Horizons (8 page)

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T
hey buried the boy by torchlight, none of them wanting
to leave the chore until
morning. Their impromptu grave
side service included a prayer for Wynne. Afterward, they sat around the campfire, morose and silent for the most part, waiting for their breadfruit to bake in the coals. One
by one, they gradually drifted off to sleep, each hoping that tomorrow would bring deliverance—or, failing that, less death and disaster.

T
here was no sign of Wynne’s body the next morning, for which they were all privately thankful—which was about the only thing for which they were grateful at the moment. Again, it was bananas and coconut for breakfast, along with chunks of cold breadfruit. Even little Sydney wrinkled up her nose at the limited fare, as if to say, “Same old, same old.”

“Water, water everywhere,” Blair quoted drearily, staring out at the ocean, “nor any drop to drink.”

“Or to wash with,” Kelly grumped. “I hate to think of having to clean up in salt water. In fact, I doubt it’s really possible. I know swimming in it leaves your hair sticky.”

“You might get the dirt off, but the salt would dry on your skin and most likely itch,” Blair agreed. “And I don’t think I’d care to try it except as a last resort. I break out in a rash just from lake water. I think it has something to do with the algae, or maybe the fish.”

“Well, I’d give my right arm for a bath right now. Or a shower. Even a quick slap with a washcloth.”

“And a change of clothes,” Alita added wistfully. “Even a hairbrush would help.”

“That I’ve got,” Kelly said, brightening. “There’s one in my purse, and if you two don’t mind sharing, neither do I.”

“Oooh! Get it!” Blair cooed in delighted anticipation.

“And a nail file, if you have one,” Alita all but begged. Kelly reached eagerly for her purse. Just then, Zach called out, “C’mon, ladies. Shake a leg! We agreed to get an early start today.”

Kelly and Blair groaned.
Alita cursed in Spanish.

“Can’t
you guys go, and let us girls tend the home fires?” Kelly suggested hopefully.

“No, we really need you. The more people we have looking, the more territory we’ll be able to cover at a time.”

“What did I tell you?” Alita hissed, shoving to her feet. “He’s the Energizer Bunny in disguise.”

“Now he wants to explore that blasted jungle again, like Indiana Jones. I’m telling you, if we don’t find water soon, he’s going to drive us all wacky,” Kelly muttered. She tossed her knapsack and purse into a nearby clump of bushes, where they would be concealed until she got back.

“Why’d you do that?” Blair asked, half curious and half amused. “It’s not as if someone is going to come along and steal your wallet while we’re gone. Really, Kelly, we should be so lucky!”

Kelly paused, then gave a wry laugh. “You’re right. I guess it’s just a habit with me, to stuff my purse out of sight somewhere. Comes
from living too long in crime-
ridden cities, I suppose. First Houston, and now Phoenix.” Today, there was no need to leave anyone behind to watch over an injured member of their party. The most badly wounded had already succumbed, everyone else was mobile—and Roberts, no longer tethered to his tree, was going with them. They would all take turns carrying Sydney.

Off they trudged, again spread out in their search pattern as per the day before. Ten minutes later Zach called out the roll, and everyone grudgingly responded.

“Egad!” Kelly groused loudly. “I feel like one of those kids who followed the Pied Piper.”

Frazer, next in line, heard her and laughed. “Maybe we can carve Zach a didgerido so he better fits the role.”

“I am going to hate myself for asking,” Alita called o
ut, “but what is a didgerido?”

Blair, on her other side, i
nstantly supplied the answer.
“It’s a long trumpetlike instrument that the Australian a
borigines make out of bamboo.”

“Yeah, just what Zach needs,” Gavin contributed sarcastically. “He already bellows like a bull elephant.”

On cue, Zach shouted, “Pipe down and pay attention to your areas!”

“I know precisely where I’d like to shove his ‘pipe down’!” Blair avowed.

“Up
with that pipe would be even better,” Alita proposed.

A quarter hour later, they stumbled across their first significant find of the day. The lime tree was in Roberts’s sector, upon which they immediately converged.

“At least we won’t have to worry about getting scurvy,” Blair said. “Not
that we’ll be here that long…
I hope.”

