Sinister Island by Charles Wadsworth Camp (desktop ebook reader txt) 📕

Anderson found a beginning difficult. When at last he spoke his voice was low and there were uneven pauses between the words.

“I wanted to come right out and explain the situation,” he said. “Then, if you choose, you can pull out of here in the morning. Molly and I talked it over when your letter came. It seemed the only fair thing. But it means telling you in cold blood, and I swore to Molly I couldn’t do that. I said you’d call me a superstitious idiot or suspect me of sun stroke. In either case you’ll have to include Molly in your diagnosis, and you know how sensible she is.”

“Yes, and how sensible you’ve always been,” Miller said. “You don’t mean to say you’ve let this lonely hole get on your nerves?”

“I pray that’s what it is,” Anderson replied eagerly, “—just nerves. That’s why we want to use you—as a sort of test. The truth is we’re under the spell of this place, and things are happening—unnatural things—things that we can’t explain in any believable way.”

Miller tried to smile.

“Sounds as though you were haunted.”

“And that’s what it seems like. I didn’t want to say it myself. It isn’t pleasant to be laughed at even when the laugh is justified.”

For the second time that day Miller promised not to laugh at anything he might be told about Captain’s Island. He was conscious, indeed, of a sharp mental struggle before he had subordinated the impressions he had received himself coming through the Snake and into the inlet.

“I agree not to laugh,” he said, “but you must understand in the beginning that I can’t take any supernatural talk very seriously. I have no manner of belief in such rot.”

“After all, Jim,” Anderson answered, “that’s the way I want you to talk. It’s what we need—somebody with a powerful will like yours and a contempt for the uncanny to straighten us out and bring us back to commonsense.”

“Why the deuce have you stayed on if you’ve been so unhappy?” Miller asked.

“Because we can’t yield to a superstition we’ve never acknowledged. We can’t go back to the world, convinced of such madness. Molly is more determined than I. We’ve sworn for our peace of mind the rest of our lives to stay on until every hope of a natural solution is gone. You’re just about our last hope.”

“This isn’t like you,” Miller said. “Frankly, Andy, it’s folly.”

“Our only excuse for such folly,” Anderson answered warmly, “is that we’re not the only reasonable people to confess it. There’s Morgan who lives in the big house. You must have seen it when you came in. He’s more your own sort—absolutely balanced, with a strong will. You’ll like him, Jim. He’s been our only prop. But little by little I’ve seen his confidence dwindle, and his uncertainty and worry grow. Then there’s Bait, a federal judge in Martinsburg. He brought us down here in the first place.”

“That’s how you found it?”

“Yes. Bait was a friend of Molly’s father. When we were going through Martinsburg on our way to Cuba in January he made us stay over for a few days. He has a fast cruising launch. He knew I was an artist, and he thought I’d enjoy seeing this fascinating combination of jungle, water, and sand. It was a brilliant day, and we came down so fast the island seemed only a step—a charmingly isolated suburb of Martinsburg. Jim, the place seemed to grasp me physically, and to demand, since chance had brought me, that I stay and put on canvas its beauty and the mystery that tantalised even at noon. I felt I had found the inspiration for a new note, for the building of a real reputation. And everything favoured the scheme. The coquina house would do. The fact that we would have neighbours in the plantation house settled Molly. We were enthusiastic and happy about it. Then Bait tried to discourage us. He let us see that even he was subject to this—this folly as you call it.”

Miller whistled.

“A judge, eh! He ought to get enough that’s beyond the ken of man in his own courtroom. What did your judge say?”

“To begin with he told us the amazing history of the island and old Noyer, its original owner.”

“That at least has corroboration,” Miller said after Anderson had repeated the agent’s story.

“But,” Anderson continued, “he couldn’t define any real objections beyond the island’s isolation, its lack of convenient communication, and—of course—we take them so much for granted now—the snakes.”

“I’ve heard they’re the chief tenants,” Miller said. “They might have been a sound objection to your settling here.”

“But we hadn’t seen any that day, and we laughed, thinking the judge was trying to stop up some of his other arguments that wouldn’t hold water. And it’s true. Neither Molly nor I have seen a single snake, but they’re there somehow or other—always—in the background. It’s the feeling of the place—a feeling of long, slimy snakes, stealthily gliding in a circle from the shadows with unsheathed tongues. Lately we’ve feared they were growing daring—were getting ready to strike.”

He took out his handkerchief and passed it across his face.

“And these other arguments?” Miller asked. “The ones that the judge couldn’t define, that wouldn’t hold water?”

“Of course he couldn’t convince us with his talk of native and negro superstition while the sun glinted on the inlet and bathed the scene of his atrocious yams.”

“Atrocious, you say, yet you—”

“They must be,” Anderson said. “Sitting here, face to face with you, I can say it. They must be—Superstitions founded on Noyer’s revolting cruelty to his black merchandise, on his terrible fits of rage, on the Arab girl who was pampered and murdered in our house. Beyond question the island is avoided, and these stories, rather than the snakes, are responsible. The boy who brought your telegram from Sandport yesterday stumbled in at dusk, in tears. He refused to go back until daylight—lay awake half the night, crying out These beliefs made it necessary from the first for us to bring our own provisions from Sandport—to drive or walk the three miles to the river end of the island, signal for a boat, and row across.”

“Pleasant!” Miller said. “What do the servants think of it?”

“Servants! Haven’t had one in the house for two months, except Jake. Same way with Morgan. He’s managed to keep his man and a cook. That’s all.”

“Of course Jake would be faithful,” Miller said.

“Yes, he’s faithful, but with a painful struggle. Sometimes I feel I have no right to make him stay here, loathing and fearing the place as he does.”

“As you do, too, Andy,” Miller said softly. “Tell me what has made you doubt the judge’s yarns were atrocious. What kind of spooks am I to lay? What do you think you’ve seen?”

“We’ve seen nothing. If one only could see! It’s more subtle than that. It began the moment we moved down. We had found we couldn’t get a native servant near the place so we sent North for Mary and Ellen. You know how attached they were to Molly, how long she had had them.”

“Yes,” Miller replied, “but ignorant women—easily scared by stories.”

“They heard no stories,” Anderson said. “There was no chance. We met them at the station in Martinsburg and started immediately on Bait’s launch which he had loaned us. He had taken our impedimenta down before, so everything was ready for us. Mary and Ellen were enthusiastic when we sailed into the inlet. They had never been South before. They were excited by the experience, and completely satisfied. But when we entered the house its damp, chill air repelled us.”

“It would,” Miller said. “I’m told the entire island is a jungle. Such places don’t get the sun, and, remember, your house had stood in that jungle, uninhabited, for decades.”

“Yes,” Anderson agreed, “I ascribed a great deal to the climate at first, and maybe it’s that, but—after awhile one wonders.”

“First, then, the girls became frightened!”

“I don’t know—at first. We all fell silent We started fires in every room, but it seemed as though no amount of warmth could cut that charnel house atmosphere. And the day went so quickly! Black night had trapped us before we had time to realise it. I looked at Molly.

“‘If the judge could peep in on us now,’ I said, ‘the laughing wouldn’t be all on one side.’

“So we smiled at each other and were more cheerful after that until dinner time. Then Mary, without warning, burst into tears.”

“Homesick in a strange house,” Miller suggested.

“We couldn’t find out what