He smiled and came to his feet, yawning, stretching, bringing himself back to full awareness. Time to go! He walked back inside the small cabin, the deck now burning the soles of his feet where the strong rays of the sun had found it through the thicket above. First he placed the rifle in the lazaret as no longer being necessary, replacing it with a razor-edged machete taken with its scabbard from the dry amidships. Then he brought back the made-up bunk to its original position, hiding the panel, straightening the rug. He pulled on trousers and the boots he had been clever enough to bring along this time, drew a long-sleeved shirt over his head for protection against the insects rather than the sun, and tucked the revolver into his waistband. He glanced about the small cabin, checking to make sure he had forgotten nothing required for his short trip, and then froze.
There was a sharp knock on the side of the boat! For a second he wondered if perhaps one of the schools of sharks had inadvertently bumped the hull, but he knew this was fantasy as soon as he thought it. The knock was repeated; a voice called out.
“Ho!”
The island was occupied! He stood unmoving, his mind churning. It certainly hadn’t been the plane returning from Barbados or another boat approaching by sea; he would have heard those. No — after centuries someone had come to what he had long since considered his own personal, private island, protected both by the voracious sharks as well as by his inalienable rights. But right now someone was on the island! His jaw tightened; he took the revolver from his belt. Well, that wouldn’t be any great problem! Not now, not after all the years, and the lives lost — not when he was this close!
“Ho! Anybody on board?”
He took a deep breath and went on deck, shoving the gun into his pocket, one large hand covering it. The afternoon sun was lowering, striking him in the eyes, half-blinding him. He moved to the shore side of the boat, looking down at his visitors, and then released his grip on his gun. To think he had almost panicked! This really should be no great problem.
Two men in ragged field-working clothes stood there, one of them in the act of banging on the railing again with his free hand. Their feet were bare and dirty; broad-brimmed straw hats hid their faces completely in shadow. The one banging on the railing carried a hoe in his free hand; the other had a rake dragging on the ground beside him. Neither one was armed. McNeil looked down at them quietly. So somebody had finally decided to try to scrape a living off the island; God alone knew why! Anyone had to be insane to pick a spot surrounded by sharks, miles away from the shipping lanes, and very difficult to sustain with supplies. But had they found the stones? He chuckled. Would anyone finding a fortune in gems remain here, eking out a bare existence from the soil, wearing these rags? No, the stones were still here and still available.
“Well, hello,” he said pleasantly. Just stopping by, he thought, or I got lost, or — even better — temporary difficulty with the boat; that should do nicely for an excuse. And at first light a brief trip through the forest and the swamp. He smiled to himself. Who knows? After all, a couple of farmers — maybe they’ve drained the swamp or even cleared the forest? It would be a big help...
“Don’t see many strangers here,” the second man said. His voice was harsh, rasping, difficult to understand; he sounded as if air were escaping from somewhere. The wide straw hat was tilted forward against the setting sun, so that even with his head tipped back to see, his face remained invisible.
“Bostard of an engine,” McNeil explained easily, waving his hand. He smiled. “Did me dirt, but I’ll get her fixed up in no time, my word. I may have to ask your hospitality for the night, but that shouldn’t be any great problem, should it, mon?”
There was a moment’s pause as the two men considered this request. McNeil frowned; standard hospitality required that their answer be automatic in the islands. At last the first man spoke up. He was still leaning on the rail with one hand, the hoe over his shoulder; his face was also in shadow.
“That would have to be up to the doctor, I’m afraid.”
“Doctor?” McNeil’s frown deepened. Doctor? Doctors were educated; doctors didn’t live on abandoned islands in the middle of nowhere! What would a doctor be doing on Green Hell Island? And besides, he suddenly thought, doctors aren’t as easily fooled as poor bostards like these. “What doctor?”
“The doctor...” The man seemed puzzled, as if not understanding what was so difficult about comprehending his simple answer.
“Damn it, mon, I said, what doctor?” McNeil glared at them, leaning over the railing. “You tell me, now, before I lose my temper and come down there and get it out of you, you hear? My word!”
The man leaning on the boat seemed stunned by the sudden inexplicable hostility. He withdrew his hand from the boat’s railing and stepped back. McNeil’s eyes had become accustomed to the light; for the first time he saw that the man dragging the rake was an old man, bent with years of toil. He also saw the large clawlike hand of the man who had stepped away from the side of the boat, and the lionlike features beneath the hat. The other removed his hat to wipe his brow, the reason for the difficulty in breathing and speaking becoming apparent: Where his nose should have been was a gaping hole. McNeil fell back in terror from the gruesome sights.
“Good God! What is this place?”
The old man with the rake started to answer, but his crippled friend saved him the agony of speech.
“It’s a sanatorium for Hansen’s disease,” he said sadly, slowly. “A leprosarium...”
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.