Chapter 10

Tension seeped into the air that night. It was the anticipation felt when Zell was about to change women, a fluttery, fearing, eager sort of anticipation.

Ella and I had Danny between us. I signaled her with my eyes, then held to his arm. "Danny-no matter what happens, or who it happens to, promise you won't do anything about it. You're not ready yet."

His jaw was knotted. "If Zell tries to-"

Ella said, "Danny, don't lose yourself to us now. Don't get taken away from us."

He didn't answer. We waited; all the women waited. And when Zell scraped the last morsel from his plate, it came. Handing his plate to Elena, he said, "Take it to the trough, and you don't have to come back."

Although we were listening so hard we could have heard him whisper, Zell lifted his voice: "I'm gonna give somebody a break tonight."

He paused for effect, then snapped it into the silence: "You!"

His thick forefinger was pointing at young Helen Fergus. She shrank back, pretending that it was someone else.

"You," Zell repeated. "Helen-come on over here."

Helen became smaller. She didn't move.

"Okay," Zell grated, "so I'll come over there.

"Jessie," Helen wailed, "Jessie-you said you wouldn't let him hurt me."

He was near them then, bulky, menacing. "That right? How you gonna' stop me, Jessie dear?"

She stared up at him, flint-eyed and pale.

Zell grunted in scorn. "Come on kid, I'm gonna' show you how different it is with a man."

Helen started to cry.

"Course," Zell said, enjoying himself, "it might hurt some. But you can holler all you want. Look at it this way, kid-you keep playin' around with other women, you might go queer yourself."

Shoulders shaking, Helen put both hands to her face.

"You rotten bastard," Jessie hissed, eyes glittering. She came to her knees, facing him across the fire. Her elbows were bent; she looked like a wrestler.

"Come ahead," Zell invited. "You been needin' a bust in the mouth.

Jessie didn't stand up. Her hands flashed out, lifting, scooping, and most men would have been trapped by her swiftness. Zell's animal instincts saved him. He caught the burning branches on one forearm as Jessie followed them across the fire, thumbs spread and hooked for his eyes.

He clamped her hands in his own and grinned at her. Slowly, her face whitening, Jessie went to her knees, arms high, her hands locked into his. Zell's forearms writhed under their covering of black fur, and there were sounds like the popping of peanut shells.

Jessie screamed, a hopeless wail full of agony.

Zell released her hands and she pulled them close to her chest, cupping the broken fingers, rocking back and forth on her knees.

Zell laughed and stepped past to stand over Helen. The girl's face was a study in tear-streaked terror. He leaned to snatch her up, to make a bundle of her limp arms and legs. He carried her into his hut.

Danny was first to move. He went to Jessie and I gasped in horror as he chopped one swift, accurate punch to her chin, a blow that toppled her over onto one side.

"Quick," he ordered, "Mary-Joy-set those fingers while she's out and can't feel it. Splint them tightly, then put her hands in cold water and keep them there. She's going to hurt-hurt like hell when she comes to, but maybe she won't be crippled."

Danny stood up then, and stared toward Zell's hut. His shoulders rolled and his fists were solid chunks. "Not now," he muttered. "Not now, Zell, but soon. Damned soon."

And from then on, he refused to touch either Ella or myself. I was glad, Ella didn't know my decision yet, but I had to have Danny for myself. At dawn, he went back into training, stepping up the pace, forcing his body to toughen up or to collapse.

I watched him work at the heavy bag, watched him flicking a long jab at it; jab, jab, feint and the right hand fired down the slot, his wrapped fists thudding into the stubborn give of the bag. His hands were tough now, the skin thickened by hours of soaking them in salt water. I hadn't understood why he put brine compresses over each eye, too, until he explained how a cut could blind a fighter and finish him. Danny wasn't missing a trick.

He pulled out every gimmick he'd ever learned in the ring, sharpened and polished them tirelessly. Even I could see the punching muscles over his sloping shoulders begin to swell, and new muscle ridged his belly.

Danny said he was no longer a middleweight, but a full-fledged light-heavy now. He was still many pounds below the massive weight of Zell, of course, but he felt fine and looked better.

He had Ella and I help him perfect his timing. At first we were afraid we'd hurt him, but after he slipped away from awkward punches, ducked under a left, and picked off our tries to hit him in mid-air, we bore down. When I sighed and panted to a stop, it would be Ella's turn, and both of us worked hard at our job.

And one day he said: "Fm ready."

I frowned at him. "Are you sure?"

He smiled at me. "Past a certain point, training doesn't help. I've got a good edge right now, and I want to hold it. There's one other way you two can help me."

Ella asked, "How, Danny?"

"By letting me stay a hermit until it's over. Go back to camp and sleep together. I'll stay here, on the beach."

Ella lowered her eyes; I grinned. "For how long, hermit?"

"Until Zell pushes it. He may start the party by grabbing one of you. I think he might."

"I wish it didn't have to be," Ella said. "I wish he'd just let us alone."

