The Green Hell Treasure

9

There can be no doubt that there was a great deal of luck connected with McNeil’s terrified flight in utter panic from Green Hell Island. A warrant had been issued that morning for his apprehension for questioning in regard to the mysterious disappearance of Diana Cogswell, and had he immediately fled back to Barbados — as he thought he was doing in the first blinding explosion of unbearable dread — he most certainly would have been picked up in the late afternoon light, for the planes were still patrolling, new pilots and observers now manning the operation, and police boats still covered a good portion of the shoreline cutting back and forth before the beaches, hotels, and docks.

But fortune was on the side of the large black man in several ways. He vaguely remembered screaming hysterically at the men on shore, and then rushing to jam down on the self-starter and throttle without even realizing he was still tied to the large palm bending over the cove. Only his automatic gesture in mooring the boat with a hitch rather than a knot prevented utter disaster; as the engines caught with a roar the rope jerked sharply in protest but then trailed free, dipping into the water, nosed at by curious sharks as he swung the wheel and sped from the small inlet. He might well have torn the eyebolt-tackle from the prow, might even have ripped the hull, possibly even to a point of foundering, but he did not. However, he wasn’t even aware of the near-miss; his mind had blanked itself mercifully from the horror of the island and the two souls staring sadly after him.

A second bit of fortune — and the one that saved him from placing himself in the hands of the police — was that he was a good hour’s run from the island before he came out of his coma-like state enough to notice he was frozen to the wheel with the sun at his back over the taffrail, heading senselessly out into the wide and empty Atlantic, with the waves a deeper, more perilous green and the swells becoming threatening rollers. Without even thinking, he put the wheel over, placing the lowering orange ball in the middle of the low roundhouse. He locked the wheel and staggered into the cabin.

He stared at himself in the small mirror over the galley sink, as if expecting to already see the horrible evidence of that terrifying encounter: skin hard and cracking, seamed, nose eaten away, ears gone. He had been with lepers; he had spoken to them! They had practically breathed in his face, infecting him, contaminating him! A sudden additional frightening thought came; they had touched the boat! He spat into the sink as if to rid himself of the germs, staring into the mirror at his dulled yellowish eyes, wondering at the curse that had been laid upon him, and then left the cabin, picking up a bottle of rum and a holystone from the locker, carrying them on deck. The rum was splashed over the place where the clawed hand had slapped against the rail; the holystone applied on top of the damp surface with an almost-frenzied zeal, his large trembling hands taking care not to touch the surface itself. When the air had dried the railing, he returned to the galley for a second flask to repeat the performance, and then the third and last. Only when the final bottle was bobbing lightly away from the boat, hiding itself between the waves, did he suddenly wish he had swallowed some of it. Or all of it. There might have been some peace in the sweet stupor the rum contained along with its tartness. He stared stupidly down at the holystone still clenched in his hand and then flung it from him as far as he could.

He went back to the wheel and took command of the boat once again, reducing its mad speed, calculating the little time of daylight remaining, but all in a daze as something that had to be done, although he couldn’t be sure just why. His hand moved the wheel without conscious volition; only a tiny portion of his mind attacked the problem of the boat’s position while the balance attempted to evaluate the full enormity of the tragedy. For the first time in his memory a situation had arisen beyond his control — beyond anyone’s control. The stones were lost beyond recovery, and his fifteen years in prison had, indeed, been for naught. Fifteen years and the lives of good men — all for what? Bits of shiny glass, colored chips of rock, baubles. Oh, they could buy many things, my word, but they couldn’t buy back the fifteen years in prison or the lives of the dead men.

Night had fallen with tropical swiftness; he had not even noticed the evaporation of the light. The stars lifted and lowered above him as the boat rolled lightly through the blackness, its twin exhausts attempting to be comforting with their steady rumbling, their efforts wasted on the thinking man. What a sad joke the entire affair had become, eh, Billy my boy? If that bostard on the porch, that Tommy, could have been trusted, it all could have been saved; if he could have been trusted, the mon might actually have been waiting for him on one of the other islands with a stack of cash on his release from prison. But he couldn’t be trusted, and that was the fact. And besides, who could have calculated that some maniac would decide to put a leper colony on his island? Nobody, that’s who. The whole bloody thing was a farce. My word!

