Sword in Sheath (13 page)

The man sank rather than wriggled out of the Samoan's hold. Still gripping the table, as if he were clinging to the one stable thing in a fearsome world, he collapsed to his knees. He wasn't even trying to deny Fate now, but he shook his head from side to side. A tear slipped down along his thick nose. Kane's stomach rebelled. It wasn't good to witness such fear.

“Why don't you want to go ashore?” the American demanded abruptly, for no other reason than to break through that curtain of abject, piteous terror.

But the turtle hunter was too deep in his personal hell — words couldn't reach him now. Kane moved, he wanted to stand up, to get around the table and shake that gibbering man into rational sanity again. A hand imprisoned his wrist in a steel grasp which held him in his
place.

“We can get nothing from him now.” Lorens’ quiet emotionless words cut across the soft moaning cry of the native. “I have seen this before — he is mad with fear.” Without raising his voice or changing tone from the same quiet pitch the Netherlander leaned toward the man and, releasing his hold on Kane, reached out his hands to put them over those fingers still biting into the wood.

“You are not going ashore, you are not going ashore. You are safe, entirely safe. You do not have to go ashore — “ The sing-song of Coast Malay words made a pattern. Kane felt his own tenseness ebb away as he listened. “You are safe — you need not go ashore.” The repetition was still quietly spoken, without color. But the head of the turtle hunter had ceased to sway in its horrible gesture of negation. His half-open mouth eased shut. Now Lorens’ hands were moving, trying to straighten those cramped fingers, to loosen the man's grip. “You do not have to go ashore — ”

The native's eyes fell to his hands and those others over them, then he looked up into Lorens’ face. His mouth closed, he swallowed twice, then sniffed. Lorens spoke to the captaia

“Give him a drink. I think he will be all right now. But we had better not try that again. He was very close to the edge — ”

Van Bleeker filled a glass and pushed it hastily in the general direction of the kneeling native and Lorens released the man's wrists. He looked to the Netherlander before he took up the gin and waited for Lorens’ nod of permission before he downed the fiery stuff.

“Golly — “ whispered Sam. “What in blazes
is
on shore anyway! That guy certainly had the wind up!”

“I think we had better find out,” returned Lorens.

“I do not go ashore — “ It was only a thread of whisper.

“You do not go ashore, you are safe,” reassured
Lorens again.

The fellow actually smiled, grinned at them all, even at Fortnight who still blocked the exit from the cabin.

“Ask him what's ashore, maybe he'll tell you,” Sam urged the young Netherlander.

But Lorens hesitated, almost as if he feared to hear what that answer might be.

“Do so.” Van Bleeker's agreement had the force of an order. “We should know why this creature becomes a gibbering idiot when. going ashore is mentioned. I have little liking for this — ”

“Nor have I” Lorens’ fingers were twitching a little. “He was mad with terror. If I should bring on such an attack again — ”

“At the same time we don't want to walk into anything,” Kane pointed out “This may mean our lives.”

“Or his reason.” For the first time Lorens was bitter. “Very well” He began to speak in Coast Malay.

“Tell me — What danger lives ashore?”

The native was staring with a dog's intentness into the Netherlander's eyes.

“Danger ashore — “ He repeated the words as if they had no meaning for him. Then a spark of intelligence flamed in his dark eyes, was alive behind his ugly face.

“Danger, much danger, Tuan This is the Forbidden Place!”

13

SWEET POTATO DEDUCTION

“The Forbidden Place!”

“You still thinking about that?” demanded Sam from the upper berth. He might have meant his question jestingly, but the tone which echoed back from the roof of the cabin had something of annoyance in it

“Just as much as you are, son,” Kane returned cheerfully. “That's the umpteenth time you've turned.”

“All right, all right! So I can't get to sleep. Well, I've heard you counting sheep also.”

Kane folded his hands behind his head on the thin pillow and stared into the dark.

