Assignment - Ceylon

by Edward S. Aarons

  “What injection?”

  “A drug of my own concoction.” Sinn smiled grimly. The strange obsidian eyes, like the eyes of some demon straight from hell, told Durell nothing. “The drug will be fatal in forty-eight hours. If Wells can return with your body then, he gets an antidote and lives. If he fails, he dies, anyway.”

  Durell stared at the fat man. Wells stirred at last and smiled. Durell said. “Is it true, Willie?”

  “It’s true. I think I can take you, Cajun.”

  “In forty-eight hours?”

  “Less than that, I hope.”

  “You accepted his drug?”

  “You heard him. In I bring your carcass in, I get the antidote and I’m safe. I work for him.”

  “And if I hold out longer?”

  Wells shrugged. “Then I’m a dead man. I was sent out to get you—orders directly from our mutual boss, Dickinson McFee. The little man was so mad at you for selling out, or for what he thought was a sellout, he decided you couldn’t be left running loose. So things have changed. We didn’t have all the factors then. We didn’t know about Dr. Sinn. But that’s the deal. It’s you or me. One of us lives.” Durell turned back to Dr. Sinn.

  “How much of a start do I have?”

  “Ten minutes. Madame Aspara is waiting outside for you. The guard there will give you a knife. Your ten minutes,” Sinn said, “begin right now.”

  nineteen

  He did not seem to be hurrying as he went down the broad staircase and was ushered to the rear by the guards. After the long hours in the cell, the light outside struck him with blinding force. Waves of shimmering heat engulfed him. He saw Aspara waiting below the terrace. They had given her shorts and sandals and a white shirt. He didn’t like the white shirt. It would reflect light, be easily spotted. He realized he was already thinking in terms of the hunted, of being the quarry. No use wondering why Dr. Sinn had given Aspara into this game. The woman meant nothing to the fat man. Perhaps Sinn was amused by adding this handicap to everything else. He would have to think in other terms, Durell decided. He had to think of turning everything, anything, to his own advantage. Overlook nothing, miss no chance, no opportunity, to survive.

  He began to appreciate the fat man’s irony. Dr. Mouquerana Sinn was playing on his one weakness—or so he thought. The drive, the will to survive. He had brought it all down to elemental basics. Kill or be killed. It was primitive but effective.

  “Dear Sam—”

  “Do you know what’s going on?” he asked harshly.

  “Yes. But I cannot believe it—”

  “You had better.” He turned to the guard. “I’m supposed to have a knife.”

  “Djamana,” the man said. He gave Durell a sheathed hunting knife. “You had better start running.”

  “Sam—” Aspara began again.

  “You heard the man. Run.”

  He pulled at her arm, but she hung back, her face pale, her mouth taut. “No. I’d only be responsible for your death. I’d slow you down. I can’t do it.”

  “You used to hunt a little, didn’t you?”

  “Long ago. As a young girl. We went to India—”

  “Then let’s go.”

  “But you needn’t help me—”

  “Come,” he insisted.

  She drew free and turned with him without looking back at the ruined palace. A footpath led down from the terrace toward a tall brake of wild bamboo. He ran quickly, seeking cover first, and the girl kept up with him in the heat, pacing herself with a light-footed speed that made her footfalls silent. In the bamboo, the path turned right, heading for the shoreline about half a mile away. He followed it, with Aspara behind him, and the bamboo soon gave way to a tangle of vines and shrubs. Another footpath crossed the first, and he turned left to head parallel to the shore, to where he had spotted the deserted village. Maybe something useful had been left there, somehow— something he could use as a weapon. Insects surged after them in thick, stinging clouds. The vines and creepers closed over their heads, making the path a ^dark-green, suffocating tunnel. He couldn’t see the palace from here. Which, in turn, meant he couldn’t be seen from there. He wished he had a watch. But when he judged that ten minutes had passed, he stepped off the footpath toward a dense patch of mangrove off to the right, closer to the shore.

  “We’ll go this way,” he told Aspara. “We can’t make a sound from here on. Do you understand?”