He forced his mind away from the terrible thought, trying to concentrate on the approaching shoreline and the hills faintly visible under the sliver of moon. Lights had appeared there, tiny pinpricks in the dark curtain of the night. He found the flashing buoy off Plymouth Point and automatically pulled the throttle back, letting the boat rock in the wash of the sea, then leaned forward, pushing the winch lever, feeling the boat heel slightly as the anchor slowly paid out, seeking bottom. He felt it grab and hold, the boat swinging in an arc. He turned off the ignition and slipped over the side, feeling the sharp bite of the salt water on his lip where he had bitten it without knowing.

He was unaware until he had taken several strokes that he still retained his clothing, and the revolver was still tucked in his pocket, sagging, weighing him down. He paused, treading water, neither surprised nor angry at his own forgetfulness — everything seemed to be out of his hands now — and calmly removed first the boots, then the trousers, and finally his shirt. The shoes and trousers sank instantly; the shirt floated a while behind him, the sleeves waving languidly in the gloom. Then he put his head down and slowly began to stroke for the beach.

The small house beyond the fringe of trees was dim, but a faint light glowed this time behind a drawn curtain over an open window. And this time the big black man made no attempt at silence or secrecy, tramping toward it across the glade, calling out loudly.

“Tommy!”

The curtain was brushed aside urgently; a voice whispered through the screened opening.

“Billy, is that you? You bloody fool, keep your voice down!”

The curtain dropped; a moment later the door to the porch had opened and closed. Tommy glared down through the darkness at the faint shadow of the man below him. McNeil came closer, breathing deeply. The walk inland from the shore, plus the stiff climb to the house, had not been sufficient to dry his wet swimming trunks, but he was unaware of their clamminess against his skin. He was tired, his breathing painful; he was surprised that the swim and the hike had enervated him to such an extent, but at least it had driven the worst of the demons from his brain, if only for the moment. He climbed the steps slowly, his calves aching (Had he, then, really contracted the disease? Was this the first symptom?) — and slumped on the top step. He began to speak, and then found he had to pause to clear his throat. (Did it affect the vocal cords so quickly?)

“Rum.”

“Keep your voice down, mon!” Tommy stared at the other, calculating. McNeil undoubtedly had picked up the gems, he thought; not much question of that. Only success could have drained the big man’s energy to that extent; failure never had. And three bottles of rum aboard with which to celebrate. A mistake, those three bottles, but what the devil! “So you got them, eh?” It was impossible to keep the elation from his voice. “Good-o, Billy boy!”

“Rum!”

“Billy, for Christ’s sake, keep your voice down!”

“I said—!”

McNeil glared upwards in the darkness savagely. On top of everything else he had suffered that day, was he going to have trouble with Tommy now? My word!

“All right!” The intent whisper contained a touch of disgust; he disappeared into the house to return in moments with a bottle. He handed it down. “Here’s your bloody rum, but you sound as if you’ve had your share and more, already.”

McNeil didn’t bother to answer. He grasped the bottle, twisted the cork loose and tossed it aside, upending the bottle, gulping eagerly. He paused for breath and raised it again, quaffing deeply. Tommy glared down at him.

“Well, you needn’t drink it all, mon.”

McNeil swallowed again and then paused, frowning, his gullet locked against the fiery liquid as a thought came to him. Don’t drink it all? He lowered the bottle.

“Don’t worry,” he said huskily. “I won’t.”

He raised the bottle again, chuckling to himself. Drink it all? The idea made him choke on the rum, coughing. Never would he drink it all, never fear! If he had the disease, let Tommy suffer with him. Who had dreamed up the scheme in the first place, and hadn’t spent one single solitary day at the rock pile while the rest of them — God rest their souls — hadn’t had it that easy. Drink it all? No chance. My word! He caught his breath and handed the bottle up.

“Here, mon. Be my guest.”

The other man took the bottle, started to raise it to his lips, and then paused.

“Well, here’s to you, Billy boy, and a good job done. Here’s to a fair split, too...”