I said, "I wish you weren't such an idiot, that we could gang up on him and beat him with clubs."

Danny looked at me, at Ella. "You're probably right, but this is a thing I have to do. It's the chance to stand tall again, to prove I can stand alone."

"You don't have to prove that to us," I said.

"I have to prove it to Danny Mixon," he said.

Ella shifted from one foot to the other. "I-maybe I know something that will change this. The Japanese girls are getting ready to sail."

I blinked. "So soon? I thought-"

Danny wasn't surprised. "I saw the raft. A good job, solid and seaworthy. How do they plan on keeping it secret from Zell? They have to battle it down from its biding place and get it into the ocean."

Ella gnawed her rich lips. "They don't plan to hide any more. Michiko made a bow and some arrows; the others say she's good with it. Sako and Kyoko have spears, and Joy's with them. Elena and Eve Short, too. They're going to fight him if he tries to stop them."

Danny looked thoughtful. "They're banding together; good. If s a start. How about the other women-Mary, Jessie, Helen?"

"I'm not sure," Ella said. "Michiko didn't tell me too much; just invited me along."

"She's gotten over her foreigners-phobia, then," I said.

Danny said, "She needs all the hands she can get, for the raft. But she needs help right now, too-to move the thing, to set up protection against Zell. Where is he right now, Ella?"

Ella shook her head. "Hunting, I guess. He wasn't in camp when I left."

"Let's go," Danny said.

Michiko was surprised to see us, and a little edgy until she was sure Danny only wanted to help. And after he explained the guard need, she welcomed us.

We worked like madwomen, placing poles under the lashed-together logs, inching the huge platform laboriously down the sands to the rim of the bay. It was slavery, but it was also a labor of love for most of them. The raft meant home; it meant escape, freedom, civilization.

Only Eve Short worked slowly, as if her heart wasn't in it, and she frowned often.

Halfway down the dunes, with Sako at the pole ahead of mine, the raft suddenly lost motion. Sako wasn't pushing; she was staring in back of us. I turned and saw him.

He looked twice as big, outlined against the skyline. Shaggy-haired, huge, dominating, he roared down at us: "You damned fools!"

Michiko slipped aside, her quick hands going to the flooring of the raft.

Zell came striding toward us. "You think I didn't know about this? Think I'm so stupid I couldn't hear hammers, couldn't find tracks leading to that raft?"

Danny moved toward him, hands lifted.

"No!" I yelled.

"That's right, baby," Zell said. "Take care of the drunk. Keep him outa' my way until I finish kickin' tail on the slopeheads. They come first. That damn raft ain't never gonna' touch water."

A slim, erect figure darted out, stopped balanced before Zell. Michiko Kuwaye held the bow ready, an arrow notched on the string. The arrowhead glinted in the sun, light reflecting off honed and shaped metal.

Zell froze.

Michiko drew the string smoothly, with a deftness that told of experience. I remembered the Zen bowmen of Japan, the uncanny archers who could split bamboo poles from the back of a running horse.

Zell must have remembered, too. He whirled to run, his powerful legs thrusting hard against the sand, his upper body straining forward in abrupt flight.

He was nearly to the trees when the arrow drove into him, when it tore cunning barbs deep into his flesh and grated on bone.

Zell screamed-not in terror, but the mad bellow of an enraged beast, the roar of a wild thing made insane by pain and anger. We heard him crashing through the trees, smashing his way through them, ripping branches and flinging them aside, still mouthing that throat-twisting snarl of madness, he echoes lingered for a long time.

Joy San tee said what most of us felt: "He-he'll come back and kill us all."

Michiko glared at her. "Next time, I'll hit him better."

Danny shook himself. "First we'd better get that raft into the water, and set up a guard with whatever weapons we have. Michiko will have to be protected, since she's the only one who can handle that bow."

"I am not afraid," Michiko said.

Ella said, "You should have killed him with the first arrow. Now we'll all have to be afraid."

"Ella's right," Danny said. "Zell is more dangerous now, like a wounded animal. We have to keep him away, or he'll pick us off one by one. When that wound festers, he'll go off his rocker."

"Good," Michiko snapped. "We have the raft; we'll leave the wounded pig to lick his wounds here-alone."

"That would be okay," Danny mused, "except I don't see your food and fresh water loaded up. Someone has to go get those things, and Zell is going to be close by, every minute. He's still got that spear."

I came over to him and put my arm around him. Ella just looked at us.

He put one arm around me. "We have decided to stay here."

"Zell," Michiko spat, "Zell will murder you all." I pressed my cheek into Danny's shoulder. "It's worth the chance." Ella said nothing. She knew.

Everything went wrong. Zell's attack had upset us, thrown everyone into a panic that dwindled to just enough fear to make us all clumsy and inept

The pole I was using snapped in my hands when I thrust it too far under the logs. Up ahead, Joy Santee's hand slipped; she fell into the raft and brush-burned an ugly wound across her cheekbone. Mary Tetson skinned a knee.

