‘Better than he’s had in his life. I don’t think much meat has come his way.’
A pause, and now Dann could not help himself. ‘Out with it, what is it?’
Griot sat silent, and then said in a low voice, ‘Don’t blame me for what I have to tell you. Bad enough to have to sit on the news for so long …’
‘Out with it.’
‘Mara’s dead. She died when the child was born.’ Griot averted his eyes from Dann’s face.
Dann said in a matter-of-fact way, ‘Of course. I knew it. That makes sense. Yes.’
Griot risked a swift glance.
‘I knew it all the time, I must have,’ said Dann. ‘Otherwise, why …’ and he fell silent.
‘The message came just after you left.’
Dann sat on, not moving. The dog came to him, put his head on his knee and whined.
Dann rose up from his chair mechanically, slowly, and stood, hands out, palms up. He stared down at them. ‘Of course,’ he said in the same reasonable voice. ‘Yes, that’s it.’ And then, to Griot, ‘You say Mara’s dead?’
‘Yes, she’s dead, but the child is alive. You’ve been gone a good bit, sir. The child …’
‘It killed Mara,’ said Dann.
He began moving about, not consistently or purposefully, but he took a step, stopped, and again there was that way of staring at his hands; he took another step or two, whirled about as if ready to attack someone, stood glaring.
Ruff was following him, looking up at his face. Griot watched them both. Dann took another jerky step or two, then stopped.
‘Mara,’ said Dann. ‘Mara’ in a loud emphatic voice, arguing with someone invisible, so it seemed, and then threatening: ‘Mara dead? No, no, no,’ and now he shouted, all defiance, and he kicked out wildly, just missing Ruff, who crept under the table.
Then in the same erratic jerky way he sat down at the table and stared at Griot.
‘You knew her?’ he said.
‘Yes, I was at the Farm.’
‘I suppose the other one, Kira – Kira had her baby and it’s alive?’
‘Yes.’
‘I suppose we could count on that,’ said Dann grimly, and Griot, knowing exactly why he said it and feeling with him, said, ‘Yes, I know.’
‘What am I going to do?’ Dann asked Griot, and Griot, all pain for Dann, muttered, ‘I don’t know. I don’t know, Dann, sir …’
Dann got up again and began on his jerky inconsequential progress.
He was talking nonsense, names of places and people, ejaculations of protest and anger, and Griot was not able to follow it.
At one point he asked about the old woman, and Griot said that she was dead.
‘She wanted me as a stud, and Mara as a brood animal.’
‘Yes, I know.’
This tale, like the others of Dann’s and Mara’s adventures, was known generally, but sometimes told fantastically. The custodians of the Centre had waited for the rightful prince and princess to arrive and start a new dynasty of the royal ruling family, but they had refused. So far so good. But then the public imagination had created a battle where the old pair were killed because they would not share the secret knowledge of the Centre, and Dann and Mara escaped to found their own dynasty, and would return to the Centre to take over … all of Ifrik, all of Tundra, or however far the geographical knowledge of the teller extended. And in these versions Dann had become a great conquering general who had fought his way here from far down Ifrik.
Dann talked, then muttered, while Griot listened and Ruff watched from under the table. Dann was more than a little mad, and at last Griot got up and said, ‘Dann, sir, General, you must go to sleep. You’ll be ill. You are ill.’
‘What am I going to do, Griot?’ And Dann gripped Griot by the shoulders and stared close into his face. ‘I don’t know what I’m going to do.’
‘Yes, sir. Just come with me. Now come.’
For all the time Dann had been gone, two rooms had waited for his return. One was Dann’s and Griot knew this, but the other had been Mara’s, and that Griot did not know. When Dann stumbled through this room and looked down at the bed where Mara had been, he began crying.
Griot led him through this room and to the next. It had a door open on to the square where the soldiers drilled, and this Griot shut. He led Dann to the bed and, when he did not do more than stare down at it, Griot helped him lie down. Ruff lay by the bed, keeping his distance.
Griot went off and returned with a sticky black lump which he showed to Dann. ‘It’s poppy,’ he said. ‘You’ll sleep.’
At this Dann shot up, and grabbed Griot by the shoulders and shook him. With a terrible laugh he shouted, ‘So, you want to kill me.’
Griot had seldom smoked the stuff, he did not care for it. He had no idea what Dann meant; Dann saw that anxious puzzled face and let him go.
‘It did nearly kill me once,’ he said and, of his own accord, lay down again.
‘The soldiers use it. They burn it. They like the fumes.’
‘Then forbid it.’
‘There’s not much of it in the camp.’
‘I said – forbid it. That’s an order, Griot.’ He sounded sane enough.
Griot covered Dann’s legs with a blanket and said, ‘Call me, if you want me,’ and went out.
He sat on the bed in the room next door and heard howling. Was that Ruff? No, it was Dann, and Ruff was whining in sympathy. Griot put his head in his hands and listened. At last there was silence. He crept to the door; Dann was asleep, his arms round the snow dog’s neck. Ruff was not asleep.
Now Dann was ill, and it went on, and time went on, and Griot looked after Dann, not knowing if what he was doing was right. Yet Dann did take some responsibility for himself. First, he told Griot that if he ever asked for poppy Griot must refuse. ‘That’s an order, Griot.’ He demanded to be kept supplied with jugs of the beer the soldiers made, alcoholic if enough of it was drunk, and he stayed in his room, sometimes walking about, sometimes lying on the bed, and he talked to himself or to Mara, or to the snow dog. He kept himself drunk. When he walked about, Ruff went with him, step for step, and at night Ruff lay close, and licked his hands and face. Dann told Griot he must call Ruff to go out, have his meals and run around a little. Ruff went willingly with Griot and he made the acquaintance of the other snow dogs – a tricky thing this, because Ruff had not been with others of his kind. But they got on well enough, provided Ruff kept his distance. He never became one of their pack. He always wanted to return to Dann. Weeks passed. Griot was thinking that now was the time to invade the Tundra cities; all the news he was getting confirmed this, but he needed Dann because he was General Dann and known through all of Tundra. And, too, Griot needed Dann for his superior military knowledge.
Though Dann was quite crazy at this time, this did not prevent him from emerging on occasion, to sit at the table with Griot, advising on this and that. The advice was sensible and Griot relied on it.
The soldiers talked among themselves, of course, because they were on duty as guards outside Dann’s room, and sometimes inside the room, when Dann was worse than usual. Their General was mad, they all knew, but for some reason this did not seem to alarm them. They spoke of him always with respect – more, it was love, Griot thought, and this did not surprise him.
But Dann did not seem to be getting better, so Griot decided to