Return to Skull Island

by Ron Miller

  “I can’t speak for the others,” I said, glancing at Pat, who gave an almost imperceptible nod, “but so far as Miss Wildman and I are concerned, you have our word.”

  *****

  On our second day out, I’d decided to take a look at the hold, to see if I could figure out what was in some of the crates the Japs had loaded. There seemed to me to be far more supplies that even a small army could consume. When I entered the main hold, I was astonished at what I saw. Ito’s men, who had now changed into naval uniforms, had already been unpacking several of the larger crates. There, in the center of the hold, was a half-assembled miniature tank. Elsewhere, men were unpacking and inventorying rifles, machine guns, boxes of ammunition and God knows what else.

  “Looks like your dinosaurs aren’t going to stand a chance,” said Pat, who had come up behind me.

  “I have to admit I wish I’d had half this fire power a year ago. I wouldn’t have lost the men I did.”

  “Well, how could you have known?”

  “True enough, but I still think about those boys.”

  “Ito’s got some kind of pull,” Pat said, sticking her thumb at the tank. It was a little thing, I noticed, maybe fourteen feet long, six wide and seven high. “That’s the latest model, a Type 95 Ha-Go. It’s so new that’s probably a prototype sitting there.”

  “How do you know all this?”

  “Good heavens, Carl, you need to get around more.”

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  While I could have cut the tension on board the Venture with a butter knife, things went along more smoothly than I would have expected during the following week. Everyone knew their job and did it—though Englehorn’s crew made no effort to hide their contempt for the Japs. Still, no one caused any serious trouble, no doubt because of the cash reward they knew was waiting at the end of the trip. The crew might have been patriotic but they were also practical.

  We were steaming through the Strait of Malacca, with the Indian Ocean not far ahead. That’s all I was willing to tell Ito: that the island was somewhere west of Sumatra, figuring there was no good reason to give him the exact location until he needed it and every reason not to. There was no need for intimidation or threats. Ito knew he’d get the information eventually. It might have frustrated him, but if it kept him awake at nights he didn’t show it and I didn’t care.

  The weather was fine, the waters of the Strait were smooth and we were making something like eight or ten knots. We were in the narrowest part of the Strait. A mile or so to the south was the almost uninhabited, swampy coast of Sumatra. About thirty miles north was the small town of Port Dickson. Obeying Ito’s orders, Englehorn had been carefully avoiding contact with any inhabited areas since leaving Japan. He wanted no one asking questions regarding our destination.

  Buck, Andrews, Pat and I passed the time playing poker or swapping stories. The two adventurers seemed to get along with Ito and his men. But they’d had a lot of experience dealing with foreigners, especially Orientals, and approached the whole affair pragmatically. We feigned a spirit of camaraderie and good sportsmanship and invited Ito to join us. As we’d figured, he was no match for four hard-boiled American cardsharps (Pat showed us some stunts that would have put Dai Vernon to shame) and, soon enough, begged off future invitations and left us strictly alone.

  So every evening we made a point of meeting in one of our cabins where we’d split a bottle of bourbon and talk about ourselves. I’d known Frank for some time, of course, our paths having crossed many times. Neither Pat nor I had ever met Andrews before, though he and Frank were old chums. Pat was an unknown to all three of us, though Frank and Roy wasted no time in trying to remedy that. Fat lot of good it will do them, I thought smugly.

  Buck talked about the practical aspects of bagging a live dinosaur and transporting it to Europe or the States.

  Although Nakayama had called Buck a “big-game hunter,” the truth was that the dapper American’s reputation had been built on his success at capturing live animals for circuses and zoos. Hence his famous nickname: “Bring-’em-Back-Alive.” He talked incessantly about the exhibition of prehistoric creatures he was going to create at the coming World’s Fair in New York.

  “It’s too late for the Century of Progress exposition,” he lamented. “My ‘Jungle Camp’ is already up and running. Had nearly a million see it already. But that’ll be peanuts compared to the show I’m going to put on in old New York!”

  I could have told him something about importing prehistoric monsters to New York, but he’d been somewhere in the middle of the Malay Peninsula when I’d had my troubles with Kong, so it all seemed a little abstract to him. I was pretty sure he suspected me of exaggerating the danger as a kind of dare.

  I did find we shared an interest in movies. I told him how much I’d admired “Bring ‘em Back Alive”, a film he’d recently released, and we spent a lot of time comparing notes.

  “It’s been a big hit,” Buck said, “but I don’t know if I really want to get into pictures. At least not that kind again. Nearly lost my cameraman to a hungry python.”

  I told him that I’d lost my cameraman to a hungry brontosaurus and he just chewed on his cigar.

  Andrews was a little harder to warm up to. Not because he was a bad sort or anything like that. It was just that unlike Buck or me he was a real scientist, even if he was an outdoorsman and adventurer at heart. About ten years ago he’d run across the first fossil dinosaur eggs somewhere in Mongolia or some such place. And just a couple of years ago, on one of his last trips to China, he’d found some mastodon bones. So it’s probably needless to say that he was champing at the bit to see a living, breathing specimen of one of these monsters. He was probably the only one of us who might have some real idea on how to handle the beasts once we found them.

