Winning such treasure that trolls, it is said,
Closed hills out of fear he’d frisk them of silver.
Racing now westward, he rode into Bexar,
Gathered the garrison, gave them his orders:
“Houston the Raven is raising a host;
Times what he asks while he tempers an army.
Never give up this gate to our land.
Hold this door fast, though death comes against us.”
We cheered Bowie’s decision and drank to him, too. Golias allowed for such activity, refreshing himself also, then he went on.
The flood of the foemen flowed up to Bexar,
Beat on the dam braced there to contain it.
But Wyrd has no fosterlings, favors no clients;
Bowie, the war-wise winner of battles,
Laid out by fever, lost his first combat,
Melting with death. Yet the might of his spirit
Kept a tight grip on the trust he’d been given.
“Buy time, my bucks,” he told his companions.
“Be proud of the price; our prince is the gainer.”
Bold thanes were with him, thirsty for honor,
Schooled well in battle and skilled in all weapons;
Avid for slaughter there, each against thirty,
They stood to the walls and struck for their chieftains,
Houston and Bowie, the bearcat of heroes.
Twelve days they ravaged the ranks of the foemen.
Tens, though, can’t harrow the hundreds forever;
That tide had to turn. Tiredly the thanes
Blocked two wild stormings and bled them to death.
The third had the drive of Thor’s mighty hammer,
Roared at the walls and rose to spill over,
Winning the fort. But the foemen must pay.
Heroes were waiting them, hardy at killing,
Shaken no whit, though sure they were lost.
Ten lives for one was the tariff for entry;
And no man got credit. Crushed and split skulls,
Blasted off limbs and lathers of blood
Were the money they sought and minted themselves —
Worth every ounce of the weregild they asked.
They liked that, and Golias had known they would. He waved in answer to their shouts, his gesture on the down sweep finding its way to his cup.
Of every eleven, though, one was a hero
Turned to a corpse there. Cornered and hopeless,
They strove while they yet stood, stabbing and throttling,
Meeting the bears death, dying while fighting.
Chieftains of prowess, not chary of slaying,
Led and fell with them. Alone by the wall,
Travis, the red-maned, the truest of warriors,
Pierced through the pate and pouring out blood,
Kept death marking time, defied it until
His sword again sank, sucking blood from a foeman.
Content, then, he ended. So also died Crockett,
Who shaved with a star and stamped to make earthquakes,
Kimball, the leader of loyal riders,
Bonham whose vow was valor’s own hall mark.
Crazed by their losses, the conquerors offered
No truce to cadavers; the corpses were stabbed
In hopes that life’s spark would be spared to afford them
Seconds on killing. Then some, taking count,
Bawled out that Bowie was balking them still;
Like weasels in warrens they wound through the fort,
Hunting the hero they hated the most.
Least of the lucky, at last some found him,
Fettered to bed by the fever and dying,
Burnt up and shrunken, a shred of himself.
Gladly they rushed him, but glee became panic.
Up from the gripe of the grave, gripping weapons,
Gizzardsbane rose to wreak his last slaughter,
Killing, though killed. Conquered, he won.
In brief is the death lay of Bowie, the leader
Who laid down his life for his lord and ring giver,
Holding the doorway for Houston the Raven,
Pearl among princes, who paid in the sequel:
Never was vassal avenged with more slayings!
It meant as much to me as to everyone else there that Bowie had accomplished his purpose and gone down fighting. Like everybody else, too, I was highly pleased with the vengeance taken for him. We cheered Gizzardsbane, the Raven, and Golias, and drank to them all with indiscriminate enthusiasm.
For me a special source of satisfaction was pride in my friend’s successful performance. I resisted bragging that I knew him, but I was feeling too expansive to keep all of my emotion to myself. I jogged the elbow of my neighbor, whose name I had now learned.
“He sure can put it across, can’t he, Hoc?”
