Island

My Visitor

With Connie out of commission and Thelma as our prisoner, the watch duty last night was being divided among me, Billie and Kimberly. Last night, they gave me first watch.

I stayed by the fire. After everyone else went to bed, I had nothing to do except sit there, sometimes toss in some driftwood, and keep watch.

I sat with my back to the inlet. That way, nobody would be able to come out of the jungle and sneak up on the gals without me spotting him.

I kept wondering if Wesley was really dead.

He had sure done a number on Thelma, no question about that. An awfully good reason to kill a guy, even if you weren’t especially bothered by the fact that he had murdered your own father.

I sure hoped she’d done it. If Wesley was dead, I could stop trying to spot him sneaking through the dark toward where the gals were asleep. I could stop glancing over my shoulder every few minutes to make sure he wasn’t creeping toward my back.

I kept wishing we’d gone ahead and checked on the body, right after Thelma came in and told us about it.

Then we’d know by now, one way or the other.

On the other hand, some of us might be dead right now.

Especially me.

I’d always figured I was next on the list. It stood to reason, considering that Wesley had killed off both the other males almost as soon as we got to the island. But now we’d had it confirmed by Thelma. Over at the falls, Wesley had given her orders to nail me with that rock.

Sitting there by the fire, though, I wasn’t especially worried about myself. The danger to me didn’t seem as important as my duty to watch over and protect the women. I felt very protective of them.

While they were asleep and I was on guard, they were my flock.

I occupied my mind, now and then, with some gallant fantasies about rushing to their rescue. With other fantasies about them, too. I won’t get into that stuff.

Anyway, about an hour into my watch, Thelma came over.

When I first saw her getting up, I thought she might be making an escape attempt. Instead of running for the jungle, though, she stepped cautiously away from the sleeping area, and walked toward me. The leftover rope hung between her legs and dragged behind her.

None of the others stirred. Which convinced me that they were asleep. Kimberly would’ve raised holy hell if she’d seen Thelma up and around. The same goes for Billie and Connie.

Looking back on it, that’s what I should’ve done—raised holy hell.

It’s what I almost did.

My first inclination, when I realized none of the others would be putting a quick end to the situation, was to shout for Thelma to halt.

A shout would bring the whole gang running. (Except maybe Connie.)

But I kept quiet.

No need to wake everybody up. I can handle this on my own.

That’s what I told myself.

It wasn’t the whole reason I didn’t shout, though. There was also the fact that I was curious. What did Thelma have in mind? Why was she coming to me? I wanted to find out.

As she walked closer, I grabbed the ax, stood up, and stepped around the fire so it wouldn’t be in the way if I needed to get at her. I held the ax in both hands, at waist level, to let her see that I meant business but didn’t have any immediate plan to chop her.

Neither of us said anything until she was just a few paces away. Then she stopped and said, “I couldn’t sleep. I mean, I was asleep, but I woke up a while ago and… I couldn’t get comfortable.” She raised her bound hands. “I don’t guess you’ll untie me?”

“No, I can’t.”

She shrugged and winced a bit. “I didn’t think so. No harm in asking, though. You oughta try to sleep with your hands tied together like this.”

“Did you try sleeping on your back?” I asked.

“On my back? Have you seen my back? No, I guess you haven’t.”

I didn’t correct her.

“Wesley whipped me. My back is so sore and tender… everything is. He really hurt me, Rupert. He hurt me everywhere. There is no comfortable position to lie in. It’s a wonder I was able to fall asleep at all.”

“I’m sorry about that,” I said.

“It’s not your fault. I’m the one that was fool enough to marry him.”

I said, “Well…”

“Anyway, that’s all over and done with, now. The thing is, would you mind a whole lot if I just stayed here for a little while? I won’t cause any trouble, I promise. I just can’t go back there and lie down. All I do is toss and turn… it’s just so miserable. Can I stay with you? Please?”

A. She had to be in a lot of physical discomfort. She wasn’t lying about that.

B. What could she do to me? Her hands were tied and I had the ax.

C. I could always shout if she tried to pull a stunt.

D. I was still curious. Did she have some sort of secret reason for coming over? Did she have a trick up her sleeve? Just exactly what would happen if I let her stay? Maybe something interesting, or even exciting.

Not to mention that I really wanted to ask her about a few things.

“Okay,” I said. “You can stay, but just for a while.”

