Sinister Paradise Part 11

"_Qui est in Coelis_--who are in Heaven--" Rozeno's voice whispered through the room. The only sound.

Ulnar moved slowly, stood beside Pedro. They had been master and servant but in the old days they had come up out of Mexico together, guarding a treasure. Ulnar moved to the wall, took down a heavy battle axe that hung there. "Time come for me," he said. "Me go meet men as my chief went to meet Cortez!" His eyes glinted.

"Wait!" Rozeno called. The priest was on his feet. "I have resolved the conflict in my soul. There comes a time when men, even good men, must fight against the forces of evil." From the wall he took a spear.

"I'll go with you two," Parker said. "In just a moment." From his jacket, he took one of the two pistols. Silently he pa.s.sed it to Effra.

"As a last resort, use it."

"But, Bill, there is still time--"

Parker didn't hear her. He was moving with Rozeno and Ulnar through another opening. "At least," Rozeno was saying. "We have this advantage.

We know our way around here."

They moved silently, by side pa.s.sages, through the rooms. "Find Retch,"

Parker whispered over and over again. "He's the heart and the core of this business. With him out of the way, we can handle the others."

"Do you see anybody, Pfluger?" Retch's voice came from somewhere.

"Naw. I think I got the old gink but he ducked out of sight somewhere."

"Retch is on the other side of the corridor," Rozeno whispered. "The man who spoke last is in the next room."

They slipped to the opening, peering into the next room. A man in there was crouching against the wall and watching the opening into the corridor. At the sight of the man, Ulnar went berserk. This was the man who had killed Pedro.

A shrill battle cry pealing from his lips, ma.s.sive axe uplifted, Ulnar charged through the door.

The crouching man whirled. Smoke and thunder rolled from the gun in his hand. Ulnar had taken death wounds before he was halfway across the room. But death wounds or not, he kept going.

The heavy axe came down on the head of the man who was desperately trying to fend it off. The man went down. For an instant, Ulnar's battle cry of triumph, wild and savage and fierce, roared through the honeycomb of pa.s.sages, then went into silence with Ulnar, forever.

"Hey, Pfluger, what the h.e.l.l happened?" Retch's startled voice came.

"We've got to cross the corridor to get at him," Parker whispered. "And there are other men in here somewhere."

"Listen!" Rozeno whispered.

Voices, a babble of sound, were coming from behind them.

"The men from the village," Rozeno whispered. "When they ceased fearing the Jezbro, they found the courage to come up here."

The babble grew stronger. Running feet moved along the corridor. Retch shouted somewhere, but the words were lost.

Rising above the other sounds was the cry of a woman--Effra.

Parker cursed beneath his breath as he ran. At the side entrance to the big room where the pool of mercury turned, he stopped, appalled.

The room seemed full of men. Some of them he recognized as coming from the village, others he had never seen before. From their appearance he judged they had come in the boat. Retch was coming through the door that led into the main corridor. The gun in his hands was centered on Effra, who crouched at the key board of the vast machine. There was a smile on Retch's face.

"Parker!" Retch's voice lifted in a yell. "Parker! I've got your girl.

Come on out and give yourself up or I'll let her have it."

This was his moment of triumph, this was the moment when he won his victory. Parker, peering around the edge of the doorway, knew now that he had no way to go. If he moved into the room, and tried to shoot Retch, the man would certainly kill Effra in one wild burst of slugs as he turned the gun on the pilot.

"Parker!" Retch yelled again. A smile on his face, he waited for an answer.

Effra's fingers moved on the control panel. Mercedes got slowly to her feet. The men in the room were silent, waiting for an answer to Retch's command. Parker stood just outside the door, hesitant. No matter what he did, it seemed to him that there was only one answer.

Behind Retch, coming from the corridor, something moved. At the sight of it, Parker felt a flood of biting cold surge through him.

It was a puma--a gigantic puma. In its jaws, as it swung its head from side to side, dangled the body of a man it had killed in the corridor.

It was a Jezbro puma.

Once it had been a little image in a niche beside the machine from the old time. Then life had flowed into it, its own kind of life, now it walked as a huge ravening beast through the room where once it had been a tiny image.

The first man who saw it went dead white and slumped downward in a faint. The others saw it in almost the same instant. Pandemonium swept through the room. No man's nerves were proof against such a sight as this. Screaming men were suddenly trying to fight their way out of a place that had suddenly become haunted.

The puma flowed into the room. Like Retch, it had yellow eyes. They glared now, with a burning light. There was a vague mistiness about this puma but there was also about it the appearance of solid reality.

Retch spun to face the menace coming from behind him. The gun in his hands spat flame and fury.

He had destroyed the Jezbro hawk. He would also destroy this Jezbro puma.

The puma dropped the man from its jaws. It crouched. It leaped straight at the gun spouting lead. Retch slid to one side. The puma missed. It hit the floor, slid, tried to turn as a frantic girl moved b.u.t.tons on the key board.

The floor was slick, the padded feet did not grip. The tail of the sliding puma touched the pool of mercury. The tail smoked as if it was suddenly on fire.

The puma screamed. It seemed to be drawn into the pool. It was as if something in the pool caught the puma, held it, pulled it into the mercury.

It went out of sight, vanished. No puff of flame followed. The life that had animated it had come from this pool. Now the life had returned to its source.

The dazed Retch lowered his smoking gun.

Parker moved silently forward.

"Lay down the gun, Johnny Retch!" he said.

Retch seemed to stiffen. His back was to Parker. He did not attempt to turn.

"You called for me," Parker said. "Here I am. Drop the gun!"

Retch snarled, spun, dropping flat as he turned. His eyes were narrowed.

They glared at Parker like twin flames of yellow hate. He tried to bring up the gun.

Something came through the air, something that he did not see. It grabbed his arms, clutched them with a fierce grip, screamed at him.

Mercedes!