Джеймс Чейз - So What Happens To Me?

‘It could do, you fool!’

I ran back to the flight cabin. Looking through the plexiglass I saw sandy beach and then jungle ahead.

‘Bernie! Harry’s had an accident! He’s knocked out!’

He didn’t say anything. He just sat there, his shirt and head soaked in sweat.

‘Bernie!’ I bawled at him. ‘Hear me?’

‘Don’t touch me.’ His voice was a husky croak.

‘Make altitude! We’re too low!’

We were now only two hundred feet above the dense jungle. He gave a shuddering sigh that chilled me as he pulled back the stick. The kite’s nose lifted. We were now flying fast over the jungle.

‘Higher! Get her up!’

‘For God’s sake Jack, leave me alone!’

There was something about him that scared the hell out of me. His stiff, set position, the sweat and now his voice.

I ran back into the aisle and shook Harry, but he was out to the world. Rushing into the kitchen, I drew water into a bowl, rushed back and threw the water in his face: this produced no reaction.

She still stood in the doorway, watching.

‘Do something!’ I yelled at her. ‘Olson can’t make the landing! Get this man on his feet!’

She turned, entered the suite and slammed the door. I heard the bolt snap to.

For a moment I stared down at Harry, then I rushed back to the flight cabin.

I saw we had lost altitude again and now we were flying less than a hundred feet above the dense jungle.

‘Bernie! Pull her up!’ I shouted.

He made a feeble effort to pull back the stick, then a moan of a man in agony escaped him.

‘Bernie! What’s wrong? Are you ill?’ I slid into the copilot’s seat. ‘Bernie!’

‘My heart... I’m dying...’ Then he fell forward. His body shoved the stick forward and the nose went down.

As I heard the undercarriage smashing through the tree tops. I flicked up the various switches, cuffing the engines. In the split second that remained to me I saw Bernie’s eyes roll back and I knew he was dead.

The crash flung me across the cabin.

Blackness came to me and I gave myself up as lost.

I swam out of a deep, black pit, feeling that I was drowning, aware of water pouring on my face. The water was warm and as I returned to consciousness, I realised it was rain.

‘Come on! Come on!’ That voice I would know anywhere was shouting at me. ‘You’re not hurt!’

I opened my eyes and saw the light of dawn coming through the treetops, then I dragged my body to a sitting position. I became aware that my head hurt and there was a nagging pain in my shoulder.

‘Jack!!’

‘Okay, okay! For God’s sake, give me a minute!’

I wiped my face with my hand and blinked, then I saw her, standing over me. She looked like a drowned cat, her shirt and slacks plastered to her body, her hair like rat’s tails: no longer the glamorous, fabulous Mrs. Victoria Essex.

I looked around. I was sitting in squelchy mud: broken trees lay around me. Rain beat down and the humid, stifling heat was as if I were packed in steaming cotton wool.

‘Get up!’

I looked up at her.

‘Are you all right?’

‘Yes: and so are you! Where are we? What happened?’

Shakily I got to my feet and leaned against a tree for support.

‘Olson had a heart attack.’ I turned and looked at the smash. I saw how lucky we had been. There were no big, solid trees. The plane had sheered through the jungle like a scythe. The wings with their jets had come of, but the fuselage looked intact. The tail unit was gone.

‘Some smash,’ I said. ‘How did I get out?’

‘I pulled you out.’

I stared at her.

‘You’re some woman, aren’t you?’

‘I thought it might catch fire.’

Then I remembered Harry.

‘How about Erskine?’

‘I don’t know.’ Her voice told me she didn’t care. ‘What are we going to do?’

I tried to think, but my mind was still groggy.

‘I must find Harry.’

‘To hell with him! We’ve got to find shelter!’

Leaving her, I walked unsteadily over to the wreck. I peered into the flight cabin that had torn away from the fuselage. I could see Bernie still sitting at the controls, his head on his chest. I hoisted myself into the cabin, opened a locker and took out a powerful electric torch. I played the beam on his dead face, then with a grimace I climbed down and into the fuselage.

Harry lay where I had left him. A pool of blood made a gruesome halo around his head. His jaw had dropped and his eyes were sightless.

I felt a chill of horror crawl up my spine. Had I killed him or had the crash killed him? He had been breathing when I had left him! I stood staring down at him.

‘You killed him, didn’t you?’

She had climbed up to join me.

‘I don’t know. If I did, it was because of you.’

We stared at each other, then she pushed by me and tried to get into the Essex suite, but the door was jammed.

‘Open it! I want to change out of these wet clothes!’

‘Don’t waste time. We’ve got to get out of here pronto. You’ll be wet anyway.’

She glared at me.

‘I intend to stay here until I’m found!’

‘We sold this kite to a Mexican revolutionary for three million dollars. If he gets his hands on you, he’ll be happy with the exchange. He will ransom you for twice that sum.’

Her violet eyes opened wide.

‘So what are we going to do?’

‘We can’t be more than fifteen miles from the coast. Once there, we’ll telephone your husband and he’ll have us picked up. It’s going to be a long, tough haul, but that’s the way it’s got to be. Wait here.’ I struggled up the inclining fuselage to the guest cabin where I had left my suitcase. I emptied the contents on the bed retaining only three packs of cigarettes, then I went into the kitchen. I packed some canned foods in the suitcase and included three bottles of tonic water and three cokes, a bottle opener and a can opener.

‘Come on,’ I said to her and helped her down into the mud and the rain. I handed down the suitcase, then clambered into the flight cabin. I undipped the Thompson machine gun then searched in one of the lockers and found a pocket compass.

Flies were already settling around Bernie. I felt bad leaving him but we had to go.

As I joined her, she said. ‘I’m hating this rain.’

‘That makes two of us.’ I swung the gun by its strap over my shoulder, picked up the suitcase and started off into the jungle.

The next two hours were sheer hell: a lot worse for her than for me. At least I had had plenty of experience in the Viet jungles of this kind of thing and knew what to expect. Although I had been a service mechanic I had had to go through a jungle course.

The rain was ceaseless, pounding down through the trees, giving us no respite. I kept checking the compass. I knew the coast was somewhere northeast, but there were times when the jungle was so thick we had to make a detour. Without the compass, we would have been hopelessly lost.

She kept up with me, walking just behind me. I paced myself, knowing we had a long way to go. Finally, we came on a clearing in the jungle. Trees had been felled. There were signs of fires, long dead that had burned unwanted wood. I stopped short at the edge of the clearing.

I looked to right and left and listened. All I could hear was the pattering rain. I turned and looked at her. Her face was drawn and blotched with mosquito bites. I could see the nipples of her breasts through the soaked shirt. I looked at her feet. She had on casuals of white calf and they showed bloodstains. She had walked until her feet were beginning to bleed and yet she hadn’t uttered a word of complaint.

‘Your feet!’ I exclaimed.