Neither of them had any real notion of how to fashion a navigable hull from such materials. It didn’t seem like an art that came instantly or easily. Very likely, it was something the Bolivians and the Egyptians had evolved and handed down over generations. They settled for the simple approach of tying reeds in bundles and lashing them together into a rudimentary platform.
By the time darkness began closing in, they weren’t even halfway done. They were too wet and cold and tired to think of a meal. There was nowhere to use for preparing one in any case. All they wanted to do was get out of this awful place, but that couldn’t be until tomorrow. Yet with the discomfort and the thought of whatever other vermin might be creeping and crawling and slithering around them, neither could there be any sleep. They nibbled on cold oddments and crouched, wet and shivering, through the long blackness of the night. It was the most miserable night Keene could remember spending anytime in his life.
They resumed working at the first hint of light. Both air mattresses had been torn by cut stems and thorns during the night, and were useless. They provided material, instead, for filling the frames of a new set of paddles—four of them this time. In addition, stouter pieces of cane lent themselves as punting poles.
The final construction took the form of two layers of reed bundles laid crossways to each other lengthways, constrained and strengthened by a cane framework. It sat alarmingly low in the water, and Keene couldn’t be certain it wouldn’t soak in more weight and founder. With ample time, the right tools, space to work, and skills handed down over generations, they probably could have done better; but for now, they would have to settle for it. Yet even with those apprehensions, they set off, conscious only of a sense of relief at being finally on their way at last.
Today, there was little of the talk and spiritedness they had shown on the trek down from the saddle. The night’s ordeal had left them cold, hungry, weary, and depressed. As they drifted downstream, still keeping close to the river’s edge, Keene stared dully at the monotonously repeating shores and the unchanging flatlands and hills beyond, feeling the wet clothes clinging to his body and the pangs of protesting muscles that seemed to greet every move. Without walking to get circulation moving again and loosen joints, he felt sluggish and drained. His mind was sinking into a state of passive resignation to whatever events the future might unfold, bereft of any will or potency to change them. Another day or more of this, and he was beginning to wonder if they would arrive in a condition to accomplish anything.
Assuming they arrived at all.
CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
At a distance from the Sun corresponding roughly to that of Jupiter’s orbit, the course of the Trojan was merging toward that of Eskimo, boosted on its more direct line from Saturn. The two ships first came within sight of each other as just specks of light moving against the starfield. For the next ten hours as they continued to close, the specks grew brighter and larger, eventually taking on discernible shape and form. Finally, they were riding in parallel, Trojan immense by comparison, its annular outer structure and main body turning slowly like a one-wheeled axle; Eskimo, unassuming but fattened by its battery of boosters, a local-range transporter built for ferrying between Saturn’s moons, now far from home. The docking radars locked with the approach beacons, and Eskimo berthed at the locks on Trojan’s forward Hub a matter of minutes later.
The reception party waiting to greet Valcroix, Grasse, and their staffs had assembled in the Command Module out at the Rim, where there was simulated gravity. Ceremonies like that were supposed to be carried out with style and dignity, after all, which would have been difficult to achieve with the participants floating about like a slow-motion ballet. The Trojan’s honor guard in dress blues snapped to attention and presented arms, and the arriving dignitaries were officially welcomed aboard by Captain Walsh, heading a deputation of the ship’s and former SA officers—the latter now renamed the Terran Defense Force. They were then escorted through the customary ritual of inspecting the ranks.