Silent Killer

by George C. Chesbro

  “Get down here and help me!” Krowl screamed to the startled men in the gallery above him. “He can’t go anywhere!”

  As the torturers scrambled in the direction of a door to their left, Chant put the scalpel between his teeth, used his hands to push himself to the edge of the table, then off—into the wheelchair.

  The force of his landing started the chair moving, but he was going in the wrong direction. He swiped with his right hand to make certain that the battery cables were disconnected, then came up with his fist underneath the tray of surgical instruments, sending them flying through the air toward the cowering Richard Krowl. Then Chant grasped the wheels of the chair, whipped himself around, and headed for Krowl’s office. He sped through the office, into the long corridor.

  There were the sounds of booted feet scrambling down a staircase to his left, twenty feet ahead. Chant took the scalpel in his left hand, held the blade out at a slight angle. A torturer stumbled breathless into the corridor, turned, and cried out as he saw Chant barreling toward him. The man leaped back toward the stairwell, colliding with two of his comrades, and Chant was just able to reach out with his scalpel and slash open the man’s wrist. Chant barely got the scalpel back between his teeth before he smashed through the swinging doors at the end of the corridor and flew down the ramp outside, gaining speed.

  All five mercenaries were outside, lounging on the grass under the bright moonlight, talking and laughing together while they smoked cigarettes and drank beer in the hot night. Their laughter abruptly stopped, turned to shouts of alarm and amazement as Chant, with a cursory wave, shot through and past them on the sidewalk leading to the helicopter pad.

  He knew exactly where he wanted to go—the only place on the island he could go where there was any possibility, however slim, of escape.

  Bullets started to whine around him, kicking off the concrete and whizzing past his head, as he reached the helicopter pad. Two bullets hit the back of the chair, but did not penetrate the steel back. Chant adjusted the direction of his wheelchair slightly as he crossed the pad, shot down the walk to the left. He was gaining speed all the time on the incline, and now he brought his arms in and rested his forearms on his lifeless thighs. He ducked his head and hunched his shoulders as more bullets caromed off the back of the wheelchair and the concrete.

  Then the firing abruptly stopped, and there was only the sound of the whining rubber wheels and the wind in his ears as, still gaining speed, he approached the rim of the cliff overlooking the shark lagoon.

  At the last moment he straightened up and firmly gripped the armrests of the wheelchair. Then he hit the rim of the cliff and soared off into space, fell through night toward the blue-black, glassy surface of the water far below, and the silent death beneath it.

  He knew he would break his back if he hit the water the wrong way, and so, still holding the wheelchair firmly to his body, he rolled in space, spinning lazily over and over, maneuvering to land the safest way—head first. He did so, and the headrest of the wheelchair absorbed some of the shock of entry. Still, the force of concussion was enough to tear the coveralls off his torso and rip open his belly and shoulder wounds. Blood, even darker than the moonlit water, swirled about him, and an instant later even darker shapes began to move about him. Then his shoulder brushed against the sandy bottom.

  Chant released his grip on the wheelchair with his right hand and took the scalpel from his mouth. At the same time he used his left hand to hold the chair over him, providing a partial shield against the sharks, which now seemed to be everywhere, circling and darting in, their razor teeth gnashing on, shaking, the steel chair. Chant crouched on the bottom beneath the chair, then thrust out his right hand as one of the dark shapes flashed by. The scalpel caught the shark just beneath the jaw, penetrated the tough, leathery skin. The force of the shark’s passage ripped the scalpel from Chant’s hand, but not before the razor-sharp blade had torn open the shark’s belly. Blood and viscera dropped into the water, totally obscuring Chant’s vision. Still he crouched on the bottom, bracing the wheelchair over his head as the sharks went into a feeding frenzy.

  His lungs were beginning to ache.

  He’d certainly provided a spectacular show for anybody watching from the top of the cliff, Chant thought, and now it was time for him to make a graceful exit—if he could. He still had a way to go.

