Island Inferno

by Chuck Holton

  “FERNANDA! COME QUICK!”

  The sound of Hedi’s frantic shout caused Fernanda to nearly fall out of her hammock. She struggled to her feet, dropping her journal in the sand, and rushed through the open door into the cabana.

  Hedi was standing on the bed, backed into a corner. A trembling hand pointed through the open door into the sparse bathroom. “Ww-what is it?”

  Fernanda gave Hedi a concerned look, sweeping her wild black hair from her face with one hand. She adjusted her bikini top and tentatively peeked around the corner into the bathroom, half expecting to see a giant boa constrictor or saltwater crocodile. Instead, something small and very blue scuttled across the floor and hid behind the commode.

  Hedi screamed. Fernanda started, more from her friend than from whatever critter was inhabiting the lavatory. “Just calm down, girl.” Fernanda bent down to peer behind the toilet. Then she broke out laughing.

  At that moment, Zack burst into the room, barefoot and panting. “What’s wrong?”

  Fernanda was still chuckling. “There’s a land crab in our bathroom.”

  “A land crab. Cool!” Zack went into the bathroom for a closer look. Hedi collapsed on the bed with a groan and buried her face in the pillow.

  Zack’s excited voice echoed out of the bathroom. “Oh, man! This guy’s feisty. He’s showing me his karate moves. I wonder if—ow! Aaaahhh!”

  Fernanda jumped out of the way as Zack streaked out of the cabana with the blue-and-orange crustacean attached to his right index finger.

  “Problem solved.” Shaking her head, Fernanda returned outside to retrieve her journal.

  Settling carefully back into the colorful woven cotton hammock, she retrieved her pen from the ground and shook the sand from the small, leather-bound diary. Opening to the current page, Fernanda laughed again as she reread the sentence she’d written just before Hedi’s outburst.

  I can’t imagine a more peaceful place on earth.

  Still smiling, she lay back and took in the beauty beyond her bright-red toenails. Two double rows of palm trees shaded her hammock, and five cabanas painted in sunny colors sat just a hundred or so meters from the water.

  The primitive resort was situated on a long beach the color of campfire smoke, about two miles southeast of the fishing village of Santa Catalina. The professor had dropped them off at their cabanas and then gone back into town to find the fisherman he had hired to take them to Coiba tomorrow morning.

  Just offshore, the large waves rolling toward shore reminded Fernanda of why she’d seen so many surfer dudes strutting shirtless around the town when they arrived.

  Carlos had borrowed a bodyboard from the owner of the tiny resort as soon as they’d finished unloading their gear. An hour later, he was still out in the water, hotdogging it with a small group of Canadian surfers on spring break.

  She brushed off the page and started writing again.

  I can’t believe I’ve lived in Panama all my life and have never seen this place. I spoke with David, the owner of the Oasis. (He’s Italian and VERY cute, probably just a few years older than I am.) He says that the property values have gone crazy in the last year, which probably means he’s a rich man. But he doesn’t seem to have much need for money. I suspect he sees the Oasis as a good way to get paid to live here and surf.

  The local fishermen had just returned with their daily catch when we arrived this afternoon. We stopped for a moment in “town” (one road that ends in the Pacific Ocean), and I watched the local kids playing futbol in the street. They were dirty, unkempt, and obviously poor, but they, like their parents, didn’t seem to have a care in the world. Maybe having so little, there isn’t much to worry over. Sometimes I wonder if it wouldn’t be better to have such a simple life. In a way, I envy them.

  Now that the road into town is paved, I’m worried that the big corporations will come in. And if they get their way, they’ll soon destroy this incredible view with a string of high-rise hotels. The professor—Alex—talks about the evils of corporate greed often in his lectures. Papa would have undoubtedly opposed him, having spent years working to build Casa Lerida into a successful company. But Alex has made me look at my upbringing in a whole new light. Our family’s success in the coffee business ensured that we always had more than enough, but what right did we have to live in such luxury on the backs of the poor Guaymi who still work our farms today? I guess I’ve always known that poverty like this existed, but I never thought about it like I have since meeting Alex. He’s a very wise man.

