The Fabulous Riverboat

Joe turned his head slowly as if it were a turret on a battleship and the tremendous proboscis were a ca

"You're getting pretty snappy with the comeback, Joe," Sam muttered. "My influence, no doubt." "I'm not ath dumb ath motht people think," Joe said. "That wouldn't be possible."

His rage had become a dull red now. Even with Joe as his bodyguard, he was far from being safe. But he was banking that John would go only so far with him, because he wanted that boat, too.

John was sitting at the big round oaken table with a dozen of his thugs. The giant Zaksksromb was standing behind him. All held clay steins. The room reeked of tobacco and liquor. John's eyes were red, but then they usually were. Light came in through the windows but the direct sunlight was blocked off by the stockade poles. Some pine torches burned smokily. Sam stopped, took a cigar out of the little box in the bag hanging from his belt and lit it. It angered him that his hand shook so much, and that increased his anger at John. He said, "All right, Your Majesty! It was bad enough that you took those alien women for your own vile purposes! But to take Gwenafra? She's a citizen of this state! You really put your neck in the noose, John, and I'm not just using figurative language!"

John downed the whiskey in the stein and gently put it down on the table. Softly, he said, "I had those women removed for their own safety. The crowd was very ugly; they wanted to kill the missionaries. And Gwenafra was taken along through a mistake. I will ascertain who is responsible for that and punish him."

"John," Sam said, "I ought to arrest your assertions for vagrancy. They certainly are without any visible support. But I got to hand it to you. You just dispossessed the devil. You are now the father of lies and grand master, past, present and future, of deceit. If being barefaced is the criterion of the greatest liar, all other liars are whiskered like Santa Claus."

John's face turned red. Zaksksromb sneered and lifted his club chest-high. Joe growled.

John blew out a deep breath and said, smiling, "You are upset over a little blood. You will get over it. You ca

The horrible thing was that John would get away with it. Everybody, including his supporters, would know he was lying. But there was nothing to do about it unless they wanted to start a civil war, and that would mean that the wolves—Iyeyasu, Hacking, maybe the supposed neutrals, Publius Crassus, Chernsky, Tai Fung, and the savages across The River—would invade. Sam snorted and walked out. Two hours later, his ex-

ectations were realities. The Councilmen voted an official reprimand against John for his mishandling of the situation and his hastiness. He was directed to confer with his co-Consul in any such future situations.

No doubt John would laugh uproariously when he was told of the decision and he would call for more liquor, tobacco, marihuana and women to celebrate.

However, he did not have a complete victory. Every Parolando knew how Sam Clemens had stood up to John, stormed his palace with only one supporter, released the women and insulted John to his face. John knew that; his triumph was standing on shaky legs.

Sam asked the Council to exile every Second Chancer La Parolando for their own protection. But several Councillors pointed out that this would be illegal. The Carta would have to be changed. Besides, it was unlikely that John would take any more action against them after the warning he had received.

They knew as well as Sam why he was taking advantage of the emotional climate to oust the Second Chancers. But there were some stubborn men on the Council. Perhaps they felt angry because they had not been able to do anything about John, and at least they could make a stand for principle in this case.

Sam would have bet that the survivors of the massacre would want to leave immediately. But they insisted on staying. The slaughter had done nothing except to convince them that Parolando needed them very much. Goring was building several large huts for them. Sam sent word down that this should stop. Parolando was already short of wood. Goring sent word back that he and his male comrades would move out and sleep under the grailstones. Sam swore and blew smoke in the face of the Chancer messenger and said that it was too bad pneumonia did not exist. Afterward, he felt ashamed, but he did not. relent. He wasn't going to scant his furnaces so that people he did not even want could sleep under a roof.

He felt upset enough, but that evening he got two messages which opened the earth under him. One was that Odysseus had disappeared at night from his boat while on the way back to Parolando. Nobody knew what had happened to him. He was just gone. The second message informed him that William Grevel, the man who'd been spying on John, had been found under a ledge at the base of the mountain, his skull smashed in.

Somehow, John had found him out and executed him. And John would be laughing because Sam could not prove that or, for that matter, even admit that Grevel had been working for him.

Sam called in von Richthofen and de Bergerac and others whom he considered to be his people. It was true that de Bergerac and he were hostile because of Livy, but de Bergerac preferred Clemens to John, with whom he had had some hot words.

"Maybe Odysseus' disappearance from the boat is only a coincidence," Sam said. "But that, plus Grevel's death, makes me wonder if John isn't striking at me through my friends. He may be pla

"Morbleu! de Bergerac said. "If it wasn't for this ridiculous law against dueling, I could challenge John and run nun through. You, Sinjoro Clemens, were responsible for that law!"

"I was raised in a country where duels were common," Sam said. "The whole idea sickens me. If you'd seen the tragedies... well, never mind. I guess you did see, and it doesn't seem to have affected you. Anyway, do you think for one moment that John would ever let you live long enough to meet him for a duel? No, you'd disappear or have an accident, you can bet on that." "Vhy can't Chohn have an acthident?" Joe Miller said.

"How would you get past the living wall of his bodyguards?" Sam said. "No, if John has an accident, it'll have to be a genuine one."

He dismissed them with the exception of de Bergerac and of Joe, who never left him unless he was sick or Sam wanted privacy..

"The Stranger said that he'd picked out twelve humans for the final onslaught against the Misty Tower," Sam said. "Joe, you, Richard Francis Burton, Odysseus and me make five. But none of us know who the other seven are. Now Odysseus is gone, and God knows if we'll ever see him again. The Stranger implied that all of the twelve would join the others on the Riverboat somewhere along the line. But if Odysseus was resurrected somewhere to the south, downRiver, so far away he can't get back up here before the Riverboat is built, then he is out of luck."

Cyrano shrugged and rubbed his long nose. "Why worry? Or is that your nature? For all we know, Odysseus is not dead. He may have been contacted by this Mysterious Stranger—who, by the way, Odysseus claims is a woman and so his Stranger is not the one that you and I met—mordioux!—I digress! As I said, Odysseus may have been called away suddenly by this so-mysterious person and we will find out in time what did happen! Let that shadowy angel—or fiend—take care of the matter. We must concentrate on getting this fabulous boat constructed and skewering anybody who gets in our way."