  She nodded, breathing lightly from their sprint. “He has a rifle?”

  “Yes.”

  “Would he really use it?”

  ‘'He’ll use it. He must, or he’ll never get the antidote to Sum’s poison that’s in his system.”

  “And you? Will you kill him, if you can? He’s an American, a countryman—

  “That makes no difference now.”

  “But will you kill him?”

  He said, “If I can, yes. Don’t talk now. Watch for my hand signals.”

  She nodded, swallowing. “What do we do for water? And food?”

  “Later.”

  He turned away into the mangroves. Dark-green and black saltwater surged around the twisting, gnarled roots of the bushes. He stepped from one to the other, moving toward the beach. Aspara followed close behind. He estimated that Wells had started after him now. He could hear the lap of the tiny surf ahead and moved faster, ducking, twisting his body to avoid breaking any branches. He did not know how good a tracker Wells might be. Assume the best. Or worst. He really knew little of the man’s characteristics. Dogged, yes. His abilities as a fighting man had been honed sharp by his service as a mercenary in Africa. He found a small muddy ridge and started to step on it, then drew back, reluctant to leave prints. Aspara halted behind him.

  “I can hear someone,” she breathed in his ear.

  “He can’t have followed this fast.”

  “It’s someone.”

  He listened. He heard the beat of his pulse in his ear and drew in a long, slow breath of the sticky, humid sea air. He heard the lap and purl of the tropical tide on the sliver of sand ahead. Somewhere above and behind him, a branch broke. It was an animal. It had to be an animal.

  He signaled to Aspara to follow him. She looked hesitant, appalled. “Come on.”

  On the beach, he ran in the shallow water alongside the mangroves, spotting coconut palms ahead, perhaps a quarter of a mile away. The wall of mangroves screened them from the shore. Aspara ran lightly beside him through the shoals.

  “Where?” she gasped. “For what?”

  “You’ll see. Save your breath.”

  They made it to the palm trees and turned inland across thick, rotting humus, cut across the point, came out through a cluster of wild oleander shrubs at the edge of the deserted fishing village. There were only half a dozen houses built with thatched roofs and eaves like ships’ prows, in Malay style. He pushed Aspara down until they crouched in the shelter of the greenery, watching. He couldn’t spot anyone. Beyond the little cluster of houses were the two fishing boats on the beach. He looked back up to the solitary knoll that crowned the island, where the palace stood. He could just make out the top of its walls above the jungle growth between them. Something flickered there, like glass reflecting sunlight. Was Mouquerana Sinn watching, waiting, enjoying the game he had begun? But it was not a game, Durell thought. It was in deadly earnest. He felt a little stir of warm air against his face. Already his mouth felt parched. But there would have to be a spring or a stream nearby, to account for the little fishing village that had once been established here.

  “Sam—dear Sam,” Aspara whispered. “What are we going to do?”

  “Find a safe place to hide,” he suggested. “No point in trying to run around and around the island for the next two days. We’ll snug down and let him come to us. Force him to make the move.”

  “He’s clever and dangerous. If he finds us—”

  “Then I’ll be waiting,” he said.

  But not like this, he thought. Not with just the knife.
He needed other tools, other weapons for survival. His mind moved ahead, considering the problems, turning it this way and that. He looked back and saw nothing but the wall of greenery, the narrow strip of sand, the nodding palms, the more distant mangroves they had just traversed. The smell of swamp mud touched his nostrils. A small breeze moved along his cheek, but it was as hot as the touch of an iron. On the still, placid sea, he saw a vagrant cat’s paw, and then it disappeared. When he drew a deep breath, it was like swallowing molten iron.

  “Let’s go.”

  The nearest fisherman’s house from the shelter of the oleanders was about fifty feet away. He got up and ran across the debris, with Aspara at his side. They reached the shadows of the far wall and threw themselves down in the deep shade cast by the westering sun. Nothing happened. A fish jumped in the sea nearby, splashing lightly, leaving widening circles of ripples. Another touch of hot, scorching breeze moved across his face. He eased forward on his belly, came up to the ladder that led into the sagging stilt house, and signaled Aspara to stay behind. He climbed fast, ducked inside. A smell of death and decay smote his nostrils. A dead dog lay in the back of the one-room house. The village had been vacated in a hurry, which was what he had hoped for. There was a clay oven for charcoal, an empty five-gallon can, a single ragged blanket. Mice scurried in the rotting thatchwork overhead. He picked up the can and the blanket, searched for a weapon, found nothing suitable, and climbed down again.