“Who, Widsith?” It took Hoc a moment to refocus his eyes as he turned to look at me. “Listen; I’ll lie to you about Widsith, but only a little. I don’t know so much about words, except that I always like them out of his mouth, but he’s got a voice like a call to dinner. He can make a dog leave a bone and fleas leave a dog to hear him. Got the know-how from a mermaid he laid in the Skaggerack. That part’s just hearsay, so don’t claim you got it from me; but he sure picked up pointers somewhere, that he can make the rest of the scops sound like crows. Let’s drink to him.”
Golias went back to his place, but there was no sense in trying to locate him in that jam of people. Therefore, and feeling better than ever now that I knew he was around, I carried on where I was. It was a lively evening, and, unlike Robin, the king didn’t see fit to put the cork back.
The competition got too stiff for me. These fellows were in earnest, and they had been practicing. Some of the younger ones had passed out, but most of them were still going strong, when I decided that if I was going to be any good the next day I had better take a walk. As I had taken care to keep eating while I drank, I wasn’t in bad shape. I was proud of how straight I could walk, though my shadow wasn’t doing so well. Eventually the exercise cured even this defect, and after a couple of hours spent strolling along the harbor I returned, hungry and wanting a night cap.
Heorot was not as I had left it. It resembled rather a battle field where a whole army had died game. Men lay on the tables and under the tables; on the benches with their heads on the tables, and on the floor with their feet on the benches. And over their motionless forms, loud as an onrushing subway train, sighed the wind of their snoring.
The torches which furnished the only light had burned so low that I at first thought that was all there was to it. Then one flared up enough to show me what had been the king’s table. Mead had been victorious there also, but a pitiful garrison of two still held out. They were recognizable, when I had picked my way nearer, as Beowulf and Golias.
The latter saw me and jumped to his feet. “Hey! Shandon,” he called, hurrying to the meeting. “Good man! I was getting worried about you.”
The friendliness in his voice doubled the pleasure I felt. Not content with shaking hands, I slapped him on the shoulder.
“I didn’t expect to find you at all,” I said. “I was sure you’d lined some wolf’s belly back there with the rest of Brodir’s men.”
“And yet you came anyway.” He was looking me over keenly. “That’s great.”
He was, I felt, giving me more credit for constancy than I rated. “Well, I didn’t know where the hell else to go, and anyhow once or twice I’d have let you down if things had turned out different.”
“It was a matter of chance, understood.” He was still examining me. “Did you have yourself a time?”
Unprepared for the question, I thought back. Who would willingly forfeit any experience that is not shameful or crippling?
“Well,” I said, “I’m glad I took the hike, I guess. What sort of a trip did you have?”
“Oh, a fine one! First off I p
layed possum while they dragged me out to be food for the ravens. I looked bloody enough to be a corpse at that, but they didn’t stop to find out that most of the blood wasn’t mine. When I saw fit to revive, there was a line of retreat open to the west, so west I went and — But come on over and join us at the mead. As you can see,” he waved a hand to include the noisy sleepers, “you’ve missed the best of the party.”
I was explaining that this wasn’t my first appearance that evening, when we reached the table. There I paused to acknowledge the introduction to Beowulf. Golias found me a cup, I found myself some bread and a big slab of cheese, and we sat down to it.
“You don’t mind if we swap experiences, do you, Wulf?” Golias filled all three mugs to the surface tension point without spilling so much as a nodule of foam. “This is the fellow I came here to meet, and we have some catching up to do.”
“Go right ahead.” Beowulf had an easy way about him that I liked. “Everybody, including me, has been talking about what I’ve done for the last three days. I’ll be glad of a change of subject.”
“You’ll have it,” Golias promised. “Let’s see; where was I?”
That momentary lapse of memory was almost the only sign he had shown of the terrific bout of which he and Beowulf were the only honest finalists. Awed, I wagged my head at them both.
“You were heading west,” I reminded him.
