THE MAGIC LABYRINTH

By then, the warring peoples across the stream had exhausted their gunpowder, and only occasionally could the Rexites hear a very low murmur, the diluted and compressed sound of people voicing their fury, hunger, and fear, their pain and their deaths.

The casualties on the Rex from both days were thirty dead and sixty wounded, twenty seriously, though it might be said that any wound was taken seriously by the sufferers. The corpses were cast in weighted fishskin bags and into the middle of The River after a brief ceremony. The bags were only to spare the feelings of the survivors since the bags would be ripped open and the flesh devoured by the fish before they reach the bottom.

Along the left bank the waters were thick with corpses, bumping into each other while the eating fish thrashed the bloodied waters. For a month, the logjam of bodies made The River hideous. Everywhere, apparently, the fighting had taken place, and it would be a long time before the drifting corpses disappeared. Meanwhile, the fish ravened, and the colossal riverdragonfish came up from the depths and took the bloating dead whole in their mouths until their stomachs were crammed. And when they had digested and eliminated these, they rose again to feed and to digest and to eliminate.

"It's Armageddon, the.Apocalypse," Burton said to Alice, and he groaned.

Alice wept more than once, and she had nightmares. Burton comforted her so much that she felt that they were close again.

The afternoon of the next day, the Rex ventured across The River to recharge. But instead of going on, it went back to the right bank. It was necessary to make gunpowder and to repair damages. That took a month, during which time Burton completely recovered from his wound.

After the boat resumed its journey, some of its crew were tasked with making a count of the survivors in various areas picked at random. The result: an estimate that nearly half the population must have been killed, if the fighting had occurred on the same scale everywhere. Seventeen and a half billion people had died within twenty-four hours.

It was a long time before gaiety came back to the riverboat, and the people on the bank behaved like ghosts. Even worse than the effect of the slaughter was the dread thought: What if the remaining grailstone line quits?

Now, thought Burton, was the time to question the suspected agents. But if they were cornered, they might kill themselves even if no resurrection awaited them. And there was also the restraint that the post-1983 people might be i

He would wait. He could do nothing else but wait.

Meanwhile, Loghu was subtly questioning her cabinmate, and Alice, though not subtle, was doing her best with Podebrad. And Burton was waiting for Strubewell to make a slip.

Several days after the voyage had started again, John decided that he would do some recruiting. He stopped the Rex during the noontime meal and went ashore to make it known that he had empty berths to fill.

Burton, as Sergeant Gwalchgwy

John was interviewing a Caucasian whose back was partially blocked from Burton's view by a tall, ski

He heard the white man say, "I am Peter Jairus Frigate."

Burton whirled, stared, glaring and then he leaped at Frigate. Frigate went down under him, Burton's hands around his throat.

"I'll kill you!" Burton shouted.

Something struck him on the back of the head.

11

WHEN HE REGAINED HIS SENSES, HE SAW THE NEGRO AND THE four men who'd been behind him struggling with John's bodyguards. The monarch had leaped on top of the table, and, red-faced, was shouting orders. There was some confusion for a minute before everybody settled down. Frigate, coughing, had gotten to his feet. Burton pulled himself up, feeling pain in the back of his head. Evidently, he'd been hit with the knob-kerrie the black had carried suspended from a thong on his belt. It lay on the grass now.

Though not entirely clear-headed, Burton realized that he had, somehow, erred. This man looked much like the Frigate he knew, and his voice was similar. But neither his voice nor his features were quite the same, and he wasn't as tall. Yet... the same name?

"I apologize, Sinjoro Frigate," he said. "I thought... you looked so much like a man whom I have good reason to loathe... he did me a terrible injury... never mind. I am truly sorry, and if I may make amends..."

What the devil, he thought. Or perhaps it should be, Which the devil?

Though this was not his Frigate, he couldn't help looking around for Monat.

"You almost scared the piss out of me," the fellow said. "But, well, all right. I accept. Besides, I think you've paid for your error. Umslopogaas can hit hard."

The black said, "I only tapped him to discourage him."

"Which you did," Burton said, and he laughed, though it hurt his head.

"You and your friends were fortunate you weren't slain on the spot!" John bellowed. He got down from the table and sat down. "Now, what is the difficulty?"

Burton explained again, secretly elated since under the circumstances the "almost" Frigate couldn't reveal to John that Burton was using an assumed name. John got assurances from Frigate and his four companions that they held no resentment against Burton and then ordered his men to release them. Before continuing the interviews, he insisted that Burton give him an account of why he had attacked Frigate. Burton made up a story which seemed to satisfy the monarch.

He said to Frigate, "How do you explain this startling resemblance?"

"I can't," Frigate said, shrugging. "I've had this happen before. Not the attack, I mean. I mean ru

Frigate didn't seem to have any superior enlistment qualifications. He was almost six feet tall and muscular but not especially so. He claimed to be a good archer, but there were hundreds of thousands of bowmen available to John. He would have dismissed him if Frigate had not mentioned that he'd arrived in an area a hundred miles up-River in a balloon, and he'd seen a huge dirigible. John knew that had to be the Parseval. He was also interested in the balloon story.

Frigate said that he and his companions had been journeying up-River with the intention of getting to the headwaters. They'd gotten tired of the slow rate of travel in their sailboat, and when they came to a place where metal was available, they'd talked its chief of state into building them a blimp.

"Ah!" John said. "What was this ruler's name?"

Frigate looked puzzled. "He was a Czech named Ladislas Podebrad."