“Thanks, Rupert.” She sounded sincere. “You’re sure a life-saver.”

“One condition, though,” I told her.

Some of her friendliness suddenly evaporated. “What’s that?”

“You have to answer me, no matter what I ask you.”

She blew out some air. “Oh, forget it. I thought you were different from them. You’re just like them, aren’t you? For once, I thought somebody was being nice to me around here.”

“All I want to do is find out a few things. What’s the big deal?”

She took a deep breath and used it to form a long, annoyed sigh. “Everybody wants to give me the third degree.”

“Maybe you’d better just go back to bed,” I said.

“No, no, no. I’ll talk. Whatever you want. Lord knows, why should you be any different from the bitches? What do you want to know?”

“Let’s sit down,” I said.

I went back to my place at the other side of the fire, sat down, crossed my legs and rested the ax across my thighs. I told Thelma where to sit: in front of me but over to my left, facing the fire. That way, we didn’t have the fire between us. Also, it would be easy to give her a nudge with the head of the ax, if she caused trouble.

“For starters,” I said, “did Wesley tell you why he did all this?”

“Did what?”

“Blew up the boat, marooned us here, killed…”

“He didn’t blow up the boat. I asked him all about that. What happened is, he smelled gas and jumped overboard just in the nick of time. He was almost killed. He no sooner got off the boat than it blew sky-high.”

“That’s what he told you?”

“Yes.”

“And you believed him?”

“Why shouldn’t I?”

I could only think of about a million reasons. “If that’s what happened,” I said, “then how come he didn’t swim in to the beach? We were all there. He knew we were there. He obviously wanted us to think he’d been blown up.”

“Well, that was the whole idea.”

“What? What are you talking about?”

“He had to disappear. He was afraid he’d get all the blame for the explosion. Which is just what happened. You heard my dad. It was all Wesley’s fault.”

“And that’s why Wesley pulled his vanishing act?”

“Sure. Lord only knows what you all would’ve done to him.”

“Yeah, Lord only knows—somebody might’ve called him an idiot.”

“You don’t know anything.”

“Was he afraid Andrew might make him walk the plank? Or keel-haul him? Whip out the cat-o"-nine-tails?”

“There’s no telling.”

“Nobody would’ve done anything to him, not for having an accident.”

“You haven’t got a clue. You have no idea how cruel Dad could be. How vicious. If you knew half the things he’s done… what he used to do to me… and to Kimberly, too.” She shook her head.

I suddenly found myself very interested.

“Like what sort of things?” I asked.

“Do you have any idea how uncomfortable it is, having your hands tied like this?” She held them toward me. “Kimberly made the rope too tight.”

Before turning in for the night, Kimberly had freed Thelma’s hands for a visit to the latrine—then had retied them.

“You knew the right way to do it,” Thelma told me. “When you tied me, the rope didn’t cut in this way. Kimberly did this to hurt me.”

“No, she didn’t.”

“Look. Just look, why don’t you?”

I leaned toward her and checked. The rope did appear to be awfully tight. It was making grooves in her wrists.

“Can you make it looser for me? Please?”

“I don’t know. Maybe Kimberly had a reason…”

“She had one, okay. She just loves to hurt me. It turns her on.”

“Sure,” I muttered.

“If you make it looser,” she said, “I’ll tell you whatever you want to know.”

Naturally, I was suspicious of her motives. I couldn’t get around the fact, though, that the rope was digging into her wrists.

“I’ll redo it,” I told her. “But you’d better not try anything.”

“I won’t. I promise.”

I put the ax out of reach behind me, then moved in close to Thelma on my knees and picked open the knot. When the knot came apart, I began to unwrap the rope from around her wrists.

She suddenly pulled her hands free.

I was left holding empty loops of rope.

Before I could do anything, she swung both her arms around behind her back and started shaking her head. “Please. I’m not doing anything. Don’t tie me up again, okay? Please? Give me a break. I can’t stand having them tied. Just give me a few minutes, okay? Please?”

“No. Come on, you promised.” I glanced over at the sleeping area. The gals were still down, thank God. I faced Thelma. “You’ll get me in all kinds of trouble.”

“They don’t have to find out. I won’t tell them if you don’t.”

“Damn it.” Dropping the rope, I leaned forward on my knees and reached out and grabbed Thelma’s upper arms. They were thick, but not flabby. They felt strong. Squeezing them, I tried to pull her arms out from behind her.

