“Am I Not—Woman?”

Chapter Eight

Kenton sat silent, unanswering, the depths of his soul troubled. Young and fair she was indeed—and Uruk and Babylon mounds of time-worn sands these thousands of years. What could he say to her—what message could he have for her who, if her story were true, ought by every law of nature, in which he believed, be but dust within the wind-driven dust of her crumpled temple?

And yet—she was not dust!

She was here before him, living, palpitant, clothed in beauty!

“Tell me, lord”—her voice roused him; her face was dreamy, the long lashes downcast—“tell me, my lord, has the Temple at Uruk great honor among the nations still? And is Babylon still proud in her supremacy?”

He did not speak, belief that he had been thrust into some alien, incredible reality wrestling with outraged revolt of the modern, skeptic part of him. What! Believe this tale of an angry goddess and god, creatures of human fancy whose fanes were but moldering ruins on the highway of the ages, whose very names were well-nigh forgotten? Give credence to this?

Nevertheless, the woman was real, living; she must be answered! Against each other strained the opposing currents of his thought.

And the Lady Sharane, raising her eyes to his troubled face, stared at him with ever growing doubt. Suddenly she leaped from beside him, stood quivering like a blade of wrath in a sweetly flowered sheath.

“Have you word for me?” she cried. “Speak—and quickly!”

What could he answer?

Dream woman or woman in ancient sorceries, there was but one answer for Sharane—the truth.

“But you are from Nabu,” she breathed. “You must be. How else could you have come—and wrapped in his blue cloak of wisdom and his serpents?”

“Listen,” he answered. “Listen until I am done—”

And tell her the truth Kenton did, beginning from the arrival of the block from Babylon into his house; glossing no detail that might make all plain to her. She listened, her gaze steadfast upon him, drinking in his words—amazement alternating with stark disbelief; and these in turn by horror, by despair.

“For even the site of ancient Uruk is well-nigh lost,” he ended. “The House of the Seven Zones is a wind-swept heap of desert sand. And Babylon, mighty Babylon, has been level with the wastes these six thousand of years!”

She leaped to her feet—leaped and rushed upon him, eyes blazing, red-gold hair streaming.

“Liar!” she shrieked. “Liar! Now I know you—you phantom of Nergal!”

A dagger flashed in her hand; he caught the wrist just in time; struggled with her; bore her down upon the couch.

“I tell you the truth!” he cried. “I know no Nergal—nor Ishtar—nor Nabu! I am a man—and I have told you truth!”

Abruptly she relaxed, hung half fainting in his arms.

“Uruk dust!” she whimpered. “The House of Ishtar dust! Babylon a desert! And Sargon of Akkad dead six thousand years ago, you said—six thousand years!” She shuddered, sprang from his embrace. “But if that is so, then what am I?” she whispered, white lipped. “What am—I? Six thousand years and more gone since I was born—and I alive! Then what am I?”

Panic overpowered her; her eyes dulled; she clutched at the cushions. Through Kenton’s mind flashed a cynic thought. This woman who could talk so calmly of commerce with gods, of their vengeance and their strife, accepting what to him was the unbelievable—this woman to be appalled by age, overwhelmed by that purely natural fact of the passing of time! It was this paradox that made her real. He had known a woman who could look at hurricane and earthquake without a tremor, but who cowered and wept at the approach of a birthday! In Uruk or Babylon or New York—the breed held true!

Pity awoke within him. He took a step toward her. She looked up at him; the pale lips still quivering, the slim fingers twitching at the silken nets over her breast. He bent over her; she threw white arms around him.

“I am alive?” she cried. “I am—human. I am—woman?”

Her soft lips clung to his, supplicating; the perfumed tent of her hair covered him; the fragrance of her body rocked him. She held him, her lithe body pressed tight, imperatively desperate. Against his racing heart he felt the frightened pulse of hers beating through the rounded bosom. And ever between her kisses she whispered: “Am I not a woman—and alive? Tell me—am I not alive?”

Desire filled him; he gave her kiss for kiss; yet tempering the flame of his desire was clear recognition that neither swift love for him nor passion had swept her into his arms.

It was terror that lay behind her caresses. She was afraid—appalled by that six-thousand-year wide abyss between the life she had known and his! Clinging to him, she fought for assurance of her own reality. Seeking such an assurance, she had driven back to woman’s last intrenchment, the primal assertion of the woman-self—the certainty of her womanhood and its unconquerable lure.

No, it was not to convince him that her kisses burned his lips—it was to convince herself.

He did not care. She was in his arms. He gave her kiss for kiss.

