Chapter 10 - Into the Fire

As our heroes were coughing up their weight in seawater on a perfect white-sand beach, they were blissfully unaware of the danger that awaited them. For, as is always the case, they had escaped from danger into greater danger. They closed their eyes and slept peacefully on the soft land.
When Joseph awoke, his hazy eyes took some time to focus. There was a big white thing with some black bits on it. His vision cleared a little, and he read: ALVIN. This didn’t mean much to him, because for a navigator, his geography was surprisingly poor. He woke the others to tell them excitedly that they had reached a city.
Alvin was not a nice place. It was not a nice place at all. It looked nice, at first glance. It was a smallish island, a tall green cone, with white sand trimming its base like lace. It had picturesque palm trees, and attractive little wooden huts with roofs made from coconut fronds. Beautiful young women in very short skirts seemed to be everywhere, much to Sammy’s approval. He was of the opinion that all towns would be improved by a few more young women in short skirts. But when you realised that the tall green cone with the cloud at the top was a ferociously active volcano, and all the beautiful young women in the short skirts were slaves, the land lost its appeal a little.
However, our heroes had not yet realised what an unpleasant place they had landed in. To them, it was land, glorious land, and a lucky escape from an evil pirate plot. The name on the sign seemed vaguely familiar to Barney, but his head was fogged with thirst and exhaustion, and he had on seen the name very briefly. So they crawled along the beach to the nearest hut to beg for a drink.
Unfortunately for them, the nearest hut belonged to Mervin the Disagreeable. Mervin the Disagreeable was, as his name suggests, extremely disagreeable. This was due in part to being named Mervin, but it was mostly because he was old and just naturally not very nice (it ran in the family – his father had been Mervin the Dishonourable and his father’s father had been Mervin the Disgusting). His greatest joy in life was visiting the slave auctions at the nearby docks, and watching the guards break the spirits of the slaves. Mervin felt that if he was unhappy, everyone else should be too.
Sammy, Celia, Barney and Joseph stumbled up to the door of the hut, and knocked. Sammy knocked rather harder than necessary, and the door crashed to the ground. Mervin the Disagreeable jumped up from his chair in the dark corner of the hut. He waved his walking stick disagreeably. “What’s all this?” He demanded in an exclamatory fashion, “Who broke my door? What do you want?” But then his eyes lit up. There were four exhausted, thirsty youngsters in his hut. He shouldn’t have too much trouble with them. Finally, he would have something to sell.
Because Mervin the Disagreeable was so disagreeable, he had spent a large proportion of his life imagining this scenario and creating a cunning and devious plan to use in the event of slaves presenting themselves to him. He ungraciously offered them water. Having seen Sammy accidently bash down the door, he had decided force was not the answer, and he would have to outsmart them. This was astonishingly easy (you must remember that our heroes were very tired and not expecting another plot against them so soon after the last one). All he had to do was drop a little of the stuff the doctor had given him to make him sleep (he hadn’t taken it because he found the doctor very condescending and argumentative) into the water before he gave it to them. All four took large, unsuspecting swallows, and dropped off to sleep. Mervin the Disagreeable quickly fastened the shackles he had been saving for situations like these onto their legs. He dragged them out of his hut one by one and tied them to a coconut tree with chains. His hut was very small and he couldn’t be falling over them all the time. He checked his handiwork, and then went for a lie-down. It was very hard work capturing slaves.
Mervin the Disagreeable was rudely awakened in the middle of the night. A mammoth was trumpeting outside his hut. There were large herds of mammoths all over the island, a strange and unexplained phenomenon, because it seemed the climate would be too hot for them. Mammoth wool was the islands second largest export, after slaves. It was crashing around and making a terrible noise. And because Mervin the Disagreeable was only disagreeable to humans (he was actually very fond of mammoths), he rose to help it.
As you may have guessed, it was not a mammoth. Sammy had woken up to find himself chained to a tree, and was furious about it. Seeing the nasty little man who had chained him there, he bellowed louder than he ever had before. “I AM SAMEUS RUFUS PEGASUS!” He bellowed, “MERE CHAINS CANNOT HOLD ME! MY FATHER IS SAMEUS ALFREDUS PEGASUS, GOD OMNIPOTENT! VENGEANCE SHALL FALL UPON YOU!” Seeing the chains shudder and strain, Mervin the Disagreeable was beginning to feel a little nervous. He picked up a large, heavy piece of wood and brought it down on Sammy’s head. Sammy fell silent. Mervin turned to the others threateningly. Joseph snarled. Celia quivered. Barney snored.
At first light, Mervin the Disagreeable returned to his captives, this time with back-up. There was an armed guard for each of them, and three extras for Sammy. They were large, burly and unpleasant. The first grabbed Celia roughly and leered at her. She did what all traditional heroines do in such a situation, and cried out: “Oh you beast! Oh, you unspeakable cad!” The guard slapped a dirty palm over her mouth. She bit him.
All their struggling was in vain, however (they all struggled; even Barney landed a vicious kick on his captor’s shin). They were dragged in chains around the corner to the slave yards.
The slave yards were at the docks. From the outside, they appeared to be a large, solid wooden fence that formed a square as large as Farmer Johnson’s bull field (but not as large as Celia’s father’s bull field). There were two enormous bolted gates, one at the village end and one at the dock end. The one at the dock end opened into an arena with a stage at one end. An enormous crowd of fat businessmen was gathered in the arena. They were all clamouring to make themselves heard, waving handkerchiefs and little cards with numbers on them. There was a lot of shoving, and several people had bleeding noses and impressive bruises forming on their faces. One of the men lost his footing on the dusty ground, and fell. No-one tried to help him up and he was nearly trampled by the time be managed to crawl to the edge. The object of their attention was a man on the stage. He was wearing a black suit and wide-brimmed hat (showing him to be dishonest). He was sweating profusely and keeping up a running commentary of prices in a loud and whiny voice. The hammer in his right hand waved at random. Next to him, firmly shackled, stood a girl. She was unbelievably beautiful, with pale skin and long, dark hair, and tear tracks on her cheeks. Barney struggle desperately. The hammer came down.
The four were thrown into the gate at the town end, still in their chains. The yard was packed with slaves, some shackled, some free to walk. Enormous guards with grey uniforms and mammoth whips patrolled the edges. It was very quiet. Everyone had either given up hope, or were biding their time before attempting an escape. The sales in the arena could be heard clearly. It shocked Barney to think that people enjoyed doing this to others. As far as he could tell, the world beyond his rock hut was cruel. Every few minutes, another slave was dragged out the dock-end door to be sold. Barney sat down to think of a plan.
Clouds gathered above the mountain.