The Valley of the Flame

CHAPTER II. DRUMBEAT OF DEATH

LUIZ WAS staring at Raft in surprise.

'S'nhor?' Luiz said.

'What?' Raft answered.

'Did you speak?'

'No.' Raft let the lens fall back on da Fonseca's bare chest.

Merriday was at his side. 'The other man won't let me look at him,' he said worriedly. 'He's stubborn.'

'I'll talk to him,' Raft said. He went out, trying not to think about that lens, that lovely, impossible face. Subjective, of course, not objective. Hallucination—or self-hypnosis, with the light reflecting in the mirror as a focal point. But he didn't believe that really.

The bearded man was in Raft's office, examining a row of bottles on a shelf—fetal specimens. He turned and bowed, a faint mockery in his eyes. Raft was impressed; this was no ordinary backwoods wanderer. There was a courtliness about him, and a smooth-knit, muscular grace that gave the impression of fine breeding in both manners and lineage. He had also an air of hardly concealed excitement and a certain hauteur in his poise which Raft did not like.

'Saludades, s'nhor,' he said, his too-bright eyes dazzling in the light. Fever, perhaps, behind that brilliant stare. His voice was deep, and he spoke with an odd, plaintive undertone that held a distant familiarity. 'I am in your debt.'

His Portuguese was faulty, but one didn't notice that. Raft had a feeling of gaucherie, entirely new to him.

'You can pay it right now,' he said brusquely. 'We don't want the station contaminated, and you may have caught something up-river. Take off your shirt and let's have a look at you.'

'I am not ill, doutor.'

'You recover fast, then. You were ready to pass out when you came into the hospital.'

The black eyes flashed wickedly. Then the man shrugged and slipped out of the ragged shirt. Raft was a little startled at the smooth power in his sleek body, the muscles rippling under a skin like brown satin, but rippling very smoothly, so that until he moved you hardly realized they were there.

'I am Paulo da Costa Pereira,' said the man. He seemed faintly amused. 'I am a garimpeiro.'

'A diamond-hunter, eh?' Raft slipped a thermometer between Pereira's lips. 'Didn't know they had diamonds around here. I should think you'd be in the Rio Francisco country.'

There was no response. Raft used his stethoscope, shook his head and tried again. He checked his findings by Pereira's pulse, but that didn't help much. The man's heart wasn't beating, nor did he apparently have a pulse.

'What the devil!' Raft said, staring. He took out the thermometer and licked dry lips. Da Fonseca's temperature had been below normal but Pereira's was so far above normal that the mercury pushed the glass above 108В°, the highest the glass tube could register.

Pereira was wiping his mouth delicately. 'I am hungry, s'nhor' he said. 'Could you give me some food?'

'I'll give you a glucose injection,' Raft said, hesitating a little. 'Or—I'm not sure. Your metabolism's haywire. At the rate you're burning up body-fuel, you'll be ill.'

'I have always been this way. I am healthy enough.'

'Not if your heart isn't beating,' Raft said grimly. 'I suppose you know that you're—you're impossible? I mean, by rights you shouldn't be alive.'

Pereira smiled.

'Perhaps you don't hear my heartbeat. I assure you that it's beating.'

'If it's that faint, it can't be pumping any blood down your aorta,' Raft said. 'Something's plenty wrong with you. Lie down on that couch. We'll need ice-packs to bring your temperature down.'

Pereira shrugged and obeyed. 'I am hungry.'

'We'll take care of that. I'll need some of your blood, too.'

'No.'

Raft swore, his temper and nerves flaring, 'You're sick. Or don't you know it?'

'Very well,' Pereira murmured. 'But be quick. I dislike being—handled.'

With an effort, Raft restrained an angry retort. He drew the necessary blood into a test-tube and capped it.

'Dan!' he called. There was no answer.

Where the devil was Craddock?

He summoned Luiz and handed him the test-tube. 'Give this to Doutor Craddock. I want a stat C.B.C.' He turned back to Pereira. 'What's the matter with you? Lie back.'

But the diamond-hunter was sitting up, his face alive and alight with a wild, excited elation. The jet eyes were enormous. For a second Raft watched that stare. Then the glow went out of Pereira's eyes and he lay back, smiling to himself.

Raft busied himself with ice-bags. 'What happened up-river?'

'I don't know,' Pereira said, still smiling. 'Da Fonseca blundered into my camp one night. I suppose his plane crashed. He couldn't talk much.'

'Were you alone?'

'Yes, I was alone.'

That was odd, but Raft let it pass. He had other things on his mind—the insane impossibility of a living man whose heart did not beat. Ice-cubes clinked.

'You a Brazilian? You don't talk the lingo too well.'

The feverishly brilliant eyes narrowed.

'I have been in the jungle a long time,' the man said. 'Speaking other tongues. When you do not use a language, you lose it.' He nodded toward the bottles on the wall. 'Yours, doctor?'

'Yes. Fetal specimens. Embryonic studies. Interested?'

'I know too little to be interested. The jungle is my—my province. Though the sources of life—'

He paused.

Raft waited, but he did not go on. The strange eyes closed.

Raft found that his fingers were shaking as he screwed the tops on the ice-bags.

'That thing da Fonseca wears around his neck,' he said, quite softly. 'What is it?'

'I had not noticed,' Pereira murmured. 'I have had a difficult day. If I might rest, it would be nice.'

Raft grimaced. He stared down at that cryptic, inhuman figure, remembering the odd malformation of the clavicle he had felt during his examination, remembering other things. Some impulse made him say, 'One last question. What's your race? Your ancestors weren't Portuguese?'

Pereira opened his eyes and showed his teeth in an impatient smile that was near to a snarl.

'Ancestors!' he said irritably. 'Forget my ancestors for tonight, doutor. I have come a long way through the jungle, if you must know it. A long, long way, past many interesting sights. Wild beasts, and ruins, and wild men, and the drums were beating all the way.' His voice lowered. 'I passed your ancestors chattering and scratching themselves in the trees,' he said in a purring murmur. 'And I passed my ancestors, too.' The voice trailed off in an indescribably complacent sound. After a moment of deep silence, he said, 'I would like to sleep. May I be alone?'

Raft set his teeth. Delirium, of course. That accounted for the senseless rambling. But that imperious dismissal was intrinsic in the man himself. Now he gathered his rags about him as if they had been ermine. He seemed to fall asleep almost instantly. From his recumbent form there breathed out a tremendous vitality that set Raft's nerves jangling.

He turned away. A heartbeat so faint that it was imperceptible? Ridiculous. Some new disease, more likely, though its symptoms were contradictory. Pereira seemed in perfect health, and yet he obviously couldn't be.