Beyond the golden stair Read online

  Scarlatti swomg toward him. "Oh, you want some, too?'* Biu-ks cleared his throat, a warning soimd. If Scarlatti heard, he did not heed. His long arms swept out and snatched Hibbert across his bent knee, face upward. He pressed Hibbert down and back as though to snap his spine. Hibbert, no match for the giant, hammered the mans face with his fists. Scarlatti barely blinked. His crooked teeth glinted in a widening grin.

  Burks took pipe from mouth and said placidly enough: "Mustn't break the Uttle toy, Frank.''

  Scarlatti only growled incoherently, forcing Hibbert yet farther down. The pain in the small of Hibbert's back was breathstopping, but he would not cry out

  and acknowledge defeat—let the giant Idll him firsti

  Carlotta's delighted giggle saved him. She had scrabbled forward on hands and knees and was trembling with excitement, actually slavering with blood lust. The Httle gurgle she made arrested Scarlatti. He let Hibbert drop.

  Hibbert lay as he had fallen, momentarily paralyzed. The giant kicked out at the woman. *T11 learn you to lose your temper—slutl" She whined under the thuds of his blows.

  Burks said sharply: "Cut itl^ He prodded Hibbert. ''Come on, get up. You're not really hurt.'' His hands, helping Hibbert, were impersonal levers. Though Hibbert would have let himself die without a whisper, he could not now restrain a groan. A few more of the giant's maulings, and he could rank with the most limber of contortionists—always supposing that he survived them.

  Carlotta leaped to her feet and flitted into the darkness. Scarlatti poimded a few steps after her, bellowing and brandishing his fist. Her wail of terror thinned away almost as if she were falling down a bottomless shaft.

  The giant shuffled back to the fire, toeing its embers and glaring at Hibbert.

  Curtly Burks said: 'Xet's hope you didn't scare your little love-bird too far away. Remember, she's the one who knows how to get us across these swamps."

  Scarlatti sat down with a solid thump, smiling a knife-cut grin. "Ah, she'll come snivelling back—she always has, ain't she?" He laughed shortly at tri-mnphant memories. '*You let a dame get by with something, and she gets out of hand." His better nature on the ascendant again, he said to Hibbert, generously: 'T)idn't mean to hurt you, junior." Then, puz-

  zledly: ''But what the hell is she to you anyway that you should want to stick up for her?"

  Burks' look at Hibbert held pity and contempt. ''Chivalry, Frank—something you never heard of."* Scarlatti's black brows drew together in perplexity. Evidently Burks knew whereof he spoke. Burks continued as though to himself: "Chivalryl Getting your head knocked oflE protecting some skirt who wouldn't spit in your eyel"

  The giant yawned. *'Me for some shut-eye.'' He unstrapped the roll of blankets—^there were four, stained and stiff with dirt. He tossed one apiece at Burks and Hibberts and stretched out with the other two. For a while he tossed and kicked until comfortable, then lifted his head.

  T)on't try getting away, Idd—^I'm a light sleeper, and you can't make it far on a bum leg." He said thoughtfully: "Maybe I ought to rope you up, just to be on the safe side." And with an incredible naivete, considering his past behavior: "But hell, I want you to likemel"

  Hibbert sat huddled in his blanket, glooming at the ghost of the fire. Burks was regarding him with unblinking intensity, as though making up his mind about something. Whatever it was, he postponed it. He slipped off into the shadows, and Hibbert heard him slashing among the rushes. He came back with a great mass of them in his arms and scattered most of them to make himself a bed. The leftovers he pushed to Hibbert perfunctorily, certainly not from kindness.

  He spread his blanket over the reeds, lay down and rolled himself in it. "Some day, Frank," he said, "Car-lotta's going to knife you—not that you won't deserve it."

  ^ The big man chuckled complacently—drowsily, too. m

  *T^Iot herl She don't want to go losing her ever-loving papa—meaning mel"

  Soon his breathing grew stertorous. He snored. Hib-bert watched him.

  Burks said softly: **! know what you're thinking, Idd—but don't try it. You'd never get away. Frankly, I don't give a damn what you do, but I don't want any trouble."

