The Terrible Ones

by Nick Carter

  The passage branched again. Nick groaned to himself and Paula sighed beside him.

  “You take one and I the other,” she whispered.

  “No! We stay together. I don’t want to have to hunt for you as well. Shall we try for straight ahead?”

  She was silent for a moment. Then she said: “You’re right. It’s useless. We need more help. I told you—”

  “Oh, for Chrissake, cut that out,” Nick said wearily. “Let’s get out of here and . . .” He stopped. His senses tingled and his body went taut. Paula stiffened beside him.

  “What is it?”

  “Listen!”

  They both listened.

  The sound came again. It was a long, low, snuffling snore. A growl. Silence. And again a snore.

  “We’ll take a look,” Nick said softly, and glided straight ahead. Paula’s breath quickened as she followed him.

  Behind them, at the end of the branch-off passage, Tsing-fu contemplated the smoke of his cigarillo and planned his forthcoming session with Evita.

  And outside under the moonless sky Tom Kee’s weary horse toiled toward the end of the trail.

  Shang stirred in his anteroom. He was not yet quite awake, but he had heard a footfall. He mumbled in his sleep.

  Nick followed the curve of the passage in the direction of the sound and pulled up short. A soft light spilled from a room with a half-open door, and beyond that door someone was snuffling in his sleep. And also beyond the door . . . there was another door. He could see it from where he stood, a solid, closed door with a bolt across it. His pulse quickened. None of the other doors had been bolted shut. And none of the other doors had been guarded by a snoring man.

  He glanced at Paula in the overflow of light. She was staring at the bolted door and her lips were parted. There was nothing of hardness in her face right now; only a kind of Oh God, Please, God, look that suddenly made him like her a whole lot more. He raised a restraining hand and slipped Wilhelmina from the special holster, a Wilhelmina made long and clumsy by the silencer he so seldom used.

  Nick sidled into the cell-like room and all hell broke loose.

  He had no sooner seen the incredibly mountainous form and raised the Luger when the vast shape rose with fantastic speed and leapt at him from the shadows. His head slammed back against a wall and Wilhelmina flew from his hands. An enormous bare foot slammed against his throat as he sprawled back against the death-cold stone and saw lights dancing where he vaguely knew there were none. Beyond the splintering lights and the red haze he saw Paula aiming her own tiny gun at the huge blubber ball, and then he saw the creature turn and swat the pistol from her hand. Nick gulped air and shook his head. The creature had its arms around her and was squeezing her with monstrous enjoyment, crushing her slim body against his own rolls of fat and muscle and grunting with hideous delight. Nick scrabbled groggily to his feet and slid Hugo from his sheath. He pounded at the fat back, thrusting Hugo in front of him like a tiny bayonet and driving it deep into a roll of flesh. The huge man-monster released one thick arm from Paula and slammed a piledriver of a hand into Nick’s face. Nick ducked and groped for Hugo, still quivering in the big man’s body, and raked the stiletto down sharply so that it tore a deep gash in the fat behind.

  The monster turned on him in a lightning move and thrust out a hand formed into an axe-blade. It glanced off Nick’s shoulder blade as he sidestepped, but Nick knew it for what it was—a karate blow designed for instant killing. He spun on the balls of his feet and shot out his right leg in a savage kick that caught the fat one under the chin and stopped him for the length of one deep breath. Hugo dropped from his bed of fat and clattered to the floor. Nick lunged for it.

  “Ah, no!” A tree trunk of a leg kicked him aside. He caught the kicking foot and jerked it savagely. It swung him through the air and flung him back against the wall. But this time he was ready for the fall. He rolled back on his hips and snapped both feet up and forward into the great bulk looming over him. The creature staggered backwards but stayed on its feet.

  “Ah, no,” it said again. “You not do that to me. I am Shang! You not do that to Shang.”

  “How do you do, Shang,” Nick said cordially, and sprang at him with a hand outstretched like a wedge of steel. It sank into Shang’s throat and came back at him like a boomerang.

  Godalmighty! Nick thought, reeling back. The fat swine knows every trick of karate, and a couple more besides.

