Chapter 3
Mallory let him pass, straining his eyes in vain for a glimpse of the Sangraal. He waited till Sir Launcelot was half a hundred yards down the highway before he encephalopathed Easy Money to follow, and he waited till a bend in the road hid the castle of Carbonek from view before encephalopathing the command to charge. At this point, Sir Launcelot became aware that he was no longer alone, and wheeled his steed around. Without an instant's hesitation, he dressed his spear and launched a counter-charge. All Mallory could think of was a twentieth-century steam locomotive bearing down upon him.
He swallowed grimly, "aventred" his own spear, and upped Easy Money's pace. Two could play at being locomotives. The approaching knight and steed loomed larger; the sound of hoofbeats crescendoed into staccato thunder. The spear pointing straight toward Mallory's breastplate had something of the aspect of a jet-propelled flagpole. Hurriedly, he got his shield into position. Maybe the man would spot the red cross, realize its significance, and slow down.
If he spotted it, he gave no sign, and only came the faster. Mallory braced himself for the forthcoming impact. However, the impact never occurred. At the last moment his antagonist directed the spearpoint at Mallory's helmet, did something that made it separate itself from the shaft to the accompaniment of a gout of incandescence and come streaking through the air like a little comet. Mallory tried to dodge, but he would have been equally as successful if he had tried to dodge a real comet. There was a deafening _clang!_ in the region of his left audio-amplifier, and the whole left side of his face went numb. Just before he blacked out he saw the oncoming knight veer his steed, wheel it around, and ride off. A peal of all-too-familiar laughter drifted back over the man's shoulder.
* * * * *
"Now," said the rent-a-robogogue, "you will try again: 'A' is for 'Atom', 'B' is for 'Bomb', 'C' is for 'Conform', 'D' is for 'Dollar', 'E' is for 'Economy', and 'F' is for 'Fun'. What comes after 'F'?"
The boy Mallory squirmed in his ABC chair. "I don't know what comes next and I don't care!"
"I'll box your ears," the rent-a-robogogue threatened.
"You wouldn't dare!"
"Yes I would--I'm a physical-chastisement model, you know. Now, we'll try once more: 'A' is for 'Atom', 'B' is for 'Bomb', 'C' is for 'Conform', 'D' is for 'Dollar', 'E' is for 'Economy', and 'F' is for 'Fun'. What comes after 'F'?"
"I told you that I didn't know and that I didn't care!"
"I warned you," said the rent-a-robogogue.
"Ow!" the boy Mallory cried.
"Ow!" the man Mallory groaned, sitting up in the weeds beside the early sixth-century highway.
All was silence around him, if you discounted the stridulations of insects and the _be-ke korak-korak-korak_ of frogs. A few yards away, Easy Money stood immobile in the moonlight. Mallory raised his hand to his helmet and felt the sizable dent that the spearpoint had made. Gingerly, he took the helmet off. Who in the world would have dreamed that they had jet-rifles in this day and age!
The absurdity of the thought snapped him back to full awareness. A moment later he remembered the peal of familiar laughter.
Perfidion!
The man must have wanted the Grail desperately to have come after it himself, which meant that it was probably worth much more than he had let on. But how had he known when and where to essay the lift? More specifically, how had he found out when and where to essay the lift on such short notice?
Mallory thought back. He was reasonably certain that he had made no slips of the tongue during his visit to the Perfidion Tower and during the ensuing game of golp, and he was equally certain that he had let fall no revealing references to the place-time he had so carefully pinpointed. Where, then, had he gone astray?
Suddenly, way back in his mind, Perfidion said, "By the way, Tom, I take it you're all set as regards costume, equipment and the like."
"I've got the sweetest little suit of armor you ever laid eyes on," Mallory heard himself answer.
