The Terrible Ones

Chinese Puzzle

Dr. Tsing-fu Shu shivered in spite of himself. He felt nothing, but contempt for native superstition, and yet the low throbbing of the drums made his flesh creep. Usually they did not begin until nightfall on Saturday, but today they had started before noon. He wondered why. Not with much interest, but he wondered. He was annoyed by their effect on him, and he was annoyed by his own complete lack of progress. Two full weeks in this stone labyrinth and his work crew had found nothing. It was most unfortunate that he had to operate with so few men and that they had to be so very cautious. But the Citadelle was one of the wonders of the world, and its very prominence as a tourist mecca presented great advantages. Inspiration alone would suggest it as the hiding place of either materials or men. Then, too, it was deserted at night, so that while great care must be exercised during the daylight hours there was no need for excessive caution at night.

He turned down a passage he had not explored before and played the bright beam of his flashlight along the walls. From somewhere beyond them he could hear the careful scraping sounds of his own men at work, searching the underground storehouses and dungeons for— He was not even quite sure what he and they were supposed to look for. Maybe it would be in packing cases left openly among the old garrison supplies, or maybe it would be in brass-bound trunks in some secret place.

Tsing-fu Shu probed the walls with his narrow fingertips, and cursed. He had nothing to go on but one slender clue, and it wasn’t enough. The scraping, scratching noises of his work crew trying to find some hidden compartment in the thick stone walls sounded aimless, futile. Fortunately they could not be heard by the tourists who even now were tramping and gawking overhead, oohing and ahing at the spectacular view from the battlements. Strange, he thought, how the pulsation of the drums made itself felt even through the massive walls.

The stone was slippery beneath his searching fingers, but it was as solid as mountain rock. It did not swing inward at his touch, as he daily — and nightly — prayed it would, nor were there any rings to pull or bolts to slide back and reveal a hidden chamber. He went on with his search, slowly and meticulously, letting his prying fingers wander over every flaw in the smoothness and investigating each protuberance and crack.

Time wore on. The drums still pulsed and Tsing-fu Shu still searched. But now the monotonous rhythm was beginning to pound at his nerves. He began to think of the sound as coming from a great, bloody heart beating within the Walls, for he had read Poe as a student in the States, and it was becoming unbearable. His irritation and frustration rose. Two weeks of nothing! The fat one in Peking would be most displeased.

He turned a corner into another corridor and cursed again, this time out loud. He was back again in a part of the dungeons he had searched only the day before, and he had not even realized where his steps were leading him. A thousand curses on this devil’s labyrinth.

It was enough for this day, he decided. He had workmen for this sort of thing; let them work. His job was to use his brains, to get more information — somehow, from somewhere.

Dr. Tsing-fu Shu, sub-chief of a very specialized branch of Chinese Intelligence, walked briskly toward a light glowing at the far end of the passage. It opened into a cavernous room piled high with ancient boxes. His men were at work among them, forcing open the crates and rummaging busily through them. Another man was emerging from what was apparently a hole in the floor.

Ah! A trapdoor! Tsing-fu’s flagging interest flickered back to life and he strode toward the trap. His man climbed up and lowered the door with a savage crash.

“Restrain yourself,” Tsing-fu reproved him. “I have said repeatedly that there must be no unnecessary noise.”

“Bah! Those peasants up there will think they are hearing ghosts!” the man said contemptuously, and spat.

“Nevertheless you will obey my orders whatever they may be,” said Tsing-fu Shu, and his voice was an icicle. “If you will not be quiet, as I ask, then you will be quietened. Do you understand?”

He stared at the other man with slits of eyes whose heavy lids reminded his enemies of a hooded snake. The fellow lowered his gaze.

“I understand, sir,” he said humbly.

“Good!” The Doctor recovered something of his spirit. He liked to see fear in a man, and he saw it now. “The trapdoor was a disappointment, I assume?”

The man nodded. “It is nothing but a cistern. Disused for many years.”

