Quintana Roo (11 page)

Manuel tossed the snake’s body into the fire, where it sizzled and twisted into a blackened cinder.

“I think we all better try to get some sleep,” Hooker said. “I want to be moving with the first light.”

Connie stared at the charred snake. “Jesus, who can sleep with those things crawling around. Yellow beard. Ugh!”

“You’ll be safe enough in your hammock,” Hooker said. “They can’t climb trees.”

“Do the snakes know that?”

“You’re not going to be a pain in the ass, are you?”

“Good night, Hooker.”

Connie went back to her hammock and managed to get into it without assistance. After the others had retired, Hooker banked the fire and climbed into his own hammock. He lay awake for a long time, listening to the squeaks and cries and the hundred other sounds of the jungle at night.

Much later, while Hooker and the others slept, a silent, blank-eyed figure watched them from the jungle. Alita awoke and stared at the spot where something had been, but she saw only the darkness.

“Somebody was looking at us last night, Johnny,” Alita said. “Or something. Looking at us from the jungle.”

“There must have been hundreds of things out there looking at us,” Hooker said wearily. “The jungle is full of eyes.” He was not in a mood to listen to Alita’s fantasies. His body ached. The hammock was comfortable enough when he first got in, but he soon learned it did not allow for easy changing of your position. After spending the whole night on his back, he was sore from the base of his skull all the way to his butt. And his mouth tasted like last week’s laundry. And he had mosquito bites in spite of the netting and the foul-smelling turtle-fat ointment. He was not a happy man.

“This was different, Johnny,” Alita persisted. “Something evil was out there looking at us.”

“Cut it out.” He put a bite into his voice that discouraged further discussion. “We’ve got enough problems without worrying about phantom watchers in the night.”

One of the problems they had was Chaco. He was surlier than ever as they drank coffee and repacked the equipment at dawn. His answers to Alita’s questions were single mumbled syllables. Once he backhanded Manuel across the face when the big man did not move fast enough in following one of Chaco’s orders. Hooker kept a wary eye on him. Little men with a chip on their shoulder could be dangerous as snakes.

As they were ready to move out, Connie shrieked.

Hooker’s hand jumped to the butt of his pistol. “What’s the matter?”

“There’s something in my hair.”

Slowly, his muscles untensed. “Calm down,” he said. “Let me take a look.”

He sat her down on a log and stood over her, carefully parting the wavy blonde hair. Blonde all the way to the roots, he noticed.

“Something was itching,” she said. “I started to scratch; then I felt this thing way deep in my scalp. A sort of hot and squishy lump.”

He found it. A tick had burrowed into the scalp at the crown of her head. The body, now swollen to the size of a bean, was dark and shiny with her blood.

“All right,” he said. “I’ve got it.”

“What is it, for God’s sake?” Connie’s voice rose with a touch of hysteria.

“Just a tick. I’ll have it out in a minute.”

“A tick! Oh, Jesus.” Her body convulsed in a violent shudder; then, with an effort, she got hold of herself.

Hooker felt a tug of sympathy for the woman. She was giving it a hell of a try out there, but snakes and ticks and mosquitoes that could eat you alive were not part of life for people from her world. He hoped a tick on her head was the worst ordeal she would have to face on this trip.

He took the swollen body of the tick gently between his fingers. He gave it a quick twist, and it came free of the head with a little
pop
. Dark red blood squirted into his hand. He tossed the tick’s body away, being careful to keep it out of Connie’s sight.

“Did you get it?” she said.

“Almost.” He slipped his hunting knife out of the sheath. “Bite your finger for a minute.”

“What for?”

“Just do it.”

Connie jammed a knuckle into her mouth and bit down. As she did so, Hooker pricked the point of the knife blade under her scalp and pried out the hard little head of the tick.

“Ouch!”

“That got it,” he said.

“Jesus, I hope so. Are there any more?”

“I didn’t see any.”

“Little bastard.” Connie reached for her head. Hooker caught her wrist.

“Wait a minute.” He dug through his pack for a bottle of alcohol and poured some of it over the neat red pinhole in her scalp.

“Ouch!”

“I’ve got a suggestion you’re not going to like,” he said.

“Such as?”

“Chop off some of this hair. Without the proper hat for cover, it makes too good a hiding place for critters.”

“I had a hat back in Veracruz, but I thought it looked too corny, so I left it there.”

“Maybe you should have brought it,” Hooker said. “Since you didn’t, I think you’d better get rid of some of that hair.”

