The Incredible Tide (8 page)

“I get it,” Conan said slowly.

“Then watch your step—and pray old Patch doesn't keep you at the boathouse nights.”

“Huh? Is he likely to?”

“He did me. Until I'd learned the ropes here. Used to keep me awake half the night, making me do this or that till I was ready to kill 'im. Boy, was I glad to go back to the bunkhouse and get some sleep!”

The sudden ringing of the bell drove them to work again.

The long twilight deepened. It was almost dark when the next bell rang. Tellit put his tools away and said wearily to Conan, “Let's go. There's a spare bunk for you at my place.”

“Oh, no you don't!” old Patch rapped out. “Boy, you're bunking right here on the floor till you learn the difference between a fid and a fiddlehead. Y'hear me?”

“Y-yes, sir,” Conan faltered, and slumped down on the floor with a fine pretense of utter exhaustion.

The moment Tellit was out of sight, Patch chuckled softly and said in the voice of Teacher, “Sometimes I almost hate myself. What a nasty old devil I am!”

“You certainly are, sir! But I can see the reason for it now.”

“Well, we've work to do. Are you as near collapse as you appear?”

“Of course not! I could work all night.”

“Good! You may have to. If we can get ready tonight, we'll leave this place tomorrow.”

Conan sat up, his face blank with astonishment. “You—how—but I thought it would be months before the trawler—”

“Oh, good heavens, son, that craft would never do. We need sail.” The old man tugged at one of the small boats he had been working on and pointed to another in the dim corner of the shop. “Drag that one here.”

Wondering, Conan did as he was told. Though he knew practically nothing about boats, it was apparent that the squat, ugly little runabout would never do for an ocean voyage, even for one person. He glanced at Teacher, puzzled.

“Turn it around,” the old man ordered. “Put the two boats together, stern to stern.”

Conan joined the boats, then stepped back and looked at them. He gasped. The ugliness had vanished. In the fading light it seemed that he was peering at a single hull, pointed at either end, with the long, flowing lines of a sailing craft.

“Why,” he whispered, “I—I wouldn't have believed it! How did you do it? I mean, I didn't know—”

“That I knew about boats? They were my first love.” Teacher moved to the door, listened a moment, then said, “The trick was to design what we needed, and build it without anyone realizing what we were doing. This was the only answer. It needs a keel—or a substitute for one—but we'll take care of that later, at the place I told you about. Now, here's the plan.…”

Tomorrow night, the old man explained, they would load both boats with the equipment they needed, and use the model for the trawler motor to take them up the coast to the break in the cliff. There, the two boats would be permanently joined, and rigged with a sail which they would make on the spot.

“But first,” Teacher added, “there are some things we must have. To get them will require your strength. You see, we must break into a building and commit burglary.”

6

DANGER

T
HEY NEEDED PACKAGED BREAD AND OTHER FOOD THAT
would keep indefinitely, as well as cloth and a roll of plastic. To burglarize the storehouse where these items were kept it was decided to wait till midnight. By then the roving watchmen would have finished their early rounds, and the way should be safer.

When it was black dark Teacher went out by the boat basin to call Mazal at High Harbor. Conan rolled in a blanket in the corner of the shop and tried to rest. He was tired, more so than he'd admitted, but at the moment sleep seemed impossible. A nameless fear had begun to trouble him. He laid it to the uncertainties ahead and tried to put it from his mind.

What was High Harbor like now? As he tried to imagine what the Change had done to it, he wished again that he had a little of Teacher's ability as a communicator. If only he and Lanna had been taught the way Mazal was taught—but in those days, with the war suddenly expanding, there hadn't been time. All at once, as a remembered vision of Lanna rose in his mind, he had an almost overwhelming desire to see her as she was now. Could he?

Maybe, if he turned all his thoughts upon her, he could banish distance and somehow manage to see her again even if they couldn't actually talk together.…

At the moment Conan was concentrating upon her, Lanna was waiting impatiently in the cottage for Mazal to return from the tower. Here, on the other side of the sea, so far to the west, it was still daylight, though already the evening chill was creeping down from the heights. Lanna shivered and closed the door she had partially opened. At that instant there came to her a brief but startlingly clear vision of Conan, not as she had seen him last, but older and stronger as she knew he must be now. She even saw the mark on his forehead.

