The Magnificent Showboats (17 page)

On the next afternoon Gassoon guided
Miraldra’s Enchantment
to Port Optimo, and ordained another performance of
Macbeth.
Zamp consulted the
River Index
and once again approached Gassoon with his findings. “The situation is less clear here than at Chist, but I find compelling reasons for a change or two. For instance: the folk here abominate the use of alcohol. Hence, Macbeth poisons Duncan by serving him a goblet of brandy. Additionally, rather than witches, we had best use water-wefkins.”

Gassoon could hardly find words. “The integrity of our work will be compromised!”

“The
River Index
points out that Port Optimo maintains three long-boats equipped with fire-harpoons. It will not be feasible to wash tonight’s audience off the deck.”

Gassoon threw his long arms into the air, as if gripping an imaginary overhead bar. “Make only those changes which are absolutely necessary.”

Either because of, or in spite of, Zamp’s improvisations, the evening’s performance was received with approbation. Gassoon still was not pleased. He took exception to the Act Three banquet, during which Macbeth, as king, commanded jugglers, dancers and acrobats to provide entertainment for the court, which entertainment continued for the better part of an hour. Gassoon also criticized the episodes of marital tenderness which Zamp had seen fit to insert into the drama.

On the following day, with sails taut before a fair wind,
Miraldra’s Enchantment
drove north past Badburg and on to Fwyl, where the
Pamellissa
and the
Melodious Hour
were already moored; and Gassoon refused to present a program under the circumstances.

After Fwyl the winds became capricious; during the afternoon of the third day
Miraldra’s Enchantment
swept grandly around Glassblower’s Point, across the swirl of the Lant current and up to the Lanteen dock, where Zamp and Gassoon had agreed on a two or three day layover.

The following morning Gassoon opened his museum to the Lanteen public, and Zamp took advantage of his preoccupation to suggest an outing to Damsel Blanche-Aster. She at first gave a curt refusal, then, faced with the prospect of a day of boredom, she asked what he had in mind.

Zamp had not yet formed definite plans; on the spur of the moment he proposed a visit to the glass-works. “The artisans are most clever and skillful; to watch them at work is said to be fascinating.”

“Very well then. Is it far?”

“Just around the hill. Let’s leave at once before Gassoon thinks of something for us to do.”

Damsel Blanche-Aster laughed with such freedom and gayety that Zamp wondered how he could have ever thought her constrained. She seemed to fall in with Zamp’s mood; like truant children they slipped from the boat and walked up the esplanade.

Damsel Blanche-Aster now decided that rather than a visit to the glass-works, she preferred to climb to the top of the hill. Zamp readily agreed, and they turned into a lane which angled up Glassblower’s Bluff, back and forth between hedges and low stone walls.

Today, through quirk, or caprice, or mood of optimism, Damsel Blanche-Aster put no constraints on her conduct. Zamp had never seen her so animated. Her pale hair blew in the wind; her eyes shone the clear gray-blue of a mountain lake; in her white frock she might have been a simple girl of the countryside, and Zamp thought her completely charming. Pausing to admire a quaint little cottage built of bulbous green glass flasks, she remarked at the flowers and even chirruped at the child playing with toy glass animals on the stoop.

They proceeded up the lane, which became a track winding up the slope past pens and pastures, then steeply up the final crag toward the sky, where puffs of clouds drifted north. Abandoning all dignity, Damsel Blanche-Aster ran up the trail, pausing to pick wildflowers or toss pebbles down-slope, while Zamp marched behind, longing to participate in the frolic, yet hardly daring to intrude without an invitation. They gained the summit and stood in sun and wind, with cloud-shadows racing across the landscape far below. Lanteen straggled along the Lant from River House on the east jetty to the Green Star Inn on its crooked stilts to the west.

Damsel Blanche-Aster climbed upon a rock and scanned the circle of the horizon, dwelling longest on the way to the north, along the mighty Vissel. She bent to descend from the rock. Zamp was on hand, and nothing could be easier as she jumped down than to catch her in his arms. For an instant it seemed that she became supple; then immediately she stiffened and slid away. Zamp was not pleased; it was almost as if absent-mindedly she had thought herself on the hill with some dream-person, only to discover, almost instantly, that the person was Apollon Zamp.

Damsel Blanche-Aster sat down in the shelter of the rock, away from the wind. Zamp joined her, and intoxicated with her proximity, slid his arm around her waist.

Damsel Blanche-Aster turned him a glance of frosty inquiry and rose to her feet; Zamp clasped her legs and looked up imploringly. “Why are you so cruelly cold? Do you love someone else?”

“I love no one.”

“Do you swear it? Tell me the truth!”

“Master Zamp, please control yourself; you are becoming emotional.”

“Emotional? I am in a frenzy! My brain feels like the Hall of Mirrors aboard the
Fireglass Prism;
from every direction your face looks at me. I ache, I suffer, I am sick with longing! I think only of your wonderful beauty!”

Damsel Blanche-Aster laughed. “Master Zamp, you really become absurd.”

“You are the absurd one! How can you be so cold? Compared to you, a statue of Saint Imola carved from ice is a madcap.”

Damsel Blanche-Aster detached herself from Zamp’s embrace. “Your doctrines are remarkable! As if I existed only to fulfill your cravings! Then, since I do not care to do so, the cosmos must be considered insane.”

“It is more than craving,” cried Zamp. “It is enchantment and wonder and dread —”

In spite of her professed indifference, Damsel Blanche-Aster was surprised. “‘Dread’?”

“Dread for that time, which must arrive, if a hundred years from now, when I shall see you for the last time. I am content only in your presence; I adore you! In fact, yes! I will espouse you formally.”