  He estimated that he had been under water less than a minute. Under normal conditions, he could hold his breath for close to three and a half minutes, but he did not have to remind himself that cowering under a wheelchair in the midst of a shark feeding frenzy while an anxious audience watched on from above was not exactly a normal condition.

  But he badly—very badly—wanted to see Dr. Richard Krowl’s face one more time.

  With no feeling or power in his legs, Chant knew that trying to drag the chair after him would expend too much energy. He released his grip on it, turned on his belly, dug his fingers into the sandy bottom and pulled himself through the cloud of dark blood, angling slightly to his right. There was tremendous movement in the water as the creatures just above his head slashed at each other, but, as he’d hoped, they seemed too busy at the moment feeding on each other to notice him.

  Again, he knew exactly where he wanted to go, and if he had not lost his sense of direction under the water, that was where he was heading—the underwater caves at the northern end of the lagoon where Bernard had gathered the pearl-bearing oysters. With luck, whatever one he entered would have some kind of space above the waterline.

  With a great deal of luck. But Chant knew that he had no choice but to enter one of the caves, for to try to surface through the feeding sharks would be to almost surely die, if not from the teeth of the sharks, then finally at the hands of the men he knew had to be looking down from atop the cliff.

  With his lifeless legs dragging after him in the sand, Chant pulled with powerful strokes, streamlining his body after each stroke to minimize water resistance and knifing through the bloody darkness. The ache in his lungs became a burning sensation. He desperately needed to breathe, and the urge to try to make the surface was almost overwhelming. But he resisted it, kept pulling. Something heavy and rough scraped across his back—but there was no rending of teeth, and even if a shark had torn a chunk off one of his paralyzed legs, he knew he would have felt the terrible tug. He kept going.

  Pull, glide … pull, glide … He concentrated on the rhythm of his strokes, occasionally blowing a few bubbles to ease the pressure on his lungs, suppressing oxygen-burning panic. Pull, glide … pull, glide …

  Suddenly he emerged from the cloud of blood into clear water. Two black shapes veered down at him from above. Chant hugged the bottom, pressing his body against the sand, and the shapes darted away to disappear into the cloud of blood behind him.

  Pull, glide … pull, glide.

  Was he heading in the right direction? Perhaps he had misjudged, Chant thought, and was heading out into the middle of the lagoon or toward the sea. Should he surface? One gulp of air, even if it were his last, would taste so good.…

  Pull, glide … pull, glide.

  He couldn’t hold out much longer, Chant thought. He estimated that he had been under water well over two minutes now, and his chest felt as if it were about to explode from the pressure of poisonous air. He released more bubbles.

  Pull, glide … pull, glide.

  No more, Chant thought; even if he were heading in the right direction, he couldn’t make it. He felt himself on the verge of passing out, and it seemed senseless to drown when he might have at least some chance on the surface. He was about to head up when two jet-black holes suddenly loomed a few yards away from him.

  The mouths of caves.

  He had come this far …

  Pull, glide … pull, glide.

  Once he entered a cave, Chant thought, he would no longer have any option. If there was no opening to the surface, he would die under black water, clawing at rock. If he died, Feather, th
e men in the shacks, and the broken people died with him. The Petroffs would die, or fervently wish they were dead.

  Surface, or enter a cave?

  Three sharks made his decision for him, and Chant pulled himself into the black mouth of a cave just as they passed through the space where he had been a moment before.

  He released more air, knew that he had only a few more seconds of consciousness left. He rolled over on his back, reached up and grabbed the rough stone just a few inches away from his face and began to pull hand-over-hand.

  Pull! Pull! Pull!

  He was finished, Chant thought. He couldn’t go on any longer. Any moment now he would either pass out, or the air would burst from his lungs and he would involuntarily suck in—water.

  Pull!

  Still he kept going, feeling the skin tear away from his palms and fingers. Then, as he reached up with his right hand for what he was certain would be his last pull, his hand missed rock, broke the surface of the water into—air.