He swore. So that was it! All Perfidion had needed to do was to make the rounds of the costumers who specialized in armor, and to shell out a few Kennedees to the one Mallory had patronized last. Then, in possession of the knowledge that Mallory was embarking into the past as Sir Galahad, all Perfidion had had to do was to consult one of the many experts he kept at his beck and call. The expert had undoubtedly told him where Sir Galahad was supposed to have found the Grail before taking it to Sarras, and, equally as important, approximately when the event was supposed to have taken place. Further questions could not have failed to elicit the additional information that Sir Launcelot had come to the chamber of the Sangraal before Sir Galahad had, and from this Perfidion had undoubtedly deduced that Sir Launcelot could very well have been a time-thief in disguise, too, and that the man, having arrived on the scene first, could very well have been responsible for the Grail's so-called return to Heaven, despite what legend said to the contrary. Certainly it had been a gamble worth taking, and obviously Perfidion had taken it.
And won the jackpot.
But that didn't mean he was going to keep the jackpot. Not by a long shot. Mallory encephalopathed Easy Money to his side and pulled himself to his feet with the help of the left stirrup and hung his helmet on the pommel. Then he picked up his spear and clambered into the saddle. "We're not beat yet, Easy Money," he said. _Giddy-ap!_
Easy Money whinnied, stamped its feet, and started back toward the _Yore_. A short while later they passed the lane that led to the castle of Carbonek. Presently Mallory heard the _clip-clop_ of approaching hoofbeats, and not wanting to risk an encounter in his weakened condition, he encephalo-guided the rohorse off the highway and into the deep shadows of a big oak. There was something tantalizingly familiar about the horse and rider coming down the highway. Small wonder: the "horse" was Easy Money and the rider was himself. He was on his way to the castle of Carbonek to lift the Holy Grail.
Mallory gazed after his retreating figure disgustedly. "Sucker!" he said.
IV
Rowena nearly threw a fit when Mallory rode into the rec-hall. "Oh, fair knight, ye be sorely wounded indeed!" she cried, helping him down from his rohorse. "Certes, an ye bleed so much ye may die!"
Mallory's head was throbbing, and he saw two damosels that hight Rowena instead of only one. "I'll be all right after I lie down for a while," he said. "And don't worry about the bleeding--it's almost stopped."
He took a step in the direction of his bedroom office, staggered and would have fallen if she hadn't caught his arm. Her strength astonished him: for all the lightness of his armor, it still lent him an over-all weight of some two hundred and ten pounds; and yet the shoulder which she provided for him to lean on did not give once all the way to his bedside. She had his pauldrons, breastplate, and arm-coverings off in no time flat. His cuisses, greaves, and sollerets followed. The last he remembered was lying there in his under garments and his chain-mail vest with three faces swimming in the misted sea of his vision, each of them invested with the peculiar beauty that concern, and concern alone, can grant.
"How is mammakin's little man now?" the rent-a-mammakin asked, applying soothing sedasalve to the boy Mallory's swollen ear.
"He hit me, mammakin," the boy Mallory sobbed. "Just because I wouldn't tell him that 'G' stands for 'Geography'. I hate geography! I hate it, hate it, hate it!"
"Nasty old rent-a-robogogue! Mammakin sent him away. He was an old model that got rented out by mistake. Is mammakin's little man's ear all right now?"
The boy Mallory sat up. "I want my real--" he began.
The man Mallory sat up. "I want my real--" he began.
"I have great joy of thy swift recovery, fair sir," Rowena said.
She was perched on the edge of his bed, applying a cool and soothing ointment to his ear. On the table by the bed lay a basin of water, and on her lap lay a pink tube. He grabbed the tube, looked at the label. _Sedasalve_. He sighed with relief. "Where did you find it?" he asked.
"La! fair sir, when ye did seem no longer on live I did run both toward and forward in the castle seeking a magical salve whereby I might succor ye, whereupon I did come to a white box in the chapel wherein lay many magical tubes of diverse colors and natures whereof I did choose one and--"
Mallory was incredulous. "You chose a tube at random?" he demanded. "Good Lord, it might have contained a counteragent that could have killed me!"
"The ... the letters thereon seemed of a magical nature, fair knight. And ... and the color was seemly."
