The Hostage of Zir by L. Sprague de Camp

was not pleased. “ ’Twill cost you eke,” he grumbled, “since I must feed this troop for an extra day. Besides and moreover, I’d fain have no lubbers prancing about my deck whilst we’re loading, lest he set himself beneath some descending tun and be smashed, like as a bug beneath a boot heel. Understand ye, good my sir?”
    As Reith herded his people into their cabins in the deckhouse, Pride said: “Hey, Fearless, you mean we’ve got to stay cooped up all day tomorrow? We can’t see the ballet, with the little priestesses waggling their pretty bare tits?”
    “No; we’ll miss the show.”
    “That’s not fair! I paid for that along with the rest of the trip.”
    Reith grabbed Pride’s lapels. “Look, you blithering ass! You got us into this. By God, if I could figure how, I’d ship you back to Novorecife and tell you to sue the agency if you didn’t like it. If you want to go ashore and take your chances with those guys—” (Reith pointed at the line of white-clad priests, waiting hopefully on the pier) “—go right ahead, and I hope they tear you limb from limb!”
    “Why, you—you jerk!” cried Pride. “Take your hands off me, damn it! You dare talk to me like that—I’ll have your job when we get home! I’ll turn in a report on you that’ll—”
    Valerie Mulroy came to Reith’s defense. “Mr. Pride, after you caused all this trouble, and Fearless saved us from being massacred, you want to blame him? Fergus is a nice boy, and you’re a silly old fart!”
    “She is right,” Santiago Guzmán-Vidal chimed in. “Shut up and go away, you sapillo!”
    Several other tourists spoke up in Reith’s behalf. Pride subsided and entered his cabin.

IV
    RIOT IN ZAMBA

    Across the turquoise waters of the sparkling Sadabao Sea, beneath a yellow sun in a bluish-green sky, the Sárbez plodded her stately way. Since the weather was fair, Reith’s tourists were all, for once, in good humor. None had ever voyaged by square-rigger before, since no such craft still sailed the Terran seas. They therefore found the details of the ship’s operation fascinating.
    They shuddered at the sight of Krishnan sailors laying aloft to furl or break out sail while swaying on footropes ten or fifteen meters above the deck. They talked of pirates and hornpipes and tacks. They mangled the nautical terminology of their respective languages.
    The morn of their first night brought the Sárbez in sight of the island of Zamba. By mid-morning, they stood outside the harbor of Reshr, the capital, where onion-domed towers loomed over a gleaming marble wall. Captain Denaikh hove to and furled sail, while a boat came alongside with a pilot and a harbor inspector. The latter’s badge of office was an ornamental key of silver and colored glass around his neck.
    Reith showed the inspector the papers for his party. With Khorsh interpreting, the official said: “In the name of King Penjird the Second, I welcome you to the kingdom of Zamba. His Majesty graciously condescends to grant you and your party an audience tomorrow afternoon, at three hours past midday.”
    “We thank His Majesty very much,” said Reith in stumbling Gozashtandou. “We shall be there. If there be no complications, we are fain to come ashore today to view your beautiful city.”
    “You are welcome to do so,” said the inspector. “You may wish to view the shánenesb this afternoon.”
    Reith asked Khorsh: “What was that last word again?”
    As the priest explained it, a shánenesb was something like a Terran horse show, in which Krishnan domestic animals of several species were put through their paces.
    The inspector shouted to the captain, who shouted to a petty officer, who shouted to a seaman, who ran up a flag. A pair of harbor craft, which had been waiting in the offing, approached. They were oar-powered tugs—heavy rowboats, like small galleys, with a pair of brawny Krishnans pulling each oar. With much yelling, slap of bare feet on decks, and