Only then, despite her own burning thirst, did she think of herself. She turned to Gabriel, but he anticipated her question. "You drink now, mistress,'* he instructed. "Eat, too. No chance again to eat."
"I'd rather not eat now," Janine protested. "I'm not the least bit hungry, and "
"You eat!" The Negro's voice was rough and stem. "Maybe you no hear Gabriel tell you what he tell you, mistress. Very long night still come, and this last chance to eat. Bad enough to carry one sick. Gabriel plenty much strong, but have only two arms, mistress. If you sick, have to leave you in swamp. Gabriel can't carry more than one sick."
Considerably chastened, Janine removed a slab of bread and a chunk of jerked beef from the pouch and began to eat. She had never before tasted meat that had been cured in so crude a manner and she found it tough and salty. But she was surprised, after the first swallow or two, to discover that she was ravenously hungry and she immediately forgot her fastidiousness and began to eat with a will. She looked up to find Gabriel grinning at her.
"Much walk make for empty inside," he said companion-ably. He had finished his own meal in an amazingly short span of time.
*That's true," Janine agreed. "I thought I couldn't walk another step, and I'm beginning to be refreshed already." She wondered what her companions at Mistress Ormsby-Blake's Seminary for Young Ladies would think of her if they saw her now. She was somewhere in the steaming hinterlands of a tropical jungle, her arms and legs smarting from thorn scratches, her lap heavy with the head of a very sick fugitive from the representatives of the Crown. And her dinner companion was a half-savage Negro giant!
She started to laugh quietly, but the sound became a scream of terror as something dark and vile smelling swooped down out of nowhere, brushed against her face, and became enmeshed in her long hair. She ducked her head and tried to cover her face with her hands, but at that instant the creature broke loose. Shuddering, she touched her cheek and removed a small quantity of what appeared to be a downlike fuzz.
Gabriel regarded her with compassion. "That just a little rat-bat, mistress," he said. "Bats no hurt you. But," he added more forcefully, "soldiers on night patrol hurt plenty much if they hear scream and catch. Next time let rat-bat make nest in hair, but no scream again!"
Janine nodded but knew that she would not be able to control herself if another bat touched her. Jeremy moaned under his breath, and she poured more of her precious water supply onto the handkerchief. The high color had drained from his face, and in the dim light he looked deathly pale. Some of the bloat had disappeared from his cheeks, and she was astonished that a man who had been in such robust health only a few days before could be so emaciated. It would truly be a miracle, she felt, if he survived the night.
As she watched, his eyelids fluttered, he stirred slightly, and his lips parted. A faint sound came from the back of his throat, and Janine bent her head closer, thinking that he was trying to speak. But Gabriel was on his feet in an instant, and before the girl quite realized what he was doing he took hold of the hair on the top of her head and jerked her head upright.
To her astonishment, Gabriel's expression was mild, his eyes grave but serene. "Mistress not come too close to face of sick one," he announced imperturbably in his deep bass. "When Mistress put face too near, spirit of Yellow Death leave sick man and enter body of Mistress."
"But he was trying to say something, Gabriel." Janine was very much disturbed. "I think he was trying to tell me something, and "
"Sick man not know what say. Evil spirits have hold of inside of head of sick man. If someone try to speak, not sick man who talk, only evil spirit. Much more better you not listen."
Believing neither in spirits nor in the power of the Yellow Death to communicate itself from one individual to another, Janine wanted to protest. But she was suddenly afraid for her own safety if she offended the superstitious credo of this semi-barbarian. Her heart pounded violently, and she was unable to reply, so she again devoted herself to ministering to Jeremy, taking good care, however, not to allow her face to approach too close to his.
Somewhere in the deep weeds nearby a cricket began to chirp, and within a few moments a score of his fellows took up his song. Their noise was harsh, but the girl felt strangely soothed; the familiar buzzing, reminding her of happy, snug nights she had known in France and England, was comforting.
The shrill double cry of a parakeet sounded in the distance. Gabriel sucked in his breath and grinned to himself, and Janine watched him as he walked to the far end of the rock, cupped his hands over his mouth, and repeated the call. His action was so unexpected that it took the girl an instant to realize that someone had signaled to him and he was replying. He said nothing to her but peered out across the water, waiting.
A few moments later a long canoe floating close to the shore line glided up to the rock, and she saw Michael sitting in the stem, guiding the craft dexterously and silently with i double-ended paddle. Gabriel chuckled, but his friend in the boat was wooden-faced. "No soldiers near," he said tersely. *'Boat where we left her. Nobody find. Get in now."
The craft was easy to handle despite her heavy load and responded instantly to Michael's bidding. Janine's foot touched something hard, something that rattled against the hull, and she unthinkingly reached out a hand, then drew it back when she saw a long, two-edged cutlass.
The air was cool but caressing, and on the open water it was almost chilly. There was a different perspective of both the island mainland and the Port Royal peninsula from here, and Jamaica seemed to fill the world. There was something brooding, almost sinister, about the thick foliage that rose along the shore line on every side in a black, seemingly impenetrable mass. And directly ahead, behind the gently rising plateau known as the Liguanea Plain, stood the Blue Mountains, Jamaica's towering, unexplored guardians. As always, a few clouds drifted above the visible crests, and behind this screen, unseen and silent, stood the tallest of the peaks, rising seven thousand feet and more toward the sky.
Then, without warning, Jeremy Stone moaned, and the spell of the tropics was broken. Janine came back to the realities of the present.
The shore opposite the Palisadoes was directly ahead now, and the girl thought the canoe would be beached in a few moments. But Michael changed directions suddenly, swinging the craft parallel with the approaching shore and proceeding west at a reduced speed. She could feel the tension of the men behind her, and she became nervous too. For another ten minutes or more not a word was spoken, then Gabriel chuckled, and when he spoke Janine could tell that even this phlegmatic man was relieved.
"Back there old Spanish fort," he said. "Sometimes English King have soldiers in stone house, sometimes not. We stay away and not find out." He leaned forward, tapped Janine on the shoulder, over the prostrate body of Jeremy, and pointed a thick index finger toward the shore. "Over there village," he announced contemptuously. "Poor-fool fishing people live there. Call damn-fool place Kingston. Nobody but crazy fishing man ever live there. No place for town, never have town there."
Janine looked inland and saw nothing but the inevitable thick, tall trees and high weeds. If there was indeed a fishing village back of the shore, the inhabitants kept their dwelling places well concealed. She squinted hard as the canoe swept on, but still saw no sign of habitation. Michael was hugging the shore closely now, and the boat was moving so slowly it seemed to be drifting.