Had she recognized what was happening, and managed to blank everything else from her mind, she might have made her first contact with him. But other matters suddenly demanded her attention.

First, she was startled by hearing Jimsy's crow signal coming from the slope behind the cottage. Jimsy had been absent from her morning classes, and she hadn't seen him since she recovered the ax. Hearing him call now, so late in the day, was upsetting; he'd never done this before. Not, of course, that there was any reason why he shouldn't call her at any hour if he had something important to tell her.…

Jimsy's signal came again, and now she was aware of the urgency in it. What could have happened?

She opened the door and glanced at the tower, hoping to see Mazal returning. Irresolute, she hesitated, torn between the immediacy of Jimsy and her concern for Conan and her grandfather. Yesterday Teacher had told Mazal that the time of escape was near, that it might come within a day or two. Maybe, even now … Abruptly she shook her head, closed the door once more, then caught up her cape and sped like a pale wraith through the dimness of the cottage.

At the front entrance she stopped quickly at the sound of footsteps on the porch, and moved aside just as the door was thrust open. Shann entered.

“Off to the ball, so early?” he said, making a weary attempt at being lighthearted.

For a moment she was unable to respond. “I—Jimsy's calling me,” she told him. “I'm afraid something's happened.” Then she made out the deeper lines in his face, and remembered he'd been away since dawn.

“Wha—what's wrong, Shann?”

He eased the door shut and leaned against it, closing his eyes. “A virus,” he said softly. “It's broken out at the other end of the harbor. Six of the young ones are down with it already. And I don't have anything for it.”

Her dark eyes widened in swift alarm. This was the sort of thing poor Shann had been afraid of for five years. So far they'd been lucky, for nothing dangerous and highly contagious had appeared here. But now …

“And you think it's—serious?”

“Yes. It's something new—at least to me. I think the trade ship brought it. The crew are probably immune. But the young ones—it hit them last night, and three of them are unconscious already. Er—have you seen Dyce?”

Lanna shook her head. The commissioner had not been around for two days.

“I've got to find him,” Shann said. “He's not a doctor, but he knows a little medicine, and he's got a lot of Pharmaceuticals on board. He might be able to help us.”

“Maybe Jimsy can tell us about him. I'll ask.”

She threw on her cloak and ran outside. Near the office she paused just long enough to make sure no one was watching, then hastened up through the woods to the twisted pine at the top of the slope.

Jimsy was crouched against the tree. In the fading light his small, ragged body seemed almost part of the growth around him. Only his unkempt mop of red hair stood out brightly against the shadows. As he rose painfully to his feet she saw that the left side of his face was badly bruised and swollen, and the eye nearly closed.

“Jimsy!” she cried. “What in the world—have you been in a fight?”

“Aw, forgit it,” he growled. “I'm O.K.”

“But you're hurt! You'd better come down right now and have the doctor—”

“Naw! I said I was O.K., didn't I?” Jimsy paused, and his hard eyes bored up into hers. “You heard about the meeting?”

“What meeting?”

“Then you ain't heard. It's tomorrow about this time, over at that place on the road. And Orlo, he's back of it.”

A new fear, sharper than the others, suddenly cut into her. That “place on the road” was on the other side of the ridge where an old highway, useless since the Change, curved past what had once been a roadside park. The spot was the nearest large open area, and the kids often met there for games and talks.

“Jimsy, what are you trying to tell me?”

“Well, a—a lot of the guys don't like the way Doc's trying to hold ‘em down. I mean, they and the girls want things he don't figger they oughta have, see? From the trade ship, I mean. Like bicycles an' music boxes—”

“But, Jimsy, we need other things
far
more! Don't you realize—”

“It ain't
me
wants 'em. What use would
I
have for a music box? Some dirty skunk'd swipe it from me anyway. And Orlo, he'll wind up owning everything. You see, he wants to take over.”