  Aspara watched the line of brush beyond the house. “I thought I saw something.”

  “Where?”

  “There. But I’m not sure. Maybe it was a bird.”

  “Maybe.”

  He went through the village quickly, wasting no time. He had the feeling that Wells would try to get this over with in one fast effort, before settling down to the tedium of patient tracking and hunting later. The high-prowed boats on the beach on the other side of the village were all hulks, partly charred by deliberate fires, with holes stove in their sides. Useless. He looked for canoes, outriggers, in the brush. Nothing. He found an old paddle of solid teak, which he thought he could use as a club. He gave it to Aspara to carry for him. She took the blanket and the five-gallon can too, leaving his hands free for the knife, if necessary. The whole place, silently brooding in the heat of late afternoon, smelled of death. He didn’t like it. It made him uneasy. He let himself think with his instincts, his belly, rather than his brain. It was a primitive situation. He needed primitive reactions.

  The last boat on the beach looked more promising. He ran across to it, halted in its shadow, glanced again at the dense foliage that fringed this eastern shore of the island; then he vaulted aboard. There was some old fishnetting, which he took, and then a heap of line, which he quickly coiled in a large loop and slung over his bare shoulder.

  As he straightened beside the leaning mast on the beached boat, the first shot slammed into the rotted wood and showered splinters over his shoulders and face.

  twenty

  His reaction was swift and sure and powerful. His first leap took him to the far side of the canted boat. He heard the report of the first shot a split second after the slug hit. The second shot tore a chunk of the boat’s old railing as he vaulted over it and dropped to the sand and warm shallow water beneath. He fell to his knees, scraped his right leg on a plank lying in the sand, and called, “Aspara?”

  “I am here.”

  “Can you get around the stern?”

  “Yes. Where is he?”

  “Some distance away. Maybe up a tree.”

  The sun was in his eyes as he searched the low profile of the island’s growth. The third shot smacked harmlessly into the sand near the boat’s high prow on the beach. Aspara came scrambling through the water around the stern and dropped, gasping, on the sand beside him.

  “Are you all right?”

  “He missed. Overeager. Too sure of himself.”

  “Can you see him?”

  “No.”

  He measured the distance to the fringe of brush and coconut palms beyond the narrow strip of sand. There was a small rift in the wall of green bushes, and then he saw the slight glimmer of water running in a tiny stream behind one of the leaning stilt houses. His guess had been correct. The fishermen who had lived here before Mouquerana Sinn took over the island would have settled near fresh water. He had to fill that five-gallon can, he thought. He lay still, and listened, and let his instincts command.

  “Is he coming?” Aspara whispered. “Does he think he hit you?”

  “We’ll soon find out. Stay here.”

  “He—he didn’t fire at me, Sam. He could have hit me. I was exposed to him on the other side of the boat.”

  “That’s right, but—”

  “Let me go first,” she urged. “Maybe he won’t consider me as his target.”

  Three shots suddenly slammed in rapid succession into the sand near the bow of the boat that sheltered them. The reports of the high-powered rifle sounded about a quarter of a mile away. As the last echo died, Durell gathered himself and raced for the line of darkly shadowed foliage. He was almost there when another shot caught him. He felt a tug at his ankle, tripped, fell, rolled over and over, and came up in the thick, prickly undergrowth. He looked back and saw Aspara running after him, carrying the blanket and tin can, her hips swaying in the awkward way that women run. No shots followed her. His ankle burned, and he flexed his leg and saw blood over his foot and swore softly.

  “Oh, Sam . . .”

  “It’s all right. Just a scratch. A nick.”