“How many?” Tsing-fu asked sharply. “Five? Ten? More?” It was important to know, for the cache was said to have been hidden in 1958 or perhaps 1959.

“More. Fifty years, a hundred. It is hard to say. But it is certain that no one has so much as been down there in at least a dozen years.” The man’s smooth, yellow-tinted face crinkled with distaste and his big hands brushed at his tunic. “The place is a nest of cobwebs and ratholes, but even the spiders and rats have long since left. It is foul down there, and it is dead. And there is no hiding place. Sir.”

Tsing-fu nodded with satisfaction. The news was not pleasing to him but he knew he could trust Mao-Pei’s report. The man was a surly devil but he was expert at his task. And he was pleased that the fellow had remembered to call him, Sir. Tsing-fu was not the sort of sub-chief who enjoyed having his subordinates call him Comrade. Even his Work Group Captain.

“I would have thought so,” he said. “I am sure that what we seek will be in a more subtle hiding place. When you and your men have finished with these boxes here — and I am sure you will find nothing in them — then you will start on the floors and walls of the east wing. Tonight we will go back to the cannon galleries and finish with them.”

He left the work group then and went down yet another passage to the large room he had converted into a temporary office for himself. His mind picked at his problem as he walked. There were other dungeons in this vast building besides the ones he and his men were searching, but they were open to tourists during the day and heavily bolted at night. That had also been the case at the time the treasure was hidden. And the men who had hidden the cache would surely have chosen a place that they could easily return to without interruption. Therefore…

Tom Kee was waiting for him in the makeshift office that had once been occupied by the keeper of the store house. He folded his newspaper as Tsing-fu entered and rose to his feet in a stretching, catlike movement.

“Ah” Tsing-fu greeted him. “You are back. You have arranged for more supplies!? Good. You did not perhaps discover the reason for that incessant drumming I hear even down here?”

Tom Kee’s lean face twisted into a sneering smile. “I did, sir. Those misbegotten blacks down there are drumming to drive away the spirit of a djuba that appeared last night. There is a story about it in the paper that may interest you.”

“So?” Tsing-fu took the proffered newspaper. “But you must not talk about them in that way, Tom Kee. Misbegotten blacks! Tch! We are all people of color, you must remember that. We are all friends.” He smiled gently and glanced at the headlines. “Think of them as our black brothers,” he added, “our allies against the world of Whites.”

“Oh, I always do,” Tom Kee said, and grinned. His grin was no more pleasant than his smile.

Dr. Tsing-fu read the newspaper account with growing interest. It was an incredible tale of the supernatural and of bravery far beyond the call of duty. An unspeakable monster, it seemed, had risen apparently from the sea and fought a hideous battle upon the cliff top of Cap St. Michel. In the darkness it had been impossible for Dog Patrol Squad Number Nine to examine the area with any great thoroughness, but while they were making their preliminary investigation the duty dog gave signs of detecting a scent. It then led Squad Nine toward a small mountain cave.

Tsing-fu Shu read on to the end, his lips curling with contempt as he read of the men’s departure from the scene and the “exceptional bravery” with which they had returned in the morning light. They had flushed out the cave with gas-bombs, incantations and smoke, but they had found nothing — not the slightest trace of occupancy, human or inhuman. Later in the morning the body of the dog turned up many miles away downstream, clawed practically to ribbons. Clearly all this was the work of some supernatural agency. Thus, the drums, to guard against a recurrence of the horror.

There was one final item in the STOP PRESS column. It said:

Tsing-fu’s eyes narrowed. “So, Tom Kee. Mysterious howls in the night — a decoy, quite possibly — and today we find the body of a bearded man in army fatigues. But Haitian army men are seldom bearded, is that not so? Have you perhaps heard more of this than is in the paper?”

“I have Doctor. That is why I thought you might be interested in that account.” Tom Kee snapped his knuckles reflectively. “It is said in town that the body was that of a Fidelista. A big man, well-built with rotten teeth.”

“That sounds like Alonzo,” Tsing-fu said almost conversationally.

