The Death Hunter

by Lou Cameron

  Tomas shrugged and said, “He is a Greek or perhaps an Italian. His Spanish is grotesque, whatever he may be. El Chino, the shopkeeper, speaks better Spanish.”

  Gaston had been listening. He pointed to the lighthouse on a rise beyond the village and asked, “Would there not be a Costa Rican agent on duty out at that lighthouse?”

  Ernestine looked blank. Tomas said, “I don’t know who is on duty out there. These people are not friendly and we seldom come into town.”

  As if to prove the guard’s words, a quartet of men in white duck pants and seaman’s sweaters stood across the path at the edge of the village. One of them was holding a gaff hook, thoughtfully. Captain Gringo waved and they ignored him. As he and those with him came closer, the man with the gaff hook said, “We are not looking for to buy any sulfur. You people are far from your mine, no?”

  Captain Gringo said, “We’re on your side, friend. We just had the usual argument about the right of way and I think it’s settled. La señora, here, needs a mount to get home.”

  The fishermen exchanged glances. Then one of them said, “We fish for tuna, not sea horses.”

  The others with him seemed to think that was funny as hell.

  Captain Gringo waited until the laughter died down and then he said, “I’m looking for your alcalde, señors.”

  The one with the gaff hook said, “We have no alcalde, but I am the bully of this town.”

  “I figured you might be. My men and I have money to pay for food and shelter for the night and we’ve come in peace. How does that sound to you, so far?”

  “Why don’t you stay with your friends at the great sulfur mine we are not allowed to approach, eh?”

  Captain Gringo muttered, “Oh boy.” Then he told Ernestine, “I may be able to wrangle you a ride home, but you’d better get rid of these guards. I’m getting the distinct impression they’ve been pushing these folks around and it’s not our fight.”

  Ernestine nodded and said, “Return to your quarters, Tomas. That’s an order.”

  “But señora, el patron said—”

  “I know what my husband said, damn it! Get out of here before they start throwing things! I’ll be all right. Tell my husband I’ll be home in just a little bit-Reluctantly, Tomas and the other two uniformed men started backing off, muttering among themselves. Captain Gringo smiled at the fishermen and asked, “Is that better?”

  The boss fisherman frowned and said, “You will pay us, in silver? We do not accept that paper stuff they print up on the mesa.”

  The tall American reached in his pocket for some change and held it out, saying, “I was just about to suggest we all have a drink together. Where’s this Greek who runs a cantina?”

  The bully lowered his gaff hook and said, “He’s Armenian, but as long as you know how to act like a gentleman we will drink with you. What about the Dutch woman? Aren’t you afraid she’ll be molested?”

  “Why should I be? Aren’t you hombres gentlemen, too?”

  The man with the gaff hook laughed and said,

  “Hey, they call me El Tiberon, Gringo. How are you called?”

  “Gringo is just fine. They call me Captain Gringo. I’ll introduce my men over some cerveza, no?”

  “Hey, we’re fishermen, not farm girls, Captain Gringo. If you’re not buying ton fuerte it’s no deal!”

  It was going to be all right. As the fishermen led them into the village people appeared in doors and windows with relieved expressions and Captain Gringo murmured to Ernestine, “You folks had better ease up on your neighbors. Your high-handed views on property have turned these simple fisher-folk to sullen types.”

  She said, “I had no idea they could be this friendly. Jan says one has to keep natives in their place.

  “Yeah, well, let’s not forget this whole point of land was their place, until your company filed a mining claim on it.”

  “Can’t you explain it’s for their own good?”

  “Later. You’re still getting dirty looks from ladies up in those windows. It’s bad enough you’re blonde and wearing shoes. I’ll mention the danger to their kids and goats after we see if we can loosen them up a bit.”

  They followed the fishermen into a dark cavernous cantina, where El Tiberon pounded on the bar and said, “Hey, how about some service? We just met a gringo who thinks he can drink me under the table.”