“Just … cut it off?” It was as though he had asked her to have her teeth pulled.

“Unless you want more little friends like the one we just dug out of your head.”

She shuddered again. “God, no. Cut it.”

Still holding the hunting knife, he took a handful of her hair. It felt soft and alive in his grasp. “I’m not exactly an expert at this,” he said.

“I’ll do it,” Alita offered. She looked quickly at Connie. “If you want me to.”

“Yes, yes, go ahead. Leave me a little, though, will you? I don’t want to come out of this bald.”

Hooker gratefully turned the knife over to Alita and stepped aside. The two
chicleros
moved in closer to watch as Alita took firm hold of a handful of hair and began sawing at it with the knife.

“Your hair is very soft,” she said. “Like silk.”

“Thanks,” Connie said without enthusiasm.

“I used to cut my father’s hair for him when I was a little girl. His hair was very thick, like mine. Indian hair. Only I had a scissors then. And a razor. I used to give him his shave, too.”

Connie sat with her hands clasped in her lap, eyes closed, as Alita hacked away. She winced as big chunks of blonde hair sifted down across her face and settled on her clasped hands. The whole operation took about ten minutes.

“Okay, all done,” Alita said cheerfully.

Connie opened her eyes. She looked at Hooker, searching for a reaction. He kept his expression carefully neutral. Hesitantly, she raised her hand and touched her head.

“My God, you’ve scalped me!”

“Got to be short or it don’t do no good,” Alita said reasonably.

“A mirror. Where did I put my mirror.” Connie rummaged through her pack and brought out a round mirror with a handle. She held it at arm’s length and looked at herself, turning her head from side to side. She used her free hand to fluff and shape as best she could what was left of her hair.

Hooker watched, being careful at first not to let his feelings show. He knew how much a woman’s hair meant to her. Then, with some surprise, he decided she really didn’t look bad at all. The hair was very short, almost boyish in length now, but the overall effect was entirely feminine. If anything, it made Connie look younger.

She gave him a hopeful look. “Well? Let’s have the verdict. Is it too horrible?”

“It’s not horrible at all,” he said. “In fact, you look pretty darn good. Probably start a whole new style when you get back to the states.”

“You wouldn’t kid me, would you, mister?”

He grinned at her. “Not this time, lady. Not this time.”

She searched his face, looking for any hint of mockery. When she decided he was serious, she allowed herself a tremulous smile. “Well, maybe I can do something with it.”

After another fifteen minutes, with the mirror in one hand and a brush in the other, she said, “I guess this is going to have to do. It’s not something I’d want to spring on the crowd at the Stork Club, but all in all, it’s not too bad.”

• • •

When finally they got underway, it was about an hour later than Hooker had hoped for. However, the weather was holding, and he figured they could make it up without too much trouble. The jungle heat seemed not as oppressive as the day before. Maybe they were getting used to it.

Chaco continued to be a worry to Hooker. From the start, his attitude had been one of hostility and contempt. Now the dark little eyes burned with hatred whenever he looked at Hooker. He was not sure what had caused the relationship to worsen, but he resolved to watch the little Indian closer than ever the rest of the way.

An hour later, the hostility burned through to the surface. Along a stretch of trail that was heavily overgrown, Chaco hacked away part of a bush to discover a young jaguar. The cat crouched with its eyes wide in fright, teeth bared in a soundless snarl.

Chaco said something to Manuel, and with a malevolent grin, raised his machete and advanced on the animal. The jaguar, with heavy thicket blocking any escape, stood its ground, the spotted fur bristling along its spine. Laughing, Chaco moved closer. He swayed from side to side in a crude dance parody, waving the blade of the machete before him. The jaguar stared up at him, terror showing in the amber eyes. Chaco brought the weapon up over his head for a blow.

“Hold it!” Hooker snapped.

Chaco froze at the sudden command and turned to glare at Hooker.

Keeping his eyes on the
chiclero
, Hooker spoke to Alita. “Tell him to leave the cat alone. We’ve got more important things to do.”

Alita spoke a rapid sentence. Chaco stared at her incredulously, then answered in a sneering tone.

“He says it is only a jaguar. He is not afraid.”

Hooker did not talk through Alita this time. He rested his right hand on the butt of the .45 and pointed with his left for emphasis. “You … get up there … and get moving. Now.”

Whether or not he understood the words, Chaco got the message. Watching Hooker all the time, he moved slowly back to his position at the head of the line. Once there, he whirled suddenly to decapitate a squat palmetto with a swipe of his blade, then turned for a long look at Hooker. The jaguar, freed from its tormentor, sprang across the trail and disappeared into the brush.