“Drink.”

“I’ll drink. Here’s to a good idea, if I say so myself, neatly handled — even if unfortunately delayed by a few years in quod. And here’s to an end to a lack of trust, too. Here’s to—”

“Drink!”

McNeil was beginning to come to his feet unsteadily. Tommy frowned in uncertainty and hurriedly drank. There had been precious little left in the bottle, was all he could say. He started to toss it away, empty, and then thought of the noise. Instead, he bent and placed it carefully on the porch.

“Good-o,” he said, straightening up. “Enough of celebration, eh, Billy? The coppers are thick as fleas tonight. Let’s split the stuff and be on our way, eh, mon?” His voice tried to remain calm but could not conceal his anxiety. “Where are the stones? Let’s see them.”

“I don’t have them.”

There was a moment’s silence. When the standing man spoke again, his voice was quiet but deadly. One hand had gone surreptitiously to his pocket.

“Don’t joke with me, Billy.”

“I’m not joking, mon.” The rum was hot in his blood, wild in his brain. For one moment he wondered if the disease also reduced one’s ability to drink, but put the thought aside in favor of the more delectable one: Tommy had just told him not to joke, and here he had just played the best joke of his life. On Tommy. He couldn’t help himself; he began to laugh. “I’m not joking, mon. My word!”

“You’re drunk, you sot! Where is the package?”

McNeil brayed with laughter. Drunk, was he? Well, that he was, and he’d be the last to argue.

“The package is where it always was and where it’ll stay until doomsday, mon. The truth!”

“I said, don’t joke with me, Billy.” Tommy stared down coldly. “D’you think I hadn’t figured you’d try to pull a trick like this? Mon, don’t be daft! But you’ll cough up my share, fair and square, don’t worry, because I took out a bit of insurance, you might say. Either you forgot the nonsense or you can kiss the girl good-bye.” Tommy stepped back a step, his hand tight in his pocket. “Only you’ll never see her to kiss her good-bye, hear? And this is a gun I’ve got here, Billy boy, so don’t be thinking of tricks.”

“Girl?” McNeil shook his head, the rum fumes fogging his brain. “What girl?”

“Your precious barmaid, that’s who!”

“Mon, what are you talking about?”

“You are drunk, you sot! I’m talking about your girlfriend, your Miss Diana Cogswell, ex-barmaid at the Badger Inn. That’s who I’m talking about. Now do you know what I’m talking about?”

“Diana? What about her?”

“Try to listen and try to understand, Billy boy. I said I’ve got your precious Miss Diana Cogswell stashed where you’ll never find her, and you’ll split those stones, or you’ll never—”

He would never have imagined that McNeil in his drunken state could ever have moved so quickly. One moment the big man was slumped on the top step of the porch, arms dangling almost idiotically, and the next he was up and on him long before he could begin to untangle the revolver in his pocket. A large hand clamped itself over the gun, squeezing viciously. Tommy screamed.

“Billy! You’re breaking my hand! Let go! Let go!”

“Ease your hand out, mon.” The drunkenness seemed to have disappeared as quickly and mysteriously as it had come. McNeil swung behind the smaller man, one thick arm locked about the scraggly neck, the other hand still squeezing the pocket with the pistol. “Ease your hand out without the gun or I’ll tear it off. My word!”

“I can’t with you squeezing my hand! You’re breaking it, Billy! Let go!”

“One trick and your neck snaps. Believe me.” McNeil eased the pressure slightly; the empty hand of the smaller man emerged from the pocket, crushed and bleeding, already beginning to swell. McNeil reached into the pocket, taking the gun, tucking it into the waistband of his swimming trunks. He swung the other man about, grasping him by the shoulders, shaking him like a toy doll. “All right, now, Tommy. Let’s talk. What were you saying about the girl?”

A bit of bravery — or it may have been desperation — hardened Tommy’s voice. He grasped the wrist above his wounded hand, pressing tightly, trying to abate the pain.

“I have her where you won’t find her. And pushing me around won’t help...”

“Now, won’t it though!” McNeil said viciously. “Let’s try!”