  Chant surfaced with a great, barking explosion of air from his lungs. Panting, gasping for breath, he floundered in the water, only vaguely aware of what looked like the moon high above his head, as if glimpsed through a telescope. He continued to flounder as he gasped the sweet, fresh air. Then the knuckles of his right hand bounced painfully off a rough edge. He explored the surface with his hands, found it to be the lip of a narrow rock shelf. With his last strength, he dragged himself up out of the water onto the shelf. Then he collapsed to the stone and passed out.

  TWENTY-THREE

  When he awoke, the sky at the top of the natural stone chimney above his head was barely aglow with a murky, misty dawn. Unless he had lost track of time, Chant thought, it was the day the Petroffs were to be brought to the island. At most, he might have a few hours.…

  Feeling had returned to his lower body, but he was very weak. He raised himself to his hands and knees, stayed in that position a few moments until his head stopped reeling. The air wafting down through the chimney smelled of rain, and he felt chilled and clammy.

  If it were misty and raining, Chant thought, the helicopter might not come. There was no way of knowing.

  He slowly rose to his feet, swayed slightly, then went through a series of exercises to increase his blood flow and flex his stiff muscles. He knew he was near the end of his resources, and from somewhere deep inside himself he was going to have to summon up sufficient strength and will to finish the task he had set for himself.

  He sat down on the stone shelf, used his herb-hardened nail to open the callus under his left heel, where there was a second small packet of the herb mixture that once before had served him so well. He opened the packet, put the green mixture in his mouth and chewed slowly. Within thirty seconds his head cleared, and he could feel strength returning to his arms and legs. His heart fluttered dangerously, but then settled into a strong, slightly heightened beat. He licked condensation off the rock walls to slake his terrible thirst, took a series of deep breaths to focus his kai, then slowly but steadily began to climb up the rock chimney toward the gray sky.

  “Yield or die,” Chant said softly.

  The tall Japanese, his Uzi slung over his shoulder, had been standing near the edge of the cliff, smoking a cigarette and staring out at the fog-shrouded sea. The man dropped the cigarette, wheeled. He started to reach for his gun, then froze when he saw the tall figure in stained, tattered coveralls standing before him. A look of astonishment passed over his face, and then he smiled thinly.

  “Welcome back from the dead, Sensei,” the Japanese replied evenly. He straightened up from his crouch—but did not take his hands away from his gun. “Somehow, I find I’m not that surprised to see you. How did you manage—?”

  “Yield or die,” Chant repeated. “Your skills and weapons are for hire, and you’ve done your job. The man who hired you is now as good as dead; you and your men cannot protect him.”

  “I understand … and I believe that what you say is true. Unless, of course, I manage to shoot you now. Considering your condition, it might have been better if you’d shoved me off the cliff.”

  “I know my condition, so it becomes something for you to consider. If you believe you can kill me before I kill you, then you may wish to try. Then you will die. I suggest that Dr. Krowl and the men he has brought here are not good people to die for.”

  “You must be very weak now.”

  “Decide now,” Chant said curtly.

  The Japanese studied Chant for some time, then very slowly unslung the submachine gun and handed it to Chant, butt first. “I yield, Sensei,” he said quietly.

  Chant broke open the magazine and examined it; it was full. “Will you work for me?” he asked as he snapped the magazine back into the stock.

  “I would consider it an honor, Sensei,” the Japanese answered with a slight bow.

  “What’s your name?”

  “Akiro.”

  “What about your men? Will they come over to me?”

  Akiro shrugged. “I will find out.”

  “I want only men I can trust, as I now trust you.”

  “I understand, Sensei. And I thank you. I will make my selection carefully.”

  “I need this gun. Can you get another from one of your men?”

  “Yes.”

  “Has Krowl sent anyone to search in the brush around the complex?”

