PULAU MATI (12 page)

Gray
, Anna, Paolo and Keegan moved to where they could see the dock and the clearing but remain hidden in the foliage.  They squat and waited in silence.  The ship had turned around its anchor with the bow now to the south.  The motorboat reached the dock about the time Lex and Melanie reached the clearing.

Keegan said
to Gray in a low but angry voice, “Yer should’ve stopped her man.”

Paolo gave the young Irishman an angry glance. 
Gray had no rational response to Keegan’s statement.  He was regretting not stopping them.

Gray
counted nine men that climbed onto the dock from the boat.  Their voices carried but the distance made it unintelligible even if he had known the language.  Suddenly one of them yelled and all nine heads turned toward Lex and Melanie.  The two were still hand in hand and more than half way to the dock.  The men were chattering until someone barked an order and they went quiet.  Two of the nine came forward and the rest gradually advanced behind them.  They all wore vests or T-shirts, and shorts or abbreviated pants.  Most carried rifles and many had holstered pistols or pistols stuffed under their belts.  Some wore ball caps or painters’ style hats, some wore do-rags and all were wiry with sun darkened skin and coal black hair.

The man who appeared to be the leader wore camo shorts, a vest, no shirt and his thick black hair tied into a pony tail.  The man beside him wore a bright orange Hawaiian shirt and khaki shorts.

Lex and Melanie had reached the two men and Lex was saying something and holding out his hand like an offer to shake.  The four stood talking but the words were unintelligible up the trail even with the breeze carrying the sound.  The other seven men slowly surrounded Lex and Melanie.  Melanie was making hand gestures and speaking rapidly.  Lex said something to her and she stopped talking.  The apparent leader pulled a pistol from his holster, raised it to Lex’s face and fired point blank.  Lex’s head jerked back.  Melanie screamed and Anna stifled a scream.  Keegan groaned.  Lex’s legs wobbled and he crumbled to the ground.

“Oh, meine Gott!” Anna cried.
  Paolo made a coughing sound like he had been punched in the stomach.  He looked truly appalled.

Melanie dropped
to her knees beside Lex but one of the men grabbed the back of her shorts and jerked her back to her feet.  Others held her while they tore off her clothes.  She kicked and screamed until one of the men swung a rifle butt into her stomach.  She doubled over and they held her that way with a man on each arm twisting it upward so she had to either keep on her feet or dislocate her shoulders.  The men were laughing and hollering.  The leader dropped his shorts and entered her from behind.  Melanie was making gasping screams as if unable to catch her breath.  The leader had thrust into her for no more than 15 seconds when he roared and stopped.  He pulled out and the man in the Hawaiian shirt took his place.  Melanie’s screams were like those of a trapped animal raging to be freed.

Anna was gripping Gray’s arm so tightly the veins
of her hands were showing.  Her body jerked from the held back sobs.

“
We’ve got to get out of here,” Gray whispered.  He rose and took Anna’s hand and led her out to the trail.  As they ran up the trail he kept glancing behind to make sure they did not come into line of sight of the clearing.  Keegan and Paolo followed in silence.  Before they reached the saddle, Gray led them into the jungle and they crossed the saddle hidden from the clearing.  They went back onto the trail and jogged to the shelter with Anna stumbling and sobbing much of the way.  Shinobu and Dayah were sitting outside the shelter, their heads bowed in despair.  Shinobu raised his head as they approached and he had a horrified expression on his face.  Tears had run from his eyes and he tried to speak but could not for the emotion.  Gray thought it was only because of what he had witnessed from the lookout but the old man pointed behind him to Lleyton.  When Gray moved closer, the young man’s eyes were staring lifelessly at the roof of the shelter.

Anna sank to her knees
wailing.  Gray knelt by the old man.  “Did you see what happened in the clearing?”

Shinobu nodded.

“You told Dayah?”

“Yes.”

“Will you help me kill those men?”