  He rolled over and presently slept. The mention of Carlotta's knife reminded Hibbert that Burks must have used one to cut the rushes for his bed. He wondered if he dared creep over to him and search his pockets. But Burks' blanket was wound tightly around him—

  He turned warily toward Scarlatti. The giant's breath came tumbling forth in Imnbering snorts, yet his eyes were barely closed and the last vestiges of the firelight flickered in their slits. He had better wait.

  The night grew chilly. He poked up the fire and hunched closer to it, his back icy, his knees and chest scorching, his breath visible and flameht pink. Down by the water, leopard frogs rasped and a Hmpkin skrieked piercingly, its eerie yowl like an echo of Carlotta's departing cry. Crickets and katydids shrilled to each other like the creaking floor boards of the night as the moon arose and walked it.

  The fire died down and Hibbert cast his blanket aside to fetch more wood. He stood at the water's edge with sticks in hand peering into the crystalline moon-glow, the purple blackness of the shadows. Carlotta had taken the canoe. He speculated how far he might be able to Hmp along the bayou before he woidd have to swim it.

  A great claw caught him from behind and spun him around. The wood dropped clattering. Scarlatti tow-

  ered in Herculean silhouette against the glow from the fire, rage in every contour.

  **You pup—^I told you not to run awayl**

  Scarlatti caught him around the middle, lifted him bodily and threw him back toward the fire. Hibbert cracked down on the hard groxmd and rolled, but did not leap up to give combat. He was beginning to see that discretion was indeed the better part of valor.

  ^'Now stay therel"* The giant had scooped up the fallen wood and now flung it on the embers. He stamped to his blankets and settled down in them again, but from time to time he lifted his head vigilantly.

  Burks sat up. Too damned coldl*' he complained. **Kid, do you want to pool blankets with me?"'

  It would have been like bundling for warmth with an adding-machine. Hibbert shook his head. *Well," Burks observed noncommittally. He wrapped his coverlet about himself in imitation of Hibbert and joined him at the fixe.

  Palmetto bugs scurried to and fro by the fire as if also seeking its warmth. They explored the men, scuttling up their backs and tickling their ears from behind with long feelers. Some were larger than mice.

  Hibbert brushed them oflF, his skin crawling with disgust. Biurks speared one on a stick and toasted it over the flames—^neither vengefully nor for any visible amusement, but rather as if he were interested in how much baking the insect could endiure. His face was as detached as that of a surgeon.

  "^Carlotta was right,"* he said. 'TTou haven't any business here with us. You re making trouble between her and Frank—and that may speU trouble for me."

  Hibbert said insolently: "In all my life, I never dreamed I'd sit side by side with a murderer, talking

  like this. You intended to shoot me back there before we started into the swamp."

  "It would have been convenient. I knew you'd be trouble if we left you and a posse found you and made you talk. And I knew you'd be trouble if we brought you along. But Frank had to have you. If I'd done anything to you, he might have lost his head and spoiled our plans altogether."

  The baked bug burst open with a wet pop. Burks dropped it into the flames.

  "But now," he continued, "we're in the swamp, and there isn't much that Frank can do if something should —^just by chance—happen to you. As I told you before, I don't give a damn what you do, just as long as you don't cause more friction."

  "Huhl If I give in to Scarlatti, Carlotta gets spitefuL And if I don't give in, he tries to murder me."

  "Well, that's your problem," Bruks commented carelessly. "Either way, you're in a spot, because one more little flare-up like tonight, I'll tak
e over." His bright eyes sparked at Hibbert. "Meaning—finis."

  The moon climbed higher, its Hght changing the water to tarnished brass. They heard the splash of a paddle, the whisper of the canoe shding on the mud. Carlotta tiptoed into the firelight. She did not even glance at Burks or Hibbert but went straight to Scarlatti, wormed imder his blankets and nestled silently against him. He seemed asleep, but one big arm went around her, snuggling her closer.

  The night was so long that Hibbert wondered how frostbound Eskimoes fared in six months of darkness.

  Presently Burks lay down and rolled up. Hibbert's head began to nod, and then he, too, was sleeping.

  Chapter Three

  The Pool of the Flamingo

  Of the next day, and the next, and the day beyond that, Hibbert's impressions merged into a chaotic picture of which only a few details shone clear. Strangler figs which had planted themselves in the crotches of imrelated trees and sent down naked, rubbery rootlets to the earth like the tentacles of octopi; a group of drab-clad gnomes which proved to be knotty dwarfed cypresses growing in bare coral rock and starved for soil; swamp maples of crimson and henna-hue aflame like beacons in the sun; air plants studding the bark of the trees like huge rosettes, the blue tubes of their flowers ridiculously tiny to be culminations of such explosively spraying jasper-pink bracts.

