"Yes, to Loria Bed. . . Bednacourt. She carrying a guest yet?"
This question seemed excessively personal, but Tim supposed it might matter to merchants interested in hiring a woman"s husband. He said, "Not yet."
"So come."
Tim shook his head.
She was trying to study his face in the dark. "n.o.body has to be down there on the sand with the sharks, Tim. Not a labor yutz, anyway.
They never reach the wagon roofs."
She thought he was afraid?
"You know," she said, "the Otterfolk must have been the first unhuman tool users anyone ever saw. Cavorite wouldn"t have just sailed past."
She was right, he thought. And- "They can draw pictures of Cavorite," he said.
He couldn"t say, Loria doesn"t even want me talking to you, let alone- Rian would wonder why, and Tim didn"t know, but that left only a killing in Spiral Town as his excuse, and what would he tell her instead?
He said, "I wasn"t the only cook-"
"You have four. Van Barstowe limps. A caravan yutz has to walk, you know. Drew Bednacourt drops things, and he"s surly. You and Van, you"re the best. Do you like my company, Tim?"
At dinnertime there were knives everywhere you looked, and where was Loria right now? "No, look, Rian, we all grow up knowing about hybrid vigor, but Loria doesn"t think like that. My life wouldn"t be worth living if-"
He stopped talking, because the merchant wdman was up and moving away.
He wondered if he"d jumped to conclusions. "Company," she"d said.
Only that. He"d made an embarra.s.sing mistake.
The house was empty.
Long after he was in bed, Loria slid in and tickled him awake.
There was a ferocity to her lovemaking, and she wouldn"t let him talk.
She didn"t want to talk afterward either. They made love again. . .
unless he fell asleep first. . . but sunlight blazed through the bedroom window and someone was pounding on the door.
Tim pulled himself out of bed, squinting. Why didn"t Loria answer?
"Come," he called. He pulled on some pants and went into the common room.
Sharlot Clellan, Drew Bednacourt, Harl Cloochi, and Berda Farrow, all elders of Twerdahl Town, came in from the glare of sunlight. They ushered in three merchants wearing wild colors. Two men, one woman. Tim recognized the dark man named Damon.
"What"s it all about?" he asked.
Harl said, "Tim, these are Damon and Milo and Halida, elders of the caravan. They came to us last night, not just to us, you understand, but to all of Twerdahl Town. Tim, this may sound odd-"
The door opened again. Loria and Tarzana.
Tim repeated, "What is this?"
"Loria, dear, we"ve had an offer," Harl said.
"Right. Did you know they came to Tim last night? Tim, what did they offer you?"
She could have learned that last night. "Job as a labor yutz.
Cooking."
The elder Twerdahls stared at the merchants. "You went to him first?"
Damon smiled and shrugged. "We looked for a better bargain. He was reluctant."
Tim couldn"t read Loria"s expression.
The merchant woman, Halida, said to Tim, "Your elders and mine, they"ve been talking. We offer a long knife for every twenty days you"re gone."
"Loria, is that a good price?"
"Dammit, Tim!"
"Tarzana?"
Tarzana said, "Yes."
"Sounded like it. Haron got less, his first time."
Damon said, "We want you cooking for us tonight, Tim. That means you join us now. You"ll be with ibn-Rushd wagon, my family"s wagon. Don"t take too much with you, no more than you can carry. Don"t take speckles.
We"ve got plenty. And Tim-" He smiled. "The more we discuss it, the farther we"ll have to chase the wagons."
It was happening faster than he could think, and he was still playing catch-up. "Loria, let"s talk," he said, and pulled her into the bedroom.
Dawn light blazed through the window. It was easier to read her face in here. "What"s going on?"
"Can"t you tell?"
"Oh, a little. They"d have had me cheap if I"d gone with them last night. Now they"ve got to pay off the whole town, but Loria, do they think I"m for sale? I have a house and a wife."
And a secret that any of three hundred people might speak.
"The old people, they"ve already taken the knives," Loria said bleakly. She swept the blanket off their bed, flung it high and let it settle on the floor. "We have to pack. I knew they"d have you. You can do things n.o.body else can. Tim, didn"t I try to keep you in the house?" He saw she was crying. "At least I gave you a great send-off. Didn"t I?"
"I didn"t know I was going."
"T-".
"Great send-off, d.a.m.n right. Can you come with me?" Her head snapped up, amazed. "You"d. . .
"What?"