“Hey! This is great! A little rum, and we’d have the makings for banana daiquiris,” Frazer noted. “I wouldn’t mind getting a little sloshed right now. My leg is killing me.”

Roberts considered this a moment. “You know, there just might be a way to make us some home brew out of something on the island. That breadfruit maybe, or fermented coconuts. You can do it with everything from grain to potatoes, so one of these foods ought to do the trick.”

“I’d settle for tea or coffee, myself,” Blair put in.

“I’d be tickled with lime-flavored water, if only we had the water,” Kelly added.

They loaded up on limes, stuffing their pockets full.

“Okay,” Zach commanded, hoisting Sydney up on his shoulders. “Back to the search, troops.”

Slowly, they began to disburse, dragging their feet like students reluctantly returning to class after recess. They’d taken but a few steps when Zach let out a yell loud enough to send the birds fleeing the treetops. Kelly whirled around, only to stare stupidly at the empty spot beside her—where Zach had been just a second ago.

Chapter 8

B
efore Kelly could comprehend what had happened, Gavin came dashing across the small clearing, his hands held straight out in front of him, palms up. He dived into Kelly, bowling her aside, and in the next instant Sydney fell into Gavin’s open arms.

“What the devil?” Kelly muttered in confusion.

At the same time, Sydney was shrieking and Gavin yelled breathlessly, “Got her! I got her! The kid’s okay!”

“Thank God!” Zach’s voice floated down from above. As did the others, Kelly looked up, and gaped in horrified astonishment. Perhaps thirty feet overhead, Zach dangled upside down in mid-air, twirling slowly at the end of a vine which was wrapped around his ankle. The other end of the vine disappeared somewhere in the foliage at the top of a tree, no doubt attached to an unseen limb. Their immediate, amazed exclamations melded together.

“Oh, my lands!”

“How did he…
?”

“What in the…
?”

“Good grief!”

“Get him down!” Kelly screeched. “We’ve got to get him down!”

Again
…
“How?”

And from Roberts, “Why? He didn’t want to let me loose. Besides, I think he looks real cute swinging around up there like a red-faced monkey.”

“Toss me a knife, so I can cut this vine,” Zach hollered over the confusion below.

“Dang, mate!” Frazer called back. “You’re hangin’ higher than most rooftops. Cut that vine, and the fall will surely break your neck.”

“Climb it,” Gavin offered as a safer solution. “Haul yourself upright, and pull yourself up the vine, the way they do in rope climbing exercises in basic training. Once you reach a sturdy limb, you can work your foot loose.” By folding himself double, Zach managed to grab hold of the vine just above his ankle. The effort made him swing like a human pendulum, but at least his head was even with his foot now, the blood no longer pounding to his brain.

“Be careful!”

“Don’t untie the noose! Try to work your foot into it if you can, like a stirrup.”

“Oh, God! I can’t watch!”

Zach didn’t want to watch either, but necessity demanded that he keep his
eyes open, no matter how dizzy
it made him. Finally, his stomach lurching all the while, he maneuvered the loop over his heel and pulled himself into a standing position, losing his shoe in the process. Again the vine spun wildly, twirling him around like a top. He did close his eyes then, and fought to keep his breakfast down. The thick, twisted vine to which he clung with such desperation was old, dried out to the point of flaking,
and creaked ominously beneath his weight—an audible warning of its brittle state.

Praying as fervently as he’d ever prayed, Zach coiled his foot in the loop and his hands around the upper length, and slowly began to hoist himself upward, inch by perilous inch. Several times, his sweaty hands slipped, nearly sending him plunging to the ground. His sore shoulder ached, crying out for relief from the strain.

At last his head cleared the lower cluster of leaves. Daring to look upward, Zach was dismayed to find that the vine was attached to a limb still well overhead. Not that he intended to climb that high. Nor would that particular bough, slim and limber as it was, provide the support he required. Upon viewing it, he was vastly surprised, and grateful, that it had sustained his weight thus far. Surely, it wouldn’t do so much longer.

Still spinning, Zach spotted a larger branch some distance out of his lateral reach. It was the only one near that appeared sturdy enough to bear him. There was one major problem, however. In order to reach it, he was going to have to swing himself over to it.