He took the small man and began to shake him, then shook him harder and harder again. Tommy’s neck snapped back and forth, his teeth chattered, smashing against each other. He tried to clamp his jaw; it did no good. His wounded hand bounced painfully, snapping with each shake. He tried to speak.

“Billy, for God’s sake!”

“Where’s the girl?”

“I’ll tell you! I’ll talk!” The shaking stopped abruptly; Tommy shook his head, his ears ringing, trying to clear his brain. Despite his pain and his fear a touch of malice came into his voice. “And I’ll tell you something else. She’s no barmaid. Anyone with half an eye could have seen that. She’s a copper, Billy — a lousy plant. Put there in the Badger just for you to fall for and spill the beans to.”

The big hands tightened on the smaller man’s shoulders, preparatory to resuming their punishment. Tommy spoke hurriedly.

“She’s in the barn. But she’s still a police plant, Billy. She is, you know.”

“You’re daft!” McNeil dismissed the statement without discussion. “If you harmed her in any way, I’ll kill you, you know. My word! If they hang me for it.”

“I didn’t touch her. She’s perfectly all right.” His head was feeling better, but his hand still pained him considerably. There was pleading in his voice. “Billy, won’t you listen? She’s a copper, mon! Use your skull — wouldn’t it be a perfect place to spot one? And a woman, at that? And you with fifteen years without a woman? Besides,” he added, suddenly remembering, “she knew about me, and I’m sure you never mentioned me to her.”

McNeil paid no attention to the statement; his grip on the other’s shoulders tightened again.

“Is that why you said the place is swarming with coppers tonight? Because she’s missing?” He flung the other from him in disgust; there was a grunt in the darkness as the smaller man slammed against the wall. McNeil glowered at him. “You bloody fool! And with them sure to be knowing I’m gone, you’ve put me in a fine bloody mess! They’ll think I had a hand in it!” He frowned. “Where did you pick her up?”

“At the foot of the hill before her place. Last night. She didn’t see me, not a glimpse of my face.” The note of pleading intensified. “Billy, for God’s sake, listen to me. She’s a copper, I tell you. Why else would they put it on the radio, and why else would the coppers be out like mosquitoes, eh?”

“She’s no copper.”

“I tell you she is! She—”

“Shut up. I’m thinking.” There were several minutes silence. “All right. You take her back to where you found her. Drop her off near her house. And I’ll know tomorrow if you hurt her. If you did, there’s no place on earth you’ll be able to hide.”

A horrible thought suddenly came to him: He had leprosy and like a fool had passed it on to Tommy! Now how could the other even free the girl without infecting her himself?

“And don’t touch her, do you hear? Let her get into the auto herself. Don’t put a finger on her, even to lend a hand. Do you hear?”

“But why?”

“Because I say so.”

“And when I come back?” Cupidity had returned to Tommy’s voice. “Do we split the stones then?”

McNeil looked at him and shook his head in disbelief.

“Mon, Tommy, but you’re a fool! I told you I don’t have the stones and don’t know how to get them. Are you hard of hearing? If I had the bloody things and wanted to cheat you, would I be coming here? Not even knowing you had the girl, or anything? Use your noodle!”

“You’d have come here in time.”

“But I didn’t come here in time. I came right away. Didn’t I?”

Tommy thought a moment and then nodded slowly, sadly.

“You did.” His eyes came up; he sounded aggrieved. “Why didn’t you get them? Weren’t they there?”

McNeil slumped down on the top step again. “You say the girl’s all right for now?”

“She’s fine.”

“Then get some rum and I’ll tell you.”

“All right.” Tommy disappeared into the house, hurrying. His hand still pained, but it seemed to pain less. He came back with a bottle and handed it down, seating himself in the creaking chair. McNeil drank deeply and handed the bottle back; Tommy took a short drink, recorked the bottle, and set it aside. He leaned forward. “Well? Weren’t they there?”

“I don’t know, but I imagine they were.”

“Then why didn’t you get them? Mon, don’t make me drag it out of you word by word!”

“Because it was Green Hell Island, that’s where I hid them. And I didn’t even get off the bloody boat.”