“Oh, yes. I made westing — more than I wanted, because a bunch of Brian’s men spotted me and chased me clear out of the Boss of Arden. Well, when I’d shaken them and rested up, I cut south and east, got mixed up in the Calydonian Boar hunt, got lost by following the wrong dogs and ended up dining with Bricriu. He’s a bastard, but the rest of the company was good. Then I went to King Fisherman’s, on a Sunday that was; bivouacked a couple of nights with Arjun, Bhima and the rest; visited Pwyll — he wasn’t there, as a matter of fact, but Arawn’s a good fellow; and here’s to it.” We drank with him, and he went on. “So far I’d been able to keep a pretty straight course; but after leaving Pwyll’s I ran into Orlando, absolutely off his rocker and out for blood — anybody’s. Hell, I’ve known Orlando for years, but I didn’t stop for any ‘remember whens’ after I saw the way he was tearing up the forest and bashing rocks to pieces. I had to make another westward detour and didn’t try to make southing again until I came to the Terne Wathelyne.” He drank once more.
“Well, Graelent — did I tell you I met Graelent near there? — had a beautiful friend who had a beautiful friend who didn’t have any friend just then until I came along.” He blew a kiss with the fingers that weren’t gripping his cup. “That was charming, but I had to meet you; besides she was trying to pin me down to a long-term contract. So I did a night march, figuring to get clear of Broceliande, and cut across the Troyan prairie, which was a good enough idea only I damned near got myself killed with Igor. Well, Igor got captured, so I demobilized myself and made it to Watling Street.” He started filling cups again, but I held mine out of reach. “Due to that business with Orlando I didn’t make my point by a long shot. It was just short of Tilbury town where I hit the street, so I cut back east, dined the next night but one at Woodlands, where Johnny Quae Genus slipped me this outfit, and pulled in here yesterday. How’s Robin?”
I hadn’t mentioned Robin, but apparently the green uniform was known to him. Leaving out such things as I saw fit, I sketched my own experiences since Brian’s slaying. I chose not to let him see my eyes, but even so his own watchful ones caught something. Although I had flattered myself that I had been sufficiently casual whenever it was necessary to mention Rosalette, he had but one comment when I was through.
“A lovely girl, eh?”
I felt my face flushing, but I tried to carry it off. “Pretty enough,” I yawned. “Just a kid, of course.”
“A youngster, and no doubt a gentle one,” he conceded, “but just the same she had a bite of your heart.”
Beowulf was looking as if he hadn’t caught a word of what was being said. Anger started out behind my embarrassment, but it was catching up fast. Golias saw that and laughed.
“Don’t take it hard. Your heart will heal up, if it hasn’t already, and will be all the stronger for having had a work out. Here, clink ’em.”
“What’s the program?” I asked by way of changing the subject. “Got any ideas?”
He grew serious. “I know what I’m going to do, and I’d like for you to come with me. But I warn you it may mean long traveling on rough roads.”
“I’m used to that,” I shrugged. Mentioning Rosalette had brought on a relapse into melancholy; and I was beginning to feel generally let down. “What’s on your books?”
He poured all around, and this time I let him fill my mug. “I’ll have to ask you to excuse us again, Wulf,” Golias said. “But listen in; we may want your advice.”
“No apologies needed,” Beowulf assured him. “If an undertaking’s worth tackling, it’s worth talking about first.”
“Check.” Golias turned to me again. “The day before I ran into young Quae Genus I was fed and lodged through the hospitality of a stranger. His name is Lucius G. Jones; the middle name is spelled G-I-L, and just for the record rhymes with eel not ill. There was no reason for him to foot my bills except that I was broke, and he’s a fine fellow.
“Not being clam-mouthed like you,” he went on when I merely nodded, “he opened up over the third or fourth bottle we split and told me what was eating him. I always give the courtesy of my ear to the man who’s buying the drinks, but this time I was really interested. So I didn’t listen noncommittally, like you’re doing.”