And since Zell's coming, Eve Short had been useless anyway. She kept looking off into the forest where he'd gone.

To top it off, the sky was darkening in mid-afternoon. The chill wind that came with the clouds was strange and penetrating. The crests of the palm trees off the beach began to sway sickeningly.

Danny watched the sky, frowning. Then he motioned us together. "We'd better not take any chances, girls. Leave the raft where it is, bring your weapons, and we'll all head for the cave."

"Danny?" Ella said.

"Typhoon," he said. "We'd better not let it catch us in the open." Typhoon!

The dread word rang through the group, shuddered down all our spines. We hurried. Stretched out single file, with Michiko leading, her bow strung and ready, with Danny and a coral club bringing up the rear, we hurried.

At the campsite, we paused just long enough to collect containers of fresh water, to clutch at bedding; then we raced on up the slope toward the cave. We were thankful now that it was food-stocked and sturdy, that we had a place to hide from the fearful wind that was beginning to pluck at our clothing and snatch at out hair.

At the cave mouth, we stopped, huddling to one another, until Danny could come up from the rear and joined forced with Michiko. They went inside slowly, carefully, but Zell wasn't hiding there. We tumbled in after them, gathered to tremble and listen to the rising howl of the fierce winds outside.

I had to put my lips to Danny's ear. "The raft-what about the raft?"

"It's heavily built, Julie. The girls knew what they were doing when they made it. They put it together to withstand the poundings of the sea. It should hold up under this storm. It's a good thing we didn't get it all the way down to the beach. It would have been lost by now."

I thought about that, for the other women's sake. The raft's mast would be gone, of course, and maybe the planking and some of the lashings. But those things could be redone, remade with a little time and effort. If Zell didn't succeed in another attempt to break up the sailing. He'd never allow his herd of mares to sail away from him; not Kane Zell, the ruling stallion.

Ella occupied herself with the others while I crouched close to Danny, whose attention remained riveted on the mouth of the cave. He kept the club of coral ready, stayed just a foot inside the entrance, where the searching winds slapped at him. I knew he was watching for Zell.

It would be a good time for the big man to sneak in upon us, a fine time for him to catch us disorganized and frightened in the storm. He could use the lightening-slashed darkness for cover, and come unheard through the wild keening of the typhoon, through the crashing trees.

The wind came in spasms, now screaming insanely and hurling itself across the trees and at the cave, now falling away to a watery mutter. The lightning flashes cracked the sky, heavy artillery for the bayoneting rain. Under the savage battering, the entire island seemed to shudder, to writhe, and the universe was filled with ear-splitting sound.

For some reason, Danny came to his knees. I watched him as a streak of lightning outlined his poised body. He was staring fixedly into the dark, tense, waiting.

Zell was upon him almost before he knew it, and certainly before I realized he was anywhere near the cave. Later, Danny told me that no sight, no sound had warned him of Zell's presence. It was something else, something totally alien to the fresh-washed air-the swift fragment of an odor. The scent reached Danny fleetingly; a wild smell, a feral odor that came and passed swiftly. But it was enough to warn Danny.

He rose from his knees and brought the heavy stone club down and out with all his strength, striking at a dark spot which would be head-high to man. The club slammed into something.

Lightning sputtered and Danny saw a hand, wide and hairy, twitching on the earth near his feet. It was Zell's hand. Danny hefted the club again and chopped down at the hand as sudden dark fell once more. The club thudded into empty sand.

Crouching, Danny prodded the blackness with his club, feeling into the shadows, coiled to slash at anything his weapon touched. He felt nothing. I hoped he wouldn't feel anything. I sat rigidly, not daring to breathe.

Danny waited, staring into blackness. Zell had been hit; he had been knocked down and hurt-but not badly; not badly enough. My stomach twisted and grew cold, thinking of Zell back upon his feet, somewhere out there in the violent darkness, cat-silent, cat-mad and waiting for Danny to come out.

I slid to Danny, tugged at his arm. He eased back, the club balanced on one shoulder, still watching the path occasionally lighted by flaring lightning, watching the jumble of zigzag rocks. I didn't have to ask him not to leave the cave tonight; Danny realized that Zell probably wouldn't try to come in again. His surprise attack had failed.

But I thought of the others to come, the other attacks, the hundred cunning ambushes Zell must have in mind. Zell was combat seasoned, a line soldier. He could work out dozens of devious plans. Sooner or later, one of the girls might wander too far from the group, and Zell would have her. Sometime in the days to come, while we worked to repair the raft, a girl would stray too close to the brush-and Zell would have her.

What then? Zell was blind mad; he was hurt and savage. He might murder the first girls, but I thought he'd save most of them. Michiko Kuwaye would surely die-the moment Zell got his powerful hands upon her. Jessie Marawski was probably marked for death, too. She'd be of no sexual use to Zell.