"Well anyway it was the right one." He looked at her. Could she read? he wondered. He was tempted to ask her, but refrained for fear of embarrassing her. "In that same white box," he said, "you will find a big bottle filled with round red pellets. Would you get it for me?"
When she returned with it, he took two of the pills, then he laid his head back on the pillow. "They'll restore the blood I lost," he explained, "but in order for them to do the job properly I've got to lie perfectly still for at least one hour."
She sat down on the edge of the bed. "Marry! the magic of Merlin is marvelous, albeit not as marvelous as the magic of Joseph of Arimathea."
"What did he do that was so marvelous?"
The plum-blue eyes were fixed full upon his face. "Ye wit naught of the tale of the white shield ye bear, fair sir? List, and I will tell ye:
"It befell after the passion of our Lord thirty-two year, that Joseph of Arimathea, the gentle knight, the which took down our Lord off the holy Cross, at that time departed from Jerusalem with a great party of his kindred with him. And so he labored till that they came to a city that hight Sarras. And at that same hour that Joseph came to Sarras there was a king that hight Evelake, that had great war against the Saracens, and in especially against one Saracen, the which was King Evelake's cousin, a rich king and a mighty, which marched nigh this land, and his name was called Tolleme la Feintes. So on a day these two met to do battle. Then Joseph, the son of Joseph of Arimathea, went to King Evelake and told him he should be discomfit and slain, but if he left his belief of the old law and believed upon the new law. And then there he showed him the right belief of the Holy Trinity, to the which he agreed unto with all his heart; and there this shield was made for King Evelake, in the name of Him that died upon the Cross. And then--"
"Hold it a minute," Mallory said. "This shield you've finally got around to mentioning--is it the same one you set out to tell me about?"
"Wit ye well, fair sir. And then through King Evelake's good belief he had the better of King Tolleme. For when Evelake was in the battle there was a cloth set afore the shield, and when he was in the greatest peril he left put away the cloth, and then his enemies saw a figure of a man on the Cross, wherethrough they all were discomfit. And so it befell that a man of King Evelake's was smitten his hand off, and bare that hand in his other hand; and Joseph called that man unto him and bade him go with good devotion touch the Cross. And as soon as that man had touched the Cross with his hand it was as whole as ever it was tofore. Then soon after there fell a great marvel, that the cross of the shield at one time vanished away that no man wist where it became. And then King Evelake was baptized, and for the most part all the people of that city. So, soon after Joseph would depart, and King Evelake would go with him whether he would or nold. And so by fortune they came into this land, that at that time was called Great Britain: and there they found a great felon paynim, that put Joseph into prison. And so--"
"A great _what_?" Mallory asked. In one sense the story was familiar to him, but what bothered him was the fact that it was familiar in another sense too--a sense he couldn't put his finger on.
"A wicked unbeliever in our Lord. And so by fortune tidings came unto a worthy man that hight Mondrames, and he assembled all his people for the great renown he had heard of Joseph; and so he came into the land of Great Britain and disinherited this felon paynim and consumed him; and therewith delivered Joseph out of prison. And after that all the people were turned to the Christian faith.
"Not long after that Joseph was laid in his deadly bed. And when King Evelake say that he made much sorrow, and said: For thy love I have left my country, and sith ye shall depart out of this world, leave me some token of yours that I may think on you. Joseph said: That will I do full gladly; now bring me your shield that I took you when ye went into battle against King Tolleme. Then Joseph bled at the nose, so that he might not by no means be staunched. And there upon that shield he made a cross of his own blood. Now may ye see a remembrance that I love you, for ye shall never see this shield but ye shall think on me, and it shall be always as fresh as it is now. And never shall man bear this shield about his neck but he shall repent it, unto the time that Galahad, the good knight, bare it; and the last of my lineage shall have it about his neck, that shall do many marvelous deeds. Now, said King Evelake, where shall I put this shield, that this worthy knight may have it? Ye shall leave it there as Nacien, the hermit, shall be put after his death; for thither shall that good knight come the fifteenth day after that he shall receive the order of knighthood: and so...."