“
What?
”

“He—he wants to kick Doc out an' be the big boss here.”

She could only stare at him in shocked silence.

“An' that ain't all,” the boy muttered. “Orlo, he's got it in for you. I mean, I—I seen what happened when you got the ax back.”

“You—you were watching?”

“Yeah. Sorta figgered he'd get mean, so I was ready to pop 'im with an arrer. But you got away O.K.” He stopped and suddenly said, “You sure nobody seen you meet me up here?”

“Jimsy, I'm
always
careful. The only person who knows I'm with you now is the doctor. But I
had
to tell him, because—”

“Aw, he's aw'right. I reckon Orlo just made a good guess.”

“Guess about what? Jimsy, was it Orlo that gave you a beating?”

Jimsy shrugged. “It don't matter.”

“Then it
was
Orlo—and it
does
matter! Oh, that dirty animal!” She clenched her hands in sudden fury. “He did it because he thought you told me about the ax!”

Another shrug. “I said it don't matter none. Anyway, I ain't gonna forgit it. I'll fix ‘im.” He turned away, saying, “I hope it rains or something tomorrow. It sure ain't gonna be good if that goat robber comes here an' takes over.”

“Jimsy—wait! We've got to find the commissioner. It's terribly important. Have you seen him anywhere?”

“Yeah. I seen 'im.” Jimsy's hard, freckled features became a little more grim. “He's been with Orlo all day.”

“Orlo!”

“Yeah. Them two, I think they made a deal. The commissioner, he's gonna be at the meeting tomorrow.”

“Oh, no!”

“That's what I heard. I think they're both out at the trade ship now.”

Again shock held her silent. She hardly saw Jimsy leave. When she finally turned, fighting back a growing dread, she was momentarily forgetful of her enemy beyond the land, and failed to lower her eyes in time. So abruptly she saw it in all its menacing vastness—the great shrouded, darkling sea that had swallowed continents and drowned the past, the ever deadly sea that seemed to be coiled and waiting. It was all in shadow save for a single spot of reflected light that glared at her from the horizon like a monster eye.

She cried out against it and might have panicked if Tikki, who had been circling watchfully overhead, had not dipped lower and lighted on her arm. Thankfully she clutched the bird to her and fled down through the twilight.

In the corner of the boat shop Conan awoke suddenly with the pressure of a hand upon his shoulder.

Teacher's voice came quietly out of the darkness. “It's time, son. We'll have to work fast.”

Conan thrust the blanket aside and rolled to his feet, almost instantly wide awake. It surprised him that he'd been asleep at all, for it seemed that only seconds had passed since he'd been thinking of Lanna and High Harbor. Remembering his effort, he felt a little depressed. He'd never make a communicator.

Before he could ask Teacher if Mazal had sent a message from Lanna, the old man pressed a flashlight into his hand and said, “Follow me, son. Don't use the light unless you need it, and turn it only on the ground to see where I am.”

“If you're going to lead, hadn't you better carry it?”

“No, it wouldn't help. I'm practically blind.”

“You're
what?
”

Teacher chuckled softly. “I've always been nearly blind. I thought you knew. Happened when I was a child, fooling with chemicals. Without glasses—they were lost the night of the Change—I can make out just enough to draw my boat plans. But it made disguise a simple matter. Even without a beard, take away a man's glasses, give him a patch in place of a glass eye, and who would know him?”

“You certainly fooled me! But how in the world can you find your way—”

“In the dark? Easily. I have other senses. Let's go!”

As he followed the swift feet of his guide through the blackness, Conan for the first time in his life began to regard Teacher with something of the awe with which the entire world had once looked upon him. That this tall and almost frail-looking old man was Briac Roa, the greatest mind of an era, had meant little to him. He'd always accepted him simply as Teacher, a beloved friend. So, now, it was not the realization that this was the genius who had produced so many marvels that suddenly aroused his awe. It was the simple but obvious fact that a man who was nearly blind had somehow trained himself to see in the dark.