She struggled not to let me. After a few seconds, though, she said, “Stop it or I’ll scream.”

I let go fast.

It took a while to catch my breath. Then I said, “Come on. If somebody wakes up and your hands aren’t tied…”

“You’ll get in more trouble than me.”

“We’ll both be in trouble. Come on.”

“I’ll make you a deal,” she said.

I picked up the rope. “Like what?”

“Just let me stay untied for a while, okay? Just while we sit here and talk, and then—I’ll let you tie them up again, I promise.”

“Somebody might wake up. And besides, you tricked me. You took advantage of me trying to do you a favor. So just give me your hands.”

She shook her head, and kept them behind her back.

“Come on,” I said. “Please. I’ll make it really loose.”

“I thought you wanted to ask me a lot of stuff about Wesley. And about Kimberly? Don’t you wanta know about how Dad used to abuse her?”

“He abused her?”

“He used to do all sorts of things to her. To both of us.”

“Really?” I glanced over at the sleeping area. So far, so good.

“You’re so worried, well just pretend I’m tied.” Thelma offered her hands. I wrapped the rope around them a few times to make it look good, but left it loose and unknotted. “There,” Thelma said. “Now you’re covered if anyone comes snooping.”

“Just don’t try anything,” I warned her. Then I went back to where I’d been sitting, sat down and put the ax across my thighs. “What did he do to her?” I asked.

“To both of us,” Thelma said.

“Okay.”

Family Ties

“It’s… awful nasty. Sick. Are you sure you want to hear about it?”

I nodded. Already, I was feeling a little shaky inside with a mixture of dread and excitement.

“Well, okay then. You asked for it. Don’t blame me if you don’t like what I have to tell you.”

“I won’t. I promise. Come on.”

“One thing was, he used to make us strip naked and then wrestle on the floor. We’d all be naked. Me, Kimberly and Dad.” She spoke in a quick, hushed voice, as if she were sharing a very juicy bit of gossip. “He’d start off by making just me and Kimberly go at it, while he watched from the side and… like cheered us on, gave us orders. He’d try to get us to hurt each other. And do perverted things. Then, after a while, he’d join in.”

“Jeez,” I muttered. “How old were you?”

She shrugged, shook her head. “I don’t know. It went on from the time I was nine or ten, all the way through high school.”

“What about Billie? They were married for… twenty years? She let all this… ?”

“He never did anything in front of her. But she worked, you know. Dad found plenty of time to be alone with us.”

“Wasn’t he away at sea a lot?”

“Not that much. Not nearly enough, if you ask me. And when he did come back from sea tours, he was worse than ever. He had all sorts of games. The wrestling was just one of them. But it was his favorite, I think. He wanted to do it whenever he had us alone. He used to get these holds on us, and make us scream. We’d be screaming and crying, squirming around with him on the floor and he’d—you know, stick his fingers in us. And his tongue. And he’d bite us.”

“Billie didn’t know any of this was going on?”

“No, huh-uh. It was our dark little secret. Dad said he’d kill us if we ever told on him.”

“What about Connie?”

Thelma shrugged. “I don’t know. I stopped living at home when I went away to college. I mean, that’s like twelve years ago. Connie would’ve only been like… how old?”

“She’s eighteen now.”

“So that would’ve made her only six when I left. I know he kept it up with Kimberly after I was gone. We never talked about it, but I knew. I mean, they weren’t about to stop. But I don’t know if they got Connie doing it. It sure wouldn’t surprise me, though.”

“’Weren’t about to stop’?” You almost make it sound like Kimberly was… a willing participant.”

Thelma blew a huff of air out her nose and mouth. “Kimberly didn’t go away to college. What does that tell you? An honor student, class president, you name it, she could’ve gone to Princeton or Yale if she’d wanted to. But what did she do instead? Enrolled at the community college and lived at home.”

“You think she kept on doing things with him?”

“Hell, yes. She really got into it. The whole pain thing. Delicious pain. That’s what Kimberly always called it, delicious pain.”

“Really?” I was a bit dumbfounded by all this. “She hasn’t got any scars. Not that I’ve seen, anyway.”

“No, no. Of course not. Scars are a dead giveaway. She’s always been very careful not to let herself get hurt in any ways that show. You don’t want people knowing about your nasty little secret life. They’ll think you’re a degenerate, a sicko. You know what I mean?”