“I didn’t know you cared about animals,” Connie said as they moved on.

“I can take them or leave them,” Hooker said.

“Then why did you stop him?”

“First, we can’t spare the time; second, I don’t believe in killing anything for fun. Third, I just don’t like the little son of a bitch.”

• • •

As they moved on, Connie borrowed a kerchief from Alita to wear over her newly cropped hair. Whenever they stopped to rest, she scrubbed her scalp with her fingers and asked Hooker to search for ticks. He found none.

“You know,” Connie said, brushing her fingers over her head, “I believe I’m getting to like this. It’s certainly cooler. And easier to take care of.” She smiled at Alita. “You ought to consider becoming a hairdresser.”

“I have a job,” Alita said without returning the smile. “I work for my father in his store.”

“Let’s move,” Hooker said, anxious to avoid any friction between the two women.

• • •

It was growing dark by the time they found a rocky patch of ground suitable for making camp. Dinner was the same as the night before, but without the iguana meat. They ate in silence, with no complaints from Connie. At Hooker’s request, Alita managed to get a few words out of Chaco. He had hung his own hammock well apart from the others, including Manuel.

“He says we are very close,” she told Hooker when she came back.

“Do you believe him?”

Alita shrugged. “What else can we do?”

“I guess you’re right.” He glanced over at Connie, who was rubbing turtle fat on the back of her hand where a wasp had stung her. She looked up at him quickly, then away. He turned back to Alita.

“Tell me,
chiquita
, how are you doing? You haven’t said much.”

“I’m fine, Johnny. It’s the Mayan blood. The jungle is no enemy to me.”

“Yeah, well, you’ve been swell, and I want you to know I appreciate it.”

“You glad I came along?”

“Sure.”

“Tell me.”

“I’m glad.”

She hugged him and pressed her body against his.

“Hey, I’m glad you’re here, but we’ve still got a long way to go.”

They banked the fire early and settled into their hammocks under the mosquito netting. Hooker felt the tension slowly drain out of his body. It had been a long two days, and he had slept little the night before. He intended to stay alert, but his eyes would not remain open. The sounds of the jungle soothed him like gentle music. He let himself drift.

His dreams were troubled fragments of flight and pursuit. Enemies with hidden faces were hunting him down, chasing him. He tried to run, but the enemies were everywhere. Then he was caught, imprisoned, pushed into the execution chamber. He was in the electric chair. A steel clamp seized his wrist.

Hooker’s eyes snapped open. Instinctively, his right hand tried for the gun in his holster, but his hand would not move. Something pricked him under the chin.

In an instant, he was wide awake. The thin, swarthy face of the
chiclero
was so close to his own he could feel the moist breath. The black eyes glittered, reflecting the faint light from the fire. Chaco held his right wrist immobile in a grip of steel.

“What — ” Hooker began.

The point of Chaco’s knife dug into the flesh of his neck. He felt the warm trickle of blood.

“How you feel now, gringo bastard?” Chaco whispered.

The little fuck speaks English, Hooker thought. He held himself rigid, his mind racing, searching for a way out. His left hand was free, and his feet, but lying in the hammock there was nothing he could brace against, no solid point to give him leverage. Any sudden movement, he was sure, would only put the knife the rest of the way through his throat.

“You want to live, gringo bastard?”

Hooker ground his teeth. It seemed he could already feel the blade slicing through flesh, cartilage, arteries, windpipe.

Flecks of saliva dotted Chaco’s thin lips. The son of a bitch is crazy, Hooker thought.

“You not gonna beg? Too bad, gringo, ‘cause then you gonna die.”

Hooker could feel the blade move as Chaco’s fingers tightened on the hilt of the knife. He prepared himself to make a grab for the knife in what was surely a futile attempt to save his life. But he was not going to die without doing
something
.

In the split second before Hooker could move, the Indian made a choking noise, and his head was jerked backward by something thick and hard wrapped around his neck. Hooker threw himself sideways out of the hammock and felt the blade slice flesh across his throat. He rolled once and came up in a crouch, the .45 in his hand.

Chaco, his little eyes bulging, was flailing his arms helplessly as Manuel easily held him in a choke hold from behind. Gradually, his struggles lessened, and the knife fell from his grasp.

Connie and Alita, awakened by the sounds of the struggle, rolled out of their hammocks. Alita was the first to reach Hooker’s side.