  With the foliage hiding them, they made it to the little stream without any further attack. Durell washed his ankle and saw that the wound was truly only superficial, but it would be painful later. Then he helped Aspara rig a length of the rope around the tin can as a shoulder strap with which to carry then water easily. He did not stop to drink until he had arranged the line and the netting and the blanket in a tight pack that he could sling over his shoulder. He gave the broken piece of paddle back to Aspara, to carry as a club.

  “Sam, I—I feel desperate.”

  “No more desperate than Willie Wells, remember. He has that poison in him. He knows that Sinn will show him no pity if he falls.”

  “It’s like a nightmare.”

  “Worse.” He tried to grin. “It’s for real.”

  Her face was pale. Her large, dark eyes showed signs of fatigue already. He looked at the sun and judged there were still more than two hours before the sudden tropic night came to help them. He put his hand under her elbow and helped her to her feet. Her body swayed against him, and he felt the warmth and softness of her and remembered the poya nights they had shared. He knew that she was remembering too, and he softened his voice.

  “We’ll look for a place to hole up now. He’ll be heading this way, but he’ll be careful, worrying about what we might have picked up here. He won’t be so sure of himself now, and that will slow him down.”

  He started off, following the little stream, walking on the flat stones and in the sandy shallows, carefully pushing through the vines and creepers that made a tunnel out of the route. Insects plagued them, biting and stinging, swarming in increasing numbers as evening drew near, getting in their eyes and ears. Every few steps he paused to listen, but there was no sign that Wells was close by. The little stream went only a short distance and ended in a low-lying swampy area that seemed to extend all across the northern perimeter of the island. He recalled that the junk that had brought them here from Ceylon had landed on the southwest shore, which had been forested. The swamp here was a problem. The mud clung to their feet, sucking them backward, making Aspara slip, fall, and stumble. Each step of the way was a struggle against the tangled vines that closed in around them. Now and then he had to use the knife to hack a passage through the barriers ahead.

  Every fifty paces he paused to look back and listen. But the swamp was full of small sounds from the creatures that lived here, large and small, birds and amphibians, and he
could not tell if any of the noises behind them might be the sounds of Wells’ passage after them. He swore softly. The sun was only a dim guide through the leafy canopy overhead. The smells of the swamp were nauseating.

  Then suddenly he came upon a rotting plank walk among the mangrove roots, a path that someone had laid down many years ago. The local people that Sinn had eliminated, he thought. He stood up on the end of the walk and paused to .pull the girl up after him. She looked exhausted, covered with mud, scratched by branches, bitten by the myriad insects that swarmed hungrily around them when they stopped and which followed them in eager clouds when they pressed on.

  “Sam . . . ”

  “It’s all right. We’ll find ourselves some cover before dark.”

  “I feel he’s right behind us, or ahead of us, all around us.”

  “He’s only one man,” Durell said.

  “But he has the rifle.”

  “We’ll manage.”

  Aspara wondered at Durell’s confidence. She knew she was disheveled and probably ugly-looking in his eyes at this moment, and she pondered this man, to whom she had made love on two occasions now. She had accepted him, although she knew he would come and go, that nothing was permanent with him; this big man, for all his capacities, his strength and tenderness, his brutality and sentiment, was essentially homeless, a wanderer, and yet he was at home anywhere in the world, able to adjust, to blend with his surroundings, capable of dealing with enemies both natural and man-made in just about any environment.

  She both envied and resented him. Long ago, as a small girl, she remembered going on a tiger hunt with her father, in India, and she never forgot how the huge beast had led them deeper and deeper into the dark forests, knowing the way, moving with powerful, machinelike precision, only occasionally glimpsed, with those great green malevolent eyes. Durell, this big, brutal, lithe man, was like that tiger. He seemed to enjoy being hunted, playing this terrible game, pitting his wit and his strength, his cunning and his training, against an enemy possessed of overwhelming odds in the hunting rifle. Overwhelming? She remembered how the huge beast had suddenly sprung, out of a darkness that was nowhere, and took her father down, clawing, growling, the huge fangs ripping at her father’s throat, releasing the life blood in a great red gushing torrent. . . .