* * * * *
When Mallory awoke, Rowena's head was resting on his chest, and she was breathing the soft and even breaths of untroubled sleep. Her hair, viewed thus closely, was not as dark as he had at first believed it to be. It was brown, really, rather than dark-brown. And astonishingly lustrous. Without thinking, he rested his hand lightly upon her head. She stirred then, and sat up, rubbing her plum-blue eyes. For a moment she stared at him uncomprehendingly, then, "Prithee forgive me, fair sir," she said.
Mallory sat up, too. "Forgive you for what? Go open a couple of vacuum tins while I get into my armor--I'm going to bring this caper to a close."
"Thy ... thy strength has returned?"
"I never felt better in my life."
In the rec-hall he said, sitting down at the table before one of the two vacuum tins she had opened, "You never did ask me what happened."
"Ye will tell me of thy own will an ye wish me to know."
Mallory took a mouthful of simulsteak, chewed and swallowed. "Your Sir Launcelot turned out to be a phony, and pulled a rabbit out of his helmet the nature of which I'd better not try to describe to you."
Eyes round as plums, she regarded him across the table. "A ... a phony, fair sir?"
Mallory nodded. "That's a sort of felon paynim who plays golp."
"But with my own eyes I did see his armor, fair knight."
"That's right--you saw his armor. But you didn't see him. A certain character by the name of Perfidion was residing behind that hardware--not the good Sir Launcelot."
"Perfidion?"
Mallory grinned. "Sir Jason Perfidion--a knight errant ye wit not of. But the tournament's not over yet, and this time _I've_ got the rabbit: he thinks I'm dead."
"He ... he left ye for dead, fair sir?"
"That he did, and if that little brain-buster of his had struck just one inch to the right, I'd have been just that." He shoved his empty vacuum tin away and stood up. "Excuse me a minute--I've got to visit the sorcerer's tower again."
In the control room, he took the _Yore_ back to 7:20 p.m. of the same day and re-materialized it half a mile farther down the valley. Turning, he saw that Rowena had followed him and was watching him from the doorway. "Whereabouts may I find oats that I may feed thy horse, fair knight?" she asked.
"Easy Money doesn't eat. He--" Mallory paused astonished as two of the largest tears he had ever seen coalesced in her eyes and went tumbling down her cheeks. "Oh, it's not that he's sick," he rushed on. "It's just that horses like him don't require food to keep them going. Why, Easy Money's guaranteed for ... he'll live another thirty years."
The sun came up beyond the plum-blue horizons of her eyes. "It pleaseth me mickle to hear ye speak thus, fair knight. I ... I have great joy of him."
Back in the rec-hall, Mallory pulled on his gauntlets, reset his timepiece, and donned his helmet. The left audio-amplifier was shot, but otherwise the piece was in good condition--aside from the dent, of course. He encephalopathed Easy Money to his side, hung his shield around his neck, and mounted. "Hand me my spear, will you, Rowena?" he asked.
She did so. "Ye be a most noble knight indeed, fair sir," she said, "for to set so little store by thine own life in the service of a damosel the which is undeserving of thy deeds. I ... I would lever that ye forsook the Sangraal than that ye be fordone."
Her concern touched him, and he removed his helmet and leaned down and kissed her on the forehead. "Keep the home fires burning," he said; then, setting his helmet back in place, he activated the lock, rode across the mirage-moat, and set forth into the forest once again.
V
This time when he reached the crest of the ridge that separated the two valleys, Mallory took an azimuth on the towers of Carbonek, encephalo-fed the direction to Easy Money, and programmed the "animal" to proceed in as straight a course as possible.
In the east, the moon was just beginning to rise; in the west, traces of the sunset lingered blood-red just above the horizon. On the highway below, a knight sitting astride a brown rohorse and bearing a white shield with a red cross in the center was riding toward Carbonek to challenge a twenty-second century "felon paynim" in imitation Age-of-Chivalry armor. In the valley Mallory had just left behind him there were two castles named _Yore_, and soon, a third would pop into existence and yet another Mallory come riding out. Mallory grinned. It was a little bit like playing chess.