“Green Hell Island?” Tommy stared at him. “You hid them there? But they went and built a sanatorium there, I heard. Over five hundred men on the island, I hear. Hansen’s disease, it was for, they said. They must have built it a good ten years, now.”

“I know.” McNeil paused. When he spoke at last, his voice was expressionless; he stared up somberly, looking at the faint shadow of the other’s face. “I think I’m almost sure to have caught leprosy, Tommy. And now so do you, you see, because you drank from the same bottle...”

“Leprosy?” Tommy stared at him. “You say you didn’t even get off the boat? Then how the devil could you have gotten leprosy?”

“There were two men — lepers. Christ, you should have seen them!” McNeil shook his head. His deep voice was despondent, remembering. “One of them had a hoe and the other had a rake, I think. Anyway, they must have been coming in from the fields, or something. They came by the cove where I was tied up. One of them touched the boat rail. Both of them breathed on me...”

“Did you handle either one of them rough? Or drink from the same bottle, or anything like that?”

“Christ, no!” McNeil shuddered at the thought. “But I tell you the whole place is full of leprosy. It has to be. And these two — you should have seen them. I talked to them; they breathed on me. And one of them even touched the rail. I scrubbed it down good with holystone and rum, and threw everything away, but he touched it. And they both of them breathed on me...”

Tommy let out his pent-up breath and leaned back in his chair, relieved.

“Mon, you had me frightened there for a moment! You don’t pick up leprosy that easy, believe me. Don’t you know anything? Leprosy is one of the least contagious diseases in the world. Mon, there was a lot of opposition from a lot of ignorant people when that sanatorium was put on that island; the folks here in Barbados were afraid the wee little bugs might jump the fifty-odd miles, or come flying over on a good onshore wind like Mother Carey’s chicks. I remember clear; I was passing through at the time. The newspapers were full of it, you know — articles like fleas — trying to get the straight of it through people’s skulls.”

“And what’s the straight of it?” McNeil asked dully. He continued to stare at the step below him, not seeing it. “Do they know what the straight of it is?”

“Of course they know what the straight of it is, mon! You have to have physical contact with a leper, and on one of his sores, too. And for a long time. And then only in some cases. I’m not saying,” Tommy added, unable to stop himself, “but what if you’d have shook one of them with his spit flying in your face, the way you shook me, but what in five years or so you might not have come up with something unpleasant; but just catch it because you both breathed the same air? Or because some poor bloke puts his crippled mitt on the rail of the boat? Don’t be daft!”

“Daft, eh? My word.” McNeil looked up. “You know why I’m still alive, Tommy? Because I was daft, you’d call it.” He paused a moment and then continued. “Let me tell you something: Down in that Brazilian hellhole of a prison, they had a typhoid epidemic once. They had some medic around punching arms with needles, to save you, they said. Well, they’re a civilized nation, you see; needles and doctors and all that, just spreading the bugs, and I wasn’t having any part of it. But you don’t get away from the needles that easy, my word! So I slogged him.”

“Who?”

“The doctor, mon!” Despite his depression, McNeil smiled faintly. “Got me two weeks in solitary, which was my aim, you see?”

“A fortnight in the dungeon was your aim? And you’re not daft?”

“Am I, though! For fourteen days I had neither food nor drink — nor contact with the bloody sick either. It wasn’t easy, but I came out whole, which is more than I can say for those suffered the doctor. Eighty-four dead, and over a hundred sweating their guts out over the head, and never the same — but me?” His predicament suddenly came back to him. “Well... Anyway, up until today...”

“There’s nothing to it, I tell you, Billy! A hand on a rail...”

“You didn’t see that hand,” McNeil said stubbornly. “I did. It looked more a claw than a mitt.”

“I don’t care if it looked like Captain Hook’s beauty, Billy boy. Don’t scare me like that.” Tommy leaned forward, his aching hand forgotten for the moment, his voice enthusiastic. “Look, Billy! Now that you’ve finally let loose of the precious name of the island, we can go back there tonight yet, and still pick the stuff up first thing in the morning. There’s still ample time before light, and more than ample petrol aboard. What say?”

McNeil stared at him quietly, stubbornly.

