Moby Jack & Other Tall Tales Read Online Free

contents had spilled out, over the desert floor: marble statuettes of angels, of cherubim, of seraphim.
    She stared where he was pointing.
    He said, ‘When you retied the knot, you used a knot that slipped— there’s the result.’
    ‘I’m sorry. I just wanted to...’
    ‘To spy,’ said Niccolò.
    He could see he was right by the expression on her face and he grabbed her and pulled her to her feet. She immediately struck him a sharp blow with the heel of her hand behind his ear, then as his head snapped to the side, she kicked him in the groin. He went down in the dust, excruciating pains shooting through his neck, a numbness in his genitals which quickly turned to an unbearable aching.
    She had been, after all, a soldier.
    ‘Don’t you dare try that again,’ she cried. ‘My mother was an assassin. She taught me the martial arts. I could kill you now...’
    In his agony he didn’t need to be told.
    By the time he had recovered, she had gathered his statuettes, carefully wrapped them in their protective rags, and tied them inside the pack. He hobbled over to it and inspected the knots, satisfying himself that this time they were correct and tight. Then he swung himself into his saddle, winced to himself, and gestured for her to follow on with the camels.
     
    Those figurines,’ she said, obviously trying to make friends with him again, ‘they’re very beautiful. Where do they come from?’
    ‘I carved them myself,’ he said, ‘from the finest block of marble the eastern quarries have ever disgorged.’
    She seemed impressed, though she was obviously no judge of art, nor could she know the work that went into just one of the three hundred and thirty-three statuettes. There was admiration in her tone.
    ‘They’re very beautiful,’ she repeated.
    ‘They’re flawless,’ he remarked as casually as he could. ‘It took many years to carve them all, and I have only just completed them. They are a gift, for da Vinci. He can no longer carve minutely, the way one needs to be able to carve if one is to produce a piece just six inches tall—objects that need a younger steadier hand—especially since he developed arthritis.’
    She was silent after this.
    The Tower grew in size and height, as they drew nearer to its base, until it filled the horizon. Its immensity and resplendence overawed Niccolò so much that he almost turned around, forgot his mission, and went back to the mountains. It would now take him a day to ride, not to the end, but to the edge of the Tower’s shadow. The Tower was like a carved mountain, a white pinnacle of rock that soared upwards to pierce the light blues of the upper skies. Its peak was rarely visible, being wrapped about with clouds for much of the time. The high night winds blew through its holes and hollows, so that it was like a giant flute playing eerie melodies to the moon.
    By this time they had begun to eat one of the camels, and two others had been set free, their fodder having been consumed and their usefulness over. The water was almost gone.
    Romola showed him how to produce water, by using the stretched membrane of the dead camel’s stomach. She dug a conical pit in the sand, placed a tin cup at its bottom, and shaped the membrane so that it sagged in the centre. Water condensed on its underside and dripped into the cup.
    ‘I’m an artist,’ he stated, piqued by her superior survival knowledge, ‘I don’t know about these things.’
    ‘So, an artist, but not a survivor?’
    ‘I make out.’
     
    They reached the Tower, footsore, weary, but alive. The Holy Guardians immediately took them into custody. Romola protested, saying she was a former soldier, but she could not get them to understand what she was saying. All around the tower was a babble of voices, men and women talking to each other in a dozen different tongues. Romola’s pleas were ignored and she was thrown into the dungeons.
    Niccolò found a Holy Guardian who spoke one of the three languages he knew