  Captain Gringo motioned the men packing the machine gun and ammo boxes over to a corner as he digested this news. He didn’t remember anything about a contest, but apparently El Tiberon still wanted the boys to remember how tough he was. None of them had mentioned the odds or the guns his party was packing. Since they had eyes, it seemed obvious they’d opted for more civilized contests to prove their virility. Captain Gringo put some money on the bar and asked the dark morose man behind it if he spoke English. The Armenian said, “A little. Why?”

  “I don’t want my men too drunk. I’ll pay as well for water as I will for rum. Do you read me?”

  “Like a book,” smiled the Armenian, adding, “We get an occasional tramp or navy vessel in here from time to time. It’s not such an unusual request.”

  El Tiberon elbowed his way closer to Captain Gringo and the blonde and asked, “Hey, what’s all this talk about? Are we going to get drunk or talk all night?”

  The Armenian nodded and started filling glasses. Captain Gringo admired the way he moved his hands. He was expecting it, and he still thought he was getting straight rum until he tasted the tame mixture in his glass. He glanced at Ernestine and she nodded. He wouldn’t have to carry her home after all.

  As others bellied up to the bar the Armenian slid glass after glass to the boisterous and growing crowd. Some of Captain Gringo’s men were looking oddly at their drinks, but they were old hands and there was a little rum in each man’s glass, so nobody bitched.

  Captain Gringo waited for a lull in the uproar before he called the Armenian over and explained he needed quarters and a ride home for the blonde. The Armenian nodded but moved off down the bar without saying just what he had in mind. Within minutes El Tiberon was singing, loudly, to some admiring girls who’d wandered in and the tall American felt a tug at his sleeve. He turned to see a small timid-looking girl there. She murmured, “You and la señora follow me, señor.”

  He nodded and took Ernestine’s elbow to steer her through a curtain of hanging glass beads. Ernestine was flushed and panting and she said, “Heavens, I’m so glad that wasn’t straight rum! As it is, I feel it. How long have we been drinking, anyway?”

  He answered, “Just twenty minutes or so.” She wasn’t one of those gals who passed out at the whiff of a cork, was she? She hadn’t downed as much as he had and he didn’t feel a thing.

  The young girl led them along a dark corridor and up a flight of stairs. She opened a door and led them into a small clean room, furnished with a spartan looking iron framed bed. The girl said, “No one will disturb you here, señora y señor.”

  Captain Gringo noted the thunderstruck look on the married blonde’s face and quickly said, “Wait a minute. The room was for me, alone. The man downstairs said he’d see about a ride out across the lava for this lady. She wants to go home.”

  The young girl looked puzzled. Then she shrugged and said, “I will tell my patron, señor. I only work here. He said nothing about a ride,”

  She stepped out, closing the door behind her. Captain Gringo smiled reassuringly at Ernestine and said, “It’s early yet. It won’t be dark for hours. We’ll let them simmer down, downstairs, and if somebody doesn’t show up with a donkey cart I’ll go down and scout one up.”

  Ernestine giggled as she looked out the window. Then she closed the shutters and said, “If anyone sees me up here, they’ll think something terrible is going on!”

  He took out a smoke and sat on the bed to light it as he said, “I don’t know if it would be so terrible, but I can see how we could get in Dutch.”

  Then he realized what he’d said and laughed.
He said, “I didn’t mean that the way it might have sounded.”

  She sighed and said, “I know. I’m used to being treated like a perfect lady.”

  “Aren’t you a perfect lady, Ernestine?”

  “I don’t know. When your parents arrange a marriage for you at fifteen, you get few opportunities to find out. Would you believe me if I told you this was the first time I’ve been alone with another man since I left the convent?”

  He didn’t know if he believed her, but he was getting her message. Could she be serious? The old goat she was married to would be looking for her any minute.

  On the other hand, Jan Hoover didn’t know where to find her. She knew that, too. He decided to blow some smoke rings. He wasn’t about to bite at the hook until he’d had a better look at it.

  Ernestine came over and sat down beside him. The bed sagged and their thighs touched. He blew some smoke and she asked, “Where will you be going after you leave here, Mr. Walker?”

  He said, “Back up to San Jose, and you’d better call me Dick or move over a bit.”