  “Hey, Fernanda.” She looked up to see Zack heading her way.

  “Hey.”

  Zack stopped short of where she was lounging and turned slightly to gaze out across the beach when she sat up. She got the distinct impression he was trying not to look at her. That’s strange. She only noticed because that was the opposite reaction she got from most men.

  “I, uh … I just saw the professor pull in. Didn’t he say something about going out for pizza?”

  She closed her journal and stood up. “I think so. Why don’t you go fetch Carlos, and I’ll change clothes and see if I can wake up Hedi.”

  Zack ran a hand through his blond non-hairdo. “Sounds like a plan.”

  Ten minutes later, Alex, Fernanda, a very sunburned Carlos, and Zack piled into the SUV for the short trip to the local pizza joint.

  “Where’s Hedi?” Carlos asked, his black hair still wet from the surf.

  “She’s not feeling well.” Fernanda shrugged. “I think the long ride down made her a little queasy. She gave me her camera, though, and made me promise to take lots of pictures.”

  “I hope she’s better by tomorrow morning,” Zack said. “She’s going to have a hard enough time carrying that pack without being sick to boot.”

  “We’ll convene after supper and distribute our food and other common gear,” Alex said, as he powered the Rexton up the steep dirt road that led into town. “Regrettably, I was forced to make some last minute changes to our boat plans. The captain I normally use went to Santiago to get a part for his boat and won’t be back until tomorrow afternoon.”

  Fernanda frowned. “Didn’t he know we were coming?”

  “Well, yes. But these things happen in an area without proper communication resources. It’s easily remedied, though. Any of the fishermen in town will gladly take us. A trip to Coiba is much more profitable than fishing all day.”

  A moment later, Alex turned left onto a dirt path and slowed as they passed a gaggle of scruffy surfer dudes.

  “Hey!” Carlos called out the window. “What up, brah!”

  Alex looked puzzled. “Who are those boys?”

  Fernanda smiled and winked at him. “Carlos’s Canadian surfing buddies.”

  The SUV rolled to a stop in front of a small orange house with several thatch-topped umbrellas shading tables arranged about the front yard. A sign with the name Pizza Jamming hung above a walkway that led from the gate up to the side of the house. Lively Reggaeton music emanated from inside.

  “This is a restaurant?” Carlos looked doubtful.

  “What kind of a name is Pizza Jamming?” Zack asked as they got out of the SUV.

  Alex shrugged as he rounded the front of the SUV to Fernanda’s side. “They’ve got a brick oven pizza that’s to die for.”

  “Rock on!” Carlos pushed through the gate, and the rest of the group followed him toward the entrance.

  Fernanda caught the professor’s attention and hung back as Carlos and Zack went inside. “Alex. I’m worried about Hedi. What will we do if she’s sick tomorrow?”

  His confident smile made her feel gooey inside. “We’ll worry about that in the morning.” He touched her elbow lightly with one hand as he motioned toward the entrance with the other. “You look beautiful tonight, Fernanda. Let’s enjoy an evening together, shall we?”

  The way he said it made the evening sound like a date. But something deep inside her didn’t mind.

  The place was packed, though f
ew of the mostly younger crowd looked like locals. The two women who ran the restaurant—one waiting tables and the other behind the bar—weren’t local either. Everyone sported the sort of half-dressed look that seemed to be the norm around here. Fernanda got the feeling that if you lived here, you’d rarely have need for much more than a two-piece.

  The restaurant was open to the yard on three sides, with a brightly painted bar made of concrete strewn with decorative driftwood and seashells. Hammocks hung around the edges of the several picnic tables inside. Party lights strung in the eaves gave the place a festive atmosphere, and shirts and shoes were definitely not required. Even the waitress wore only shorts and a bikini top.

  Once they found an empty table and were seated, Fernanda excused herself and went to wash up. When she returned, the waitress had apparently already taken their drink order, because everyone had a bottle of beer, except for Zack, who sipped a Pepsi.