“Maybe you’re right. Maybe I didn’t get the dommed disease. Maybe the newspapers were right back then, and it’s straight the way you say. But I’m not setting foot on that island ever again, and that’s the fact. I’m not, you know!”

“Then I’ll go myself.” Tommy instantly recognized the argument he knew he would face and quickly moved to correct his error, leaning forward, his voice as ingenuous as he could make it, honeylike in its sincerity. “Ah, Billy, you can tell me where the stuff is on the island and just how to get there. You can, you know. You can trust me.”

There was the briefest of glances from the seated man. His voice was dry. “Can I, now?”

“You can, you know. Of course you can, mon! I’ll get my gear together, and extra petrol and all if needed, and be ready in—”

“You’ll go down and free Diana and take her home right this minute, that’s what you’ll do!” McNeil said suddenly in a harsh voice. He slammed his fist viciously on the porch to emphasize his point, not feeling any pain. (Wasn’t that one of the symptoms he’d heard about — not feeling anything in the hands and feet? Tommy swore he couldn’t possibly have caught the disease, but did Tommy really know? Tomorrow would undoubtedly tell; if he hadn’t developed large open sores...) He stretched his hand for the rum bottle. “First you get the girl home, and then we’ll talk about it. And even so, don’t touch her, do you hear? Call it just for luck.”

“Right, Billy.” Tommy came to his feet with alacrity, sensing victory. McNeil would finally tell him where the stuff was — all because of the establishment of the sanatorium on the island. What a break! Thank God the big man was as ignorant as he was vicious. “Just as you say, Billy boy! I’ll have her home in a jiffy and right as rain. And then you’ll tell me—” He sensed the look on the other man’s face even without seeing it in the darkness, just in the way the outstretched hand suddenly froze with the rum bottle in it. “We’ll talk about it then, Billy boy,” he said hastily. “We’ll talk about it then.”

He stepped around the seated man and trotted down the steps, walking quickly down the path in the direction of the barn, familiar with the route even in the blackness. McNeil leaned back, one elbow on the porch, his legs stretched down the steps, and uncorked the bottle of rum. He took a deep drink and brought the bottle down, holding it in his hand, trying to feel some of the euphoria, or at least elation, that much rum should have given him, but memory of his encounter with the two lepers on the island twisted his stomach with cold dread. Why in hell had he ever picked Green Hell Island? Why not either of the other two in the group, or even one of the lower atolls to the north or the west? Or why hadn’t he even just hidden the stuff right here in Barbados? There still had to be plenty of spots around Gun Hill or Cole’s Cave that hadn’t been disturbed in the years since the robbery.

He took another drink of rum. Could Tommy really get the stones without getting infected with leprosy? And was it even possible that the stones themselves might be carriers — after all, they had been on the island with the diseased men for ten years, even if walled up. Well, Tommy didn’t think there was anything to it, but could Tommy be trusted? Ah, that was the rub, you see? If he had thought Tommy trustworthy fifteen years before, how different it would all be today! But he hadn’t thought Tommy scrupulous then, so why should he think so now? A leopard doesn’t change his spots.

He became aware of the stumbling steps of the other man coming back from the direction of the barn at a half-run, shuffling quickly to avoid collision with one of the many obstacles, calling to him in a startled half-whisper.

“Billy!”

“What?”

“She’s gone, Billy; she’s gone!”

“What!”

“She’s gone, I tell you! She was in the loft and the ladder taken away—”

McNeil came to his feet, putting the rum bottle aside. Trustworthy, eh? Either Tommy had made up the whole story in the first place, or the little bostard was trying to pull something clever now. McNeil walked down the steps and then paused, reeling slightly, suddenly feeling the accumulation of all the rum, his head swimming. He reached out and grasped the other man by the hand. Tommy screamed.

“Billy, that’s my hurt mitt!”

“Is it, now!” McNeil said coldly. He started down the path toward the barn, staggering slightly, dragging the other along with him, whimpering. “Let’s go down and look for Diana together, eh? And if we don’t find her, maybe I can help you remember where she is, eh? Or if you ever even had her. Maybe I can jog your memory, eh? One way or the other?”