Seeking the Mythical Future

  Seeking the Mythical Future

  Book One of the Q Series

  Trevor Hoyle

  First published in Great Britain in 1977 by Panther Books Ltd

  This ebook edition published in 2014 by

  Jo Fletcher Books

  An imprint of Quercus Editions Ltd

  55 Baker Street

  7th Floor, South Block

  London

  W1U 8EW

  Copyright © 1977 by Trevor Hoyle

  The moral right of Trevor Hoyle to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988.

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.

  A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

  ISBN 978 1 84866 932 1

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, organizations, places and events are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or locales is entirely coincidental.

  You can find this and many other great books at:

  www.quercusbooks.co.uk and

  www.jofletcherbooks.com

  Also in the Q Series and available from Quercus and Jo Fletcher Books

  Through the Eye of Time

  The Gods Look Down

  ‘The cup might smash and then fill.’

  Aphorism from A Lay Guide

  to Myth Technology

  (VII Sdp Edition, 3rd Revision)

  For Nick Austen, for believing.

  1

  The Red Ocean

  The vessel cleaved through the red ocean, the purple foam churning and frothing in its wake. It was a three-masted barque, square-rigged on the fore- and main-mast, schooner-rigged on the mizzen, with yellow, vinyl sails, its prow a whorled piece of timber painted white in the shape of a unicorn’s horn: the Slave Trader, seventeen days out of London Toun bound for New Amerika in this, the ninth year of the reign of Our Most Gracious King Jimmy K.

  For three days the Easterlies had tautened the sails and swept the vessel along at a fine pace, but now, approaching the doldrums, the wind was slackening and within hours would have died to a whisper, barely moving the heavy ship at a rate of two or three knots. A thin haze obscured the yellow orb of the sun, encapsulating the heat so that the breeze along the decks was as warm and fetid as human breath.

  Captain Kristiensen stood impassively on the bridge, a tall barrel-chested man with a full black beard who had sailed the oceans since boyhood and knew the tempers and tantrums of the sea, its sly temperament and cunning, and knew also the deeply superstitious nature of the men who sailed it. They were not educated, could neither read nor write, and sought omens and presentiments in the natural phenomena of clouds and waves, birds and sea creatures. Only the day before, a black albatross had circled the main-mast – as the embodiment of an evil spirit might hover round a crucifix – and the crew had watched fearfully in case the bird should decide to land. They could have fired the cannon to scare it away, but that would have prevented the ‘spirit’ from making a free choice; in effect it would have been cheating on destiny. Instead they had watched silently, and waited with upturned eyes, as the long sweeping arcs of the bird’s flight brought it first nearer to the ship and then away from it, approaching and departing, testing their nerves with the perfect symmetry of its swooping glides. Then at last it had flown off: an ominous black hieroglyph heading directly towards a point on the horizon which would eventually be dissected by the descending parabola of the huge yellow sun.

  One member of the crew, a Summarian – small, slant-eyed, olive-skinned – said that the black albatross had returned to its master to report their position, course and speed; it was a warning, he said, which they ignored at their peril.

  Kristiensen knew of the rumours circulating on board ship but chose to do nothing about them. They were an outlet for the latent fears of the crew, the outward show of collective paranoia which was harmless, providing it didn’t erupt into open mutiny. As he said to the First Mate, Mr Standish: ‘It almost seems as if the voyage is timed to a nicety, as if the length of it was predetermined in some way. On every trip the sickness reaches the point where it can no longer be contained, when the crew are lethargic and unwilling to work, yet in a very dangerous mood; and then, as always, we sight land.’

  The First Mate stepped back from the binnacle, having checked the compass in its brass mounting. He was a young man, this was only his second voyage, and he had great respect and admiration for the Captain. ‘There have been mutinies in the past,’ he pointed out. ‘I read of them in the Nautical Record.’