  “Ah, Fernanda,” Alex said, half standing as she approached. “I took the liberty of ordering you an Atlas. We’ve got some ceviche on the way as well.”

  “Thank you, but I’d prefer water,” she said as politely as possible.

  The professor looked somewhat embarrassed. “Oh, of course. Forgive me.” He turned and beckoned to the waitress. “Agua, por favor.”

  Carlos reached over and helped himself to her beer. “What, you don’t drink either?”

  She gave him a pasted-on smile. “I drink water.”

  “Why, is it a religious thing for you like it is with Saint Zack here?”

  Zack pointed the top of his Pepsi bottle at Carlos. “Saint Zack. That has a nice ring to it.”

  Fernanda was impressed. Under that blond mop, Zack had confidence about himself and his faith. She wished she could be more like that.

  The waitress hurried up carrying a bowl of ceviche in one hand and a small plate of water crackers in the other. Once the appetizer was on the table, Zack and Carlos attacked it while Alex ordered two pizzas for the group in near-perfect Spanish. Then the waitress left.

  Alex pulled a laminated map from his back pocket. “I guess we should review what the schedule looks like tomorrow so we can get everything ready when we return to the Oasis.”

  He spread the map out between them, and they all craned their necks to look at the topographic representation of Isla Coiba.

  “It looks like a big shrimp,” Carlos noted.

  “It doesn’t look that big,” Zack said. “We should be able to cross the island in a day or two, shouldn’t we?”

  The professor chuckled. “Perhaps if it was flat and had no vegetation, but Coiba is eighty-five percent virgin triple-canopy rain forest. Most of it is so dense and steep that prisoners who had escaped into the interior often were never heard from again or came stumbling back to the penal colony a couple of days later, begging to go back to work in the fields.”

  “Wow, you’re kidding.” Zack’s eyes danced. “This is gonna be great!”

  Fernanda thought of the trails she and her friends had hiked around Boquete when she was younger. Since then she’d spent plenty of time in the jungle, but Panama didn’t have many places left that could legitimately be classified as virgin triple canopy. And on Coiba there wouldn’t even be a trail to follow.

  She hadn’t told her mother that the packing list for this trip had specified not one, but two machetes per person. Considering that Señora Lerida would undoubtedly consider it unladylike to be seen near any sort of farm implement.

  Fernanda couldn’t imagine what her mother would say about her daughter hacking through la selva with a three-foot knife. That was why at home Fernanda rarely elaborated about her work.

  Her mother probably imagined her behind a microscope in the lab, when in reality Fernanda’s favorite part of her studies was hanging ninety feet up in a giant ceiba tree, collecting specimens.

  “The boat will first take us to the ranger station, here on the north end,” Alex said, as he pulled out a red pen and pointed out the small encampment at the top of the laminated map.

  At least we won’t be the only people on the island.

  “We’ll spend an hour or so looking around and getting our permits stamped, then continue around the windward side, and put in here, at Playa Hermosa.” He circled the spot with his pen. “I’d like to try to penetrate at least three miles into the rain forest from there. It’s an area farthest from most of the prisoner work camps spread around the edges of the island, which means there are areas that may have never been seen by humans.

  “If we can get some good specimens collected by day three, we should be able to make it back to Playa Hermosa with half a day to relax on the beach before the boat arrives to pick us up.”

  “That sounds awesome, Alex,” Zack said. “What kinds of things do we need to watch for while we’re there?”

  “Well, it’s important to remember that we’re at least a day’s journey from the nearest hospital, so we all need to be very careful. The fer-de-lance is one of the most venomous snakes around, and they are quite common on Coiba. I brought some of the antivenin, though. It’s in the trauma kit. The only problem is that the antivenin itself makes the victim go into anaphylactic shock in about fifty percent of the cases. So let’s make a good effort to scare away any snakes we come across.”

  A shiver crawled up Fernanda’s spine. The standard procedure for treating anaphylactic shock was a strong dose of adrenaline, which posed its own problems. And the professor hadn’t said anything about having that on hand.