The others I didn't know. Zell might torture Ella or me, just to strike back at Danny. But I didn't think he'd kill us. He didn't realize that there was nothing between Ella and Danny, now.

I shivered in the darkness, and Ella's fingers closed tight upon mine. She whispered to me, "It's all right. But don't leave me now. I'm afraid. Vividly, I could picture Ella's golden body being covered by Zell's hairy flesh. Ella would struggle; she'd fight, and Zell would tear her apart

Myself-I tried to visualize me, spread by Zell's terrible strength, supine under his thrusting body. I tasted the wildness of his brutal mouth again, and the flavor sent chills through me. I couldn't stand Zell; he would have to beat me unconscious. I couldn't possibly accept his body-not after having had Danny. I would die in Zell's brutish mauling, shrivel and fade if forced to suffer my thighs being dirtied by his rutting.

I flinched when Danny put his mouth to my ear so he could make himself heard above the roar of the storm.

"I caught him a hell of a shot with the club." Danny said. "But he recovered so damned quick. I couldn't get in another blow."

The cold worked itself deeper into my body. With a heavy coral club, Danny had smashed Zell in the head. The blow had only knocked him down. Zell had rolled away, vanished before Danny could hit him again. Was it humanly possible for Danny Mixon, for any one man, to defeat such animal power, such animal ferocity?

I wasn't sure. Danny would have skill and speed on his side, and experience that perhaps Zell didn't have. But Zell-ape-like, deadly and primitive-Zell might batter Danny down and break his spine.

That would end it for all of us. Especially for me, but also for the rest of the women. Without Danny's help, they might be split wide open the next time Zell came charging at them. He might get past Michiko's arrows, snap her neck with one might sweep of a massive hand. And afterward, he'd see to it that none of them-of us-ever had the spirit to try escape again.

Danny was talking to me once more. "I'll have to try and bring it to a head before we get the raft into the sea," he said. "Zell and me, I mean."

"Yes," I answered, thinking that it would be better if we could bring our enemy into the open while there was still safety of a sort in our numbers, while there were still many women on the island who hated Zell enough to kill him.

Outside, the wind was slowly dying, dropping its fury to a thin and reedy whine, smelling of salt, of struggling things flung up out of the sea. I thought of typhoons I had read of, of hurricanes I'd seen in newsreels, and knew we had been lucky, that our island must have been on the fringes of the storm.

But would our luck hold? Could we get rid of Zell before he slaughtered any of us, before he murdered Danny Mixon?

Danny slipped away after patting my arm. He was back in a few minutes, able to speak normally now that the wind was whimpering itself into silence.

"We're one girl short," he said. "I counted noses when we came in, but one is missing now. She must have sneaked outside somehow, and we didn't see her."

"S-sneaked out? But why? Why would anyone leave the cave and go out where Zell is prowling around: And who, Danny-who?"

"Eve Short," he said thoughtfully. "And she must have gone out deliberately to find Zell and be with him."

Now Zell had help.

The next day came quietly, chastened by the passing of the storm. Only the trailings of the great wind fingered across our island, probing shamed-faced at stripped and splintered tree limbs, skipping lightly and apologetically across the scattered sands.

I came out into sunlight and stretched gratefully. It had been a long night, and a tense one. Now there were many things to do-the raft had to be checked for damage and repaired; fresh food had to be gathered. But now these things had to be done in force, by the entire group, instead of each of us fanning out to assigned jobs. It was going to be more difficult, but we didn't dare relax. Kane Zell would be watching and waiting.

Cramped, shaken by the fury of the night, the women gathered about Danny. I felt proud for him, glad for him, because now he was strong, and because all of us were dependent upon him. Danny had taken his rightful place as a man.

"Zell is around," Danny reminded us all. "I hurt him last night, but not so it will slow him up much. We'll have to keep a constant watch, and we'll have to stay together. Michiko-is your bow all right?"

She held it out. "The wind would have taken me first."

Mary Tetson asked: "You say Zell came last night, during the storm? Maybe he was just looking for shelter."

"No. He came to kill me-and probably a few more of us."

"And Eve," Mary said. "Did she go to him."

"We think so," Danny said.

"All right," Michiko said. "The raft-what about the raft?"

"We'll go see," Danny answered, and led us off.

The raft sat firmly in its bed of sand, its deckhouse torn away, lashings ripped. There was only the stump of the mast left. The food cache had been partly scattered, partly buried. But there was no major damage, nothing that couldn't be re-gathered or fixed within a day or two.

Typhoons had swept this island before, crippling foliage. It would soon right itself and grow back. In some ways, the storm had been a boon to us, for the shore was littered with stunned crabs and roped with edible kelp.

But another storm waited for us in the jungle, plotting, hating, healing itself and waiting to unleash murder on our heads. I stared into the bruised and tattered trees, wondering how long Zell would wait. We made a fire near the raft and breakfasted on boiled crabs, and talked about Eve's desertion.

