"He's flippedl" Tex shouted. "Clobber him, someone!"
"Get some rope!" Peter Marlowe yelled frantically as he held on to Max, his forearm jammed under Max's chin, away from the grinding teeth.
Dino shifted his grip, worked one arm free, and smashed Max on the jaw, knocking him unconscious. "Jesus," he said to Peter Marlowe as they stood up. "He goddam near murdered you!"
"Quick," Peter Marlowe said urgently. "Put something between his teeth, hell bite his bloody tongue off."
Dino found a piece of wood and they tied it between Max's teeth. Then they tied his hands.
When Max was secure, Peter Marlowe relaxed, weak with relief. "Thanks, Tex. If you hadn't stopped that knife, I would have had it."
"Think nothing of it. Reflex action. What we going to do about him?"
"Get a doctor. He just had a fit, that's all. There wasn't any knife." Peter Marlowe rubbed the score on his stomach as he watched Max jerking spastically. "Poor bugger!"
"Thank God you stopped him, Tex," Dino said. "Gives me a sweat to think about it."
Peter Marlowe looked at the King's corner. It seemed very lonely.
Unconsciously he flexed his hand and arm and gloried in its strength.
"How is it, Peter?" Tex asked.
It took Peter Marlowe a long time to find the right words. "Alive, Tex, alive
— not dead." Then he turned and walked out of the hut into the sun.
When he found the King eventually, it was already dusk. The King was sitting on a broken coconut stump in the north vegetable garden, half hidden by vines. He was staring moodily out of the camp and made no sign that he heard Peter Marlowe approaching.
"Hello, old chap," Peter Marlowe said cheerfully, but the welcome in him died when he saw the King's eyes. "What do you want? Sir?" the King asked insultingly.
"I wanted to see you. Just wanted to see you." Oh my God, he thought with pity, as he saw through his friend.
"Well, you've seen me. So now what?" The King turned his back. "Get lost!"
"I'm your friend, remember?"
"I got no friends. Get lost!"
Peter Marlowe squatted down beside the coconut stump and found the two tailor-made cigarettes in his pocket. "Have a smoke. I got them off Shagata!"
"Smoke 'em yourself. Sir!"
For a moment Peter Marlowe wished that he had not found the King. But he did not leave. He carefully lit the two cigarettes and offered one to the King. The King made no move to take it. "Go on, please."
The King smashed the cigarette out of his hands. "Screw you and your goddam cigarette. You want to stay here? All right!" He got up and began to stride away.
Peter Marlowe caught his arm. "Wait! This is the greatest day in our lives.
Don't spoil it because your cellmates got a little thoughtless."
"You take your hand away," the King said through his teeth, "or I'll stomp it off!"
"Don't worry about them," Peter Marlowe said, the words beginning to pour out of him. "The war's over, that's the important thing. It's over and we've survived. Remember what you used to drum into me? About looking after number one? Well, you're all right! You've made it! What does it matter what they say?"
"I don't give a good goddam about them! They've got nothing to do with it.
And I don't give a good goddam about you!" The King ripped his arm away.
Peter Marlowe stared at the King helplessly. "I'm your friend, dammit. Let me help you!"
"I don't need your help!"
"I know. But I'd like to stay friends. Look," he continued with difficulty.
"You'll be home soon —"
"The hell I will,'* the King said, his blood roaring in his ears. "I got no home!"
The wind rustled the leaves. Crickets grated monotonously. Mosquitoes swarmed around them. Hut lights began to cast harsh shadows and the moon sailed in a velvet sky. "Don't worry, old chum," Peter Marlowe said compassionately. "Everything's going to be all right." He did not flinch from the fear he saw in the King's eyes.
"Is it?" the King said in torment.
"Yes." Peter Marlowe hesitated. "You're sorry it's over, aren't you?"
"Leave me alone. Goddammit, leave me alone!" the King shouted and turned away and sat on the coconut stump.
"You'll be all right," Peter Marlowe said. "And I'm your friend. Never forget it." He reached out with his left hand and touched the King's shoulder, and he felt the shoulder jerk away under his touch.
"Night, old chum," he said quietly. "See you tomorrow." And miserably he walked away. Tomorrow, he promised himself, tomorrow I'll be able to help him.
The King shifted on the coconut stump, glad to be alone, terrified by his loneliness.
Colonels Smedly-Taylor and Jones and Sellars were cleaning their plates.
"Magnificent!" Sellars said, licking the juice off his fingers.
Smedly-Taylor sucked the bone, though it was already quite clean.
"Jones, my boy. I have to hand it to you." He belched. "What a superb way to end the day. Delicious! Just like rabbit! A little stringy and somewhat tough, but delicious!"
"Haven't enjoyed a meal so much in years," Sellars chortled. "The meat's a little greasy, but by Jove, just marvelous." He glanced at Jones. "Can you get any more? One leg each isn't very much!"
"Perhaps." Jones picked up the last grain of rice delicately. His plate was dry and empty and he was feeling very full. "It was a bit of luck, wasn't it?"
"Where did you get them?"
"Blakely told me about them. An Aussie was selling them." Jones belched.
"I bought all he had." He glanced at Smedly-Taylor. "Lucky you had the money."
Smedly-Taylor grunted. "Yes." He opened a wallet and tossed three hundred and sixty dollars on the table. "There's enough for another six. No need to stint ourselves, eh, gentlemen?"
Sellars looked at the notes. "If you had all this money hidden away, why didn't you use a little months .ago?"
"Why indeed?" Smedly-Taylor got up and stretched. "Because I was saving it for today! And that's the end of it," he added. His granite eyes locked on Sellars.
"Oh, come off it, man, I don't want you to say anything. I just can't understand how you managed to do it, that's all."
Jones smiled. "Must have been an inside job. I hear the King nearly had a heart attack!"
"What's the King got to do with my money?" Smedly-Taylor asked.
"Nothing." Jones began counting the money. There were, indeed, three hundred and sixty dollars, enough for twelve Rusa tikus haunches at thirty dollars each, which was their real price, not sixty dollars as Smedly-Taylor believed. Jones smiled to himself thinking that Smedly-Taylor could well afford to pay double, now that he had so much money. He wondered how Smedly-Taylor had managed to effect the theft, but he knew Smedly-Taylor was right to keep a tight rein on his secrets. Like the other three Rusa tikus. The ones that he and Blakely had cooked and eaten in secret this afternoon. Blakely had eaten one, he had eaten the other two. And the two added to the one he had just devoured was the reason that he was satiated. "My God," he said, rubbing his stomach, "don't think I could eat as much every day!"