Sinister Paradise Read online

subsided. "Where did you run into the rumor aboutthis island?"

  Retch shrugged. "It was just one of those things you hear." He studiedthe landscape. "We should spot a boat soon."

  "We are not exactly on the well-traveled ocean lanes," Parker pointedout. "Does it happen that there are any other little things about thisisland that you forgot to tell me when you chartered my ship to fly youdown here?"

  Retch flushed. "Such as--"

  "Such as how it happened that my 'copter threw a vane just after wesighted the place?"

  Retch did not answer.

  "Seemed as though somebody shot at us."

  "Oh hell no! The loss of the vane was accidental."

  "Accidents like that can happen but they usually don't. I checked theship before we took off." Parker turned silent. There was no proof thatthe wrecking of the 'copter had been anything but an accident. "What doyou expect to find on this island?"

  "I told you--"

  "Just before the 'copter started down, Miss Valdar was yakking about howwe were all going to be rich," Parker interrupted.

  The glance Retch gave Mercedes had no love in it. "Sometimes she's gother mouth open when she ought to have it shut."

  * * * * *

  Mercedes was silent. "I see," Parker said. "When you chartered my ship,you told me you were a scientist and that you wanted to investigatecertain phenomena on this island. You said your investigation would takeonly a few hours. I was to fly you here and wait for you. You said youmight want me to fly you back to the mainland, or might not, dependingon what you found here. Is this correct?"

  "Certainly," Retch answered. "I'm sorry you lost your ship but theinsurance will take care of it."

  "Insurance will take care of the 'copter but not of my neck. _Are_ you ascientist?"

  "Of course. Didn't I tell you--"

  "What kind of a scientist are you?"

  "I--ah--What do you mean?"

  "What's your specialty? Are you a biologist, a physicist, or what?"

  "I--"

  "I don't believe you are a scientist at all. You don't talk like one."

  "Damn it, I told you what I am and that's what I am!" Retch's faceshowed sullen and his hand moved toward the gun. Parker tensed. Retchstopped the movement of his hand. He glared at the big pilot.

  "Okay," Parker said. "It doesn't make any difference anyhow." He resumedpaddling.

  The sun slid down the western sky. Retch and Mercedes huddled in thefront end of the raft and whispered to each other. From time to time,the woman glanced at Parker. He paid no attention to her.

  The sea was calm. In the distance, a school of flying fish skitteredover the surface. A dozen gulls played near the surface. A high-ridingfin cut the water. Shark, sensing food.

  The sun reached the horizon and wallowed in the sea like a fat, roundshining pig on fire.

  Mercedes screamed, pointed, jerked a terror-stricken face toward Parker."Beel! Beel!" She scuttled across the raft, threw herself into his arms."Look, Beel, look!"

  Terror and panic almost beyond understanding were in her words.

  Parker looked where she was pointing. His heart climbed up into hismouth and threatened to choke him. He had thought he was shock-proof,that nothing could jar him. But here was something that made his mindreel.

  _Walking across the water toward the raft were three men._

  Clad in knee-length breeches, wearing cloaks, the three men looked as ifthey had just stepped out of the 17th century. Two wore big,broad-brimmed hats, the third had a handkerchief wrapped around hishead. He also had a wooden leg and he stalked across the surface of thesea with all the sureness he might have had with concrete under him. Hecarried a curved cutlass in one hand. The other two men were armed withswords, in scabbards. In addition, heavy, clumsy-looking pistols werethrust into sashes at their belts.

  They looked like men out of a nightmare--or like pirates out of theolden days; swash-buckling buccaneers who had somehow managed to survivetheir proper period in history and to live into the 20th century.

  "Ghosts!" Mercedes screamed. "Devils! They've come up out of hellbecause of our sins!" She wrapped her arms around Parker's neck. "Saveme, Beel, save me!"

  Parker caught her wrists, jerked her arms loose from his neck, and rosequickly to his feet. He hoped fervidly that his eyes had been deceivinghim and that standing up would cause this mirage to disappear.

