“The natives are essentially children,” the overseer explained in answer to Pamela’s question. “The senior male member of the Mendez has been called El Padre for generations. You are the first female ruler Paraquito ever had.”
“What do you mean, ruler?”
“Don’t you understand that you have absolute power here, Pam? You could order natives whipped, or even shot, if you wanted to.”
“That’s terrible! I would never do either!”
“There’s nothing to prevent you being a benevolent dictator, if that’s your bag,” DiMarco said with a smile. “It will bemuse the natives, because the Mendezes were pretty despotic. But they’ll adjust to it. They’ve been adjusting to the whims of dictators for four hundred years.”
“Don’t call me a dictator,” Pamela objected. “I just bought the island, not the people on it.”
“You bought the whole ball of wax,” the overseer told her. “You may as well get used to reigning.”
When Pamela was ready to come out of her self-imposed isolation, it was unnecessary for her to leave the island in order to rejoin the international jet set. She merely let it be known that she was back in circulation, and the Beautiful People came to her, the possession of 400 million dollars being a powerful social magnet.
She started in a small way by scheduling what she whimsically called her “coming out party” for about two dozen of her closest friends. One of the invited guests was the internationally famous race car driver, Baronet Ambrose Harding. He was an old friend, but it occurred to Pamela that there was at least a possibility that their relationship would now ripen into something even more intimate. The baronet had been divorced from his second wife about the same time Pamela was shedding her sixth husband. He was about ten years younger than her, but all except her first husband had been several years younger. While she was not yet consciously husband hunting, she looked forward to seeing the baronet in his new bachelor status.
All but a half dozen of the guests would arrive aboard various yachts. The other six, who all happened to be on the Riviera when their invitations arrived, were flying together from there to San Juan, where they were scheduled to land at 7:30 Saturday morning. Because Ambrose Harding was in that group. Pamela decided to go along when her pilot flew her private plane to meet them.
Pamela and Juan DiMarco breakfasted together at six Saturday morning. Tom York, the pilot, had already breakfasted and was checking out the jet prepatory to taking off for Puerto Rico at six-thirty.
They were just finishing breakfast when the distant sound of a drumbeat came from the interior of the island. There was no rhythm to the sound, merely being a series of discordant thumps, repeated several times.
“What’s that?” Pamela asked DiMarco.
He shrugged. “I don’t read the drums.”
“Read them? You mean some kind of message?”
“Uh huh. Louquo can read them.” He turned to the Indian girl who was just pouring them second cups of coffee. “Tell the criado principal to step in, Pahali.”
The chief servant was a wizened but erect man of seventy. After listening to the drumbeat, he said that one of the natives of a village near the central lake had been bitten by a water moccasin.
Pamela said in surprise, “I thought there weren’t any snakes on Caribbean islands.”
“The moccasin is the only kind on Paraquito,” Louquo said with a curious air of apology. “What does La Madre wish to reply?”
“Don’t call me that,” Pamela said irritably. “I’m not your mother. Why should I reply anything? Isn’t it just a news bulletin?”
The old man shook his head. “The message is meant for you. It asks if you can obtain some white-man medicine.”
“Don’t the natives have any treatment for snakebite?”
“Yes, señora, for ordinary bites. But this was in the neck.”
“Jesus,” DiMarco said. “We’ll have to get the poor devil to San Juan for antitoxin.”
Frowning, Pamela asked Louquo how long it would take to get the snakebite victim to the house.
“Two hours, perhaps, with the fastest canoemen.”
Looking at her watch, Pamela said, “If the plane’s on time, we could be back by then.”
Staring at her, DiMarco said, “You certainly don’t plan to take off now, before the victim gets here.”
“I certainly don’t plan to let my guests cool their heels for two hours at the San Juan airport.”
After gazing at her for several more seconds, the overseer said to the aged criado principal, “That will be all, Louquo,” then said to the maid serving them, “We won’t need you anymore either, Pahali.”
When both servants were gone, Pamela said, “I take it you want privacy because I’m going to get a lecture.”
DiMarco nodded. “About the facts of life on Paraquito. Will you get it through your head, Pam, that you are absolute ruler here, and as such have some definite responsibilities?”
“I am not absolute ruler!”
The overseer made an impatient gesture. “You are in the eyes of the natives. They’re used to despotic rule, and could understand harshness, or even cruelty, because a long line of Mendezes subjected them to both for four centuries. But the Mendezes, like most enduring despots, also took care of their subjects when the need arose, much as harsh parents rise to protect their children in emergency, even though they tend to abuse them other times. The natives are accustomed to regarding the island’s owner as a sort of all-knowing parent, which is why they labeled you La Madre. A cruel mother they could understand, but they would never forgive indifference.”
“Why are you making such a big deal of it, Juan? I’ll be back in two-and-a-half hours at the latest.”
“You don’t know that. The flight into San Juan may be late. The victim could get here in an hour and a half, anyway, instead of two. Louquo’s no canoeman. Believe me, it’s extremely important, not just for humanitarian reasons, but for your status on this island, that you wait.”
Tom York came in to tell Pamela the plane was ready for takeoff. Rising to her feet, Pamela said to the overseer, “Tell Louquo to have the patient brought here, and that Tom will fly him to San Juan as soon as we get back.”
It did take less time than Louquo had estimated for the canoemen to traverse the winding jungle stream from the lake. The snakebite victim arrived shortly after eight a.m. and was given a bed in the servants’ quarters. At nine Pamela contacted the house by radio. There was no phone service on the island, but there was a shortwave radio room in the house, and Tom York had instructed all the house servants in its operation.
Juan DiMarco was out on the veranda, peering east in the hope of spotting the returning plane when the call came. The weather was clear, with a limitless ceiling, he was happy to see, but the ocean was getting rough. The guests arriving by yacht would probably be late, he thought, because headway against such high seas would be difficult.
When Louquo came to tell the overseer that their employer was on the radio, he hurried to the radio room and said into the mike, “Juan here, Pam.”