She thrust him from her; sprang to her feet; faced him.

“I am a woman, then?” she cried triumphantly. “A woman—and alive?”

“A woman!” he answered thickly, his whole body quivering toward her. “Alive! God—yes!”

She closed her eyes; a great sigh shook her—a sigh that was almost a sob.

“And that is truth,” she cried, the Lady Sharane. “And it is the one truth you have spoken. Nay—be silent!” she checked him. “If I am woman and alive, it follows that all else you have told me are lies—since I could be neither were Babylon dust and it six thousand years since first I saw the ship. You lying dog!” she shrilled, and with one ringed hand struck Kenton across the lips.

The rings cut deep. As he fell back, dazed both by blow and sudden shift of fortune, she threw open the door of that other cabin in which he had glimpsed the clustered girls.

“Luarda! Athnal! All!” wrathfully she summoned them. “Quick! Bind me this dog! Bind him—but slay him not!”

Streamed from the cabin seven warrior maids, short kirtled, bare to their waists, in their hands light javelins. They flung themselves upon him. And as they wound about him Sharane darted in, tore the sword of Nabu from his hand.

And now young, fragrant bodies crushed him in rings of woman flesh, soft, yet inexorable as steel. The blue cloak was thrown over his head, twisted around his neck. At the strangling grip Kenton awoke from his stupor—awoke roaring with rage. Savagely he tore himself loose, hurled the cloak from him, leaped toward Sharane. Quicker than he, the lithe bodies of the warrior maids screened her from his rush. They thrust him with their javelins, pricking him as do the matadors to turn a charging bull. Back and back they drove him, ripping his clothing, bringing blood now here, now there.

Through his torment he heard the laughter of Sharane.

“Liar!” she mocked. “Liar, coward, and fool. Tool of Nergal, sent to me with a lying tale to sap my courage! Well—witless one, I’ll send you back to Nergal with another tale to tell him!”

Back and back he was driven. The warrior maids dropped their javelins, surged forward as one. They clung to him; twined legs and arms around him; dragged him down. Cursing, biting, flailing with his fists, kicking—caring no longer that they were women—Kenton fought them. Berserk, he staggered to his feet, the girls clinging like hounds to a stag, seeking his throat, his eyes. His foot struck the lintel of the rosy cabin’s door. Down he plunged, dragging his wildcat burden with him. Falling, they drove against the door. Open it flew, and out through it they rolled, writhing, battling down the ivoried deck.

There was a shouting close behind him, a shrill cry of warning from Sharane. Some urgent command, for grip of arms and legs relaxed; clutching, clawing hands were withdrawn.

Sobbing with rage, Kenton swung to his feet. And as he swung upright, he saw that he was almost astride the line that was the mysterious, deadly barrier between ivoried deck and black. Dimly it came to him that this was why Sharane had whistled her furies from him; that he had dragged them too close to its menace.

Again her laughter racked him. She stood upon the gallery of little blossoming trees, her doves winging about her. The sword of Nabu was in her hand; derisively she lifted it.

“Ho, lying messenger!” mocked Sharane. “Ho, dog beaten by women! Come get your sword!”

“I’ll come, damn you!” he shouted, and leaped forward.

The ship pitched. Thrown off his balance, Kenton staggered back, reeled to the line where black and ivory decks met.

Reeled over it—unhurt!

Something far deeper than his consciousness registered that fact; registered it as of paramount importance. Whatever the power of the barrier, to it Kenton was immune. He poised himself to leap back to the ivory deck.

“Stop him!” came the voice of Klaneth.

In mid-spring long, sinewy fingers gripped his shoulder, swung him round. He looked into the face of the beater of the serpent drum. Staring at him with amazement and a curious awakening speculation in his beady black eyes, the drummer’s talons lifted him and cast him like a puppy behind.

And panting like some outraged puppy, Kenton swayed upon his feet and looked around him. A ring of black-robed men was closing in upon him, black-robed men whose faces were dead white, impassive; black-robed men closing in upon him with clutching hands. Beyond the ring stood the mailed warrior with the golden beard and the pale agate eyes; and beside him Klaneth.

Naught cared Kenton for any or all of them.

“Stop me—hell!” he roared.

He rushed the black robes. They curled over him, overwhelmed him, pinned him down.

Again the ship lurched, this time more violently. Kenton, swept off his feet, slid sidewise. A wave swished over him, half strangling him. The hands that clutched him were washed away by it. Choking, he threshed hands and feet, striving to stand. Another wave lifted him, flung him up and out. Like a leaf over a cataract he felt himself falling into the sea. Deep he sank. He fought his way upward, thrust his head at last above the surface. He dashed the water from his eyes; looked for the ship.