“I fear, Master Zamp, that you are a victim to your own perfervid imagination.”

“Absolutely not! We sail to Mornune; promise that you will return with me!”

Damsel Blanche-Aster shook her head. “I have my own hopes and dreams.”

Zamp shook his head in disbelief. “What must you do at Mornune, that you ignore the ardor of Apollon Zamp?”

“It is quite simple. I left Mornune to avoid espousal to a man I detest; now he is dead and I may return home.”

“Astonishing!” declared Zamp. “Gassoon thinks you go to seek a treasure in rare books; you told me that you must save your sick father from imprisonment; now you remember this unwelcome suitor.”

Damsel Blanche-Aster looked away to the north, and smiled a strange smile. “I am absent-minded; I forget to whom I have made explanations.”

Zamp hissed between his teeth. “You have tantalized me beyond endurance! Here and now we shall set matters to rights!” Zamp stepped forward and took Damsel Blanche-Aster in his arms, only to receive a terrible blow on the head that brought tears to his eyes. For a period the sky rocked. A nasal voice rang in his ears: “Traitor and dog’s vomit, I heard all I want to hear! Do you think you could deceive me with your skulking? Never! Prepare to die on this spot!”

Zamp, his eyes yet unfocused, glimpsed Gassoon brandishing a heavy cutlass. Frantically Zamp rolled aside and Gassoon’s lunge went wide.

Zamp tried to scramble to his feet, to slip and fall sprawling again, while dodging Gassoon’s second blow. Damsel Blanche-Aster ran forward and seized Gassoon’s arm. “Throdorus! Calm yourself! Put up your blade!”

“I must destroy this vermin!” cried Gassoon. “He has performed a wicked act this morning!”

“He is foolish rather than evil. And remember! Only Zamp can provide us safe conduct across the Bottomless Lake!”

“This might be a sterile capability,” Gassoon grumbled. He gave his cutlass a final flourish and addressed Zamp. “Consider yourself a dead man restored to life! I hope that you will be induced to mend your ways.”

Beside himself with fury, Zamp gained his feet and snatched forth his own blade. “Come now, you lank misfortune of a dog’s miscarriage! Let us see whose life hangs by which thread! How dare you come spying on your betters?” He stepped forward but Gassoon struck down with his cutlass and broke the shaft of Zamp’s rapier and Zamp stood holding only the pommel.

Damsel Blanche-Aster took Gassoon’s arm. “Come, Throdorus, let us ignore Master Zamp; he has lost his temper and is no longer coherent.” She led Gassoon down the trail. Zamp sat down on a rock and massaged the side of his head. The episode seemed an incredible dream. How could any woman, alive and healthy, resist such importunities as those he had lavished upon Damsel Blanche-Aster? No matter! The voyage was not yet at its end. Zamp recalled that fractional instant when Damsel Blanche-Aster had seemed to melt. It was a positive sign, and Zamp would redouble his efforts. He would woo this exquisite creature with such gallantry as the world had never known! He would warm her icy heart with graceful occasions! He would quicken her pulse with music, fire her brain with poetry! She would learn to find him indispensable, and come to him brimming with love, beseeching his attention.

Zamp rose to his feet and found his hat. He clapped it upon his head, and set off down the hill.

Returning to
Miraldra’s Enchantment
, Zamp stalked up the gangplank with dignity. Gassoon greeted him coldly though without open rancor. The evening’s performance went smoothly and Gassoon even seemed to approve certain of Zamp’s embellishments which heretofore he had labeled ‘not authentic, opposite to the spirit of the original’.

On the following morning Zamp noticed that, contrary to his instructions, certain essentials were not being brought aboard the ship. He went at once to Gassoon’s office, but found it empty; Gassoon was in the museum, displaying his collection of antique costumes to a group of local matrons. Gassoon pointedly ignored Zamp’s signals and Zamp was forced to wait while Gassoon lovingly brought forth the old garments: imperial gowns, embroidered aprons, the black cassock of a Royal Skannic Lancer, the silks of a Lalustrine nymph, the costume of an ancient spaceman, and Gassoon’s own favorite: a regal jacket brittle with age, embroidered lavishly in thread of green and tarnished gold. Gassoon discoursed upon each item in a reedy droning voice until Zamp finally grew impatient. Grinning to himself he went to Gassoon’s private office, entered and closed the door.

Within half a minute he heard hurried footsteps and Gassoon appeared. “What are you doing in here? This is my private office where I do not welcome intruders.”

“My apologies, Master Gassoon, but I wish to consult you on a matter of some urgency.”

“Well then, what do you wish to discuss?”

“It appears that I am not forceful enough with our shore agents. Yesterday I ordered aboard four bullocks to supplement our present eight beasts, together with ten tons of fodder. Nothing has yet been delivered and I would like you to take a hand in the matter.”

“I canceled the order,” snapped Gassoon, “which explains the whole situation.”

“I did not order these bullocks out of idle caprice or in a spirit of self-indulgence,” said Zamp. “The monsoon is starting to fail, and the journey is long; we should not put our faith in variable winds.”

Gassoon made an incisive gesture with his big white hand. “The expense is beyond our prudent capacity; the issue is as simple as that. Even more to the point: I have developed very serious doubts about the whole wild scheme. Suppose we arrive at Mornune and fail in the competition? We have wasted a large sum of money for nothing.”

“We will not fail.”

Gassoon gave his head a mulish shake. “The project is too risky, especially in view of the failing winds.”

“If we leave now there is no lack of time, even allowing for flawed winds.”