But in a few moments he removed the knife from my throat and stood up, puzzled, I think, on the raft.
No fugitives came plunging through the rence.
As I have suggested, this was not surprising to me.
In a few Ehn, however, a fellow did approach, covered with mud, cut from the rence. He had, I gathered, forced his way through the rence, in the charge. His weapon was still unsheathed. "Bring the prisoner forward," he said.
My keeper put a rope on my neck and then freed me from the harness.
The raft was thrust up, on a small bar, that it not drift away.
"Precede me," he said, pointing forward.
I went before him, through the rence. In a few yards we had come to the side of the low, covered barge. Many men were standing about, in the water. Too, there were now many of their small craft about, brought from the rear. The barge was aground, tipped, on a sand bar. In another Ahn, or with a change of wind, and current, it might be swept free.
"Come aboard," said the officer, now on the barge.
I looked up at him, over the gag.
I was pushed forward. Men reached down from the barge. Others, in the water, thrust me up. I was seized beneath the arms and drawn aboard. My keeper, my leash in his grasp, clambered aboard, after me.
On the deck of the barge, toward the stem, I could see that the small, slatted windows on the port side of the barge had been burst in. The door aft, leading down two or three steps to the interior of the cabin, hung awry.
The captain looked up at me.
I knelt.
"Remove his gag," he said.
This was done, and wrapped about the leather strap looped twice about my neck, that threaded through the center hole in the yoke, behind my neck. It felt good to get the heavy, sodden wadding out of my mouth.
"Some think you know the delta," he said to me.
"I am not a rencer," I said. "It is they, if any, who know the delta. I am of Port Kar."
"But you have been in the delta before," he said.
"Yes," I said.
"Have you seen barges of this sort before?" he asked.
"Yes," I said. "Of course."
"Wrap his leash about the yoke," said the officer to my keeper. "I will take charge of him."
The keeper wrapped the rope leash about the yoke, behind my arm.
"Come with me," said the officer.
I rose to my feet. This can be difficult to do in a heavy yoke, a punishment yoke, but was not difficult in the lighter yoke, a work yoke, which I wore. I put down my head, and followed the officer through the small door and down the two stairs, to the interior of the cabin. His mien made it clear that others were not to follow.
The cabin was not completely dark, as the windows at the sides had been broken in. Some, perhaps, might have been broken before. But I had little doubt that it was due to the men of Ar, themselves, in the vigor of their attack, that others had been destroyed, and that the door in the back, that awry in the threshold, through which we had entered, had been broken. I looked about the half-dark interior of the large, low-roofed cabin.
"A great victory," I commented.
The cabin was, in effect, empty, save for some benches and other paraphernalia. To be sure, there was some debris about, much dust. There was no sign that the area had been recently occupied.
"I do not understand it," said the officer to me. I did not respond.
"Where are the Cosians?" he asked me.
"Did you question the crew?" I asked.
"There was no crew," he said, angrily.
I was again silent. I had not thought that there would have been. If there had been, it was not likely the barge would be still aground, particularly with pursuers in the vicinity. The men of Ar, of course, were moving during the day, and in numbers. Too, they were strangers to the delta. They did not move with the silence, the stealth, of rencers.
"There may have been a crew," said the officer. "They may not have had time to free it of the bar."
"But there is little evidence that there has been a crew here for some time," I observed. To be sure, perhaps some fellows had poled it from time to time, earlier. But there was little evidence, as far as I could tell, of even that, certainly not in the cabin itself.
"Where are the Cosians?" he demanded.
I looked about the dusty, half-lit cabin. "It seems not here," I said.
"We have pursued this barge for days," said he, angrily. "Now we have closed with it. And it is empty!"
"It is my surmise," I said, "that it has been empty for weeks."
"Impossible!" he said.
"I suspect it is simply an abandoned barge," I said. "Such are not unknown in the delta."
"No," said he, "it is a vessel of the Cosian rear guard!"
"Perhaps," I said.
"Or one of their transports, straggling, abandoned!"
"Perhaps," I granted him.
He went to one of the small windows, and looked out, angrily.
"It would seem, however, would it not," I asked, "to be an unlikely choice for a troop transport?"
"What do you mean?" he asked.
"You are not of this part of the country," I said, "not from the delta, or the Vosk, or Port Kar," I said.
"I do not understand," he said.
"Examine the window before you, its screen," I said. He looked at the apparatus, burst in, hanging loose. "Yes?" he said.
"Consider the position of the opening lever," I said. "Yes!" he said.
"The window could not be opened from the inside," I said. "Only from the outside."
"Yes," he said.
"Also, in this particular barge," I said, "given the depth of the cabin floor, one could not, sitting, look directly out the windows, even if they were opened. One, at best, would be likely to see only a patch of sky."
"I see," he said, glumly.
"And if the shutters were closed," I said, "the interior of the cabin would be, for the most part, plunged into darkness. Too, you can well imagine the conditions within the cabin, the heat, and such, if the shutters were closed."
"Of course," he said.
"Examine, too," I said, "the benches here, within, where they are still in place."
"I see," he said, bitterly.
"You or I might find them uncomfortably low," I said, "but for a shorter-legged organism, they might be quite suitable."
"Yes," he said.
"And here and there," I said, "attached to some of the benches, I think you can detect the presence of ankle stocks, and, on the attached armrests, wrist stocks."
"But for rather small ankles and wrists," he said.
"Yes," I said, "and here and there, similarly, you can see, still in place, the iron framework for the insertions of the neck planks. You will note, too, that the matching semicircular apertures in the planks, there are some there, on the floor, are rather small."
"Yes," he said.
"This barge," I said, "is of a type used in Port Kar, on the canals, and in the delta, for example, between Port Kar, and other cities, and the Vosk towns, particularly Turmus and Ven, for the transportation, in utter helplessness and total ignorance, of female slaves."
"Yes," he said. "I see."
"Of course, such vessels are used elsewhere, as well," I said.
"In the south," he said, "we often transport slaves hooded, or in covered cages. Sometimes we ship them in boxes, the air holes of which are baffled, so that they may not be seen through."
I nodded. There are many such devices. One of the simplest and most common is the slave sack, into which the girl, gagged, and with her hands braceleted behind her back, is commonly introduced headfirst. These devices have in common the feature of ensuring the total helplessness of the slave and, if one wishes, her ignorance of her destination, route and such. Sometimes, of course, one wishes the slave to know where she is being taken, and what is to be done with her, particularly if this information is likely to increase her arousal, her terror, her desire to please, and so forth. For example, it seldom hurts to let a former free woman know that she is now being delivered as a naked slave to the gardens of a mortal enemy. One of the most common ways of transporting slaves, of course, is by slave wagon. The most common sort is a stout wagon with a central, locking bar running the length of the wagon bed, to which the girls are shackled, usually by the ankles. Most such wagons are squarish and have covers which may be pulled down and belted in place. In this way one may shield the girls, if one wishes, from such things as the sun and the rain. Too, of course, the cover may be used to simply close them in. Many slave girls, too, of course, are moved from one place to another on foot, in coffle.