Билл Пронзини - The Paradise Affair

So. The tube must have another entrance, or at the least an outside vent, somewhere ahead. He quickened his pace, walking upright now, holding the lantern high. The floor bore small cracks and the footing was more certain. Ahead, the tube widened into a kind of grotto whose walls were lined with piles of round, smooth stones. They seemed to have been arranged by primitive hands into a pattern — the first indication of human habitation. The fresh-air current was stronger here; he had a briny whiff of the sea.

Around another turning he found the auohe .

And something else even more momentous.

This section of the tube was some thirty feet in width, its stalactitic ceiling pressed low as if spread by great force from above. The floor and the lower parts of the walls were grayish black, streaked here and there with encrustations of green and rusty red. Above and ahead, more recent lava flows had formed an embankment of solid glistening black that rose, with another upslope of the ceiling, into a jagged ledge some fifteen feet above the floor. Now the air was no longer fresh. The pungent odor that assaulted Quincannon’s olfactory sense was that of mold and rot.

Part of the embankment had been carved into a terrace of shelves. On these lay dozens of full and partial skeletons, some wrapped in decaying tapa cloth, others arranged on powdery mats, one wearing an elaborate necklace made of what might have been shark’s or whale’s teeth fastened with braided hair. Piles of bones and detached skulls were heaped together in hewn niches. Interspersed among these grisly remains were artifacts of the sort he had seen in the Millay ranch house — fiber nets, drums covered with some sort of fish or animal skin, rotting feather standards, spears and arrows and daggers, calabashes and gourds and woven baskets.

But it was none of this that held his attention and triggered his wrath, even though the discovery was not completely unexpected. He subscribed to the theory espoused by Mark Twain’s Pudd’nhead Wilson: “When angry, count to four; when very angry, swear.” And so he blued the dank air with a string of sulfurous oaths the originality of which would have made Mr. Clemens himself proud.

For he stood not just in an ancient burial cave, but in a modern one as well. The human remains that lay sprawled at the base of the embankment were a long way yet from being a skeleton. And even at a distance, the upturned face was identifiable in the flickery lantern light.

He had finally caught up with Lonesome Jack Vereen.

A quick inspection revealed two bullet wounds, one in the upper torso, the other just below the left temple. Crusts of blood surrounded the wounds, splotch-stained the rock floor next to the body. Shot and killed here at least two days ago. There was no offensive odor, as there had been with Nagle’s corpse; the cold here had acted as a temporary preservative.

Quincannon yanked at his bad ear, hard enough that it throbbed when he let go — an involuntary gesture of frustration. First Nevada Ned, dead of a morphine overdose the cause of which was likely never to be explained, and now Vereen dead of lead poisoning — both scoundrels sent to Satan before he could get his hands on them. Weeks of chasing the pair in Oakland, San Francisco, San Jose, then across nearly three thousand miles of ocean and over two blasted islands... all for naught. By design or accident or divine perversity he had been cheated out of his due as a peerless detective. Unfair. Infuriating. Insufferable. By all that was holy, he would not stand for such a finish!

He drew a deep breath, took a firm grip on his emotions. Then, with the lantern held high, he examined the rest of the cave. There was nothing else of import to be seen, no sign of the personal belongings Vereen had carried away with him from the Hoapili Street bungalow. Satisfied, he set the lantern down and searched the pockets in the dead grifter’s once neatly tailored, now torn and soiled clothing. Empty, every one.

Vereen would not have left R. W. Anderson’s stock certificates and bearer bonds anywhere in Honolulu, of that Quincannon was certain; he would have carried such valuables on his person. The one who had done him in had them now, along with however much was left of the two thousand dollars in stolen cash. Who else but the man who had not drawn a sober breath since Monday, whose fear and nervous strain were at least partly the result of guilt? Who else but Stanton Millay?

But why? Not for the bonds or certificates, the aggregate worth of which did not amount to enough to entice a wealthy rancher into committing homicide. A fit of rage after discovering that he had been swindled? Possibly, but why do the deed here in the burial cave? Murder could be done and bodies safely made to vanish anywhere in this volcanic wilderness.

Why come to the heiau at all, for that matter? Unless...

Quincannon swung the light along the shelves for a closer look at the artifacts scattered among the bones. None of them seemed to be of much value to anyone except an archaeologist or a museum curator. If something of value had been secreted here by Polynesian high priests in ancient times, it must have been removed long ago.

He started to turn away from the open crypts. In the sweep of light as he did so, his eye caught movement among the rocks on the high ledge farther down. His reaction was immediate, instinctive.

He had already dropped the lantern and was flinging himself sideways when the rifle flash came.

The bullet missed him and shattered the lantern, sent it bouncing and crashing across the floor. He landed on his right shoulder and skidded into the opposite wall, the boom of the shot repeated in lustily reverberating echoes all around him. Two seconds later the Navy Colt was in his hand and he was squirming into a pocket of shadow behind Vereen’s corpse, the weapon thrust out in front of him.

There was a second shot, the slug missing high and showering him with lava chips and dust. Behind him, the shattered lantern had left a trail of burning kerosene, but the reservoir by now must have been a quarter or less full; the flames were low and before the sniper on the ledge above could trigger a third round, they flickered out. The tube, then, was plunged into blackness as thick as india ink.

Quincannon scrambled backward and sideways toward the middle of the cave. Then, again, he froze in place. The stillness that followed was as absolute as the dark. Now he and whoever had been trying to kill him were on equal footing. If either of them fired, the muzzle flash would betray his position and make him a clear target.

A stalemate, but one that couldn’t last. Sooner or later he or the shooter would have to make a move.

How many seconds or minutes crept away Quincannon had no idea. In such darkness you quickly lost track of time. And it was difficult, if not impossible, to gauge the exact source of any sounds — both an advantage and a disadvantage.

Well?

His heightened sense of smell picked up a new scent on the air currents. And then something broke the silence — a distant dripping and thrumming. Ozone. Wind and rain. The kona storm had commenced outside. Before the ambush he would have grumbled at the fact. Now he saw it as a potential boon to his chances.

The second entrance to the burial chamber must be somewhere up near the ledge where the shooter was hidden, so the sounds of the storm would be louder in his ears. That would make any noises down here even harder to pinpoint.

In his mind’s eye Quincannon could see the shape of the chamber and his relative position. He calculated the distance to the turning behind him. Then he made his move, propelling himself backward and sideways on forearms and knees, deliberately making as much clatter as he could.