“Looks as if we can't take it any more,” he challenged. “I don't recall these hysterics in the old days. D’you suppose we're getting old?”

There was a smother of relaxed laughter from above. “That may be it, at that You know this has all the good old melodramatic ingredients of a pulp adventure story — a lost island with a ruined temple, that queer old god up in Siva's house, the mysterious bomber in the lagoon
and the cave dwellers — All we need now is a bunch of bloodthirsty cannibals and the Marine Corps to arrive in the nick of time before we go into the pot. It's so much of an adventure story that it's funny.”

“Yeah, only once in a while we run into real life. The turtle hunter wasn't amused by it all. That guy had it — bad.”

There was a long moment of silence before Sam answered Kane shifted on the tangled web of sheet and pillowcase. He didn't want to see etched across the darkness that terror-stricken face.

“His story was lame — even when van Norreys pried it out of him,” Sam's words came at last “All that stuff about camping out here, trading with two natives for pearls and then finding one of the fellows dead in the morning — ”

“ ‘Torn, Tuan, as if some beast had been at him. But here, Tuan, I swear it to you — there is no beast of claws, no tiger — as all men know!’ “ Kane quoted.

“No four-legged ones, maybe,” Sam corrected. “At any rate, he had the wind up — but good.”

“You know — we may be talking ourselves into somewhat of the same state of mind right now,” Kane said slowly.

“What!” But Sam's explosion was followed by sober agreement “Telling ghost stories in the dark so we'll jump when the wind slams the door. I get it, partner. Okay — so long until tomorrow.”

And the night hours were long. Kane sweated miserably in the dark. He set himself the old exercise of building words, a trick which had carried him through those bad hours before jumps, before attacks. One began with a noun and added certain adjectives and a verb until one had a sentence — each word must be seen in the mind, spelled out — defined —

“Up with you, sleeping beauty!”

Kane opened smarting eyes. It was a stinging slap which had brought him awake. Sam was thrashing about in the dusk, going through the movements of a contortionist while in the process of donning his clothes. Kane yawned and rolled over the side of the bunk, reaching for his slacks as he went.

“What kind of a day is it?”

“A fine frosty morning!” caroled Sam. “Just the type on which you'd choose to be shot. Come on, no need to beautify yourself today. We're businessmen, remember?”

“As if you'd let me forget. Do we get fed before this bold rally?”

“Always thinking of your stomach.” Sam clawed impatiently at the cabin door.

“I'm part of an army, aren't I?” returned his companion reasonably. “And that's what an army travels on — its stomach. Sounds as if we were snakes or something of a like nature — ”

Luckily van Bleeker and the
Samba
’s
commisssary were equal to the occasion There were mugs of coffee flanked by well-filled plates on the mess table, and it did not take long to slide into one's seat and get to work.

“Van Norreys, Kane, Marusaki, Fortnight, Ali, Chang, and myself to go, Chief,” van Bleeker was telling Bridger. “Shen and Felder will stay aboard.”

“An’ me?” The chief might be a plump middle-aged man in oily dungarees, but he was also loading a forty-five with a skilled touch. “Suppose th’ boat sorta cruises around while you fellas go ashore? You might need some support — ”

Both Lorens and van Bleeker reached for the map, but the captain got it first And Bridger used the nose of the forty-five to make clear his suggestion.

“See, here's where you're goin’ ashore, ain't it? All
right — suppose I take Kanake, Red an Bert an’ ferry you over. Then we coast around this here point an’ paddle along th’ shore a ways. If you’re goin’ across clear ground like you say, then we can keep an eye on you — ”

Van Bleeker consulted the map. “It is a good idea. What do you think?” he asked the others.