The old man gazed at Gray without blinking.  “Of course
,” he growled.

Anna, still on her knees turned to the two men.  “And I.”

His fists clenched, Keegan glared at Gray.  “Yer should’ve stopped her man!”

Gray was stunned not only by the young man’s
words but also by his venomous tone.  “How?  Physically?  You think I should have stopped her with physical force?”

“Aye
!  Yer should’ve!”

“I guess in hindsight I wish I had
done that.  I’d rather suffer her wrath than losing her and Lex.  Why didn’t you stop her?”

“W
ould yer have allowed it?”

Gray bowed his head and ran
a hand through his hair.  “Honestly, Keegan, I don’t know.  I wish one of us had tried.”

“Y
er were our leader,” the young man said, softening his tone and sounding like he was on the verge of crying.

Shinobu stood and faced the young man.  “It is easy
to criticize with hindsight.  I saw how she did not believe Gray about the pirates.  If you or Gray had tried to stop her she would have kicked and screamed and given you all away and you would not be here arguing about it.  Do not forget, Lex was the only one who might have persuaded her but he has paid too dearly for his mistake.”

Keegan bowed his head without retorting.  Anna asked him, “Will you help us?”

He sighed heavily.  “Of course I will.”

Anna turned to Dayah
but before she could ask, the young Malay said, “I too, but what I do?”  She looked very distressed.

All eyes turned to Paolo.  He sensed it and sighed.  “What the woman did she did to herself against argument and pleading from four other people.  And the man who followed her down there was just as heedless and stupid.”

Keegan bristled and looked on the edge of attacking Paolo.  “Their names were Melanie and Lex!” he growled.

Paolo did not blink.  “Gray, do you truly think you can kill those men?”

“Yes.”

“Then I will join you.  Not necessarily for revenge but they threaten our safety and our ability to leave this island.  That and they are the lowest vermin on earth.
”

Keegan said, “
I agree with the last part.”

Gray asked everyone to come close. 
“I know Melanie will make an effort to keep our existence from them but they may torture her unmercifully.  We need to get away from here because this is the first place they will look if they find out about us or even suspect there being others on the island.”

Everyone agreed to that and Gray said,
“Anna, Dayah, put on your slacks; we may be running through the jungle.”

Both
rose without hesitation and went into the shelter and dug out their slacks.

Gray went through the supplies and tools they had accumulated at the shelter.  He poked a hole into the pocket liner of his trousers and pushed
the old revolver into the pocket, making a secure holster.  He laid out three long knives for Paolo, Anna and Dayah, and the small shovel for Keegan. He handed the machete to Shinobu and asked him and Dayah to gather all the food items into two of the cloth bags and Anna and Keegan to gather the bottles of water into two bags.  There were seven Claymore mines they had not taken to the cave.  He set aside two to carry himself, and one each for Keegan, Paolo, Shinobu, Dayah and Anna.  He added four of the small airline blankets to each pile.  Shinobu had the binoculars hanging from his neck on a strap he had added to them.  The signal mirror was in his pocket.

“We need to get the
rest of the mines to a dry hiding place,” Gray said.  “They may be our best weapon right now but I plan to get some of the rifles from those men.  Have any of you shot firearms?”

“I served five years in the
navy and learned rifle marksmanship when I was young,” Shinobu said.  “I have not fired a weapon since.”

“
I fired a pistol once that uh mucker had.”

Paolo said, “I shoot skeet often enough.  Not much with rifles and pistols.”

Dayah said, “Never.”

Anna shook her head.  “I have a good eye
for targets.  You can teach me.”

“You do have a good eye.  You
will all do fine.  Can any of you throw… like a spear?”

“We used to fish
for carp with a spear,” the old man laughed.

Gray laughed. 
“Someday I would like to hear your life’s story, Shinobu.  When we get out of here I hope you will invite me to your home, or come to mine.”