  Shang was coming at him again. No—he was pausing. A great hand scooped Paula off the floor where she was reaching for a gun and flung her sideways. She landed in a crumpled heap. Nick leapt again, driving a vicious blow at the temple and another into the fat gut. Shang grunted and slapped his great palm against Nick’s head. Nick went down heavily, rolled over once, and came up panting. Shang was standing over him, thick arms outstretched, just waiting.

  Tsing-fu frowned. He had given explicit orders that the men were not to talk while they were working, but now he heard their voices. Did he? He listened carefully. No. Nothing. Still, it was time to check on them and see what they were doing. And it was high time that Tom Kee returned. He stamped out his cigarillo and reached for his flashlight.

  Nick rolled again and bounded to his feet. Shang grinned like an ape and swung a huge paw at him. Nick dodged and felt the half-blow smashing past his ribs. He backed away and unleashed a kick that landed full against its tender target between the trunklike legs. Another man would have doubled up and screamed. Shang yelped and fell into a crouch, fat arms reaching out to bearhug Nick around the knees. He caught one of them only; the other crumpled up underneath his chin and rocked him backwards like a bobbing balloon.

  Shang laughed low in his throat. “You are insect,” he growled softly.

  Nick felt like one. He stung again with a chest stab that sank into a cushion of fat and made the giant laugh again.

  “Ho, see! I use club on you,” he rumbled. He reached down swiftly and grasped Paula by the ankles. She was less than half-conscious and her feeble squirm meant nothing to him; he swung her a couple of times like a baseball bat, picked up momentum, and struck at Nick with her helpless body—a Neanderthal using a woman as a club. He let go at impact and chuckled to himself.

  Nick absorbed most of the weight and impetus with his outstretched arms, cushioning the impact for both of them. But he could not keep his balance and he went down beneath her, cursing quietly. The hairless ape came at him crabwise as he rolled free, swinging out a great leg in a side kick that could have scrambled Nick’s brain like raw egg if it landed. It didn’t land. Nick twisted away and saw the giant’s foot come down awkwardly, slightly off-balance, and he struck out viciously with his own legs. One foot slammed hard against one padded shin; the other snaked around behind the other thick leg and gave a mighty jerk. The man-monster went down with a grunting thud and tried to rise. Nick bulldozed a kick at the groin and leapfrogged up, swinging a booted foot even as he leapt. This time the blow sledge-hammered against the side of the thick skull and Shang’s head jerked like a punching bag.

  It was cat and mouse no longer. Shang wasn’t playing any more and the slashing kick had barely dazed him. But it had helped. Shang clawed widely upward with one hammy hand and missed his target by inches. Nick backed away as Shang started to rise, and he leapt again as high as he could and then down with all his weight upon the bulging belly. He heard the ribs cracking and he jumped again, grinding his feet deep into the fat and the ribs and the guts. Breath wheezed and grunted out of the blubbery form beneath him.

  Not very cricket, Nick told himself, and slammed down again with all his weight. His heels ground down in a pulverizing motion, churning savagely into the breastplate, into the heart, into the thickly muscled abdomen. Shang’s flailing arms brushed past his legs and plucked at them uselessly.

  There was a hideous squelching, scrunching sound. Shang lay very still.

  Nick bounced off his human trampoline. Paula, he saw from the corner of his eye, was on her
feet and moving groggily toward the barred inner door. He looked down at the horrible mess he had made of the monstrous man and felt nauseated. Shang was very dead, and he had died painfully. Nick scooped up Hugo and the fallen guns and followed Paula into the dark cell. She flicked the flashlight’s beam into the corner.

  A woman lay huddled on a stone bed, trussed with cord, eyes wide with terror in a gaunt face with oddly swollen lips.

  Paula ran to her crooning like a mother who had found a long-lost child.

  “Evita, Evita! It’s Paula! Don’t be afraid. We’ll get you out of here.”

  “Paula! Oh, Paula . . . .” It was a cracked whisper that became a sob.

