The Tattooed Tribes (27 page)

Jon gave a
snort of mirth. “I take it she’s not being co-operative.”

“
She is, justifiably, unsure of us,”
Wainwright said. “But Dr Riddett assures me she will tell us
everything we need to know eventually.”

Jon glanced at
the circle of faces around him and saw the expressions on several
faces; they might have been expelled by their people, but customs
bred in the bone are hard to ignore.

“
Tell me, Congressman, do you think
kidnapping a child is morally justified?”

“
What do you mean?”

“
Do you and the good doctor believe it was
right to kidnap the child?”

Wainwright
became flustered again and began a speech full of false starts, but
Dr Riddett interrupted him.

“
It was necessary for the child’s
protection to remove her,” she said.

“
And the rest of it?”

“
What rest?” she asked in some
bewilderment.

“
You do know how the child was
removed,
don’t you?”

It was her
turn to be flustered. “It was arranged by a concerned party,” she
told him. “They hired Eldrien and his men to carry out the
rescue.”

“
Did they indeed?” Jon replied. “I wonder
who this interested party could be.”

Over in the
bushes Lucien and Stacey’s eyes met.

“
Eldrien
liedwer
,” Jon said, before Dr Riddett could expand on her theme.
“The taking of a bride on her way to a hand fasting is not a good
custom even for men with no tribe.”

Wainwright
opened his mouth at this, but Eldrien held up his hand.

“
It is perhaps as you say, Harabin
dheillwer,”
he replied “But unfortunately
sometimes necessity must come before good custom.”

Dr Riddett
gave Jon a gloating smirk of triumph at this.

“
Was it also an
unfortunate necessity
to torture her father to death
and to rape her mother?” Jon asked.

“
It wasn’t,” Eldrien replied. “Their deaths
were a necessity, but the manner was not.”

The smirk on
Dr Riddett’s face faded. “I don’t believe you,” she stated.

There was an
angry stirring amongst the men. They may have lost their home and
their status by failing to observe custom, but this did not stop
their belief in some of its adherence- lying and accusing a man of
doing it was one such.

Eldrien gave
her look of total contempt and sent another jet of saliva to sizzle
into the embers of the fire.

“
I will not be called a liar by a
bare-wristed woman of no worth,” he said in a low dangerous
voice.

“
Now see here ...”Dr Riddett began, but
Congressman Wainwright was a politician of long standing and
experience; once his initial shock had subsided, he rose
majestically to the situation.

“
Thank you, Dr Riddett, for your useful
impute,” he said smoothly. “But I believe as senior representative
of The Tribal First Nation and Colonial Resources Department, it is
my responsibility to get to the bottom of this unexpected
development.”

He turned a
professional smile upon Eldrien.

“
I believe there has been some
misunderstanding,” he began. “Possibly arising from the inherent
difficulties that always occur when two different cultures begin to
co-operate. I’m sure there has been just such a misunderstanding
here and Eldrien will confirm that no harm came to anyone during
the rescue.”

The silence
that greeted this piece of spin went on for long enough to make the
congressman fidget.

“
Eldrien?”

Eldrien
shrugged. “I gave instructions for the child to be taken alive. If
the parents resisted, they were to be killed. They resisted; they
died.”

Wainwright
stared at him in open-mouthed horror.

“
Is this true?” he asked, turning to
Jon.

“
Of course it isn’t!” Dr Riddett cried, but
there was a hint of doubt in her voice.

Jon held up
his hand to silence her. “Was it necessary for them to die as they
did?” he asked Eldrien. “The father tortured and the mother
raped?”

Eldrien
whittled some more of the stick. “I dealt with those responsible,”
Eldrien said. “The dust had taken away their wits as well as their
honour. I wrecked their canoe and left them alone with one knife
between them and a bag of dust.”

“
I don’t understand?” Wainwright
said.

Eldrien smiled
“One bag of dust between five of them. It would not have been long
before there was only one of them alive and the dust and the crows
would have seen to him.”

Recovering from his shock Wainwright
became pompous again. “I believe I have expressed to you my feeling
on the use of drugs amongst your people. I was assured you did not
have access to them; therefore I
demand
to know who gave you this dust. I will not permit any of
you to use it.”

“
You will not permit it?” Eldrien
repeated.

“
No,” Wainwright stated. “It’s the only
thing I am in total agreement with The Guild about. Whatever
happens, all recreational drugs will be forbidden to the
tribes.”

The
expressions of the men around the fire went blank.

“
Careful, Congressman,” Jon said and there
must have been something in his tone or something in the atmosphere
to alert Wainwright, because he fell silent.

“
Why did you allow these things,
Eldrien
liedwer
?” Jon
asked, conversationally “Give me your thoughts on
this.”

“
Why should it concern you, Harabin
dheillwer
?”

“
Because the child must be returned to The
Elders of her people.”

At this Dr
Riddett spoke up. “The girl is going nowhere!”

Jon ignored her and kept his eyes on
Eldrien. “Isn’t that what custom says,
liedwer
?”

Before the
tribesman could answer, Dr Riddett rushed forward and snatched the
talking stick from his hand.

“
Enough of this!” she said, throwing it
onto the fire.

There was a
deep growl of annoyance from the assembled warriors, but she
ignored it.

“
The child was taken to save her. She’ll
provide me with the evidence I need to rescue every other little
girl on this planet from the abominations practised here. You
people are
disgusting;
your
way of life is
disgusting
. If
you can’t or won’t conform to civilisation, you will be made to do
it. By force, if necessary!”

There was a
horrified gasp from Stacey, a hiss of anger from Vlic and Lucien
brought his rifle up to his shoulder in preparation for what he was
sure would follow.