  Alex took a sip of his beer. “The crocs won’t be a problem once we get inland. They stay near the salt water. Actually, the one thing to be most careful of is the monkeys.”

  Fernanda’s brow wrinkled. “Monkeys?”

  “Yes, howler monkeys. They won’t hurt you, but they’ll steal anything they can get their hands on. They’re sneaky little buggers. I lost a pair of leather gloves to them last year.”

  Carlos laughed. “So if we wake up and Fernanda’s gone, we know to blame it on the howler monkeys.” He launched into his impression of a primate. She didn’t tell him that it made him look more civilized.

  A warm hand gently rested on her leg beneath the table. Fernanda turned to look at Alex and saw his smile and a barely perceptible wink.

  For a moment, she hesitated, and the tingle in her spine returned. Then, returning his smile, she slid her fingers into his.

  Would this be a night to remember—or regret?

  Hugo sat at the bar brooding as he had for the last three hours, because he had nowhere else to go tonight. The cheap Panama brand beer was weak and nearly tasteless, but he was happy to have it since there had been none at all on the island. But what he really wanted was a hot shower and a comfortable bed.

  He had come to Pizza Jamming specifically because none of the locals did. He didn’t want to talk to any of the fishermen who frequented the other bar in town. Here he could pretend to be just another tourist, though he was obviously Panamanian, and pretend to be interested in perfectly worthless pastimes like the foreigners were.

  Surfing? What’s the point? Paddle out only to be pushed back in. And yet most of the people around him probably paid more for the airfare to get here than he had made in the last ten years. How so many people acquired such wealth baffled him.

  Perhaps one day soon I will know what it is like to be rich.

  Something flashed like lightning. Hugo looked up from his beer to see a beautiful chica taking pictures of her three male companions.

  He studied the girl. She was stunning, and he realized that it wasn’t just beer that he’d been missing on the island. She was tall and athletic, with nicely toned legs and flowing curls of black hair that reached halfway down her back. High cheekbones offset intense green eyes that made Hugo think this was a woman you wouldn’t want mad at you.

  Ah, but with those lips, what fun it would be making up!

  Alas, it looked as if the goddess was already spoken for. The two young men at the t
able probably wouldn’t know how to treat such a woman. But the older man—the one with the salt-and-pepper goatee—he looked at her as Hugo himself did, but with an obvious air of smugness that showed he had what he wanted, or soon would.

  Hugo swallowed the rest of his beer in one gulp. No matter, he would be gone by early morning anyhow. He must catch the first bus to Santiago and be back with the needed supplies in time to make it back to the island before darkness fell. He had better get some sleep.

  Rising from his stool, he turned to go, then stopped abruptly. What was that map the man with the goatee had spread before him?

  As nonchalantly as possible, Hugo sauntered toward the restroom, catching a better look at the map as he passed their table.

  Coiba! It wasn’t so much the presence of the map that made his blood run cold, however.

  It was the location of the red circle.

  He might stay out tonight later than he had hoped. Unfortunately, though, his only companions would be other locals waiting in line to use the phone.

  The Oasis. 2130 hours

  A SLIGHT GUST of wind from offshore started the palm trees swaying in the darkness as Fernanda left the large open-air eating area at the Oasis. She’d spent the past hour talking with Zack and David, the owner of the resort.

  Though the sun had been down for at least two hours, the sandy path leading to the beach was still warm, and it felt good on Fernanda’s bare feet. In that time, the air temperature had dropped at least fifteen degrees, giving her goose bumps. She wished she had packed something to put over the thin white blouse she wore.

  She’d lost track of time. She planned to go to bed early and only went to see David to buy an extra bottle of water. Zack was there, watching a movie via satellite, and they got to talking. Soon David emerged from the kitchen and sat on one of the comfortable wicker couches. Before long the movie lost out to the more interesting conversation. Fernanda was impressed with Zack’s travel experience. Since the age of eight, he had accompanied his physician father on medical mission trips around the world.