  He remembered a lovelorn chameleon distending its rosy throat like a child's toy balloon; alligators swimming underwater with only their nostrils and popeyes showing on the surface—one could estimate the size of the beasts by the distances between the three protruding points.

  Even as they journeyed deep and deeper into the swamps, the world Hibbert had known dimmed into shadowy memory and the fantastic facts of the swamplands took precedence; wonder succeeded won-

  der until at times he speculated on what heights of improbability they must culminate.

  Among those images were glimpses of his companions—Burks in a shaft of simlight, suddenly as radiantly beautiful as an angehc visitant, his bright-gleaming hair like flame itself, his blue eyes crystals reflecting the binning sky; Carlotta panting at her paddle like a dog, shaking drops of sahva from her tongue and a curiously canine odor streaming from her; Scarlatti thundering with rage over nothing and a few seconds later mollified for as Httle reason.

  But now Carlotta no longer pointed out nor commented on their surroundings. Ever since her return, she had been moodily silent, a peculiar remoteness in her eyes—except when they dwelt on Scarlatti, and then among their tenderness was a dogged determination. Something was brewing. Scarlatti did not notice it, but Hibbert did and Burks. He squinted at the sun.

  "Are you certain we're headed right, Carlotta? Looks to me as if we re going in entirely another direction than when we started.''

  "If you think you can do better,** she said serenely, "go ahead and try."

  He said nothing, but he brooded at her. Briefly, her gaze touched Hibbert, and as though she were transparent he could see the vicious little devils that danced within her.

  He thought that he understood, and his misgivings grew. She was necessary to Scarlatti only as long as she was needed to guide him through the swamps. After that? In his interest over his new plaything, he might tire of her and cast her away. She might have decided to insure his favor by prolonging the joiuney, dehberately leading them off course until such time as Hibbert escaped or was killed And if Biu-ks had

  I

  The Pool of the Flamingo 25

  guessed this or Scarlatti should . . . Hibbert's disquiet deepened.

  They conserved their dwindhng stores by supplementing them with cabbage palm salads, with a fox squirrel large as a rabbit, shot by Burks; with fistsized fresh-water snails plucked from stones and from cypress knees; tree snails red and yellow which had fastened on the trunks.

  On the third day of flight, the sky was filled with hmn and roar, and a Border Patrol plane passed overhead. Was it merely a routine maneuver, or was it searching for them? At the time, they happened to be drifting downstream through a tunnel of willows, the limp branches hanging dejectedly down to the water in disappointed Narcissism. They were not seen.

  On the fourth day, Hibbert heard Carlotta murmuring, almost whimpering: "Frank, you got no right to stay mad at me. I couldn't help it, that I waked you up last night. I was scared. I had a dream.*'

  "Ahl'' He thrust the flat of a hand at her. ''Drive a guy nutty with those halfbaked notions of yoursl Keep me awake all nightl''

  "It was real as life,'' she whispered. "Those people in funny clothes looking down at us from the skyl That httle white thing that looked like a teddy bear, jxmip-ing up and down! And that awful black shadow behind them, like a big black hole without any bottom— and the voice that come out of it, saying awful things were going to happen if we didn't go backl"

  Hibbert started. Was it coincidence, or could she possibly have experienced his owm recurrent dream? Stranger stiU, Burks' narrow visage showed some expression—startled recognition of something unexpectedly familiar. Strangest of all was his quick cognizance that Hibbert had responded to Carlotta's words and

  his swift, wary appraisal of Hibbert. That meant, then, that the tliree of them had something in common.

  But aknost as swiftly as Burks had revealed his surprise and wonder, he suppressed it, making his face a mask again.

  Carlotta added further details. "The people, they shone like they were angelsl Or ghosts. I felt like the time I dreamed of Waco WiUie rolling in the mud, the night before he got drowned—remember?^

  Scarlatti grunted, ^'Ah, it was just your conscience yapping at you, your past catching up with you. It didn't mean nothing. I get them dreams sometimes myself, so what?''