Anna and Shinobu both caught the optimism in Gray’s last sentence.  They stared at him and Anna asked, “Gray,
I know you answered yes when Paolo asked if we could kill those men.  But please don’t give us false hope.  Do you truly believe we will get out of here?”

Dayah and Keegan stepped closer to the other
s.  Dayah looked like she was about to ask the same question when Gray said, “Of course I do.  We have the advantage that every rebel in history has had; they have to come after us.  We choose where we will engage.  And I plan for us to make every use of that advantage.”

Shinobu was grinning broadly.  “When we get out of here, I will be honored for all of you
to visit me.”  He glanced very pointedly at Anna.

“That could happen,” Gray said and
also glanced at Anna.

They dragged Lleyton’s body to the north of the shelter and left it well hidden in the brush.  They feared they had not the time to bury him.  After a short discussion of whether they should move Malik, they left him in the shelter with some bottles of water and some blankets on the small chance he awoke.

“Have we forgotten anything
?” Gray asked and got four head shakes.

Paolo’s was not among them.
  “You said Melanie will try not to give away our presence but if the pirates come to this beach they will see a lot of debris from the wreck.  The shelter is not easily seen from the beach but they will see all those seat cushions and litter.”

“Thank you, Paolo,” Gray said, smiling.  “We can make a sweep of the beach and hide everything south of the shelter where the jungle is the thickest.”

They took the bags and went south on the beach to nearly the notch and then walked back picking up every piece of litter from the wreck.  When they had hidden it well they went back to the shelter and picked up their burdens.

“Okay,” Gray said.  “W
e will start up the slope and if it is too much we will leave some and come back.”

It took them 2
0 minutes to reach the tree line that ran most of the way around the peak, almost twice as long as it would have taken Gray unencumbered but they did not have to make a second trip.  They stayed low and followed the tree line around the peak to the cave where they stored the food, water and the mines they had carried. Gray went back along the tree line and removed the detonators from the mines he had set up for a signal.  Anna climbed the peak from the north side, and staying low, pulled up the wires and brought them down with the triggers, or clackers as Gray called them.

In the cave Gray
went over their options.  One was to find a place where only one or two of the men ventured and ambush and shoot them with the revolver.  Attacking any more than two of the men with only the revolver made the chance of success prohibitively small.  He believed the trail was not entirely grown over because the men used it to get to the west side of the island although he had no idea why they came to this side.

T
he trail was a good place for ambush and if they used a Claymore chances of success were very good.  The mines could be set up to detonate by trip wire or manually with the clacker as he had shown them on the peak. He told them the mines are directional in that they cover a fan shaped area in front of the mine of about 60 degrees and are very lethal out to 50 yards, shooting a cloud of pea sized steel balls at high powered rifle velocities. Ideally though would be to kill one or two of the men silently to get their weapons.  They would then have uncertainty on their side.

Gray
had some ideas about how to instill fear into the pirates but it meant using tactics not for the squeamish. That statement brought curious looks from all five but he said he had not yet decided whether to use those tactics.  He instructed them to avoid talking aloud, especially when away from the cave.  He explained that voices could carry in the jungle farther than one could see.  And they must never walk in the open again.  Stop often and be very still and listen.

Gray said, “We do not have time to drill or learn a lot of hand signals but when we move through the jungle as a group we need to concentrate on a few things.  We will walk single file and keep about twenty feet between us. 
Do not talk.  Make as little noise as possible.  If what you are carrying rattles or squeaks, adjust it.  Step carefully and set your heel down first and roll your foot forward.  Keep your eyes moving, watch the ground and the person ahead of you.  A simple hand raised means stop.  If the person in front squats, you squat and do not speak or move otherwise.  A come on gesture means to join up close so we can talk, but always remain quiet.  If you see something important that you do not think the leader sees, give the little whistle that the orange bird we have been seeing makes.  Then raise your hand to stop anyone behind you and squat.”