  “Not that I know of, Sensei—and I would know.” He paused, smiled thinly. “Whatever you’ve hidden is still there.”

  Chant grunted. “It stands to reason; he was waiting for you people to leave. There are pearls. I will share them with you and any of your men who will work for me.”

  “I do not require payment from you, Sensei. Watching you work, and now working with you, is a lesson of very great value. You are even more powerful than the legends indicate.”

  “Well, I’m still alive,” Chant said with a shrug. “But we will share the pearls.” He paused, smiled wryly. “I don’t work for nothing; neither shall you.”

  “As you wish, Sensei.”

  “Where’s the woman?”

  “Krowl gave her to his … guests … for their use.” The Japanese seemed embarrassed. “I believe she’s still in their building.”

  So much for the torture doctor’s word, Chant thought as he abruptly slung the Uzi over his shoulder. “Where’s Krowl?”

  “I saw him walking by himself earlier, but I believe he went to his office.”

  “He’s up early.”

  “He’s upset because he thinks he lost you to the sharks. He’d bragged to us about how you were going to teach him the secrets of the ninja while he dragged you around behind him on a cart.”

  “Did a helicopter land yesterday or this morning?”

  “No, Sensei.”

  “Is one scheduled to land today?”

  “I don’t know. Unless it clears, I’m not sure one could land today.”

  A potential problem, Chant thought, but there was nothing to be done about it. “If and when that helicopter lands, you’ll really start earning your pay. I’m almost certain there’ll be armed men on board; I don’t know how many, but they’ll be very good. Obviously, I want that helicopter, but there’ll be a couple on board and I want every precaution taken to make certain they aren’t harmed.”

  “I understand, Sensei.”

  “I’ll take care of Krowl and the torturers. You talk to your men and see who’s willing to work with us; if you have to do any killing, try to do it quietly. I don’t want Krowl to suspect anything’s wrong until I have my hands on him.”

  “I understand, Sensei.”

  “After you’ve selected your men, free the men in the shacks down by the shark lagoon, as well as any other prisoners around here I don’t know about.”

  “I don’t believe there are any.”

  “Well, check it out—quietly. Then round up all the broken people you find wandering around here. Take everybody to the cellblock and wait. I’ll join you there when
I’ve taken care of my business.”

  “Good hunting, Sensei,” the tall Japanese said quietly as Chant melted away into the mist.

  Richard Krowl was not in his office, nor did Chant find him in the adjoining cottage. Unwilling to risk the possibility of Krowl discovering what was happening and getting to the radio before he did, Chant decided to take a calculated risk of his own. He went to the radio shack and, using a special, ultrahigh frequency, sent out a series of coded messages that Gerard Patreaux would be waiting for; the machinery for medical attention, forged documents, and covert transportation would be set in motion. Then Chant removed a key component from the radio, put it in his pocket, and went next door to the dormitory.

  He found Feather tied to a bedpost in a room on the first floor. Her hair was disheveled, but she was dressed and did not appear to be harmed. She looked up, saw him standing in the doorway, and her face lit up with joy. Tears welled in her eyes.

  Chant put his finger to his lips, then mouthed the words: “Are you all right?”

  Feather nodded her head. Chant stepped into the bedroom and perfunctorily snapped the neck of the man sleeping in the bed. He untied the weeping woman, held her in his arms for a few moments, then gently removed her arms from around his neck and motioned for her to stand behind the door. “I’ll be right back,” he said, and left the room.

  He found his second victim in the bathroom, shaving, and Chant quietly slit his throat.

  As he started up to the second floor, a man appeared at the head of the stairwell. The man shrieked when he saw Chant, turned to run. With the silence already broken and the radio disabled, Chant was no longer as concerned as he had been with silent killing; he snapped the Uzi into firing position and pulled the trigger, blowing the man’s head off with one burst.

  He machine-gunned the last two remaining torturers as they rushed from their rooms into the hall, then once again slung the smoking submachine gun over his shoulder and returned to Feather.