“
I believe Dr Riddett would like to
apologise for that outburst,” Wainwright said desperately as
Eldrien rose to his feet. “My government is fully committed to the
protection of Tribal Rights and I can assure you …”

“
Only because they don’t understand,” Dr
Riddett said, obviously either unaware of the danger or indifferent
to it. “Once the child has been made to tell the truth
…”

“
Having much success?” Jon asked
cynically.

Dr Riddett
flushed. “All she needs is the proper counselling.”

Seeing the
expression on his face, she played her trump card.

“
And what is more, these men …
tribal men
… all agree with me and they
will be witnesses as well.”

She looked at
Jon in triumph.

“
What?” Jon said in total
astonishment.

“
Why else do you think they have helped
us,” she returned. “Tell him, Eric.”

Jon turned to
Wainwright, who managed to look both pompous and apologetic.

“
Well,” he said, “we were led to believe
these men were no longer part of their tribes because they had lost
faith in the cultural values expressed …”

Jon turned to
Eldrien. “Is this right? Have you moved so far away from the ways
of the People you no longer respect true words?”

“
Eldrien has shown himself to be in
complete agreement with me,” Dr Riddett announced.

“
I have never spoken those words,” Eldrien
replied.

She gaped in
astonishment. “But you did everything we asked you to do,” she
said, “Agreed with everything we said.”

Eldrien
shrugged. “Let us say … I chose not to disagree.”

“
Then why did you help?” she asked in
bewilderment.

“
Because of
this
!” a voice from
behind them announced.

Chapter
18

Lucien, Vlic
and Stacey nearly gave themselves away. Sheer luck kept Lucien’s
trigger finger from squeezing. A man had walked out of the woods
within yards of them, but they had not seen or heard him until he
spoke.

The tribesmen
around the fire gave out a huge yell and began to pound the ground
with their axes and clubs.

Tim Frain
strode over to the fire and threw a couple of bags onto the
ground.

“
Dust!” he shouted. “Dust enough for all of
you!”

“
That is why, Harabin
dheillwer
!” Eldrien said and, at a signal, Jon was
jumped by a couple of the men who stripped him of his weapons and
bound him hand and foot.

Vlic grabbed
Lucien’s arm, but he did not need to worry, his friend was
unmoving, frozen with horror.

“
Mr Frain,” Wainwright said in amazement,
“what’s this all about? Why have you given the men that
stuff?”

Frain levelled
a rifle at him. “You really are a bloody fool. It’s their pay of
course.”

“
Pay?”

“
Yes, pay. What I give them for getting you
here and keeping you alive.”

“
I don’t understand,” Dr Riddett said in
confusion.

Frain walked
over to Jon and kicked him savagely.

“
You’ve worked it out, haven’t you,
Master
Traveller
?”

“
Most of it,” Jon replied, gasping
slightly.

“
What are you talking about?” Wainwright
demanded.

“
Good old Tim here wants a hell of a lot
more trouble between the tribes and the Settlement than you do,”
Jon said, trying to get into a kneeling position, but Frain kicked
him again.

“
That’s not true.” Dr Riddett protested.
“Mr Frain is as appalled by the customs here as I am.”

Despite his
pain Jon laughed. “Timmy boy doesn’t give a flying fuck about
custom, do you?”

“
Not even that much, “Frain agreed, giving
Jon yet another kick.

“
Tell them what you do want,” Jon
gasped.

Frain pulled
him into a sitting position by his hair.

“
Pearls, gold, furs and timber. Wealth!” he
snarled. “What you and those pious bastards on the Council denied
me.”

“
You always were a little shit,” Jon
remarked, and grunted with pain as the foot landed in his ribs
again.

“
Hey!” Wainwright protested, moving forward
to stop the assault.

“
Back off!” Frain ordered, levelling his
rifle. “Killing you is part of the plan and I don’t care if I do it
now or later.”

“
What! You can’t …”

The retort of
the rifle made everyone jump. Stacey managed to stop a cry of
protest in her throat, but Evandne Riddett screamed and rushed to
where Wainwright had fallen.

“
Someone help me,” she pleaded, trying to
stop the blood flowing from a wound in the man’s side.

“
He’s only grazed,” Frain said in disgust,
but he signalled to one of the men to help her.

Stacey watched
her father’s shirt ripped open and a brief examination of the wound
made. A wad of something was thrust against it and strip of rawhide
tied around to keep it in place.

“
Why?” Dr Riddett asked in bewilderment, as
much to herself as Frain.

“
Work it out, woman,” Frain jeered. “First
a bride is kidnapped and her parents are murdered. There’s enough
evidence to show it wasn’t a tribal killing, or at least enough for
The Tribes, but not enough for a colonial court, who will come up
with a thousand logical reasons why no blame can be attached to any
civilised colonist. Next the kid turns up dead. Bit of a shame
this, because it’s going to have to be obvious she didn’t die
quickly and a lot of pretty nasty stuff happened to her before she
did. That’ll send the Tribes into frenzy. No tribesman would do
such a thing to a maiden, so there can be only one explanation-
someone from The Settlement did it.”

He laughed at
this.

“
They’re as blinded by their own feelings
of superiority and bigotry as the newcomers. My boys here would do
anything for a bag of dust, wouldn’t you?”

Eldrien, who
was in the process of inhaling a quantity of the dark brown powder,
shot Frain a look of loathing and disgust, but he ducked his head
in shame-faced agreement.

Frain laughed
again.

“
Then you and good old Eric will turn up
dead as well, stuffed full of tribal arrows. Everyone knows neither
of you are supporters of tribal custom and it won’t be long before
the killing of an eminent academic and a distinguished congressmen
by savages will be hot political stuff. There will be calls for
action.”