Emperor of Gondwanaland Read Free

it your ship is captainless.”
    His reedy voice sung out as if reciting liturgy. “Oh no, good sir, such is not our situation. We have a most fine and excellent captain, only occupied with pressing matters now is he. Our situation is more dire than mere loss of captain. You see—”
    The head of the Sanctus had been constantly swiveling on his crane-like neck as he talked, while his pop-eyes stared here and there for I knew not what. His speech was cut short by the arrival of what he had obviously been fearing.
    A Fanzoy walked into view.
    The Fanzoii were the native race of Paean. They lived only on Carambriole. I had never seen one before.
    Tall and willowy, the Fanzoy was clothed in a billowing off-white robe, sleeveless, with a square-cut yoke of intricate patterns. The Fanzoy’s flesh could be observed on its arms and neck and bare feet, as well as its face. It was a subdued orange, like the color of a peach or burra-fruit, and had a velvety nap, not unappealing. The Fanzoy’s lips were somewhat prehensile, its eyes a stunning violet.
    It regarded us in what I took to be an unmenacing manner, yet the Sanctus was completely unnerved.
    “I, I—” he faltered. Then, abandoning all pretense of calm, he turned and fled.
    Belgrano and I watched him scurry off in amazement. With no human left to speak to, we approached the Fanzoy.
    “Where is the captain?” I asked.
    It eyed me stoically, curled its unnatural lip almost into a roll, and departed wordlessly. Had it even understood?
    I decided to try the aft deckhouse, where traditionally, at least on Union ships, the captain’s quarters would be.
    At this point more Fanzoii, two or three dozen, appeared, seemingly springing up from the very planks. All were similarly hipless and possessed of deep amethyst eyes. I could not distinguish between sexes or individuals. Their velvet-flocked faces bore no obvious expression of ill will.
    Yet they carried at their sides wooden dowels like clubs.
    Belgrano and I hastened to the deckhouse, the Fanzoii following several paces behind, en masse. I confess my heart was racing a bit faster than was its wont. At the rear superstructure, the door hung closed on one hinge. I knocked, and also called out.
    “Hallo, captain of the Cockerel ! This is Captain Sanspeur of the Melville . Are you there?”
    The Fanzoii ringed us at a small distance. I had no hint as to what their next move might be.
    I heard the door opening. I swung about.
    A man emerged, closely trailed by a Fanzoy.
    “Back, you rabble,” he called forcefully, gesturing languidly with one slim hand, which did much to mute the sternness of his command. “These are friends, not pirates. Can’t you fools see anything? Get back to your duties.”
    At his words, the Fanzoii dispersed. However, ten or twelve took up sitting positions in a rubber-limbed fashion not far away, their truncheons resting across their laps.
    I had time now to study the captain and his companion.
    The man was of medium height, slender and wiry, in his mid- thirties. His face was wan and pinched, its olive skin drawn, like that of a hedonist whose pleasures have betrayed him, or a man used to comfort whom life had treated unwontedly harshly of a sudden. His black hair was cut short. His long mustachios were waxed and pointed. I smelled the pomade’s scent. His dress was of faded elegance. His manner was refined, yet indolent.
    The Fanzoy had all the qualities of its kind: the eyes, the skin, the long graceful limbs. Yet I thought to detect a play of keen intelligence on its somewhat angular features, a kind of alert inquisitiveness not evident in the others, which set it apart.
    The man who had saved us extended a hand that bore several begemmed rings. “Captain Sanspeur,” he said in a weary and lax voice totally unlike that which he had assumed to dismiss the Fanzoii, and yet which I took for some reason to be his normal tone, “I am Captain Anselmo Merino of the Golden Cockerel , out of Saint