low, lean ships, straight-keeled and shallow-drafted, single-mailed, began to slide past us. I could see the oars lifting and dipping in unison, as they moved by.
'You do not seem concerned,' I said to Shoka, Ulafi's second officer, who stood near me.
'We are of Schendi,' he said.
I stood with Shoka near the rail. 'Suddenly,' I said, 'I have this strange feeling, as though I were swimming and then, as though from nowhere, I found myself swimming with sharks, who silently passed me, not regarding me.'
'It could be frightening,' admitted Shoka.
'Do they never prey on ships of Schendi?' I asked.
'I do not think so,' said Shoka. 'If they do, I suppose the ship and its crew are destroyed at sea. One never hears of it.'
'I do not find that particularly comforting,' I said.
'We are in the waters of Schendi,' said Shoka. 'If they were to attack Schendi ships, it does not seem likely they would do so in these waters.'
'That is slightly more comforting,' I granted him.
The low, sleek ships continued to pass us. I could see the black faces of crew members here and there. I could not see the nearest oarsmen, for these were concealed by the structure of the rowing frame. Occasionally I glimpsed the far oarsmen, as the ship rolled in the swells. The oarsmen would be free men. One does not put slaves at the oars of warships. The wall on the rowing frame, of course, tends to protect the oarsmen against high seas and the fire of missile weapons.
I watched the ships. They were very beautiful.
Shoka indicated that the two girls should rue and come to stand by the rail, to look out and see the fleet.
'Is that wise?' I asked. 'Perhaps they should be put on their bellies, under the tarpaulins, that they not attract attention.' Why should one advertise that one carried two lovely slaves?
'It does not matter,' said Shoka. 'Let the slaves see.'
'But they will be seen as well,' I pointed out.
'It not matter,' said Shoka. 'In two months time those ships will have hundreds of such women chained in their holds.'
The two girls then stood by the rail, lovely, naked, neck-chained together, watching the passing ships, their bare feet on the smooth boards of the deck of the Palms of Schendi.
'I suppose you are right,' I said.
'Yes,' said he.
The ships, then, had slid past us. I saw Ulafi, on his stern castle, raise his hand to a black captain, some seventy yards away, on the stern castle of his own vessel. The captain had returned this salute.
'You did not even take defensive precautions,' I said to Shoka.
'What good would it have done?' he asked.
I shrugged. To be sure, one merchant ship, like the Palms of Schendi, could have made little effective resistance to the ships which had just passed us, nor could she, though swift for a round ship, have outrun them.
'What if they had taken such action as an indication that we were hostile?' asked Shoka.
'That is true, too,' I said.
'Our defense,' said Shoka, 'is that we are of Schendi.'
'I see,' I said.
'They need our port facilities,' said Shoka. 'Even the larl grows sometimes weary, and the tarn, upon occasion, must find a place in which to fold its wings.'
I turned about, watching the ships vanish in the distance.
'Return to your work,' said Shoka to the girls.
'Yes, Master,' they said and, with a rustle of chain, fell again to their knees and, seizing up the deck stones, once more, Shoka near them, vigorously addressed themselves to their labors.
I turned again to watch the ships. They were now but specks on the horizon. They plied their way northward. In the northern autumn they would return, to be refitted and supplied again in Schendi, and would then, a few weeks later, in the southern spring, ply their way southward. Schendi, located in the vicinity of the Gorean equator, somewhat south of it, provides the ships with a convenient base, from which they may conduct their affairs seasonally in both hemispheres. I was pleased that I had seen the ships. I could not have conceived of a more pleasant way in which to have made their acquaintance. I had seen the passing of the fleet of the black slavers of Schendi.
The girls had been cleaned and combed. Shoka had soused perfume on them.
'Extend your wrists, crossed, for binding,' said he to the blond-haired barbarian.
She, kneeling, complied. 'Yes, Master,' she said. The line which Shoka now tied around her crossed wrists was already strung through a large, metal, gold-painted ring, one of two, which were mounted in the huge wooden ears of the kailiauk head which, high above the water, surmounted the prow.
We had lain to after more closely approaching the port of Schendi in the evening of the preceding day, the day in which we had seen the fleet of the black slavers of Schendi. We could see the shore now, with its sands and, behind the sand, the dense, green vegetation, junglelike, broken by occasional clearings for fields and villages. Schendi itself lay farther to the south, about the outjutting of a small peninsula, Point Schendi. The waters here were richly brown, primarily from the outflowing of the Nyoka. emptying from Lake Ushindi. some two hundred pasangs upriver.
'Extend your wrists, crossed, for binding,' said Shoka to Sasi.
'Yes, Master,' she said. Her wrists then were tied to another line, it strung through the gold-painted ring fixed in the right ear of the kailiauk head at the prow. I had volunteered her, at the request of Ulafi, who had his vanities. He was an important merchant and captain in Schendi. Indeed, he had not entered port yesterday evening. The Palms of Schendi would make her entrance in the morning, when the wharves were busy, the shops open and the traffic bustling.
I looked about The Palms of Schendi sparkled. The deck was smoothed and white, ropes were neatly coiled, gear was stashed and secured, hatches were battened, and the brass and fittings were polished. Yesterday afternoon two seamen had reenameled the kailiauk head at the prow with brown, and the eyes with white and black. The golden metal rings, too, had been repainted. The Palms of Schendi would enter Schendi, her home port, in style. At sea, of course, a sensible compromise must be struck between a ship which is constantly ready, so to speak, for inspection, and one which is loose. The ship must be neat but livable; there must be order but not rigidity; the ship must be one on which men are comfortable but it must also be one on which, because of its arrangements and discipline, the efficient performance of duty is encouraged. Ulafi, it seemed to me, struck this sort of balance well with his men and ship. I thought him a good captain, somewhat begrudgingly because he was of the merchants. It was hard to fault him. He ran a clean, tight ship, but with common sense.
The light anchors were raised.
Canvas was dropped from the long, sloping yards.
Oarsmen, at the command of the first officer, a tall fellow named Gudi, he standing now on the helm deck, slid their great levers through the thole ports. Soon, to his calls, the oars drew against the brownish waters about the hull.
The girls knelt on the deck before the stem castle, their wrists bound before them, lines leading to the rings.
The Palms of Schendi began to negotiate its wide turn about Point Schendi.
'Are you proud?' I asked Sasi.
'Yes, Master,' she said. 'I am very proud.'
I stood at the port rail, by the bow. I watched the green of the shore, moving slowly by. Last night we had had lanterns at stem and stern.
I looked at the blond-haired slave girl. She was very lovely, kneeling naked, in her collar, her wrists tied before her body, the line running to the golden ring. Seeing my eyes upon her, she put her head down, ashamed.