  ‘That is so,’ the Captain agreed, ‘but they were usually the fault of the captain, not the crew. An inexperienced man can easily be misled into believing that harsh, repressive measures need to be taken – when in fact quite the reverse applies. These are simple men. They understand clear and direct decisions, but at the same time they are likely to interpret them wrongly, to suppose that a captain dealing harshly with them is doing so through fear and because he has something to hide; therefore a lack of action, indifference almost, can be the correct and sensible approach.’

  The young Mr Standish nodded slowly. He could see the wisdom of this, though he also wondered why the Captain thought it necessary – not believing in omens, spirits and demons – to pray each night in his cabin. To whom or what was he praying? And from what horrors of the unknown was he seeking deliverance? Could it be that the black albatross really was a sign of imminent disaster, one they would do well to heed? He felt a vague unease, and despite the enveloping prickly heat the back of his neck was cold and clammy.

  *

  On the third day of entering the doldrums they sighted the sea monster. It rose from the red ocean at a distance of approximately three hundred metres: a green scaly neck and massive head with large yellow eyes fixed in a glassy reptilian stare. The crew cowered behind the gunwales, shocked into fearful silence, fingering their holy beads and miming with numbed lips. There was little the Captain could do, for the vessel was practically becalmed on the ponderous swell, the sails hanging wrinkled and flaccid from the sweating booms. Over the entire ocean, from horizon to horizon, there was hardly sufficient movement of air to cause a ripple. He could have ordered the crew to fire on the creature, but the distance was too great, and, instead of frightening it away, might have had the effect of provoking it to attack. If it came any nearer they would have no alternative but to release a broadside yet, knowing the poor accuracy of the fire-weapons (antiquated pieces with primitive sighting devices) and the appalling marksmanship of the gunners, Captain Kristiensen knew very well that the chances of a direct hit were abysmally low.

  The First Mate had trained the deck-mounted telescope on the monster and was watching it with a dreadful thrilling fear. It was his first; he had seen sketches and lithographs, heard innumerable eye-witness accounts, but this was his first personal sighting and he was caught between the conflicting emotions of nervous exhilaration and cold abject terror. His throat worked in order to produce saliva for his dry lips.

  The creature rode easily on the swell, its yellow saucer-eyes observing the barque with a flat unmoving stare, but making no attempt to approach it. The snake-like neck extended several metres into the air, enlarging to the head and grooved snout below which three concentric rows of backward-facing teeth glinted in the hazy sunlight. The bony diamond-shaped protuberances on its back –
hence the name ‘Diamond Back’ used by the sailors – were plainly visible, appearing as a long line of blunt spikes resting on the surface of the water.

  ‘What do you estimate its length to be?’ Mr Standish asked; his excitement and fear were evident in his voice but even so he couldn’t bring himself to look away from the eyepiece of the telescope.

  ‘It’s a fully-grown plesiosaur,’ the Captain answered. ‘They can be anything up to eighteen metres and have been known to reach twenty in the southern hemisphere. It’s the first you’ve seen?’

  ‘Yes,’ Mr Standish said, mesmerized. He hardly dared breathe. ‘Will it attack?’

  ‘If it does we shall part company, you and I.’ The Captain tightened his hands into fists and added: ‘For a little while.’ The young man was sufficiently intrigued to glance up. He frowned and said, ‘For a little while? How is that?’

  ‘We shall part company when the monster attacks and meet up again – very soon, I assure you – in its stomach sac. You see the mouth—’ He raised his solid arm and pointed a finger which betrayed no emotion. ‘The mouth is hinged so that the lower jaw drops down and acts as a scoop over the surface of the water. It can take three men at a time and can mover faster than a sloop under full sail. There have never been any survivors of an attack by a sea monster. Ships have vanished, wreckage has been found, but never any seamen, living or dead. Not even their remains.’

  ‘So if it attacks our chances are—’

  ‘We have no chances,’ Kristiensen replied bluntly. ‘What I have told you is not opinion or hearsay, but fact.’