  Nick let them croon together for a moment while he glanced around the cell and listened for other sounds. There was no way out but the way they had come and no sound of anyone approaching. Yet. He reached into an inner hip pocket and padded toward the women.

  “Here,” he said, uncorking the flask. “Drink, and we’ll go.”‘ Paula took it from him and held it to Evita’s parched lips.

  Her eyes were still startled but she drank obediently. Nick slashed at the cords that bound her and felt for her pulse. She was in bad shape. But she would make it if they hurried. He saw the burns and the other marks of torture and swore to himself that he would get her out of here no matter what.

  “Know your way back, Paula?” he whispered.

  She looked at him and slowly shook her head.

  “I’m sorry. I’m not sure. Do you?”

  He nodded. “I think so. I’ll carry her. You stick close behind and be on guard. Evita?” He touched the girl gently. “Just hold on to me. That’s all you have to do.”

  “Tired“ she whispered. “May not make it. Tell you first . . . Paula, listen. Listen! Padilla’s clue . . . The Castle of the Blacks. But he also said . . . it’s not far from Domingo. Chinese wrong. It’s not in Haiti. Understand? Not in Haiti. And he also said . . .” She gave a little sigh and fell back limp.

  A Brightness in the Night

  Paula groaned with anguish. “She’s gone!” she whispered.

  “She’s not.” Nick bent swiftly and cradled Evita in his arms as though she were a child. “Passed out, and just as well. Kill that lantern out there and follow me like a leech. Don’t lose me—but if anything happens, it’s two lefts and a right, another left and a right, and run like hell. If there’s trouble, don’t wait for me. I won’t wait for you. Understand? Let’s go.”

  He carried his slight burden into the anteroom, stepped over the trunklike legs of the mangled Shang, and waited briefly in the doorway while Paula doused the light. Then he padded swiftly into the corridor, probing the darkness with the eyes of his mind and keeping close to the wall. The back of his neck bristled with warnings but he had no choice of action. It was go and keep going, and that was all, until something stopped them.

  Dr. Tsing-fu Shu stood in the darkness at the corner of the corridor leading to his office. He had heard something; he was sure of it. And the men were not responsible. They were working with their usual impassive silence, hammering and digging, but not talking.

  Shang? Impossible. Nevertheless . . .

  hen there was that word “Fidelistas.” It kept whispering in his mind, and echo of the girl’s cracked voice. Fidelistas . . . ?

  Now, right now, he would get the truth from her.

  His thoughts were full of Fidelistas as he snapped on his flashlight and jabbed its beam into the cross-corridor ahead, the one leading to her cell. He gasped involuntarily.

  Crossing the broad beam of light and disappearing into the shadows beyond was a tall, bearded man in Castro-like fatigues—carrying the girl!

  A cry of outrage and alarm rose in his throat as he sprang forward and grasped the gun he so seldom had to use.

  Light blazed across Nick’s face. He shifted the girl’s weight to one side and half-turned on the balls of his feet to kick out sideways at the figure behind the light. His foot connected with the hidden shin and at the same time he heard a plop! of sound and the light went out. The shriek of rage curved downward to the floor and then there was another splat of sound and a crumpling thud. Paula was busy with that little silencer, he thought with grim satisfaction, and paused to prod the dark shape with his foot. It lay still.

  “C’mon!” he whispered urgently, and padded on.

  Paula hesitated for a moment and then followed him.

  The digging sounds had stopped. Someone was shouting. from a corridor nearby. Nick made a swift left turn, ran on, made another.

  “Paula?” he hissed.

  “Coming!”

  He turned right. There were running footsteps after him, and they weren’t only Paula’s. They were close—too close. He made the next left and they faded, all but Paula’s. The girl was getting heavy. Nick shifted his grip and made the last right turn. The footfalls were loud again and another voice was shouting.

  He ran full-tilt into the stone corner of a doorway. The girl moaned and Nick cursed. Paula brushed past him and he could hear her moving the loose trapdoor they had opened an hour or two before.

  “Lower her to me!” she breathed. “Lower her— I’ll get her down the ladder.”