"Want me?"
"Yes!"
"No. No, I can"t. Yutzes are always men."
"What do you want, Loria?"
"I want you to come back. But if you"re coming back like Haron Welsh, then don"t."
She"d stacked his possessions on the blanket. Coat and shirts. No hat; Twerdahls never wore hats. The skillet from Bloocher Farm had become Twerdahl Town property, and retrieving it would be a mistake. She took his pouch of speckles. "If a yutz carries speckles, they think it"s caravan property," she said.
She considered, then added one of the few things she"d brought from the Bednacourt House. It was an old wooden toy model of Cavorite, vague in detail, worn by handling in places.
"That"s yours," he said.
She said, "You"d have something like this, if you really grew up here. Take it."
"Loria, what happened to Haron Welsh?"
"The way he sees us ... changed. He"s Uncle Haron, but we don"t call him that anymore. He thinks he"s too good to talk to us. Don"t come back that way. Tim, what"s your name?"
"Jemmy Bloocher."
"All right." Loria rolled the blanket and tied it into a compact bundle. "Go on."
He could have smoothed it over, made his peace with Loria. He knew it then and he believed it later. But the caravan was already moving, and Twerdahi Town wanted knives, and Otterfolk remembered enough of Cavorite to draw pictures.
8.
On the Road You d011"t stop your wagon to do business, not unless it"s a favored mark or a decent ocfer. Stopping makes you look eager. Keep talking and let the chugs move on until the mark takes your ocfer.
-Shireen ~b~-R~5hd The wagons were rolling steadily away from Twerdahi Town when three merchants and Tim Bednacourt walked into a haze of fine dust.
The morning wore on. Swamp trailed off into gra.s.s-covered hills.
They crossed a wide and sluggish stream on stepping-stones too conveniently placed to be natural. Halida named it Whelan"s Crossing.
The wagons didn"t seem to he getting closer.
The merchants weren"t hurrying. They ambled along, chatting among themselves. With his burden of possessions Tim was still hard put to keep up. Now they were asking questions about life in Twerdahl Town.
Tim tried to distract them with questions of his own. "I"ve never watched merchants cooking. What do you use?"
"You will see. I am Damon ibn-Rushd. Ibn-Rushd is eight from the lead, six from the tail. We and Lyons family carry the cookware."
"Do you cook with the same kind of thing you sell to Twerdahl?"
"Yes."
"Good. Is there always firewood?"
"Always, except at the Tail."
A stone bridge arched over deep water. Tim asked, "Did you build all of these bridges?"
Laughter. "Who else?"
Gradually they drew alongside the last wagon. Now they were pa.s.sing a line of chugs. Each chug spared Tim one long dismissive glance.
They stood almost hip high. Those sh.e.l.ls looked heavy. They"d weigh about half as much as Tim. The top of the beak was an extension of the skullcap sh.e.l.l, with a lower jaw to meet it. That beak would deliver a h.e.l.l of a bite.
Tim suddenly realized that he was seeing the same odd blemish on each chug. They were marked with an E inside a D, carved into the sh.e.l.l on the right side.
"Dole," Halida said. "Dole Enterprises."
Nineteen chugs pulled Dole wagon.
Twenty pulled the next. They were marked with a bird of Earth, an owl.
Eighteen pulled the next, marked with an ellipse and a dot in the center. "Wu family had bad luck this trip," Damon said softly as he smiled and waved at two men in the driver"s alcove.
"The wagons," Tim said, "they"re all alike."
Damon nodded; Halida smiled.
Spiral children noticed early. Eggs were alike, seeds were alike, babies were alike, but crafted things were not. Things that were all alike were ancient machines from the time of Landing, "settler magic"
like computers and microwave ovens; or they were the wood-and-iron wagons of a caravan.
Wagons were painted in flamboyant fashion, a match for merchants"
clothing. When the side opened to form a counter and sunscreen, each wagon became a shop different from every other shop. But the counters were up, the wagons were closed, and this was Tim Bednacourt"s first good look at wagons. They were identical down to the last centimeter, as if made all at the same time, from identical components, by identical workmen.
The drivers" alcoves denied their similarities. They were painted too, and furnished with pillows and little shelves and niches that held mugs or pieces of carved wood. From arcs of driver"s benches that would be roomy for four, merchants watched Tim pa.s.s. They didn"t speak, but they smiled.
"They smile for you," Halida said. "We might have had to eat our own cooking."