  Pat fell back on her habit of chatting away knowledgeably on every subject imaginable. She seemed to know as much about wildlife, hunting and prehistoric animals as Buck and Andrews—which only served to impress them more. She chatted about everything, of course, except herself.

  I said that she was a cipher to the two adventurers, but in truth I wasn’t so sure about that. Just as with Nakayama and a couple of others, I had the distinct feeling that both men already knew Pat or had met her somewhere before. There seemed to be some secret accord between them, though, because while they acted like complete strangers on the surface there was always a stray glance, an odd tone of voice, a weird sense of knowingness that passed between them once too often.

  “I’ve heard tell these are pirate waters,” Andrews said. “What do you think, Frank? This is your territory.”

  “The Malay pirates have been a problem for five hundred years. But between the Dutch and the British East India Company, most of the pirates have been eradicated. Piracy in the Strait has hardly been an issue since the turn of the century.”

  “Roy is right,” Pat said. “The Strait is one of the major shipping lanes of the world. It’s well patrolled by the navies and coast guards of the surrounding countries. The pirates are simply outmanned and outgunned.”

  A heavy fog rolled in overnight. Englehorn reduced our speed and gave orders to start the fog horn. As Pat had pointed out, the Strait is a busy shipping lane and there was a real danger of collision.

  Regardless of the weather, Ito’s crew went through their drills on the aft deck every morning. And every morning, like clockwork, Pat did her weird exercises, much to the consternation of the Japs and much to our amusement. The fog lent a weird quality to both of these activities that morning. There was nothing visible ten yards beyond the ship’s railings. There was barely a sound from the calm water and the fog absorbed what remained, other than the mournful hooting the fog horn. All sounds seem to echo back from the fog, giving a sense of enclosure, as though the Japs and Pat were working out in a gymnasium.

  I was watching Pat work out, since she is far more interesting than fifty-five Jap marines, when the lookout in the crow’s nest shouted, “V
essel off the starboard bow!”

  I could hear the telegraph jingle in the wheelhouse behind me and the sound of the engines immediately slack off. Englehorn stepped out and shouted, “What is it?”

  “Boat, sir! Coming up to the starboard bow!”

  Sure, enough, there was a sizable craft slipping up out of the fog. It was a big twaqo, which I was more used to seeing in the waters around Singapore though they weren’t uncommon as coasters in Indochina. It had been modernized. Its sails were furled and I could hear the putt putt of a gasoline engine. There seemed to be about a dozen men on board. The Venture came to a stop as the native boat slid alongside.

  “What do you boys want?” Englehorn shouted from the bridge.

  “Got fruit!” returned a voice from the boat. “Got veg’table! Coconut!”

  “What do you think, Captain?” I asked.

  “Don’t see any harm in it. We’ll be out of the Strait in a day. Once we’re in the Indian Ocean there won’t be any chance for fresh supplies until we get to the island.”

  I had to agree that they looked harmless enough. The twago certainly wasn’t my idea of a pirate ship nor a dozen half-naked natives my idea of pirates.

  Buck, having spent some considerable time in Sumatra, knew the local lingo and offered his services as a translator. Through him, the captain gave the order to load the fruit and vegetables but to let no more than six of the natives on board.

  The Sumatrans began passing baskets of produce from the deck of their twaqo to the men at the head of the Venture’s gangway. This was interesting for about five minutes, then my attention wandered elsewhere. Elsewhere being largely Pat, who had changed into white shorts and blouse and a pith helmet. She joined me on the bridge.

  “Very colorful,” she said.

  “I notice that Ito and his boys have gotten shy.”

  “They disappeared below deck as soon as the native boat was spotted. I guess they don’t want to take any chances of someone noticing they’re here and passing the word along to someone who might make some objection.”

  I turned back to the deck below me just in time to see an especially large basket overturned. Instead of a flood of melons or mangos spilling over the deck, there was an unexpected metallic clatter. Before it dawned on me what they were, the guns were in the hands of the six natives who’d been allowed on the ship. On the twago below, guns magically appeared, including a deck-mounted machine gun that had been hidden by the furled sail.

  “Good God!” Pat said. “Pirates!”

  I saw her hand instinctively go for her hip, but she was unarmed—for which I was thankful.

  One of the natives on deck, evidently the leader, shouted something I didn’t quite catch. It was probably meant as an order to those of our crew who had been transferring the baskets to the galley’s storeroom. Most of them just stood and stared. The exception was our first mate, Mudhole Parker. He had been on the forecastle where he could oversee the deck. Without a moment’s hesitation, he drew his automatic and dropped the native nearest the railing. The man clutched his chest and tumbled over, falling into the water between the ship and the boat.

  The leader of the Malays—and there was no doubt in my mind that these were examples of the very Malay pirates we’d recently been discussing—drew a long, curved sword and shouted what could have only been the Malay word for “attack!” or “kill them all!” Whatever it was, it galvanized his men. Two of the Venture’s sailors who’d been helping with the lading were shot down where they stood. Meanwhile, the machine gun opened fire. It was too low to harm anyone on deck, but it raked the bridge above it. Pat and I ducked back against the wheelhouse as paint chips and splinters of metal sprayed around us.