"She went to him, all right," Ella said. "She knew he was hurt and needed her. It's a shame she has to waste love like that on a beast like him."

Danny said, "She took some food, too. I checked the cave's stores this morning. Dried meat and fruit-and some cloth we had put aside. She was thinking all the way, knew Zell would need bandaging."

"She was thinking with her heart." Ella said. "If she used her head, she'd leave him alone to die."

Sucking on a crab claw, I tried to picture the meeting of Eve and Zell in the jungle. She'd be trying to find him, but he would find her, instead. He'd stalk her like a blood-hungry cat, cut her off, then pounce.

She'd be frightened, but determined. She'd show him the packet of food, the bandages, and tell him of her love, tell him she came to him to stand against the rest of us.

Zell would be tired and mean, his eyes red-flecked and feral. Would he laugh at her and smash her down? I didn't think so. He needed Eve, needed the help she could give him. She would be extra eyes, extra ears. Zell would keep her alive. He might even-make love to her, so she'd be bound that much closer to him.

But Eve was a fool, if she thought her loyalty would mean anything to the man. He'd use her, as he had used her before, welcoming her sensuous body, welcoming her aid against us. Then he'd slap her back into her place as just another member of his harem, relegate Eve to the position of just another mare to be taken upon the whim of the ruling stud.

We went to work on the raft, and the work progressed swiftly since it was out in the open. Two of us stood watch at all times, one at each end of the beach, keeping far enough back from the tree line so we could shout and run, if Zell and Eve appeared. We never saw either of them. We could only guess what they were up to, in the forest. Eve would be treating his wounds, feeding and comforting him. Zell would be lying up like a wounded panther, resting, gathering strength for the final assault upon us.

Mary Tetson thought differently, and her view was shared by few of the other girls. Their idea was that Zell had been beaten, decisively and for good, that he was afraid to face smother arrow from Michiko's bow.

We continued to work on the raft. Two days went by, three-pure, sunswept days in the wake of the scarring storm. On the afternoon of third day, we were struggling the raft over its road of peeled saplings once more. Lifting, straining, pushing, we worried it down the final slope of the beach. One more day would see it afloat.

We would set the new mast in place then, and store the food and water, rope the smaller raft of coconuts behind. The coconuts were Danny's idea. Filled with water and plugged, they'd be a constant supply of cool, life-giving drink for the passengers.

Guard was easier, for there was only a clean beach to watch, a strip of sand without cover for Zell to creep through. If he came for us now, he would have to come out in the open, where we could meet him head on. The sea at our backs protected us, but Danny saw to it that we didn't feel too safe about that approach, either. He reminded us that Zell could swim, that he might rise out of the ocean like some dripping sea monster and fling himself in our midst before we knew it. So we patrolled the sea, too.

Danny called me to his side. "Now is the time for Zell to make his try. Sometime between now and morning would be best. If he wants to stop the others from leaving, he'll have to jump us before high tide tomorrow. If he's decided to let them go, we're in for real trouble."

"We'll be together," I said. "We can give it one hell of a try."

"We'll double the guards tonight," Danny said. "Nobody walks alone. Two by two, and changing every hour. One more thing-spread the word that the guards are to pull in closer, to stay where I can see them within the circle of firelight. I'll go stoke up the fire, make it bigger. We want to see Zell when he attacks. If he catches us flat-footed, he'll hurt somebody before we even get a chance at him."

"Danny," I said. "You've given up that crazy idea of fighting him? Alone, I mean?"

"No," he said, and his jawline was firm. "No-it would be better that way. For me and for all of you."

"But-"

"It has to come," Danny cut in. "Keep back, when it does."

Danny and I walked post together. He was armed with the sturdy coral club, while I had one of the spears the Japanese girls had rigged. We were careful, watchful, never allowing our attention to wander. And minute by minute, the tension built within us, within the other doubled sentried, gathered force and pressure in the bellies of the women who tried to sleep and couldn't.

If we hadn't been alert, we would never have heard the thump in the sand. It came at the very end of our post, down where the shadows circled to dance at the edges of the firelight, where the encroaching trees were nearest to the beach.

"D-Danny," I said, and pointed my spear outward, its butt snugged into my hip, the way Danny had shown me.

He was poised, the club nicking back and forth, ready. "It's only a coconut. See-there in the sand?"

"It didn't fall away over here by itself," I warned.

"No," he agreed, "it didn't. Zell tossed it out hereand not to try and hit me with it. He wanted us to find it like this. I wonder why?"

"Be careful, Danny."

He was quick, darting out and back. Nothing flung out of the darkness at him, but my hands were slippery on the spear shaft. "What-what is it?"

Danny's fingers were cupping the fibered husk. He worked a wooden plug out of the shell, and I caught the thick, cloying odor only the fraction of a second after he did.

Liquor.

Not rum, nor whiskey, nor gin-but some potent brew with a heavy alcoholic content. The smell filled our nostrils-sick-sweet, penetrating. With it came mories for Danny Mixon. I saw his face tighten, saw his lips turn suddenly dry.