Sam shrugged, the rest nodded, without caring much one way or the other. It was Kane’s guess that Bridger merely wanted to get in on the excitement and knew that cross-country travel was no longer for him. If it made the chief happy —

So now the scow which set them ashore in the dawn was crowded. They had pulled well away from the
Sumba
when Kane felt the soft touch of smooth and well-cared-for fur against his arm. A round head with pricked ears was silhouetted against the water. For some reason known only to herself the
Sumbd’s
cat had selected to join the party. And when they reached the island she made the shore in a leap which her shipmates, splashing through water, might well have envied. Then she was gone into the high grass before she was seen by any except Kane.

Bridger and his men pushed the scow out again, and the shore party gathered in a sort of order. Almost instinctively they fanned out as they moved inland, keeping good space between each man

The open land was not as easy to cross as it had looked to be from the mountain. In the first place it was overgrown with a tough and wiry grass, calf, thigh, and waist high, the blades of which had edges that could slash like bolos. So in no time at all they wore smarting scratches across hands and arms.

There were inhabitants in this grassy world, small things which squeaked and scuttled away from the invaders. And there were winged things which stung and bit impartially. As it grew light the party from the
Sumba
cut away from the open to strike for the cover of the trees which grew along the thin backbone of the highland to the east. And here the flies came down upon them, flies whose bite seemed every bit as bad as a wasp’s sting.

“Anoa country,” commented van Bleeker. “The black apes like this sort of territory too. Only the island is small for anoa.”

“But you are wrong, Captain!” With his rifle Lorens swept back a tangle of grass. “Look here.”

Clean and white, polished by the beaks of carrion eaters and the jaws of insects, was a huddle of bones. From their midst the young Netherlander picked up a horned skull.

“Anoa,” agreed the captain.

But Kane was more intereted in the hole in that skull. Lorens thrust a finger through it.

“Rifle,” he commented. “And recent too. Someone was hunting for the pot and did their butchering on the spot — ”

“How long ago, do you think?” the American wanted to know.

“In this climate — who can tell? Perhaps not more than a week.”

Fortnight had pushed past them, nosing into the bushes ahead as if he were a hound trying to pick up a scent. Van Bleeker called to him.

“Any sign?”

The big Samoan shook his head. “Not here, Captain. But it would be well to advance cautiously. Shall I try for a trail?”

It was Kane who answered first “Look here, if this is hunting ground I don’t think there will be many trails. As you say, Captain, the island is so small it cannot support much in the way of animal life. Suppose that the cave dwellers, whoever they are, have realized that. Won’t they be keeping their hunting to a minimum? And that
would mean they would stay pretty much to the other side of the river. I don’t think we’ll find a path until we get over there.”

Kane’s deduction must have been the correct one, for, after they left the body of the anoa, they came across no other evidence that anyone had skirted these trees or plowed through the tough grass before them. While they were still some distance from the river they came to a clump of trees whose bright green trunks towered into the sky. And beneath the circle of leaves which topped them almost fity feet above were pods, thick and brownish green.

“Kapok!” Van Bleeker circled the largest of the trees, his head back at an awkward angle as he tried to count the pods. “That’s sure proof of cultivation — those aren’t native to islands this far north. They’ve been planted here — ”

But he could arouse little interest in kapok. Sam, Kane, and Fortnight were thrusting on toward the river, with Lorens hovering impatiently for the captain to catch up.

“It just occurs to me” — Sam was lying full length behind a bush, peering down into the channel of the stream — “that it might be well for us to avoid the paths after all — remember Burma?”

Kane nipped his lower lip between his teeth. “D’you suppose I could forget it in a hurry? But planting those path traps is a dacoit trick — these natives may not know it —”

“Sharp bamboo is not hard to find hereabouts. Anyway I’d watch where I was putting my feet Better pass that warning along. Shall we try getting across now?”

While one kept guard on the bank Fortnight and Sam decided between them which was to make the first break. The Samoan won and slipped down the bank to plunge thigh deep through the stream and scramble up the
opposite side without waste of time or motion. So one by one they crossed over into the land of the caves.

