Christopher Moore - Island of the Sequined Love Nun

“Do I look stupid?” she said. A smile there, no hint of a challenge.

“No, I guess not.” Tuck pushed up the throttles and taxied the Lear back out to the runway.

Again Beth Curtis reached over and gave him a light squeeze to the crotch. She put on her headset so she could talk to him over the roar of the engines as they took off. “Look, I know this is hard for you. Trust is some-thing you build, and you haven’t known me long enough to learn to do that.”

Tuck thought, It would help if you weren’t changing personalities every five minutes.

“Trust me, Tucker. What we are doing is not hurting the people of Alualu. There are people in India who are selling off their organs for less than the price of a used Toyota pickup. With what we make, we can be sure that these people are always taken care of, and we can take care of ourselves in the meantime.”

“If people are selling their organs on the cheap, then how are you—we—making so much money?”

“Because we can do it to order. Transplant isn’t just a matter of blood type, you know. Sure, in a pinch—and usually it is a pinch—you can go on just blood type, but there are four other factors in tissue typing. If they match, along with blood type, then you have a better chance of the body not rejecting the organ. Sebastian has a database of the tissue types of every native on the island. When there’s a need for an exact match, the order comes in over the satellite and we run it through the database. If we have it, the Sky Priestess calls the chosen.”

“Don’t the people have to be the same race?”

“It helps, but it seems that the people of Alualu have a very similar genetic pattern to the Japanese.”

“They don’t look Japanese. How do you know this?”

“Actually, it was figured out by an anthropologist who came to the island long before I did. He was studying the language and genetics of the islanders to determine where they migrated from. Turns out there are both linguistic and genetic links to Japan. They’ve been diluted by interbreeding with natives from New Guinea, but it’s still very close.”

“So you guys opened up Kidneys ’R’ Us and started making a mint.”

“Except for the scar, their lives don’t change, Tucker. We’ve never lost a patient to a botched operation or infection.”

But bullets, Tuck thought, are another matter. Still, there was nothing he could do to stop them, and if he had to do nothing, a great salary and his own jet were pretty good compensation. He’d spent most of his life not doing anything. Was it so bad to be paid for what you’re good at?

He said, “So it doesn’t hurt them? In the long run, I mean.”

“Their other kidney steps up production and they never notice the difference.”

“I still don’t get the Sky Priestess thing.”

She sighed. “Control the religion and you control the people. Sebastian tried to bring Christianity to the Shark People—and the Catholics before him—but you can’t compete with a god people have actually seen. The answer? Become that god.”

“But I thought Vincent was the god.”

“He is, but he will bring wonderful cargo in the Sky Priestess. Besides, it breaks the boredom. Boredom can be a lethal thing on a small island. You know about that already.”

Tuck nodded. It wasn’t so bad now. The fear of being murdered had gone a long way toward breaking his boredom.

Beth Curtis leaned over and kissed him lightly on the temple. “You and I can fight the boredom together. That’s one of the reasons I chose you.”

“ You chose me?” In spite of himself, he was thinking about her naked body grinding away above him.

“Of course I chose you. I’m the Sky Priestess, aren’t I?”

“I’m not so sure it was you,” Tuck said, thinking about the ghost pilot.

She pushed away and looked at him as if he had lost his mind.

Tuck slept through most of the day, then woke up with a pot of coffee over a spy novel. He looked at the words and his eyes moved down the pages for half an hour, but when he put it down he had no idea what he had read. His mind was torn by the thought of Beth Curtis showing up at his door. Whenever a guard crunched across the gravel compound, Tuck would go to the window to see if it was her. She wouldn’t come here during the day, would she?

He had promised Kimi that he would check on Sepie and meet him at the drinking circle, but now he was already a day late on the promise. What would happen if Beth Curtis came to his bungalow while he was out? She couldn’t tell the doc, could she? What would her excuse be for coming here? Still, Tuck was beginning to think that the doc wasn’t really the one running the show. He was merely skilled labor, and so, probably, was Tucker himself.

Tuck looked at the pages of the spy novel, watched a little Malaysian television (today they were throwing spears at coconuts on top of a pole while the Asian stock market’s tickers scrolled at the bottom of the screen in thin-colored bands), and waited for nightfall. When he could no longer see the guard’s face across the compound, he made a great show of yawning and stretching in front of the window, then turned out the lights, built the dummy in his bed, and slipped out through the bottom of the shower.

He took his usual path behind the clinic, then inched his way up on the far side and peeked around the front. Not ten feet away a guard stood by the door. He ducked quickly around the corner. There was no way into the clinic tonight. He could wait or even try to intimidate the guard, now that he knew they were afraid to shoot

him. Of course, he wasn’t sure they knew they were afraid to shoot him. What if Mato was the only one?

He slid back down the side of the building and through the coconut grove to the beach. The swim had become like walking to the mailbox, and he was past the minefield in less than five minutes. As he rounded the curve of the beach, he saw a light and figures moving around it. The Shark men had brought a kerosene lamp to the drinking circle. How civilized.

Some of the men acknowledged his presence as he moved into the circle, but the old chief only stared into the sand between his feet. There was a stack of magazines at his side.

“What’s going on, guys?”

A panic made its way around the circle to land on Abo, who looked up and said, “Your friend is shot by the guards.”

Tuck waited, but Abo looked away. Tuck jumped in front of Malink. “Chief, is he telling the truth? Did they shoot Kimi? Is he dead?”

“Not dead,” Malink said, shaking his head. “Hurt very bad.”

“Take me to him.”

“He is at Sarapul’s house.”

“Right. I’ll look it up in the guidebook later. Now take me to him.”

Old Malink shook his head. “He going to die.”

“Where is he shot?”

“In the water by the minefield.”

“No, numbnuts. Where on his body?”

Malink held his hand to his side. “I say, ‘Take him to the Sorcerer,’ but Sarapul say, ‘The Sorcerer shoot him.’” Malink then looked Tuck in the eye for the first time. His big brown face was a study in trouble. “Vincent send you. What do I do?”

Tuck could sense a profound embarrassment in the old man. He had just admitted in front of the men in his tribe that he didn’t have a clue. The loss of face was gnawing at him like a hungry sand crab.

Tuck said, “Vincent is pleased with your decision, Malink. Now I must see Kimi.”

One of the young Vincents stood up. Feeling very brave, he said, “I will take you.”

Tuck grabbed his shoulder. “You’re a good man. Lead on.”

The young Vincent seemed to forget to breathe for a moment, as if Tuck had touched him on the shoulders with a sword and welcomed him to a seat at the Round Table, then he came to his