy; and, had she realized that she was under attack from such a source, she might have asked Yilda or Log Jaris to remove the thing. But such was the stress of the moment that Justina merely brushed the beast away, crushing it without consciously realizing she had felt the thing bite her.
‘… and,’ said Justina, ‘given your help, I could secure ships sufficient to remove myself and my supporters from Untunchilamon for ever. All I need is help sufficient to maintain my power until the Trade Fleet comes.’
‘Why should I help you?’ said the Crab.
‘Out of mercy,’ said Justina.
And Shabble said, brightly:
‘I’ve found a cockroach.’
Nobody took any notice.
‘I will be eternally grateful for any help you give me,’ said the Empress Justina, still speaking to the Crab.
‘You will not live for eternity,’ said the Crab. ‘You will be lucky if you live another forty years. Your rhetoric is empty.’
‘Forty years is hardly emptiness,’ said Justina.
‘It’s a big cockroach,’ said Shabble.
Still poor Shabble was ignored.
Shabble tried again.
‘He’s-’
‘Quiet!’ said Chegory Guy, addressing himself to Shabble.
‘Chegory has given you a very wise command,’ said the Crab, pretending it thought the Ebrell Islander had been addressing the Empress Justina.
Chegory blushed furiously.
And Shabble said:
‘He’s hiding under a rock. He has to hide there because there’s nowhere safe for him to go.’
‘Yes,’ said Justina, at last turning her wrath upon the floating bubble of brightness, ‘but there’s plenty of places both safe and unsafe for you to go. Leave us!’
Such was the imperial anger that Shabble sideslipped through the air and hid behind Odolo. Shabble, as cold as chilled crystal, pressed Shabbleself against the conjuror’s neck and whispered:
‘Please won’t you help me. With my cockroach, I mean.’
‘Shabble!’ said Odolo, with a note of warning in his voice.
‘As I was saying,’ said the Empress Justina, a note of stridency entering her voice. ‘Dui Tin Char is-’’
‘I know what Dui Tin Char is doing,’ said the Crab. ‘You’ve told me twice and thrice already.’
Then one of the Crab’s huge claws opened. Then closed. With a crunch. This was a danger sign.
‘I think,’ said Chegory Guy, pulling Olivia to her feet, ‘that, um, you’d be more private without us, all you, um, ah, politicians and people.’
Without further ado, the Ebrell Islander and the Ashdan lass absquatulated. The corpse-master Uckermark, the least reliable member of Justina’s expeditionary force, sensed danger, and wished himself elsewhere.
‘My cockroach,’ said the plaintive Shabble. ‘Won’t anyone help me with my cockroach?’
Not having any desire to be turned inside out by a wrathful Crab, Uckermark seized his opportunity to escape:
‘All right, my friend,’ said Uckermark. ‘Let’s go and see this cockroach of yours.’
Then he looked at Yilda. And she, realizing the reasons for Uckermark’s decision, made her apologies to her Empress and followed her mate and the free-floating Shabble.
‘So,’ said the Empress Justina, ‘it seems my people wish to desert me. Very well! Be gone, the lot of you! Off you go! Now! Vanish!’
Thus spoke Justina, driving her people from her despite their protests. She too had realized that the Crab was on the verge of doing something unfortunate.
Once the crowd had left, the Crab seemed to calm down a little. At least it stopped claw-crunching. So Justina ventured to say:
‘All I’m asking is a very little favour. I’m asking you to bring Dui Tin Char into line, that’s all.’
‘I am no longer interested in your politics,’ said the Crab. ‘If you haven’t paid your taxes that’s your problem, not mine.’
‘But I’m the Empress!’ protested Justina. ‘I don’t have to pay taxes.’
‘I have heard that legal opinion is divided on the matter,’ said the Crab. ‘In any case, I am no longer interested. Go away, leave me alone.’
Further argument convinced Justina that this entity was speaking the truth. The Hermit Crab had entered one of those deep depressions to which it was prone; it wished nothing more than to be left alone and in peace. Justina did her best to rouse the Crab’s interest, appealing to its pride, curiosity, vanity and fear, to its philanthropic inclinations and its desire for human fellowship. All to no avail.