THE MAGIC LABYRINTH

"Skin by skin?" Burton said. "What does that mean?"

"It'th chutht a thayirig of my people. Do I have to ekthplain it?"

"How many of your crew also know about X?" Burton said.

"There'th the little Frenchman, Marthelin, altho known as Baron de Marbot. But Tham told him about Ekth. Tham thought he could trutht him. Then there'th that vildaththed Chinethe Tai-Peng, only hith real name ith Li Po. There'th hith black-aththed thidekick, Tom Turpin, he can really tickle the ivorieth. Ekth never recruited Tom, but Tai-Peng blabbed about it to Tom one night vhen he vath drunk, that Thelethtial thyould've died of thirrhothith of the liver yearth ago, tho ve thought ve'd better take him in. He'th a good man, any vay. And then there'th Ely Parker, who vathn't recruited by Ekth either, but Tham knew him on Earth, or of him, and he told him becauthe he vath a good friend of Ulyththeth Eth. Grant and altho a general on Grant'th thtaff during the Thivil Var. He vath an engineer on the Not For Hire. He'th an American Indian, an Iroquois of the Theneca tribe. And then there'th the ancient Thumerian who callth himthelf Gilgameth."

"Gilgamesh?" Burton said.

"That'th vhat I thaid. Tham thaid he may or may not be the king of the Thumerian thity of Uruk who lived thometime in the firtht half of the third millenium B.C. It vathn't very likely ve'd run into anybody who knew the real Gilgameth, though you never know.

"And then there'th the ancient Mayan, Ah Qaaq. He'th awful thtrong, that ith, for a thyort-nothed perthon, he ith."

"Ah Qaaq," Burton said. "That'd be Mayan for fire."

"Yeth. But he ain't no ball of fire. He'th more like a but-terball. Fat ath a pig. But he'th very thtrong, ath I thaid. And he can thyoot a bow further than anybody I ever thaw, ekthept mythelf, naturally. Even further than thome Old Thtone Ach-. erth that vath on the boat. He'th got a muthtache tattooed on hith lip that maketh him look like a vildman from Borneo."

"Then Kimon and the other survivors don't know about X and the agents?" Burton said.

"If they did, I vould have thaid tho."

Nur el-Musafir said, "It's possible that some of them may be agents, however."

"I'd like to talk to all of the people you mentioned," Burton said. He paused, then said, "If all of us who know about the Ethical are to go on the Bills, then others will have to step aside. They'll have to give up their berth on the launch. Is there much chance of that?"

"Thyure," the titanthrop said. He looked down his enormous nose at Burton, and he smiled. His teeth were huge dull-white blocks. "Thyure. There'th a chanthe. About ath much ath an ithecube in a bonfire."

"Then," Burton said, "we'll have to seize the launch. Hijack it."

"I thought tho," Miller said. "Vhy ith it that from the begi

40

THERE WERE ELEVEN IN THE GROUP. OF THESE, FIVE HAD BEEN recruited directly by the renegade Ethical. These were Richard Francis Burton, Nur ed-Din el-Musafir, Tai-Peng, Gilgamesh, and Ah Qaaq. At least, they claimed to have been visited by X. Burton, however, could be sure only of himself. One or more might be agents or even Ethicals.

Joe Miller had been told about X by Samuel Clemens. Alice knew about him from Burton. Aphra Behn hadn't been informed until yesterday, but she wanted very much to accompany them on their expedition. De Marbot had heard from Clemens about the Stranger, and he had told Behn about him. Since the Frenchman and the Englishwoman had once been lovers and were again, the others agreed that she could come with them.

Ely Parker, the Seneca, also knew about X from Clemens, and he had wished to go with them. But he'd changed his mind.

"To hell with the Ethicals and the tower and all that," he said to Burton. "I'm going to stay here and try to raise the Not For Hire. It's sunk in only about forty feet of water. Once it's up and repaired, I'll take it down-River. I'm not really interested in dying just to prove something that can't be proved. The Ethicals don't want us sticking our noses in their business. I think that the breakdowns came about because we interfered. Piscator may have screwed things up in the tower. And Podebrad told Sam that the people he left behind in Nova Bo-hemujo may have been responsible for the failure of the right-bank line. He said that before he left on the blimp some of his officers wanted to dig deep around a grailstone and see if they could tap into it to get a continuous source of power. He warned them not to, and before he took off he got them to promise they wouldn't monkey around with it. He said that what might have happened was that they broke their promise and somehow broke the circuit.

"If that happened, the area around it would've been blown up. There'd be a hole big enough to make a new lake on the right side of The River. The explosion could've wiped out Nova Bohemujo on that side. That's where the mineral deposits were, and if what Podebrad said was true, then that's the end of the mines and the New Bohemians.

"Anyway, I just don't like meddling around with the Eth-icals. I'm no coward. Anyone who knows me'll tell you that. But I just don't think it's right to mess around with things we know nothing about."

In addition, Burton thought, you'd like to be captain of the riverboat and live the good and high life.

"You won't get much help from the locals," Burton said.

He gestured at the banks and the stream, which were crowded with people in boats or getting ready to shove off.

"This area will be near-emptied within a month. La Viro is sending almost everybody down-River to restore the faith of the Chancers, to correct deviations from their theology, and to make new converts. The breakdowns have shaken the faith of many."

"Yeah," Parker said, his broad brown face twisted with a sardonic smile. "Yeah. La Viro himself is shaken. I understand he's spending a lot of time on his knees praying. He doesn't look so sure of himself now."

Burton didn't try to argue the Seneca into going on with him. He did wish Parker luck before walking away, though he wasn't going to have any. The Not For Hire was going to stay where it was until the current nudged it off the ledge and it sank to the bottom, three thousand feet down.

When the Post No Bills sank or wore out, its end would be the end of the age of advanced technology on the Riverworld. What few metal tools and weapons existed would wear out. And then the Valleydwellers would be lucky if they had stone artifacts. The entire planet would be in the Wood Age.

The news about Podebrad's story was certainly interesting. Whether or not the Nova Bohemujo had brought about the line breakdown, Podebrad had been an agent or an Ethical. Only one of them could have known where the metal deposits were in that state. Only one of them could have known that trying to tap the power of the line could result in a catastrophe.

But Podebrad, or whatever his real name was, was dead.

Burton wondered if he could have been X.

Hearing a familiar voice hail him, he stopped and turned around. Herma

"Sinjoro Burton! Mi dezirus akompani vin."

"You'd like to go with me? Why?"

"For the same reason that drives you. I want desperately to know what has gone wrong. I've always wanted to know, but I told myself that it was much more important to raise the ethical level of the kas. Now... I don't know. Yes, I do! If we are to have faith, we must also have knowledge. I mean... faith is the only thing to cling to if you can't know the truth. But now... now... it may be possible to know!"