“What about her and Keith?” I asked. “I mean, she married the guy. If she was having this thing with Andrew… ?”

“Keith was the same way.”

“He liked to hurt her?”

“Sure, he did. I walked in on them, one time. This was just before I got married to Wesley. I had to go to Dad’s house to pick up… a book. I needed Billie’s etiquette book for my wedding plans. And I walked into the house without ringing the doorbell. I thought nobody was home. But I heard noises upstairs, so I snuck up to see what was going on. I was afraid there might be a burglar, or something. It wasn’t any burglar, though—it was all three of them in Kimberly’s bedroom.”

“All who?”

“Kimberly, Keith, and Dad.”

“Having sex? All three of them?”

“Yes, having sex. And torturing her.”

“Torturing Kimberly?”

“She was strapped down to her bed, spread-eagled, and…”

“Never mind,” I said.

“Dad was in her mouth.”

“Cut it out. I don’t wanta hear…”

“Keith was kneeling between her legs. He was reaching up with pliers in each hand, working on her nipples, while his mouth…”

“Shut up! I don’t believe you. You’re making it all up. Kimberly wouldn’t… She said you’re a liar. This is all a load of bullshit.”

“Anyway, Wesley knew all about Dad and Keith. You see? He knew what a couple of sick degenerates they were. So when the boat blew up… he was afraid they’d blame him and he knew how they liked to torture people. He was terrified. Not just for himself, either. He was terrified for me and Billie… all of us. Can you imagine being stranded on an island with a couple of sadistic bastards like them? He had to kill them.”

“So why did he want to kill me? I never tortured anybody.”

A strange smile tilted up one side of Thelma’s mouth. The other side, dark and swollen from the beating Wesley had given her, didn’t move. “You’d like to, though, wouldn’t you?” she said.

Which wasn’t exactly what I’d expected her to say.

“Like to what?” I asked.

“Torture somebody.”

“You’re nuts!”

“Somebody like Kimberly,” she said.

“No!”

She smirked at me. “Who are you trying to kid? It makes you hot, just thinking about it. You’d just love to take her nipples and pinch them till she wept and squirmed and begged for mercy.”

“You’re nuts.”

“Or bite them.”

“It’s time for you to go,” I said. I set the ax aside, picked up the rope again, and shuffled over to her on my knees. “Put out your hands.”

“Look at you,” she said.

She was looking at the front of my shorts.

“So what. Hold out your hands.”

Instead of holding them out, she started to unbutton her blouse.

“Stop that,” I said.

“You can pretend I’m Kimberly,” she said, and pulled her blouse open. The firelight shimmered on her huge breasts. “Here. Feel. I know you want to. You’re aching to.”

“No. Stop it.”

She reached under her breasts and lifted them, raised them toward me. “Here,” she said. “They’re all yours. You want to squeeze them, don’t you? And slap them around? Make them swing and bounce? Wouldn’t you love to take my nipples and twist them till I cry out for mercy?”

“No.”

She lowered her breasts, but only to free her hands. Then she started to finger her nipples. She pinched them, pulled at them, twisted them. While she did it, she clamped her lower lip between her teeth. She breathed through her nose, air hissing in and out her nostrils.

I watched.

“You do it,” she gasped. “I know you want to. You’d love to.”

I had to admit, I was tempted. This was sort of like the kind of thing I’d been hoping for. But only sort of. Thelma was the only woman on the island who’d never figured in my fantasies.

I couldn’t help being aroused, though. She’d been talking dirty, getting me all turned on with that stuff about Kimberly, and now she was showing me her breasts. They were huge, covered with bruises and welts and scabs. They excited me, anyway.

Frankly, I was pretty disgusted with myself. And with Thelma.

I felt like, if I took her up on the offer, I’d feel very guilty and very dirty. I’d want to wash my hands afterward.

“Come on,” she gasped. “Come on.”

“Thanks, but no thanks.”

“I’m Kimberly. Just shut your eyes, and I’ll be Kimberly for you. Come on. Take my tits, and I’ll unzip you and…”

“Forget it,” I said. “Now stop it. Button up and hold out your hands.”

“Okay, okay. Just a minute.”

She started to get up.

“Wait. What are you doing?”

“I just want to be on my knees, that’s all. I don’t wanta be sitting down. It’s too hard to get up once your hands are tied.”

That made sense. I waited until she was kneeling in front of me, then said, “Give me your hands, now.”