  ‘We can telegraph for help,’ Mr Standish said quickly. There was a mist of cold perspiration on his forehead. He was becoming feverish.

  ‘We can do that easily enough,’ the Captain conceded. ‘We can send a message to any vessel within a radius of sixty leagues. How long do you suppose it would take a ship – if there is one to receive our message – to reach us? And when it arrives, if it arrives, what could it do? Do you think that if we received a call for help from a vessel being attacked by a sea monster we would rush to its aid? The sensible thing would be to set course in the opposite direction.’

  ‘But our cannon,’ Mr Standish said. ‘Surely we have the firepower to kill it, or at least deter it?’ There were flecks of foam on his lips now. His eyes were wide but the pupils had contracted to black dots.

  ‘If the creature comes obligingly near and stays in one place long enough then we might just possibly, given God’s own luck, score a hit. But Diamond-Backed plesiosaurs are as agile as eels: it could dive, swim under the ship, come up the other side and attack to port while we’re still attempting to sight our cannon to starboard.’ The Captain smiled grimly. ‘Still not convinced?’

  The young man turned nervously to gaze out to sea and as he did so the monster dipped its head, the long sinewy neck curving downwards with supple dexterity; the lower jaw came unhinged and the horizontal, almost rectangular mouth slot began scooping the sea in long gliding strokes. It was fascinating in its patient deliberation.

  ‘My God, it’s horrible!’ Mr Standish said. He was ashen. ‘Does it know we’re at its mercy? Does it have a brain capable of any real intelligence?’

  Captain Kristiensen crossed his arms, gripping his biceps with strong fingers. He gave the appearance of placidity, almost of unconcern, but a diligent observer would have noticed the faint white marks around his mouth and nostrils: lines of inner strain and fierce self-control. He said: ‘Nothing is known of the creature’s physiology, we’ve never even discovered a skeleton washed ashore. The seamen believe that the creature has two brains, one in its skull and the other in the base of its tail. But it’s unlikely that we shall ever get close enough to learn the truth – close enough for that alone, anyway.’

  The Second Mate came up the steps to the bridge and saluted. ‘I’ve primed the cannon, sir, and picked five men who can be trusted not to lose their heads if the monster attacks. The rest are a pack of gibbering idiots. They’re cowardly scum and I’ve told ’em that to their faces.’ He jerked a calloused thumb over his shoulder to indicate the men crouching below on the main deck. Mr Swann had risen over fifteen years from ordinary seaman to Second Mate. He had seen monsters before and lived to tell the tale, and though he knew the ship to be virtually helpless should the creature decide to attack he had absolute faith in Captain Kristiensen’s qualities of leadership – besides which he believed in his own sense of destiny; he wasn’t ready to die yet: the surge of life in his veins was too quick and strong. He glanced from the Captain to the First Mate, and it confirmed what his nostrils could detect: the rancid smell of fear.

  ‘Very good, Mr Swann. We can do no more. Have you checked the line for drift?’

  ‘Not a movement, sir, the cork’s dead. We could be on a millpond. The barometer is steady, no change.’ He stepped to the rail and spat into the sea; the spittle plopped into the murky red water and remained motionless. The vessel was fixed to the ocean as a fly stuck in treacle.

  ‘What do you reckon, Mr Swann, to sending a telegraph message?’ asked the Captain.

  The Second Mate forced a cynical grin. ‘And scare off any ship within fifty leagues? Aye, damn true, I know where I’d be if a message came through that somebody had sighted a Diamond Back. I’d be gone.’ And he pointed away towards the empty horizon, an almost imperceptible demarcation between sea and sky which was lost in the sluggish haze.