  The trap was wide open and the girl was halfway down when the two men burst into the cellar. Nick ducked into the hole and lunged for Wilhelmina. A light shone full into his face and blinded him but he trained the Luger to the right of the reflector and above it and fired three shots in succession. Bullets slapped the stone around him and one skimmed past his ear. Wilhelmina’s answering volley splintered the bobbing flashlight and kicked the flashlight’s owner in the chest. The second man held fire. Behind him, Nick could hear Paula easing the tortured girl down the narrow ladder. A shot tore through his sleeve and he fired back at the little tongue of flame and then again and again at where he thought the head and chest must be. Something dropped heavily and he waited for a moment. Footsteps thundered dully in the passages beyond. But there was silence in the room with him. He slid quickly down the ladder and pulled the trapdoor shut above his head.

  He flicked his pencil flashlight on for just long enough to see Paula struggling in the low-ceilinged passage with the girl’s dead-weight.

  “I’ll take her,” he breathed. “Get going and get those nags unhitched. But fast!” He clutched Evita’s limp form as gently as he could and draped it over his crouched back. Then he crawled—crawled as fast as a man could crawl on a floor of dried moss and worn stones, with a low ceiling over his head and a half-dead woman weighing him down. In front of him he could hear Paula scrabbling over the rough floor and heading for the conduit exit. And behind him there was a blessed silence.

  Tsing-fu staggered to his feet and clasped his aching head. His hand came away sticky with blood. His dazed mind could not at once grasp what had happened but he knew that it was catastrophic. He opened his mouth to scream but no sound came. His hands groped about on the floor beside him and found a broken flashlight. Then a gun. He clawed at it, found a trigger, and fired. The sound rocketed against the walls. Then he sank back into unconsciousness. But before the curtain dropped over his mind he heard someone running toward him, and a voice shouting in Chinese. Hurry, you swine! he thought vaguely, and blacked into a nightmare of escaping Fidelistas.

  Tom Kee dismounted in the palm grove and hastened toward the tunnel entrance. And stopped. Something was stirring in the mahogany stand. He froze where he stood, hearing leaves rustling in the windless night and the soft stomping of horses that should not have been there, and he turned toward the tall trees on his cat-burglar’s feet. For a moment he forgot all about the urgency of his message to Tsing-fu, and the doctor’s need for his help with the metal-detector. All he could think of was that there was movement in the mahogany grove, dangerously close to the castle. He flitted through the trees and pulled up short to stare into the gloom.

  Two figures were helping a third one onto a horse. One of them mounted the same horse and held the limp f
igure in a close embrace. Then the other mounted the second horse, and the two horses started moving quietly through the trees toward the trail downhill.

  There was no moon, but there was some starlight. And as the two horses moved through a narrow clearing toward the path Tom Kee caught a glimpse of the girl Evita. He also saw the two riders before the branches hid them, and though he did not recognize them he knew they were not Tsing-fu’s people.

  Hooves clip-clopped lightly on the trail and picked up speed. He turned and raced back to his own mount and led it to the path. Then he followed, first at a careful distance because there were few other riders about and then more closely as he began to meet pedestrians and peasant carts further down the slope. Once in a while he held back and drew off to the side of the road so that the sound of his hoofbeats would not be so constant that the riders ahead would notice him. He thought he saw one of them turn occasionally to glance back over his shoulder, but they went on riding at a steady pace. Now they were galloping. Tom Kee slouched low on his horse with his head bent down, as he had seen the peasants do, and he began to gallop too.

  “Got a spare bed, Jacques?” Nick tramped in with his burden and Paula quickly closed the kitchen door behind them.

  “You found her!” Jacques’ eyes gleamed with pleasure in his dark face. “But mon Dieu! She has been most terribly treated! Bring her in here at once. Marie!”

  His pretty young wife appeared in the doorway and took in the situation at a glance. “The bed is ready,” she said crisply. “Bring her this way, please. Paula, you help me undress her and we will see what she needs first. Jacques, you light the stove. Monsieur, put her down right here. So. Now leave, please.”