Chapter 27

Star Captain snorted disgustedly and asked, "Can anyone else understand me? Speak up!"

A tremulous voice answered, "This unworthy one can understand you, oh great messenger from the gods."

"OK, stand up so that I can see whom I am talking to." When the trembling man did stand up, Star Captain said, "Did you hear what I said to that fainted coward?" An affirmative nod, almost a bow, caused Star Captain to order, "See that my orders are obeyed!"

The new contact among the priests nudged another priest with his foot and spoke to him in a language unfamiliar to Star Captain. The third man struggled to get to his feet without looking at Star Captain and ran down the hill so fast that he was in danger of falling every moment. He hit the plain running and disappeared among the trees still running.

Star Captain asked the name of the priest he was talking to and was told "Many Rabbits." Star Captain said, "OK, Many Rabbits, until further notice, you are my official translator. Are there any more priests that I have not seen yet?"

"Oh, no, Mighty One. We were all here during the divination. It was a requirement. By the way, that was the chief priest that you killed with your bolt from the sky."

"Fine, don't let it go to your head, but you are now the chief priest until I say otherwise."

"Thank you, Mighty One. How may I serve you while we wait for the head men?"

"That depends on how long it takes for them to get here. I hope it isn't long. I am not well known for my patience."

"It will take some hours, Mighty One. They will have to be purified and dressed in their best finery before they can be presented to a representative of the gods."

"LIKE HELL! You send word that I want them to get their asses here as soon as they can move, and I will decide if they have moved fast enough. If not, there will be some new head men very shortly. NOW DO IT!"

"Yes, Mighty One. Right away, Mighty One." Many Rabbits nudged and spoke to a prostrated priest who got up and ran off about as fast as the other one. "That one is taking your words, Mighty One. They should be here in 15 minutes."

"OK, that's better. Wake up this coward, and lets go down to my flying machine. I'll wait for the men down there."

The first priest had regained consciousness, but had been afraid to move. He got up at the urging of the new chief priest and apologized for his actions, or lack thereof. Star Captain told him to go somewhere and clean up, he stank too much to hang around in his current condition. But he was told to return as soon as he could in case they needed another interpretor (this brought a mournful look from the new chief priest). The first man ran off to get cleaned up, and the rest of the party walked down the hill to the airship's shadow to wait for the delegation of head men.

The second messenger must have made an impression, because a party of six elderly men arrived, none of them fully dressed. One of the men was carried in a sedan chair and he was naked, with a cloth thrown across his crotch. The new chief priest explained that this man was too old to walk from the town, so he had to be carried. Star Captain nodded his acceptance of the inevitable and took a seat upon a stool passed to him from the airship. Except for the man in the sedan chair, the others were told to sit on the grass in a semicircle in front of him. It looked like the teacher with a class of school children.

Star Captain spoke, "The prisoners you have saved for sacrifice to the gods will be released immediately and sent home. You will no longer fight wars to gain sacrificial victims. None of your own people will be sacrificed. I was sent by the gods with the final word on the subject of the cold weather. As long as you act in a civilized manner with your neighbors, the gods will gradually warm the weather, but it will take years because they do not trust you to remain peaceful. Remember, the weather will warm up, but it will not warm up fast, no matter what you do to try to hurry it along. None of you will live long enough to see a complete return to the warmth you once knew, but it will eventually get here. DO YOU DOUBT ME?"

The speech had been made slowly to allow for a translation, but the shouted final question woke everybody up. A chorus of "No" was heard and translated. Star Captain then settled into his Master Trader persona and beguiled the head men with a list of things that the gods and their friends from the north could provide for them, provided that they traded honestly. The atlatl was greeted with polite interest, but they were astounded by the idea of the tampon, and absolutely enthralled by the fire starter.

These people had a beast of burden! They had managed not to eat all of their camels. When he saw the camels, Star Captain gave them a freebie: the travois. He showed them how to make one, and that was all that was needed. The travois was the final straw, when they saw that they were hooked! These people wanted to trade with everybody, but they were limited by the amount of goods that they could transport. The travois solved that problem. These people had all kinds of fruits and vegetables that they could trade for finished manufactured goods. All they had needed was a means of transport, and now they had that.

When they found out that there were people to the north who wanted to trade tampons and fire starters for fruit, they were ready to pack up and send a caravan out immediately. Star Captain said that they would not have to go all the way, but would be met by traders from the other end of the railroad. Some people were ready to pack up and leave tomorrow. There was going to be a problem because the fruit would probably spoil before it got to the railhead, but, as a gesture of good will, they would still receive the tampons and fire starters they had planned to trade for. Hopefully this would cement a trading relationship and not mark the northerners as hopeless fools. Well, time would tell.

This group of people were about 20 days from the railhead, so they would have to try to find fruit that could last that long without spoiling, but the people of Doug's Town would be so happy to get fruit of any kind that they would be easy to please. Mangoes picked green would probably be edible by the time they got to Doug's Town, and the people there would not know any better; they would be happy to get the less-than-perfect fruit just to have fruit.

Star Captain sent a detailed report that night to Doug's Town and asked that a large stock of tampons and fire starters be kept in stock at the southern railhead in anticipation of the arrival of the caravans of traders to be coming from central Mexico. There was also some crude rubber and other products from farther south which the caravans would bring. The prospects looked good.

Star Captain announced that they could not stay over night, since their masters, the gods, had ordered them to move on before dark. The locals, particularly Many Rabbits, were relieved that the representatives from the gods were moving on before they ordered other changes. The two airships moved on about 40 miles before stopping for the night.

That night, they received a message from Doug asking them to swing southeast to try to find the source of the rubber. Doug could think of many uses for the rubber, now that they had a ready source of sulfur for vulcanizing it. He wanted to switch their land vehicles to rubber tires if at all possible, and here was his chance.

The trip was now over less rugged mountains, but there was nothing but jungle below them. Star Captain was beginning to despair of ever finding people through the thick canopy of leaves and limbs. On the second day, they saw an opening in the jungle that looked like planted crops. Of course, none of the air crew had ever seen such a thing, but Doug had told them what to watch for. The dropped low and found a place where the ground did not appear to be covered by somebody's food crop, so Star landed and dropped off Star Captain and Star Engineer, suitably armed. The airship backed up about 50 feet altitude and hung there waiting for developments.