Tom Kee nodded. “That is what I thought. I can assure you that I was even more than usually careful not to be seen coming back here today. I also tried to find out if other Fidelistas have been seen. But I am told that, right now, they are all across the border in the Dominican Republic.” He smiled faintly and snapped another knuckle.

“Not all” Tsing-fu hissed. “What was he doing here? This is treachery of some kind, you can count upon it! Why did he not tell us he was coming? These people are supposed to be working with us, not against us. They must keep us informed as to their movements.” The smaller, catlike man shrugged his narrow shoulders. “We do not tell them,” he murmured. “That is not the point! When the time is ripe, we tell them what is needed. They work for us, not we for them.” Tsing-fu checked his angry stride. “But what is even more important is — who killed him? And why?”

Tom Kee smiled his crooked smile. “The djuba—” he began, and stopped. Tsing-fu was in no jesting mood today.

“The djuba!” Tsing-fu snarled. “That is good enough for primitive fools, but not for us. He was killed by some human agency, that is obvious. Obviously, also, we did not do it ourselves. Neither did the Haitians — they would have taken him in for questioning by the secret police. So who does that leave, do you suppose?”

The small man shrugged again. “It was Alonzo himself who told us about The Terrible Ones. Perhaps they are more terrible than we thought.”

Tsing-fu eyed him thoughtfully. “Perhaps they are,” he said softly, the sudden brushfire of his anger again under control. “Yes. You might be right. There may be much more to this than we know. I must take sterner measures. Later we will’ discuss more fully what we shall do about the Cubans. In the meantime you will go back into town and make further inquiries. When you are sure that this man was indeed Alonzo, or at least some other Fidelista, get in touch with their headquarters and tell them that their man is dead. You will assume that they sent him for a purpose and that he was unfortunately waylaid. Be sympathetic, be subtle, use no threats — but find out why they sent him. And come back after nightfall. We will be using the metal detector again and you must be here.”

Tom Kee nodded and took his leave. This was no time to argue about the long and dreary climb up and down the steep trail to the Citadelle. Tsing-fu’s vicious bursts of rage were well known to all who worked for him. He made his way to the tunnel pointed out to Tsing-fu two weeks before by a Haitian guide, who had died very soon afterwards of apparently natural causes, and came out in a palm grove outside the Castle grounds. He took the horse that was tethered there and began the long way down the hill.

Tsing-fu was striding down yet another passage in the maze beneath the Citadelle. His skin tingled pleasantly with anticipation. He had been patient with the prisoner for far too long. He walked past the storerooms with quickening step, jabbing his flashlight beam down the corridor toward the cells. The one he had chosen for the prisoner was perfect for interrogations. Unlike some of the others it had not even the smallest of barred windows, and it had an anteroom where Shang could sleep — or whatever it was that the creature did whenever he was alone — until he was needed.

He entered the anteroom and a vast shape stirred in the corner.

“Shang?” he murmured.

“Master.”

“You have obeyed my orders?”

“Yes, Master.”

“Good. Your patience will be rewarded. Very soon. Perhaps within the hour.”

There was a low growl of satisfaction in the darkness.

“You will wait here until I call,” Tsing-fu ordered, and smiled to himself as he slid back the heavy bolt of the inner, cell. He was going to enjoy this.

He stepped into the pitch blackness of the tiny room and swung his flashlight beam over the stone cot and its occupant. Still there, of course. There was no way out. The lantern was hanging, untouched, from its peg high up on the wall, though he lit it only when he chose. Even that had only been in the bare cell for the past few days, after he had made sure the prisoner was too weak to reach for it. Tsing-fu lit it now and looked down at the girl with something like admiration. She stared back at him defiantly, her eyes bright and feverish in her gaunt face. Hunger, thirst, and almost perpetual darkness had done nothing to make her talk. Drugs to keep her awake, drugs to make her babble, drugs to sicken her and turn her body inside out — all these had done everything expected of them except make her tell the truth. Some of her finger-nails were gone and there were cigarette burns upon her body. But he had soon seen that they were having no effect on her. Oh, sometimes she had screamed and spat out words at him, but every word had been a lie.