“Okay, I can do this,” he told himself, screwing up his waning courage. “If Tarzan could do it, so can I.” He deliberately blocked out the fact that Tarzan had purportedly been raised by apes and trained to such daring exploits from childhood—whereas he, Zach, was in his thirties and, though fairly fit, not at all used to acrobatic endeavors of this level. Desperately wishing he could let loose long enough to dry his perspiring palms, Zach sucked in a quick breath and began to rock back and forth. Above him, the vine and its thin support groaned in protest. From below, he heard multiple gasps,
echoing those in his own fear-
frozen mind.

To and fro he swayed, arcing farther each time, in imitation of a clumsy trapeze artist, one arm and hand extended
as far as he could reach toward his intended goal. “One more swing,” he thought apprehensively, scared spitless and trying not to imagine his broken body if he failed in his attempt. He’d probably shatter into more pieces than Humpty Dumpty! “One foot closer, and I’ll go for it.”

He was on the advance swing, headed back toward his chosen target, when the vine suddenly snapped, breaking his forward momentum. Arms flailing, Zach lunged for the branch, praying he’d reach it. Praying it would hold him. His nails scraped at rough bark, his fingers clawing frenziedly. His second shoe f
lew off, sailing through green-
leafed space. Frantic, he twisted, shifted, and somehow gained enough of a hold with his bare toes and fingers to haul himself up and wrap his quivering body around the branch. There he clung, arms and legs firmly grasping the rapidly vibrating bough, his teeth clenched yet still chattering.

Far below, anxious screams died away, replaced by pregnant silence. “Zach?” Gavin called tentatively. “You okay?”

“Y—” Zach had to swallow twice, past petrified vocal chords, to reply shakily, “Yeah. I think so. Just have to get my wind back.”

“Can you climb down from where you’re at now?” Frazer asked worriedly.

At this point, Zach wasn’t sure he could move at all, let alone climb down. His treetop perch was precarious at best. He risked a look around, and promptly wished he hadn’t. So far up was he, that between wavering fronds he could see all the way past the eastern shoreline, and when he turned his head to the right, he had a dizzying view of the waves rolling onto the southern coast. And between them, acres of tangled jungle growth, interspersed with massive clumps of rock and tiny clearings.

“I’m facing away from the tree. I think,” Zach told them.
“I can’t see what’s behind me, and that’s the only direction I can go.”

“You’ll just have to crawl backward, then,” Roberts instructed, speaking up at last. “Feel your way along.”

“Like an inchworm, Zach,” Kelly contributed in a bid to help. “A bit at a time, and very carefully.”

“Think like a
gal
ito,
a kitten,” Alita added nervously.

“Make that a panther,” Blair revised in a strained voice. “I’ve never heard of one of them getting stuck up a tree.”

The branch supporting him groaned, and Zach knew his short reprieve wouldn’t last. He had to move. Now. Whether he wanted to or not. Cautiously, he edged backward. Fortunately, the farther he scooted, the thicker and sturdier the branch became, until he eventually butted up to what he presumed was the main trunk. Only then did he allow himself a gusty sigh of relief.

From there he picked his way slowly downward, until his bare, scraped feet finally touched solid, never-more-welcome earth. Weak-kneed Zach slumped to the ground, his back braced against the base of the tree, sucking in deep grateful breaths while the others rallied around him, exclaiming excitedly.

“Thank God, you made it down from there in one piece!”

“I thought you were a goner for sure!”

“You are one lucky son-of-a-gun!”

“What the blazes happened anyway? How did your foot get tangled up so tightly in that vine?”

“It was a snare,” Zach explained, shaking his head in amazement. “I stepped into it, and wham! Next thing I know I’m swinging from the treetops, and Sydney is falling like a stone. I’m just grateful to God that Gavin managed to catch her before she
hit the ground.” He looked won
deringly at the girl, who had long since recovered from her fright and was grinning at him from Kelly’s arms.

Satisfied that the toddler was perfectly fine, Zach’s gaze swung toward Gavin. “That must have taken some fancy footwork on your part.”

Gavin nodded. “For a minute there, I thought I was back on the gridiron, stretching out for a pass. Luckily, that old sliding football dive I perfected in high school panned out. But Syd’s by far the prettiest little pigskin I ever caught.”