The forest which Easy Money presently entered was parklike in places, and sometimes the trees thinned out into wide, moonlit meadows. Crossing one of the meadows, Mallory saw the first star, and when at length Easy Money emerged on the highway, the heavens were decked out in typical midsummer panoply. The rohorse had followed its programming almost perfectly and had emerged at a point just south of the lane leading to the castle of Carbonek. All Mallory had to do was to encephalo-guide it farther down the highway to a point beyond the site of the forthcoming joust. While doing so, he kept well within the concealing shadows of the bordering oaks and beeches where the ground was soft and could give forth no telltale _clip-clop_ of hoofbeats. His circumspection proved wise--as in one sense, of course, it already had--and when the false Sir Launcelot came riding by on his way to the castle and the chamber of the Sangraal, he was no more aware of Mallory III's presence by the roadside than he would presently be aware of Mallory II's presence in the shadows of the trees that bordered the lane.
Mallory III grinned again and brought Easy Money to a halt just beyond the next bend. "Wit ye well, Sir Jason, that thy hours be numbered," he said.
He remained seated in the saddle, feeling pretty good about the world. In no time at all, if his one-man ambuscade came off, he would be on his way back to the _Yore_, and thence to the twenty-second century and a haircut. Selling the Sangraal without the aid of a professional time-fence like Perfidion would be difficult, of course, but it could be done, and once it was done, he, Mallory, could take his place on Get-Rich-Quick Street with the best of them, and no questions would be asked. There was, to be sure, the problem of what to do about a certain damosel that hight Rowena, but he would face that when he came to it. Maybe he could drop her off a dozen years in the future in a region far enough removed from Carbonek to ensure her safety. He would see.
At this point in his reflections he was jolted into alertness by the sound of approaching hoofbeats. A moment later he heard a second set of hoofbeats and knew that Mallory II had made his presence known. Presently both sets crescendoed into staccato thunder as the two "knights" came pounding toward each other, and not long afterward there was a clank and a clatter as Mallory II went tumbling out of his saddle and into the roadside weeds. Finally the single set of hoofbeats took over again, and Mallory III saw a horse and rider coming around the bend in the highway. He braced himself.
Before making his play, he waited till horse and rider were directly opposite him; then he encephalopathed Easy Money to charge. "Sir Launcelot" managed to get his shield up in time, but the maneuver did him no good. Mallory's spearhead struck the shield dead center, and "Sir Launcelot" went sailing out of his saddle to land with an awesome clatter flat on his back on the highway. He did not get up.
Dismounting, Mallory removed the man's helmet. It was Perfidion all right. There was a large bruise on the side of his head and he was out cold, but he was still breathing. Next, Mallory looked for the Sangraal. Perfidion had concealed it somewhere, and apparently he had done the job well. Since the armor could not have accommodated an object of that size, the hiding place had to be somewhere on the body of his horse. The horse was standing quietly beside Easy Money in the middle of the highway. It was jet-black and its fetlock-length trappings were blue, threaded with silver; otherwise, the two steeds were identical. Mallory tumbled to the truth then, went over to where the black "horse" was standing, raised its trappings, found the tiny activator button, and depressed it. The croup-hood rose up, and there in the secret compartment, wrapped in red samite, lay the cause of the mounting absentee-rate in King Arthur's court.
Always the skeptic, Mallory raised a corner of the samite in order to make certain that he was not being cheated. Instantly, a reflected ray of moonlight stabbed upward into his eyes, and for a moment he was blinded. Exorcising the thought that sneaked into his mind, he closed the croup-hood, rearranged the trappings, and returned to Perfidion's side. Dragging the armor-encumbered man over to the black rohorse and slinging him over the saddle was no easy matter, but Mallory managed; then he picked up Perfidion's helmet and spear and set the former on the pommel and wedged the latter in one of the stirrups. Finally he mounted Easy Money and, encephalopathing the black rohorse to follow, set out down the highway away from the castle of Carbonek.