  His eyes continued to deceive him. The three men did not disappear. Theycontinued to walk across the water toward the raft. They moved with thesureness of men who know where they are going.

  Behind them, suddenly outlined against the fat sun that was wallowing inthe sea, rocky, grim, and forbidding, the mysterious island was nowvisible. It had reappeared. They had found it.

  Three men coming from it had found them.

  The shark found the three men.

  Parker saw the triangular fin cut through the water toward them. Like aspeed boat taking off on a race, the fin gathered momentum.

  The three men saw it coming.

  "Ho!" one yelled.

  "A shark!" the second said.

  "Have at him, boys!" the third shouted.

  * * * * *

  The shark charged them. Drawing their swords, the three men executed animble dance on the surface of the sea. They thrust downward--theirswords entering the water with no difficulty whatsoever although theirfeet did not enter it--drew them back dripping red. They skipped lightlyout of the way of the wounded and infuriated monster.

  "Zounds!"

  "Chop the sea pig down!"

  "Carve his heart out!"

  Old battle cries rang in the air as they fought the shark. Blood coloredthe surface of the sea.

  The wounded shark suddenly took its death blow. It dived, was gone fromsight, then broke the surface a hundred yards away. It beat the waterinto foam, threshing out its life.

  With pleased interest, the three men watched the shark die. Dippingtheir blades into the sea to clean the blood from them, they wiped themdry on their pants legs.

  Again they moved toward the raft.

  Parker's hand went to the pistol inside his leather jacket. He loosed itin its holster but did not draw it.

  Mercedes moaned and covered her eyes. At the other end of the boat,Retch had risen to his feet.

  Bracing himself, Bill Parker waited for--whatever was to happen. Out ofthe corner of his eye, he saw Retch slowly drawing his gun.

  "Damn it, Retch, put that gun away!" Parker shouted. "Don't shoot untilyou know what the hell is going on."

  Retch turned, the gun visible in his hand. "What the hell--" Retchdidn't put the gun away. He lifted it. Parker found himself staring intothe muzzle.

  "Get your hands up!" Retch snarled the words. "Mercedes, get that gunout of his holster. Get your goddamned hands up or I'll blow yourblasted head off!"

  The last was spoken to Parker as the dazed pilot tried to understandwhat had happened. He could hardly believe his own eyes. Automaticallyhe lifted his hands. Mercedes slid past him, got behind him, taking nochances on getting between him and Retch's gun. He felt her fingers goinside his jacket. Expertly she lifted the gun from its holster.

  "Toss me the gun!" Retch said. He caught the weapon the woman tossedtoward him, glanced at Parker. "You thought I was going to startshooting at _them_?" He gestured toward the three approaching men. "Youmade a slight mistake." The grin on his face was wolfish.

  "What the hell have I got into?"

  "You'll find out, if you live long enough," Retch said. "Just behaveyourself and do as you're told and maybe you'll stay alive." Again thewolfish grin showed on his face but under the grin, the words were harshwith meaning.

  "Ho, Johnny!" the three men were drawing near the raft. "Ho, JohnnyRetch! What kind of a flying ship is this that you have brought backwith you?"

  Retch turned to the three men. "Gotch! Peg-leg! Masterville!" Retchgreeted them as old friends. The one he had called Gotch had s
poken. Allthree of them stared at the raft and its occupants. Mercedes drew bold,appreciative stares. Parker got blank looks. Standing lightly and easilyon the water, the three men surveyed the raft with doubtful contempt.

  "Does this thing fly through the air like the Jez--" Gotch caughthimself. "It looks to me as if it were more fit for sailing on a millpond back in Devon."

  "This is not the ship that flies through the air, that ship was wrecked.This is a rubber boat that it carried."

  "Wrecked?" Gotch spoke. "But where does that leave us?"

  "Everything has been taken care of," Retch spoke quickly. "You