  All other things being equal, the pirates would probably have taken the Venture with hardly a cup of blood being spilled, white and Malay combined. All things weren’t equal, of course. The pirates had no knowledge of the existence of Ito’s men, who now rushed the decks. If the natives had never before encountered organized, professional armed resistance this was a tough lesson for them. They never had a chance.

  Ito made a clean sweep of the deck. His men were efficient, systematic, brutal and it was all over in less than a minute. They showed neither mercy nor quarter. It was methodical extermination, done as cold-bloodedly as he would have rid the ship of rats. This extended to the Malays who had remained on the twago. They were shot and their boat sunk by a well-placed grenade dropped into an open hatch. Meanwhile, the bodies on the deck were unceremoniously thrown overboard. In five minutes, it was as though nothing had happened.

  Ten minutes later, we were taking stock of the damage. We’d lost only three men, all from the Venture’s crew. The Japs had suffered no losses. But there was one mystery that puzzled all of us. Frank Buck was missing. He’d been on the deck, translating orders for the Malay chief, but when the fighting was over he was nowhere to be found. The assumption was that he’d gone overboard in the first seconds of the attack, his death unnoticed in the general confusion.

  That was Ito’s conclusion, at any rate.

  “I’m sorry your friend was lost,” he said, looking more annoyed than remorseful. “He would have been of great value when we reach the island.”

  “Yeah,” I said, “it must be pretty tough for you.”

  Later, Pat took me aside and said, “I think Buck went overboard all right, but I think he did it intentionally. We’re scarcely half a mile from shore, you know.”

  “You think he ran out on us?”

  “No—Buck’s not that sort. That’s the mouth of the Rokan River up ahead. It’s some forty miles of swamp overland and maybe a little less by water to the nearest village, Bagan Siapiapi. I think that’s where he’s headed. If anyone could make it, he could. If he does, the authorities will know within a week all about the plans of our friend Ito.”

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  We reached the island about ten days later. When I knew we’d gotten within about fifty miles, I gave Ito the coordinates.

  “Twelve degrees south, seventy-eight degrees east,” he murmured, looking over the Englehorn’s charts of the Indian Ocean. He looked up at me and scowled. “There is nothing there.”

  “Don’t be sap. If it was on the charts everyone would know about it. But it’s a hundred miles from any shipping lane. No one’s been there for centuries.”

  “You understand there will be consequences if there has been a hoax?”

  “You worry too much. Trust me, the island’s there is all right. Where in the world did you think I found Kong in the first place? Macy’s?”

  And the island was there, exactly where I said it would be. We both stood looking at it in silence for several long minutes. There was no way for me to tell what Ito was thinking, but I couldn’t help shuddering. The distant green shore and the mammoth, barren mountain behind it brought back too many uncanny memories. The domed shape of the mountain with its three well-placed cave openings was just a little too skull-like to suit me.

  I told Ito about the reefs that surrounded the island and we approached carefully. But Englehorn knew exactly where they were. He had the anchor dropped about half a mile from where we could see the waves churning over the deadly barrier. I drew a little sketch map of the island and the reefs around it. Englehorn watched and grunted his approval when I’d finished.

  “There’s only one way in,” I said, pointing to my drawing. “That gap there.”

  “Looks easy enough,” said Ito.

  “Don’t kid yourself,” replied Englehorn. “That’s as tricky a bit of navigation as I care to do. I don’t know how we did it the first time. Sheer dumb luck, I say. Even having done it once, it’s going to take some fancy footwork to do it again.”

  “That,” Ito said icily, “is what you are being paid for.”

  Meanwhile, Ito locked himself in the radio shack with his radioman. I could clearly hear the clicking of the key, which chattered for nearly an hour.

  “I wish I knew what they
were saying,” I told Pat, who I’d found casually leaning next to the radio shack’s door.

  “I do,” she said. “The transmissions are being run through their coding equipment. If I’d been picking it up by radio, I wouldn’t have a clue what it was all about. But I’ve been listening to the key, which let’s me hear the message before it’s run through the coder. It’s ordinary Morse. In Japanese, naturally, but that’s no problem, of course.”

  “Of course.”

  “There’s a lot of chit-chat and I can get only the outgoing half of the conversation. The incoming half is in code and only Ito is seeing the translation of that. But it’s been easy enough to follow the gist.”

  “So what’s it all about?”

  “Invasion, Carl! War. The Japanese have ambitions far beyond China. Everything we saw in Shanghai and Manchuria, it was all just prelude. With the resources they hope to find on the island, the Japanese plan to invade the entirety of Southeast Asia, south from China to Sumatra, west as far as India. And even worse, so far as we’re concerned at any rate, this is the end of the trip for us. Nakayama and his masters have no intention of either the Venture or its crew ever leaving here.”

  “We’ve got get out of here and we’ve got to get word to Washington.”

  “Where’s there to go? There’s no land within three thousand miles in any direction.”

  “That’s not quite true,” I said.

  Pat followed my gaze toward the distant island. “I get your drift,” she said.