And there was a trail, wide and firmly packed. The men whose feet had beaten that road had had no reason to be afraid of anything. But the men from the
Sumba
did not follow it Both the Americans nourished unpleasant memories of the surprises to be found along just such thoroughfares in Burma, and van Bleeker was not ignorant of the man traps which ring in the villages of head-hunters in the island world. They were wary of easy trails and kept to the bush.

Which meant swinging bolos again. But, Kane comforted himself, if their coming had not yet been noted by spies, the cave dwellers must be blind, deaf, and idiotic. A little noise couldn’t damn them now.

With Fortnight leading they single-filed in the direction of the cliffs. Suddenly the Samoan stopped and gestured the others to look into a clearing.

Regular lines of plants cut the dark soil, a soil clear enough of weeds to testify that this garden was well tended. Van Bleeker identified the find in a harsh whisper, “Camates.”

Camates, the sweet potato of the tropics, the staple rough food of the natives from the Philippines south. A camate patch, well kept, and with its potates about ready to harvest, meant a settled community.

“Almost ready to harvest — ” Islandwise eyes marked that fact as important, and Kane wondered why.

“Nine months here at least then,” went on van Bleeker.

So that was it — nine months of tending meant that the cave dwellers had been here at least that long. But if they numbered among them the survivors of the bomber in the lagoon — why had they not hailed the
Sumba?

“This garden patch runs east to the cliff base — ” pointed out Sam. “Shall we work along it?”

But there was something in the silence of the tree-ringed clearing which made Kane uneasy. Sam and Fortnight slipped away toward the cliff, not waiting for agreement. Van Bleeker appeared to be inclined to shuffle after them, his tail of native seamen with him. But Lorens still lingered. Then the Netherlander stepped out into the soft earth of the bed and studied the ground, remaining there until Kane joined him.

It was easy to see the spoor which had held Lorens’ attention. A heel print traced in the soil. Someone, wearing European style shoes, had set his foot there — recently.

“What — ” began Kane. But he didn’t get his answer from van Norreys.

Did the sharp crack of sound come before the blow on his shoulder whirled him off balance — or after? He groveled into the rich muck of the garden instinctively, even before he felt the stinging burn of the furrow cut into his flesh.

“A sniper!” He attempted to pull the Reising into firing position. But there was no target. Only madly waving fronds showed where the
Sumba’s
men had taken cover.

Spitting mud, Kane raised himself on his elbows and began a careful check of the jungle front. Whoever the sniper was — he must be an old hand at this particular game, though even an amateur could have found excellent cover anywhere around here.

The burn on his shoulder was steadying into an ache. And when he moved his arm molten fire bit deep. But the start he gave when a palm fell against the small of his back made him set his teeth just in time against a real cry of pain.

“Slide back.” The order was a half-whisper which was almost a hiss. “Pass me your gun — ”

Kane relaxed his hold on the Reising as Lorens’ hand
gripped the butt. Slowly he made a worm’s progress back to the full cover of the jungle. Once the green veil there closed about him, he turned over and pulled himself up with his back against a tree bole.

The damage, he decided, a moment later, was not much although he was gory enough. Blood was soaking through his shirt, and he could feel it trickling down back and ribs. He was afraid to touch the wound with his earthy hands, nor did he dare to pull the cloth away from that point on his shoulder halfway between arm and neck. If he could avoid infection, there was certainly nothing to play the baby over.

“Dutch! What is it?” Sam wriggled to him just as Lorens backed up, still facing the garden.

Kane spat out more mud. “Just got me a crease. That guy over there must be a rotten shot. Luckily he picked the left shoulder. Any of you fellows have an idea where he’s roosting now?”

“That would be hard to say.” Van Bleeker came crashing up. “I have told Fortnight to scout. But you, my friend, must return to the
Sumba.
Yes, that I insist upon — as should your own good judgment. In these lands we do not trifle with wounds, even the smallest. It must be treated against infection. Also, we must plan better. As it is, these cave people can hide out and pick us off at their convenience. As I have said from the first, we must discover their back door to win the game — ”