“I’m just tired,” I told him. And that was an understatement. The long day and night of walking and drinking had finally caught up with me, straining all the fire from the mead and leaving me only the heaviness. Every cell in my body felt the dead hour of the morning. I wanted to go to bed, provided I could find one, but I wasn’t sure it would be worth the effort.
“We all ought to knock off soon,” he observed. “Well, this Jones told me what he’s up against, which is plenty. He can’t marry his girl, he has no place to live, he has no occupation, only a little money left, and no source of income.”
Instead of feeling sorry for Jones, I felt sorry for myself. It struck me that he wasn’t the only one who couldn’t marry the girl he wanted. And if I couldn’t do anything about that problem on my own account, it certainly seemed nonsensical to try to do it for someone I had never met.
“He wants the world with a pink ribbon around it, and he hasn’t found a job,” I commented. “Let him get the occupation and quit beefing.”
He raised his brows at my tone. “That’s one of his aims, but in some ways it will be the hardest to achieve.”
“But how can we help him?” I protested. “We’re both broke; and I don’t even know what I can find to do here myself.”
“I’m offering you something to do,” he insisted. “I don’t think you’ve seen all around this problem, Shandon. It’s big. In essence this fellow is looking for all there is of life. The great questions for a man are what to do about his time and his passion, and where to find friends and the money to live with them. When he’s found the right answers, he’s got all the four legs a man needs to walk on. Could anything be more interesting or important?”
“Not to him, I expect.”
“To us!” he snorted. “To hold the city, to battle the beast, and to gaze, after biting, on the half-worm of evil — these are more to do in many ways, and yet they only solve the great questions if a man dies doing them. This is a mighty undertaking, too, though you wouldn’t think so to hear some Delian damned fools talk.”
I had gone stale on drinking, but nevertheless I sipped. “What would we have to do?” I asked.
“Everything from living to dying. I warned you it might be rough; but he treated me like a brother, when he was almost broke himself. Are you with me?”
My body was almost asleep, but my mind had the
disillusioned clarity which sometimes comes as a sort of second wind of late drinking. What did it matter to me that this fellow had been Golias’ benefactor? Certainly the prospect of putting my neck on the line for such a reason didn’t invite me. Besides, it seemed to me that I had had enough excitement and more than enough of foreign parts.
Golias noticed my hesitation. “No hard feelings if you don’t want to,” he said, albeit with a slight change in his voice. “I never tried to get out of the Commonwealth myself — my problem has always been to get in and keep something of a whole skin in the process — but if you shop around, no doubt you can find a way to get back where you came from.”
As he said this, I had an overwhelming vision of lying in bed in my snappy little Chicago apartment, waiting for the radio to lull me to sleep. I would hate to say good-bye to Golias, of course; but if he wanted to go chasing somebody else’s business all over the country, that was his affair. But as I opened my mouth to tell him as much I noticed that Beowulf was looking at me, waiting to hear my decision.
Suddenly I could not say what I had intended. Remembering what he had done to help out strangers, I simply could not let him hear me say that I would back out on a friend who was asking my help. I wished then that I had never hesitated at all, and belatedly I manufactured a cough.
“Had a tickle in my throat and couldn’t talk for a minute,” I explained. “Sure. Count me in.”
Way Two: Highways, a City, the River, and Beyond It
11
The Undertaking
WHEN HE HAD drained the cup he was drinking, Golias looked at Beowulf. “Think it’s time to make our beds?”
The other finished his own drink, looked inside the cup thoughtfully, then placed it on the table upside down. “Yes,” he decided. “Will you take the heads or the feet?”
I had risen to accompany them wherever they were going, but I promptly saw that that wasn’t far. Among those at our table who had preceded us into slumber a half dozen were wholly or partially supported by the long bench on which we had been sitting. Methodically my two companions picked these up one by one and stretched them out on the floor.