"D-Danny-you won't-won't-"

"You smell that?" he asked. "It's the odor of a thousand mahogany bars, of tinted bottles all in a row. It's the odor of blue mirrors and deep-thumping music, the scent of quiet, too-of sleep without dreams, of a comforting blackness that hold no cares and no sorrows."

Danny's hand shook. "My opiate," he said. "All the answers in the world; the robe of forgetfulness, the blessed friend to the ill at ease; hope for the hopeless."

"Don't," I choked. "Don't drink it; that's what Zell wants, Danny! He wants you drunk again, helpless again, a-a-"

"Weakling," Danny finished. Then he lifted his voice to the waiting blackness. "No dice, Zell. I don't need the stuff; I don't even want it. I hope you saved some of this for yourself."

Danny corked the husk, threw it spinning into the night. "Here, Zell! You need this more than I do, because you're scared, big man. You're scared shitless-or you wouldn't have tried that trick. Where are your guts, big man? Did they leak out of that hole in your tail when you pulled the arrow?"

Deadly, hovering silence.

Danny frowned. "I thought that might bring him out."

Ella had come up to us. She touched Danny's wrist. "Does-does he have to be brought out? Can't we do it any other way?"

Danny looked down at her. "He has to be brought out."

"All right then," Ella said. "I can get him out. I-I wasn't going to say anything about this before, but now I guess I have no choice. We won't have any peace until you beat his head in, Danny. Okay-here it is: I'm pregnant."

I gasped. Danny rubbed one hand across his chin. "Are you sure? I guess all men ask that one, don't they? And I guess the answer is always the same. That's fine, Ella; fine, if you want it this way. But I don't see-"

I did. I said: "Danny-the bomb; the bomb that sent us down in the plane. Radiation-it's supposed to make men sterile, sometimes. I remember reading-" Danny snapped his fingers. "Yes-and Zell-" Ella ended it with: "Zell slept with several women. Nothing happened. You and me-and something did happen. That means Zell is sterile and you aren't"

I stared into the dark. "That little piece of news will drive him crazy."

"Let's not wait any longer," Ella said, and stepped out before us. She stood with vagrant rays of firelight playing over her golden beauty, stood wide-legged with her hands on her smooth hips and her lovely head thrown back.

"Hey!" she shouted. "Hey-you-Zell! We know you're listening. You're watching me right now! Well, listen to this. You're not a man at all. You hear me? No man at all, Kane Zell! You're a nothing. You're sterile. You can't make a baby. How many women have you slept with here, Zell? How many? And how many of them are pregnant? There's been plenty of time for it-plenty!

But I'm pregnant, nothing man! I'm pregnant, and you never touched me. You're not the big, bad studhorse any more, Zell-you're a gelding! But Danny is a man, you hear me? Danny Mixon is a real man!"

Danny reached for Ella, drew her quickly back between us. "All right! that's enough. If he doesn't come out for that-"

A sound struck out at us, a ripping noise like a limb being torn from a tree, splintering and shattering the night. It was followed by something else-a rising, wordless roar of utter hate and insensate rage. The scream beat across the sand and stirred the hairs on the backs of our necks.

"Soon as it's light!" Zell shouted, the words tearing out of a hate-clotted throat. "Soon as it's light, you bastard! I'll rip your guts out!"

Sounds threshed away through the trees and it was quiet again. In the brittle silence, Ella said, "I guess he heard me loud and clear."

CHAPTER ll

At DAWN, IN THE first chill and foreboding streak of light, Zell came onto the beach. A step behind him was Eve Short, hurrying, saying something to him. As they came closer, I made out the words.

"Kane-Kane-don't do it; what they said doesn't matter."

He snarled at her. "Don't do it? You heard the nigger. She said Mixon is a better man than me."

"But he's not-you know that."

Zell stopped, eyes feeling warily among us for Danny. Danny stepped out of the crowd. Zell slammed a meaty fist into his palm. "The nigger's pregnant-you ain't, the Japs ain't, the kids ain't-just a broad I never laid."

"Kane-"

"How come?"

Eve's face was twisted, desperate. "It's not your fault-the radiation-"

Zell spat. "Why me and not him? Why didn't it bother that drunk son-of-a-bitch?"

"I don't know, but it doesn't make any difference to me. And I'm the one you love."

"Love?" Zell grunted. "Love? What the hell is that?"

He swept Eve back with one hand. She fell kicking into the sand.

Zell roared at Danny. "You ready, Mixon?"

Danny nodded. "I'm ready."

"That slopehead bitch with the arrows," Zell said.

Danny didn't look away. "Michiko-put down the bow."

Her voice rang out. "Only if he throws that bayonet away."

Zell's teeth gleamed. His fingers flicked the bayonet from his belt. It drove point down into the sand.

Behind Danny, Michiko said: "The bow is put aside. Kill him, Danny."