  She stayed where she was and said, “My, I must have had too much to drink and it’s making me very bold. I was about to ask you a very silly question, Dick.”

  “Ask away. What’s that perfume you’re wearing?”

  “Sandalwood. I was about to ask if you’d take me with you when you leave. Isn’t that ridiculous?”

  He glanced at her and was surprised at the pain in her eyes. He frowned and said, “Cut the femme fatale crap and tell me what this is all about, Ernestine.”

  She put a large but shapely hand on his wrist and said, “Dick, I have to get away. I can’t stand it here.

  He nodded, but said, “So you throw yourself at the first passing ship in the night? You must really want out, bad. But how do you know you might not be jumping from the frying pan into the fire? You’ve never seen me before. I could be a maniac.”

  She shuddered and said, “I’m married to a maniac. Nothing you could be could be worse. I haven’t dared to write home about the way Jan treats me. You saw how he absolutely runs things, here.”

  He nodded and said, “Well, he looked a little filled with himself, but fair is fair. I didn’t have him down as a lunatic. What’s he been doing to you, kitten?”

  Ernestine shuddered and said, “You wouldn’t believe me if I told you.”

  He said, “Try me.” and Ernestine stood up. As he stared in wonder, the big blonde unbuttoned her bodice and began to strip. As her big pink breasts popped out of the tight dress he saw she wore nothing under it. He said, “Hey, that kid may come back any second!”

  Ernestine turned her back to him and he saw the purple marks across her soft pink flesh. He gasped, “Kee-rist! You’ve been whipped” and she said, “I know,” and let her skirt fall to the floor around her high button shoes. Wearing nothing else, she stepped out of the folds, with her broad but well-formed derriere to him. The whip marks crisscrossed her buttocks and she’d been given a few licks across the thighs, too. She turned to face him, without a trace of shyness, standing like a fertility goddess carved of rosy marble as she said, “It’s not what you think. He’s not a sexual sadist. I can face him as you see me now and Jan shows no more interest in my body than if I were a flower growing in his garden.”

  “He must be crazy,” said the tall American, rising from his seat. He stepped closer and took her in his arms, as much because it felt silly as hell to just stare as she stood there, and said, “I’ve heard about guys who like to rough women up. How long has this been going on?”

  She leaned against him and it felt odd to hold a woman whose eyes met his almost level. She said, “Almost from the beginning, and we have been married nearly six years. You must have noticed Jan is rather obese and I am hardly … petite.”

  He felt her mons against his drawing erection, their hips at the same level, and said, “You mean he’s too fat to … Come on, nobody’s that fat!”

  She pressed closer as she said, “His obesity is a symptom of his twisted passions, not a cause. We did make love, normally, at first, and I confess I enjoyed it very much. I suppose you could call me a warm-natured woman.”

  He saw they were about to crash on the bed together and braced his weight against her warm pink mass as he said, “Yeah, that sounds reasonable. But get to the good stuff, with the whips!”

  She said, “I told you. He’s a sadist. He hits me because, well, he can’t do anything else.”

  “The poor lard’s impotent?”

  She was breathing harder as she pleaded, “Isn’t it obvious? For God’s sake, Dick, don’t you want’ me, .either?”

  He kissed her and ran his hands down her bruised flesh gently as he said, “It’s funny you should mention that. I was just about to bring it up.”

  She did a naughty little bump and grind in his arms and purred, “I notice that’s not all I’m bringing up.”

  So he shoved her across the bed, tore off his clothes, and leaped aboard to ravage her thoroughly. Albeit who was ravaging whom was a good question. Ernestine was stronger than most men and met his passion with bone-jarring enthusiasm. Captain Gringo was usually a gentle lover, aware that he could hurt most women if he let himself go too freely. But the big Dutch girl afforded him an opportunity to go all out as he pounded himself into her like a logger splitting a stump with wedge and maul. She almost broke his ribs as she hugged him tight and sobbed happily about how strong he was. He didn’t know how innocent she’d been on her honeymoon, but he was sure, in all modesty, she’d never given herself to many men like this. Damned few men could have survived it!

