Emperor of Gondwanaland Read Online Free PDF Page A

sound emerged.
    My heart went out to the inoffensive man. I almost stopped to demand that Merino extricate him from the tangle of Fanzoii. Yet how could I justly interfere? The Cockerel was Merino’s command, no matter how shabbily he had performed so far. How would I react if he began to give orders aboard my ship? No, I had no say here.
    Perhaps if I had known it was the last time I would see the Sanctus alive, I might have acted differently.
    We reached Belgrano.
    “Anything to report, Master Belgrano?” I queried.
    “Nary a thing, captain,” he replied, looking relieved at my long-delayed reappearance. His face bore an expression that said that if I had asked for his opinion of the Cockerel and her captain, he would be glad to disburden himself of a few choice words.
    “Very good.” I turned to Merino. “Perhaps I can yet persuade you to abandon this mad scheme of continuing to the Nameless Land. You yourself mentioned that you cannot regard the Fanzoii as cargo any longer. Is it that they have expressed a wish to go there?”
    Intense emotions flickered across Merino’s saturnine face. “No, they’re not cargo, and yet—we must go on sailing. It seems it will be forever. If only—but it cannot be. You must help as best you can.”
    His jumbled speech seemed the sign of an increasing tumult in his weary brain. Surely he would die ignobly not long after we parted, by his own hand or by Fate’s.
    “I have tried all I can to make you see sense. Failing that, I cannot deny you any materials I can legitimately spare without endangering my own ship. We will warp our two vessels together, and thus make loading easier. My first gift will be an anchor for your wayward craft.”
    I gripped Belgrano’s shoulder. “Let’s be off.”
    My mate descended first. I had one leg over the rail when Merino shouted.
    “Wait! I must go with you. If only to be off this ship for a minute.”
    I regarded him searchingly from my awkward position, striving to detect any ulterior motive. He continued to beseech me silently. I deemed him truthful at last in wishing only a change of scenery, however small.
    “Follow me, then,” I said.
    Once in the cutter, I looked up.
    Merino descended the rope with weak limbs.
    Tess came after him
    I almost urged Belgrano to pull the cutter away, rather than have the Fanzoy set foot in it. Yet that would have left Merino dangling literally at the end of his rope. I doubted he could make it back up in his ineffectual fashion. Would the Fanzoii on the deck help him? Maybe, and maybe not. I could not leave him in such a strait.
    I let Merino and Tess enter the cutter, despite my irrational loathing of the native.
    “Master Belgrano.” I ordered, “take us back to the Melville .”
    We motored off smoothly.
    I felt my heart lightening as we neared my ship and left Merino’s behind. The glum and high-strung captain of the Cockerel failed to match my spirits however. He seemed abstracted and lost, buried in private speculations.
    We reached the Melville ’s port side, whence we had departed hours ago—hours that loomed as years. I grabbed the wet netting lying athwart the hull. I was in good spirits again, my usual self.
    “Come aboard, Captain Merino,” I declaimed, “and let me return your hospitality. Bring Tess too.” (As if they could ever have been separated this side of death!) “I’ll have my mate run a line back to your ship and we’ll begin the warping. You can step back aboard her when we’re done.”
    Merino looked longingly at my vessel, returning the curious gaze of my men gathered at the rail. “I—I can’t,” he said. “I can’t come aboard. Thank you, though. Thank you.”
    This I liked little. Yet who could account for the whims of an unstable mind?
    “In that case, I’ll ascend and toss down the line. Mate Belgrano will stay with you.”
    I wasn’t about to lose my cutter at this stage, if Merino took it in his head to abscond.
    Up the netting I scrambled, and