Slowly, Zell walked into the arena. He seemed bigger than ever before. The half-healed scar of the arrow was red along his hip; there was still a dark spot over one flat, wicked eye. He clenched and unclenched his fists as he came, and the muscles across his deep chest writhed in their black fur.

My heart said Danny-Danny-Danny, but he didn't hear it. He waited until Zell was just out of reach, until the big man's hands came up, knotted, reaching. Then Danny drifted in, slid quickly away in a half circle. Zell's head rocked back from the pair of stinging jabs that had flashed in to land over his right eye.

I shouted, and Ella cried out. Zell grunted and red flamed in his eyes. He reached out for Danny, trying to get his hands on the moving figure before him. Danny's left rapped him again and again, and Zell's clawing fingers caught only air.

Zell made a noise deep in his barrel chest and threw himself forward with snake swiftness. Danny went low, bobbing far to his left, letting Zell's clubbing right hand go past. Danny leaned into his own right, digging it belt-high into Zell's body, just under the ribs. Feet shifting, he watched Zell wheel in fury, and spun the whistling hook in with the weight of his body behind it.

Zell wobbled and shook his head. Blood seeped from a split eyebrow. "You bastard."

Danny coasted away, hands high, breathing easily. "You talk a good fight, Zell."

My man was good. He was a fighter, a real one, and he was beating hell out of Kane Zell.

Zell leaped, hooking his left hand in a long sweep, his right fist clumsily protecting his head. Danny pulled back, moving his feet only to plant them a little more firmly in the sand. Zell snorted as his swing jerked him off balance, twisted him forward and to one side, his jawline exposed.

Danny fired the right. His knuckles caught Zell at the angle of jaw under the ear, a soft and tender spot. The punch and the momentum of his own body pitched Zell forward onto his face.

Ella screamed into my ear. Other women cheered, yelling and clapping. I watched in stiff silence. I knew that Zell was going to get up.

Danny skipped back as the big man rolled over and leaped to his feet. Wiping at his gashed eyebrow, Zell brought his hands up slowly, pulling his elbows in close to his ribs, hunching the big shoulders up around his head. Now he moved carefully, setting his feet.

He would be more dangerous now, I thought. Zell's wildness had passed, had subsided into something cold and deadly. Zell has found respect for his opponent and realized he'd have to take punches. He moved on, willing to be battered, confident of his ability to absorb punishment.

Danny moved, circling, flicking the left, not whipping it in, because he could easily break it on the top of Zell's head. He feinted it high, then went in and chopped to the body. Zell's clubbing blow caught him on the shoulder before he could get out.

The punch hurt Danny. His legs took him out of danger, sliding him away from the steadily plodding Zell. He shook his arm to bring back feeling. Zell grinned.

Danny flicked the left and dropped a right into the ribs, centering on a possible soft spot. Zell cursed and forgot his protective shell. When the big man grabbed at him, Danny straightened and volleyed swift punches at the unguarded face, putting them together in practiced combinations.

Zell was stung; he wavered. Danny's foot skidded in loose sand and Zell's right hand caught the top of his head. The force of it spun Danny reeling away, off balance. Zell was after him, wasting a moment to roar and cock his arm.

The moment was enough. Danny's right hand eeled out from his shoulder, straight out with the thrust of his foot against the ground and the pivot of his hip. The punch caught Zell coming in, and added the momentum of the big man's rush to its power. The kick of its landing jarred Danny's shoulder.

Zell staggered. He rocked again under the hook that followed the right hand, and ducked forward into the chop Danny brought up in a short arc.

Zell went to his knees. Rifling, Danny moved away. Zell shook his shaggy head and pawed at smashed lips, at the steady trickle of blood from his eye.

"That's okay," Zell said slowly, "that's okay. I can take it longer'n you can dish it out."

Danny gulped air and massaged his right hand. I saw the wonder in his eyes, and knew that punch was one of the best he'd ever thrown-and Zell had taken it. Now Zell was up again and coming on.

Back and forth over the scuffed sand they circled, at the steady trickle of blood from his eye. Danny moving back, skipping in to land a flurry, jabbing, jabbing, moving. Zell stalked him doggedly, rocking under the blows, grunting, but coming on.

We watched in taut silence now, awed by the power and drama of the battle. Zell reeled from one attack, swaying close to us. Suddenly one hand darted out and caught Michiko's bow. Zell laughed through soggy lips and snapped the weapon like a straw.

Danny hit him again before he could get his hands up. Zell shook it off, sweat and blood spraying from his head, a terrible intentness in his eyes. He walked toward Danny.

Danny's left hand was sagging now, not so quick to lift into position. One knuckle was blue and swollen, a bruise along the forearm where Zell had landed one. He sucked air, trying to stay away and rest the arm.

Zell wouldn't allow him to rest. The big man's face was a gory smear, battered and slashed. Both eyebrows pumped blood now, and he wiped at them so he could see. His nose was flattened, and grated with sickening noises when he breathed. His lips were thick, raw ribbons, stretched wide for air.