  He came and tried to keep going as the big Dutch girl helped him with her massive thighs and almost masculine hip movements. And then she half screamed, “Kiss me!” and clamped down with frightening strength as wave after wave of orgasm drove her into delirium. Then she suddenly went limp and began to croon at him in her own gutteral language. Not the most romantic sounds he’d ever heard, but certainly sincere.

  He glanced at the window shutters and saw it was still daylight out. So he kissed the side of her throat and said, “We’ve got to think about getting you dressed, Honey. Tomas and his guys have been at your mine a long time, now.”

  She held him against her big breasts and said, “You can’t send me back to that brute. Not now, darling.”

  He said, “Hell, you can’t stay here tonight. Your fucking husband has a private army!”

  She grimaced and said, “I wouldn’t be leaving a fucking husband, damn it! I want to stay with fucking you!”

  “Look, Ernestine, I’ll smuggle you out and see about getting you home after we’re finished, here. But make sense. He doesn’t beat you every night, does he?”

  “No, but one never knows with Jan. How long do you intend to stay here in this village? What on earth are you doing here, anyway?”

  “We’re, uh, making a coastal survey. I don’t think it will take us long to check this area out. Don’t you think you can last a few more days?”

  “The days are no problem. It’s the nights I can’t stand. Even if Jan behaves himself, how am I to sleep, tonight, knowing you are here and that I can’t have any more of your marvelous body?”

  He kissed her and said, “We’ve time for some more marvelous body. But then I’m sending you home like a good little girl.”

  He started moving again and she sighed and said, “I do feel like a little girl in your arms, Dick. You’ve no idea how it hurts to look down at the top of a man’s head when he’s inside of you.”

  He said, “That’s silly. You’re not that tall.”

  “You don’t find me repulsive? Jan once said I made him feel like a homosexual because I was bigger and stronger than he was.”

  “Look, we’ve agreed your husband’s crazy. Let’s not bring him to bed with us, okay? I like your size just the way it is. In fact, where it counts, you’re pretty small.”

  She started moving, teasingly, and said, “We do fit nicely, don�
��t we? Do it, Dick. Make me feel little and helpless again!”

  He let himself go. She was about as helpless as a Dodge City bouncer in any man’s arms, but she sure screwed good.

  Chapter Fifteen

  The sky was purple, but it was still technically daylight when he saw Ernestine off in a donkey cart, after promising not to leave without her. The party downstairs in the cantina was still going strong. He doubted if any of the villagers had noticed his vanishing for a time with the big blonde. But Gaston said, “Of course, you know that was a most insane stunt, Dick. But how was it?”

  Captain Gringo sat across the table from the sardonic little Frenchman without answering. He noticed a befuddled individual in U.S. Navy whites and a yeoman’s rating was seated beside Gaston, but he ignored the sailor, too, as he asked, “Who’s got the Maxim, and where?”

  Gaston said, “Everything of value is locked securely in my room. Are you certain you did not find her repulsive, my old and rare?”

  “Shit, did that girl who led you up hear us?”

  “Of course, but one gathers this is a place of discreet assignations. I asked her if she wanted to have a French lesson and she declined rather rudely. This drunken sailor, here, wants to join us. I told him it was up to you.”

  Captain Gringo looked at the man in navy whites and cocked an eyebrow. The sailor said, “I’m in a jam, Captain. I can’t seem to get off this fucking point. The damned old Denver will be back any minute and my ass will be in a sling if the shore patrol catches me here.”

  Captain Gringo said, “Back up, sailor. Did you jump ship off that gunboat we saw trailing a balloon down the coast?”

  “Yeah, the U.S.S. Denver. It’s on some dumb mission for Naval Intelligence. Our regular skipper’s okay, but we sailed out of Dago with this tight-ass Captain Bligh on the bridge and I decided I’d had enough of him and his picky ways when we stopped here. I hid out till they sailed on, figuring I could make my way up to San Jose, where I understand things are great for Yanks. Only, every time I try to reach the mainland, some son of a bitch in a sojer suit chases me back here with a gun!”