A roaring wind had risen, and under it the ship was scudding—a hundred yards away. He shouted; swam toward her. The wind roared louder; down went the sail; down dipped the oars straining to keep the ship before the wind. Faster and faster flew the ship before the blast—was lost in the silvery mist.

Kenton ceased his efforts; floated, abandoned in an unknown world.

A wave smote him; he came up behind it, choking. The wind was shrieking, roaring, overhead. The spindrift whipped him. He heard the booming of surf, the hiss of combers thrown back by ramparts of rock. Another wave caught him, swept him forward. Struggling upon its crest, he saw just ahead of him a pinnacle of yellow stone rising from a nest of immense bowlders upon which the billows broke in fountains of spume. Again a wave seized him, hurled him on; he fought against it helplessly.

His strength left him; he let himself go; stopped fighting. He felt himself lifted by a gigantic comber; dashed straight against the yellow pillar.

The shock of his impact was no greater than that of breaking through thick cobweb! For infinite distances, it seemed, he rushed on and on through a soft, thick darkness. With him went the sound of waves. Abruptly, his motion ceased; the sound of the waves fled. He was gripping something—something hard and smooth; not rock, no—wood.

Suddenly he knew he was within his own room.

He snapped on the electrics; stood swaying, shuddering. What was that upon the floor at his feet? Stupidly he stared. It was water—water that was dripping from him, forming a pool. Water—water strangely colored; strangely colored water—crimsoned water.

He realized that he was wet to the skin; drenched. He licked lips gone abruptly dry—there was salt upon them!

And the water that dripped from him was crimsoned, crimsoned—crimsoned with his blood!

There was a long mirror in this room of his. He stumbled to it. Stumbling to meet him came a drenched and ragged figure. Ripped and tattered was its clothing, water dripped from it and from a score of wounds blood mixed with that water mingled and dripped.

It was—himself!

He turned to where the ship gleamed; bent over it. On the black deck was a group of the little figures, leaning, looking over the rail.

Upon the gallery of the rosy cabin one tiny figure stood.

Sharane!

He touched her.

Jewel hard, jewel cold, a toy—yet Sharane!

Sharane, beautiful, palpitant, terrified, wrathful, vengeful, mocking—Sharane!

This toy was—she!

Like a returning wave, his berserk rage against her swept him. Echoes of her laughter in his ears, Kenton, cursing, sought for something with which he could shatter that shining bark of beauty, break the link it formed between Sharane’s ensorcelled world and his own.

Never again should she laugh at him—mock him!

He caught a heavy chair by its legs, swung it high overhead, poised for an instant to send it crashing down upon the ship—

And suddenly beneath the salt upon his lips Kenton tasted the honey musk of her kisses—the kisses of Sharane!

The chair dropped from his hands.

“Ishtar! Nabu!” he whispered, arms held high in supplication. “I call upon you. Set me once more upon the ship. Whatever the price, that price I will pay. Ishtar! Do with me as you will—only set me again upon your ship!”

Swift was his answer. He heard far off a bellowing roar as of countless combers battering against a rock-ribbed coast. Louder it grew. Then with a thunder of vast waters the outward wall of his room dissolved.

Where wall had been was the crest of one tremendous wave. And that wave curled down over Kenton, rolled him far under it, shot him at last gasping for breath up and up through it.

He was afloat again upon the turquoise sea!

He thrust himself high above the waters. The ship was close! Close? Its scimitared bow was striking down by his head; was flying past him. A golden chain hung from it, skittering over the crests. Kenton clutched at it—missed it.

Back he fell. Swift raced the shining side of the ship past him. Again he threw himself high. There was another chain; a black one spattering over the wave tips and hanging from the stern.

He gripped it. The sea tore at his thighs, his legs, his feet. Grimly he held fast. Hand over hand, cautiously, he drew himself up; scaled the side of the ship. Now he was just below the rail. Slowly he raised his head to peer over.

Long arms swept down upon him; long hands gripped his shoulders, lifted him, hurled him down upon the deck, pinned him there. He felt a thong drawn round his ankles, his arms pinioned to his sides. He looked into the face of the frog-mouthed beater of the serpent drum.

And over one of the drummer’s enormous shoulders stared the white face of Klaneth. He heard his voice:

“Carry him in, Gigi.”

And the answer of the drummer, indifferent.

“As you will it, Klaneth.”

He felt himself lifted by the drummer as easily as though he had been a babe; and cradled in his huge hands he was carried through the black cabin’s door.