And he no longer had time to check her lies out one by one.

“Good afternoon, Evita,” he said pleasantly. “Did you know that it was afternoon?”

“How could I know?” she whispered. Her voice was dry and hoarse.

He smiled.

“Perhaps you are thirsty?”

She turned her face to the wall.

“No, no, no,” Tsing-fu said gently. “Soon you will have water. We have had enough of this, I think. Today something has happened which somewhat changes things. An acquaintance of yours has given us much useful information. You recall Alonzo?”

He saw the flickering of her eyelids and the slight twitch of a facial muscle.

“No,” she whispered.

“What a pity. Still, I think he might be persuaded to help you. It is now only a matter of your confirming his story.”

“What story?”

“Ah! But that would make it far too easy for you, would it not?” It would make it a lot easier for himself, he thought grimly, if he had the faintest idea what Alonzo’s story might have been. He reached for a pack of slim cigarillos and began to play with it. “No, you will tell me your story once more, and then we will discuss the little discrepancies. This time I must warn you that the consequences will be very terrible if I do not hear the truth. Tell me what I want, and you are free. But lie again, and I will know, for as I say I need no more than confirmation. And then…” His smile was very sweet and full of sympathy. “And then you will face something that even you, my dear, will be quite unable to bear. Now begin, please.”

She lay where she was and spoke in a husky voice that was totally without expression.

“My name is Evita Messina. I am born and bred in Santo Domingo. My husband was a political enemy of Trujillo and he died in prison. Afterwards they came and took—”

“Yes, yes, I know all that is true,” Tsing-fu said with gentle patience. “We are agreed that there is, somewhere, a hidden cache of precious stones and gold somewhere on the island. And both of us know that many people would like to get their hands on it. But we have not found it yet, have we? No, Trujillo hid it well. Yes! All that is agreed. Tell me again about Padilla and yourself.”

The woman sighed. “I met him casually and discovered quite by accident that he had been a member of Trujillo’s special staff. He was drunk and bragging a little. He said something about having one of the keys to the treasure trove. I was determined to find out more. And so… I… played upon him… and we…”

“Became lovers. Yes.” Tsing-fu’s lips were wet. He had heard the tapes of Herman Padilla’s sexual excursions with Evita Messina and enjoyed them enormously. The cries, the sighs, the creaking of the bed, the little sounds of pain, the slap of flesh against flesh, had given him pleasure amounting to ecstasy. A thousand curses upon the fools who had broken in too soon, during that last night!

“And in the course of your love-making,” he said thickly, through a mouthful of saliva, “what did you find out about this so-called key?”

“I told you,” she said lifelessly. “It is not a real key but a sort of clue. Padilla said there were several such clues. It was Trujillo’s idea of a game. To each of several men he gave only one part of the puzzle. Padilla was one of them. Only Trujillo himself knew all of them. Or so Padilla said.”

“And Padilla’s clue?”

“You know that also. Only an unconnected phrase— ‘the Castle of the Blacks.’ I always thought he knew more. But I was unable to find out. We were interrupted, as you may recall.” She said it bitterly.

He recalled, all right. The two listeners manning the tape machine had pounced upon the lovers in their unguarded state; quite certain that they could capture both alive and extort the full truth from them. They had been wrong. Won Lung had been obliged to stop Padilla’s flight with a bullet in the back. And the girl insisted she knew nothing more than they had overheard.

For the hundredth time Tsing-fu mulled the phrase over in his mind. “The Castle of the Blacks.” Was it code? Was it anagram? He thought not. It had to be a place. And of all places, this vast Citadelle, built by King Henri Christophe of Haiti to defend his black kingdom against French attack, fitted the name — the clue — to perfection. True, it was not in the Dominican Republic… but it was not very far away. And to hide part of his stolen millions in the very midst of his hated enemies, the Haitians, would have been a typically cunning, Trujillo-like move. Yet where in all this vast complex of stonework could the treasure lie? And who could hold the other clues? Padilla must have known.