  Mr Standish said, ‘Is it eating or drinking, or what? Why doesn’t it do something? It’s almost as if there’s something … mekanikal about its movements – so slow and deliberate.’ He looked at the others, taking a handkerchief from his sleeve and wiping his face and neck. He couldn’t believe that this was actually happening; it had about it the eerie strangeness of a nightmare. Was he really on this deck, here and now, and not dreaming in his deep and comfortable bed in London Toun, wrapped in the arms of a girl? He would wake up in a minute. He pinched himself to wake himself up but nothing happened, nothing had changed, he was still here. The plesiosaur basked seemingly unperturbed some distance from the ship. The sky, the sun, the mist still had their yellow tinge, the ocean its reddish hue. Captain Kristiensen stood with his feet firmly braced on the deck, the Second Mate leaning on the rail, the crew on their knees murmuring prayers and imprecations. Mysterious forces were at work, hidden powers of the unknown, and the First Mate felt intimidated by his ignorance of the natural elements.

  Mr Swann turned from the rail and said tersely, ‘It’s moving.’

  It was true. The plesiosaur had slid down into the water so that only its long snaking neck was visible, and had begun to move astern of them, a gentle vee of ripples marking its progress. The neck glided through the water with perfect smoothness, the creature moving away on a dead straight course, without deviation, and within minutes was a speck in the haze almost too faint to be seen.

  ‘Have we seen the last of it?’ Mr Standish asked in a voice he didn’t recognize as his own. He felt slightly braver. He had seen his first sea monster and was alive to tell of it. What a story it would make!

  Kristiensen unfolded his bulky arms, and the places where his hands had been were damp. ‘Unless one or both of its brains decides otherwise,’ he said shortly. ‘Mr Swann.’

  ‘Captain?’

  ‘Break open a cask of black biddy for the crew. They’ll need something to wash the fear out of their throats.’ He said to the First Mate: ‘I expect you could take a strong drink yourself, Mr Standish. We’ll retire to my quarters. Mr Swann, when you’ve issued the ration, post a double-look-out and join us there. It isn’t every day a Diamond Back comes a-calling and is polite enough not to eat its hosts.’

  Later in the day the faint stirrings of a breeze began to palpate the sagging vinyl canvas. The timbers began once again to creak their welcome song as the barque eased itself slowly into motion: it was barely a movement at first, a few paltry knots, but to everyone on board it seemed as though they were racing i
nto the sun itself.

  *

  The cry from the crow’s nest and the outstretched arm of the look-out brought everyone up on deck. The crew took up vantage points in the rigging and scanned the flat sea, shading their eyes from the fierce yellow orb of the sun. ‘What is it, Mr Standish?’ asked the Captain, emerging from the companionway on to the quarter-deck, still struggling into his black pigskin jerkin with the golden eagle embossed above the left breast: his captain’s insignia.

  ‘Can’t make it out, sir.’ The First Mate adjusted the brass ferrule on the telescope. ‘Appears to be a craft of some sort, quite small, I should judge. It’s signalling to us, I think.’

  ‘Let me see.’ Kristiensen came forward and squinted into the eyepieces. He was silent for a moment, his lips compressed tightly together. Then he said in a breath, ‘Oracles and omens.’ It was an exclamation used by the crew, one signifying fear and perplexity, but not what the First Mate would have expected to hear on the Captain’s lips.

  The barque drew nearer. Through the heat mist it became evident to Mr Standish that what he had taken to be a signal could now be seen as the sun’s rays glinting on the hard and polished surface of a small, low craft of shallow displacement floating not so much in the water as on top of it. And as they approached they could see the figure of a man sprawled against the smooth concave incline, his head resting on the rounded lip, one hand trailing in the water. His clothing was stained and tattered, apparently bleached white by the sun.

  Kristiensen issued instructions and a boat was lowered. At this distance – less than ten metres – they could see that the craft was made of a material resembling gun-metal. It had the appearance of having been scorched by fire: parts of it were pitted and blistered, with darker areas obscuring the hard bright finish.

  ‘What on this earth do you make of it, sir?’ Mr Standish asked the Captain. ‘Has he been cast adrift do you suppose?’ He was nearly his old self once more, curious but not frightened; castaways were not as fearsome, and much more easily accommodated, than sea monsters.