But he kept coming, and Danny couldn't move away as fast. Once he stopped to try and end it, to find a target that would bring Zell down again, and it was a mistake. Danny was hit and down. A concerted gasp rose from us.

He rolled away barely in time to avoid getting his head kicked off. He came up groggy, back-pedaling with the aching left hand in Zell's squashy face, sticking, sticking, until the blurs went away and the nausea in his belly settled. I saw the avidness in Zell's eyes, the hungry contortions of the man's butchered mouth.

Danny's legs were going-slowly, still keeping him away from the killing blows that came more often now-but they were going, losing their spring. He came down off his toes, stuck the tired left into the gore of

Zell's eye and planted his feet solidly for the follow-up right.

It snapped down the slot, a go-for-broke desperation shot that fighters throw when they can feel the bout slipping away from them, when the air is burning in their lungs and sticky in their teeth.

This one caught Zell on the point of his chin, flush, with the sodden thump of a meat axe into a chopping block. Zell swayed forward, his hands dropping, the red dimming in his eyes. Danny leaned into a left hook, pushed another right into the broken nose, another hook into what was left of Zell's eyebrow.

Zell tottered, eyes glassy. Tired, very tired, Danny slid his right foot back and braced it. His target was helpless. He threw the right with every ounce of his remaining strength.

I heard bones break in the hand with the whiplash impact upon Zell's jaw.

Zell fell toward Danny, hands pawing. They found Danny and clenched. The great arms fumbled around his waist. In blind instinct, Zell clung to him, holding himself up. The arms tightened. Danny gasped and tried to pull free. Zell squeezed, his gory face jammed tightly to Danny's.

Danny twisted away from a lifted knee. Zell's arms were a vise crushing breath from straining lungs. Danny lifted his left hand, searching across slippery flesh until he found an eye socket. His thumb hooked in. He dug and pried until Zell screamed through his broken mouth and staggered back.

Danny reeled after him, striking with slow, painful hooks with his left hand. The right dangled at his side. Another left hook and another-and I strained my throat, screaming to Danny that he was punching at empty air.

He wiped blood and sweat away from his eyes and saw Zell at his feet. The big man was on hands and knees, head wobbling, pushing at the sand, but not able to lift himself.

Danny's knees unhinged and he would have collapsed, but I was there to hold him, to prop him erect.

"Danny, Danny-" I cried.

He peered blindly at me, and stumbled along until I let him go. He lay on his back, chest heaving. I splashed water over him. His lungs were overworked bellows, straining, pumping air in and out. A swallow of water then, and his eyes cleared. He winced from the pain of his broken right hand.

"Zell?" he muttered.

"Down," I said. "Oh my darling, you're so hurt." Danny's eyes closed and his head sagged back. Somebody screamed.

The sound lanced through me, through Danny, strident in warning, breaking on a high note of terror.

Danny sat up. Across the sand, Kane Zell stood wavering like a tall tree in a high wind, and clutched in one hand was the carbine bayonet.

Michiko ran at him, stabbing with a spear, but Zell flung out a paw and piled her onto the sand. Danny pushed erect, staring in disbelief at the stubborn strength of the man. He used one weary arm to block Ella and I.

One of Zell's eyes was gone. I could see it hanging. But he was still deadly, still determined.

Zell's words were difficult to make out, mumbled through dripping lips: "Bastard-kill you-bastard-"

Behind him stood Eve Short, her face white, mingled hurt and fear in her eyes.

"Bastard-" Zell grunted and took a shambling step. "-rip your guts out-lay them other two-lay the nigger-lay the widow on your grave-"

"Kane!" Eve's voice was shrill. "Kane-you don't want them! You promised-just the two of us!"

Zell moved forward, the bayonet gleaming in his fist.

"Kane! You love me?"

"-lay 'em all," Zell muttered. "Lay 'em on a grave-"

Eve was swift, flashing across to the supplies piled beside the raft. She bent and came up with a whisky bottle full of water. A sweep of her arm broke the bottle against the logs and left her with a many-ton-gued bottle neck, its jagged shards brighter than Zell's bayonet.

"No more!" Eve screamed and ran at him. "You're mine! You won't take another one-I'll kill you first!"

She was on his blind side. He didn't see the jagged weapon she slammed into his face until it was too late. I saw his good eye swing to it then.

It was the last thing he ever saw.

Eve twisted the bottle neck. Its brittle edges cut Zell's other eye out as neatly as a surgeon's scalpel.

The noise Zell made was something none of us ever want to hear again. It struck to the soul, agonized and hopeless. Zell dropped the bayonet and kneeled, hands fumbling at one empty eye socket, at one pulped eye socket.

Eve stared down at him. Her fingers let go the bottle neck Her whimper matched his as she took the shaggy, mewling head in her arms.

I covered my eyes.

There was only one other sound on the entire beach. Michiko Kuwaye was laughing.