“He told you something else,” Tsing-fu said sharply.

“No!”

“Of course he did. Do not forget that I now have information from Alonzo.”

“Then use it,” she spat at him, with a return of her old life. “If he knows so much, make use of him!”

“Ah! So you do know him, then?”

“No, I do not.” She sank back again upon the hard stone cot, exhausted. “It was you who used his name, not I.”

“But he mentioned yours,” Tsing-fu said, watching her. It was not true, of course. In the early days of their “cooperation” Alonzo had warned him about a band of Dominican outlaws called The Terrible Ones who were also after the Trujillo Treasure, but that was all Alonzo had ever told him. “He mentioned yours,” Tsing-fu repeated. “This is your last chance to make things easy for yourself. Now tell me in your own words— What is your connection with The Terrible Ones?”

“I know nothing about them.” Her voice was toneless again.

“Oh, yes, you do. It is for them that you seek this treasure, is it not?”

“It is for myself!”

“Why?” The word lashed out at her.

“I told you! Because Trujillo took everything we had and killed my husband I want it! I want it for myself!”

“You lie! You will tell me about The Terrible Ones before I leave this room today!”

Her face turned to the wall. “I do not know them,” she said lifelessly.

Dr. Tsing-fu sighed. “What a pity,” he said. But his pulse was racing. It had been a long time since he had last satisfied his own peculiar passions. “Perhaps my assistant will be able to jog your memory,” he murmured pleasantly.

He turned his head toward the door and called out. “Shang!”

The door swung inward.

“Yes, Master.”

“Come in,” Tsing-fu said genially. “Look at her. And you, my little Evita, look at my friend Shang. He has been longing to come in here to make your acquaintance. It is only with the utmost patience that he has been able to restrain himself, for which he is now about to be rewarded. Go closer to her, Shang. And look at him, woman!”

A huge figure shambled into the lantern light and lumbered toward the cot. Tsing-fu watched the girl’s head turn and enjoyed her little involuntary gasp.

“Shang may not look like a man,” he said conversationally, “but he has a man’s desires. I must warn you, though, that he is a trifle unconventional in his approach. I have even heard it said that he is brutal. We will see. He is free to do whatever he pleases with you. Touch her, Shang. See how she likes it.”

The girl shrank back against the wall and whimpered. For the first time she clearly saw the creature who had guarded her cell door, and her whole being churned with terror and revulsion.

Shang was a gorilla without hair, a human gorilla with the enormous body of a sumo wrestler and the fang-like teeth of some vast carnivorous animal. He towered over her, growling, saliva dripping from his open mouth, sweat gleaming like oil over his bare upper body. Fat blended with muscle and muscle with fat, and both bulged and flexed together as he reached out one massive arm and ripped her thin blouse down to her waist. A hand the size of a bunch of bananas clamped down over Evita’s breasts.

“Ah, no!” she moaned.

“Ah, yes!” said Tsing-fu, trembling deliciously in anticipation of the sexual bout. “Unless you wish to change your mind and tell me what I ask?”

“I know nothing,” she gasped. “Get him away from me. Oh, God!”

“God helps those who help themselves,” Tsing-fu murmured sanctimoniously. “You will speak?”

“No!”

Shang growled and ripped again.

“That’s right, Shang,” Tsing-fu approved. He leaned back comfortably against the wall that offered him the best view and lit a cigarillo with shaking fingers. Ah, this was worth waiting for! To watch, to hear, was so much more stimulating than the clumsy crudity of the act.

“You are sure you would not rather talk?” he suggested, almost hoping now that she would not — yet.

“I know nothing!” she screamed. “Nothing!”

“So. Well, then. Gently at first, my Shang. We may need to save her for a repeat performance.”

He caught his breath with sheer delight as Shang rumbled in his throat and mounted the cot. The girl was kicking wildly. Good! Good!

Shang’s monstrous body enveloped the slim, weak figure on the cot.