“Not necessarily,” said Cugel. “Why not tomorrow?”
“Soon enough, I should think.”
“Exactly so. We have our own business to discuss. But first —” Cugel glanced out the stern window “— as I half expected, that crafty old woman has again put light to the stern lantern. I cannot imagine what she has in her mind. What good is a great flare of light astern? She is not steering backward.”
“She probably wishes to warn off that other ship which was following so close on our heels.”
“The chances of collision are small. I want to avoid attention, not attract it.”
“All is well, Cugel. You must not fret.” Tabazinth approached and placed her hands on his shoulders. “Do you like the way I dress my hair? I have put on a special scent; it is called ‘Tanjence’, who was a beautiful woman of fable.”
“Your hair is charming to the point of distraction; the scent is sublime; but I must go up and set things right with your mother.”
With pouts and smiles Tabazinth tried to restrain him. “Ah, Cugel, how can I put faith in your flattery if at the first pretext you run off helter-skelter? Stay with me now; show me the full measure of your interest! Leave the poor old woman to her steering.”
Cugel put her aside. “Control your amiability, my bountiful little poppet! I will be gone no more than an instant, and then you shall see!”
Cugel ran from the cabin, climbed to the quarter-deck. As he had feared, the lantern burned with a blatant glare. Without pausing to chide Madame Soldinck, Cugel not only extinguished the light, but removed glow-box, spurts and lumenex, and threw them into the sea.
Cugel addressed Madame Soldinck: “You have seen the last of my kindly forbearance. If lights again show from this ship, you will not enjoy the aftermath.”
Madame Soldinck haughtily held her tongue, and after a final inspection of the escalabra, Cugel returned to his cabin. After more wine and several hours of frolicking with Tabazinth, he fell soundly asleep and did not return to the quarter-deck that night.
In the morning, as Cugel sat blinking in the sunlight, he again felt that strange sense of displacement which had troubled him on other occasions. He climbed to the quarter-deck, where Salasser stood at the wheel. Cugel went to look at the escalabra; the claw pointed directly to the south.
Cugel returned to the midship deck and inspected the worms; they eased and lolled through the water on half-bait, apparently healthy save for what seemed to be fatigue and a touch of timp on the port outboard beast.
Today there would be wet work along the sponsons, from which only the ‘night-steward’ might hope to be excused.
A day passed, and another: for Cugel a halcyon time of ease, zestful refreshment in the sea air, splendid cuisine, and the unstinting attention of his ‘night-stewards’. A single source of disturbance were those strange displacements in time and space which he now thought to be no more than episodes of déjà vu.
On the morning that Tabazinth served him breakfast on the quarter-deck, his meal was interrupted by the sighting of a small fishing vessel. Beyond, to the south-west, Cugel made out the dim outline of an island, which he studied in perplexity. Déjà vu, once again?
Cugel took the wheel and steered so as to pass close by the fishing-boat, which was worked by a man and two boys. As he passed abeam, Cugel went to the rail and hailed the fisherman: “Halloo! What island lies yonder?”
The fisherman looked at Cugel as if he lacked intelligence. “It is Lausicaa, as you should well know. If I were in your shoes, I would give this region a wide berth.”
Cugel gaped toward the island. Lausicaa? How could it be, unless magic were at work?
Cugel went in confusion to the escalabra; all seemed in order. Amazing! He had departed toward the south; now he returned from the north, and must change course or run aground upon the place from which he had started!
Cugel swung the ship to the east and Lausicaa faded over the horizon. He then changed course again, and steered once more to the south.
Madame Soldinck, standing by, curled her lip in disgust. “South again? Have I not warned of dangers to the south?”
“Steer south! Not an iota east, not the fraction of an iota west! South is our desired direction! Put north astern and steer south!”
“Insanity!” muttered Madame Soldinck.
“Insanity, not at all! I am as sane as yourself! Admittedly this voyage has given me several queasy moments. I am unable to explain our approach to Lausicaa from the north. It is as if we had completed a circumnavigation!”
“Iucounu the Magician has put a spell on the ship to safeguard his shipment. This is the most reasonable hypothesis and yet another reason to make for Port Perdusz.”
“Out of the question,” said Cugel. “I am now going below to think. Report all extraordinary circumstances.”
“The wind is coming up,” said Madame Soldinck. “We may even have a storm.”
Cugel went to the rail, and indeed cat’s-paws from the northwest roughened the glossy black surface of the sea. “Wind will rest the worms,” said Cugel. “I cannot imagine why they are so spiritless! Drofo would insist that they have been over-worked, but I know better.”
Descending to the midship deck, Cugel dropped the blue silk mainsail from its brails and sheeted home the clews. The sail bellied to the breeze and water tinkled under the hull.
Cugel arranged a comfortable chair where he could prop his feet on the rail and, with a bottle of Rozpagnola Amber at his elbow, settled himself to watch Meadhre and Tabazinth as they dealt with an incipient case of gangue on the port inboard worm.
The afternoon passed and Cugel drowsed to the gentle motion of the ship. He awoke to find that the cat’s-paws had become a soft breeze, so that there was a surging motion to the ship, a modest bow wave and a gurgle of wake at the stern.
Salasser, the ‘night-steward’, served tea in a silver pot and a selection of small pastries, which Cugel consumed in an unusually abstracted mood.
Rising from his chair, Cugel climbed to the quarter-deck. He found Madame Soldinck in a testy mood. “The wind is not good,” she told him. “Better that you pull in the sail.”
Cugel rejected her advice. “The wind blows us nicely along our course and the worms are able to rest.”
“The worms need no rest,” snapped Madame Soldinck. “With the sails pulling the ship, I cannot steer where I want to steer.”
Cugel indicated the escalabra. “Steer south! That is the way you want to steer! The claw shows the way!”
Madame Soldinck had no more to say, and Cugel left the quarter-deck.