  Instantly both Hibbert and Biu-ks were on the alert Carlotta was too absorbed to notice.

  "You mean, people leaning out of the sky, and shadows that talk?''

  Scarlatti pondered. "Yes—^no—^hell, I don't know. They don't phase me none. I don't bother to remem-ber.** And surlily: 'Tou get any more of them, don't you come pestering me with diem. I got to get my sleepi"

  That night, Burks led Hibbert aside and whispered: ^What made you so jumpy when Madame Du Barry let loose with her dreams? You been having them, too?"

  Hibbert faltered an agreement. Burks squinted oflE into the darkness and remarked: "Odd." He stared at Hibbert. "They say great minds and fools think alike. I'd hate to think I'm on a plane with Carlotta." He timied away.

  On the fiifth day, they blimdered upon the stairway. It was noon and as uncomfortably hot as the nights had been cold. The canoe was leaking from several scratches, and they made to shore for repairs. Hardly

  had they cut through rushes and flags and touched a muddy landing when Carlotta raised a warning hand —^her head tipped, Hstening.

  From down the channel and around the bend came a throaty rumble hke a Hon's purr—the throb of an outboard motor. Scarlatti gripped the shank of his paddle as if strangling a serpent. He croaked: "Patrol boatr

  Carlotta's lips were parted for better hearing, her head still at an angle. She shrugged. Burks crouched low in the canoe; the giant and his woman followed his example. They pulled Hibbert down and lay waiting.

  The throbbing roimded the turn and swelled louder still, heading directly toward them. For a wild instant, Hibbert thought of jiunping up and splashing, yelling for help. As if Burks read the thought, he swept out hands as steely as Scarlatti's, caught Hibbert close, and clamped his fingers over the youngster's mouth. His tense muscles were as hard as if he were not man but machine.

  Now the throbbing was abreast of them. They could hear voices but not distinguish words. Calm voices, casual ones—^the canoe had not been glimpsed as yet.

  With a ringing scream, an ibis launched up from the reeds. Carlotta lifted her head, carefully parted the screen of rush and flag and peeped beyond it. She slipped back, lay quiet.

  ITie throbbing muted and died away upstream. Despite the maddening attentions of the deer flies,
nobody stirred. Then at last Burks took his hand from Hibbert's mouth.

  Carlotta straightened. Scarlatti asked: **Was it a pa-' trol boatr

  **NahI Probly hunters, looking for painters.** They did not understand. "People call panthers painters here,"" she said. Carlotta's accent and speech degenerated noticeably whenever she conversed with her inamorato, or was imder emotional stress.

  Thoughtfully, she watched the boat tail grackles strutting on the mud, clacking and hoarsely chirring their gossip. They were the size of pigeons, and iridescent black; they looked like haughty ne'er-do-wells promenading with hands in pockets.

  She said: **We better pull the canoe way offshore behind them there trees, just supposing more boats come along and maybe somebody gets nosy. The rest of you stand lookout while I fix it. We don't want toVe come this far and still get caught!"

  Burks' eyes lifted to the treetops; he made them into shts because of what he saw there, and his hand fell to his gun. Sharply he asked: "What's that?"

  Through a rift in die verdinre, invisible from any angle save their own, a gray-green comer of squared masonry was looming,

  Carlotta squinted dubiously at it. Burks grasped her wrist, all his suspicions confirmed. 'What is it?'' he demanded. "You ought to know—you're supposed to have been here beforel"

  She jerked her hand free contemptuously. She said spiritedly: "It's just another one of them spic ruins you find all over the swamps, made himdreds of years ago. It's a high place and dry. We can see good from there. Maybe we better have a lookl Drag the canoe in them bushes."

  She strode forward in a show of bravado. Buurks scanned the towering stonework apprehensively and followed, his hand on his gun. Scarlatti nudged Hib-bert; they followed.

  Beyond the mangrove barricades, an army of ferns awaited them, ferns all of ten and fifteen feet in height and, Hibbert was sure, as yet uncatalogued. Women warriors, the ferns fought invasion with sweet feminine guile rather than force—they flirted with coquettish fans drawn provocatively over the faces of the intruders; they flaunted finery of foliage like vividly green Cluny lace, bedizened with strands of turquoise and sapphire morning glories.