Roberts was frowning, deep in thought. “A snare?” he repeated. “One deliberately set?”

“From what I could see, yes,” Zach answered, his frown now matching Roberts’s. “The noose appeared to be skillfully fashioned, and the other end was tied in several knots to the upper branch, though how the hell anyone ever got that limb bent to the ground in the first place is beyond me. And I’d be willing to bet my last dollar if we look around, we’ll find the stake it was anchored to. Which reminds me, we’re all going to have to be more careful in the future. God only knows what other sorts of traps we might inadvertently stumble across.”

“I don’t understand,” Alita said. “Why would there be such things about, when no one lives here and according to Blair there are no animals to catch?”

“They’re probably remnants from World War II,” Blair guessed. “This entire area of the Pacific was a real hot spot back then, and the Japanese had soldiers stationed on many of these islands.”

“She’s right. That vine was brittle with age, definitely not a freshly set snare,” Zach agreed.

Roberts grunted. “In that case, we need to be on the lookout for other booby traps, like camouflaged pits with bamboo stakes, maybe. We seen plenty of that kind of dirty trick in Nam.”

“Whoa! Does that mean there could be things like live
hand grenades lying around somewhere?” Kelly exclaimed, her eyes wide with renewed alarm and dread.

Zach’s response was somber. “It’s possible. We’ll simply have to be extremely cautious from here on out, especially on any treks into the interior of the island.”

Then, on a face still pale from his recent fright, he offered an unexpected grin. “Fortunately, there is a brighter side to all this. You’ll all be glad to know that we can stop beating the bushes for a while. As I was clinging to that limb like a limpet, I spotted a small pool. It’s about two hundreds yards due south of us.”

He paused for effect, and to savor their surprised and elated expressions. “People, we now have water.”

T
he group followed Zach’s lead, treading very carefully as they headed toward a big shelf of lava rock. Zach directed them around it, to the eastern side.

“There.” He pointed proudly to a small pool, almost hidden by the growth of weeds surrounding it.

“That’s it?” Alita declared with obvious disappointment. I’ve seen wash basins larger than that. And a lot cleaner, too.”

She wasn’t exaggerating by much. The pool was about the size of a large jacuzzi, and the liquid contained in it more resembled ink than water.

Kelly groaned. “How are we supposed to drink that? It’s as black as tar!”

“No, it’s not,” Zach refuted. “It just looks black. Actually, it’s as clear as crystal.” He bent down and put his hand beneath the surface. “Look. It’s the lava rock on the bottom and sides that’s dark, making the water seem black, the way a swimming pool liner might make it appear blue.”

“It’s also reflecting the dark green of the weeds and trees,” Gavin said.

“Look, the pool is being fed from a crack near the top of the ledge,” Frazer pointed out.

“That accounts for the trickling sound,
”
Blair concluded.

“It also accounts for the purity of the water,” Zach added, and went on to explain. “It’s being filtered through the lava rock, probably better than any purification system in any city back home. And see there?” He gestured toward the opposite edge of the pool. “The water is seeping out on the other side, which serves to keep it moving so it doesn’t become stagnant.”

“Then it’s safe to drink?” Kelly asked.

“Probably more so th
an the water you get from your t
ap,” Zach assured her.

That’s all Kelly and the others needed to hear. Like a herd of deer, they converged on the pool, kneeling and cupping the water to their mouths.

“I’ve never tasted water so good!”

“It’s wonderful!”

“Delicious!”

“A fair dinkum littl
e billabong!”

They were laughing and splashing like carefree youngsters.

“It feels so good, I could jump right in, clothes and all!”

“
If we took turns, men and women separately, we could undress and really get clean.” Kelly suggested further.

“Or we could all get naked and go in together,” Roberts proposed slyly, wagging his thick blond eyebrows. “Really get to know each other.” His gaze swept over the three women, his expression that of a fox eyeing a hen house.

“Hah!” Alita spat. “Fat chance. Look where it got your wife.”

“Get real, Roberts,” Kelly added. “Don’t make me regret talking Zach into letting you loose.”

“The same goes for me,” Blair said, making it unanimous on the female co
unt. “If you want to get better
acquainted, start with something a lot less significant. Like , telling us your full name.”