Instead of obeying, she smiled at me, rubbed her hands down her thick belly and started to unbuckle her belt.

“Don’t.”

She didn’t stop. “I’ll show you what else Wesley did to me.”

“I don’t want to see.”

“Sure, you do.”

She was right, of course.

I knew I should stop her. In some ways, though, I didn’t really want to. Also, I didn’t know how. If I tried anything Thelma didn’t like, she might yell. The last thing I wanted right then, was for one of the other women to wake up and find us like this.

So I just knelt there, watching while she unbuckled her belt, un-fastened the waist button of her shorts, and pulled her zipper down.

The shorts dropped to her knees.

I expected to see panties, but didn’t.

She had no pubic hair, to speak of. Just a bulging triangle with dark whiskers like a guy might get on his jaw if he goes a day or two without shaving.

Is that what she’d wanted to show me—where Wesley’d shaved her?

Maybe there were injuries to see, but I didn’t keep looking. I turned away fast. Off beyond the fire, there was no sign of movement at the sleeping area. I thought, Thank God.

Somehow, I had to make Thelma stop all this.

I had to do it on my own.

Things had gone way too far. I never should’ve untied her hands. One thing had led to another, and now I couldn’t see how to end it. Not without shouting for help.

What would they think, if they found us like this?

What I ought to do, I thought, is back off, get away from her, grab the ax and stand up and order her, point blank, to pull her shorts up and…

Something tipped me off.

I still had my head turned and was staring toward the sleeping area. I had no intention of looking in Thelma’s direction again until I’d backed away. But something happened. I don’t know what. Maybe I’d heard a quiet sound that didn’t belong. Maybe I’d caught a movement in my peripheral vision. Sensed a change in the air. Something.

I turned my head.

Glimpsed Thelma’s hand lurching up toward my belly with a straight razor.

No fooling, a straight razor. The kind with a blade that folds into its handle—the kind of thing that nobody in his right mind would even own, except a barber. Because they’re so damn nasty, and it’s too easy to cut yourself by accident if you try to shave with one, and you can’t help but think about the sort of damage a crazy woman might do to you if she got her hands on it.

I don’t know where the hell Thelma got it.

All I know is that all of a sudden I found her with the damn thing in her hand, and she was about to run it up my belly and split me open.

I let out a yelp and threw myself backward off my knees.

She missed.

I didn’t feel anything, but saw her razor-wielding hand sweep up past my face as if she still had hopes of dividing my nose in half.

Then I flopped against the sand.

I shoved myself up with my elbows, not sure whether to kick at her or try scurrying away on my back.

For the moment, she wasn’t coming at me. Her head was turned aside.

Was Kimberly getting up?

I didn’t waste time trying to find out what Thelma was looking at. She was distracted, at least for a moment. That’s what counted.

An extra second to put some distance between me and that blade.

I dug in my elbows and heels and started scooting myself across the sand on my back.

Right away, she noticed.

The instant her eyes shifted in my direction, I cried out, “Help! Help!”

She came waddling toward me like someone whose legs had been chopped off at the knees. Her shorts were still down. They had her trapped, so she couldn’t move very fast. Not fast enough to catch me as I kept scooting away.

She was a real vision.

Lurching and flopping flesh, too well lit by a long shot, in spite of the shadows—her bruised, swollen face grinning. She waved both arms overhead as she kneed her way after me. The razor in her right hand flashed firelight.

“You stay put!” she gasped. “Stay put, you little cocksucker!”

I kept shouting for help.

Then I spotted the ax in the sand, not far from my left elbow. I hauled it toward me by its haft.

“Thelma!”

Kimberly’s voice, an angry shout.

Thelma glanced in the direction it had come from. Gasped. Then flung herself at me.

I swung the ax as hard and fast as I could.

The flat side of its steel head struck her in the forearm.

The right forearm.

She cried out and the razor leaped from her hand.

She landed on me. Her head knocked me in the crotch. A second later, though, she rolled off. Making grunty noises, she rolled over a few times and got to her hands and knees. As she staggered to her feet, she snatched up her shorts. Holding them up with both hands, she ran for the inlet.

Kimberly went sprinting after her.

Lean and quick, dark except for the white of her bikini.

At the water’s edge, she leaped and reached with both hands for Thelma’s shoulders.

A great flying tackle.

Except that Thelma twisted around and smashed her elbow into the side of Kimberly’s face. The blow deflected Kimberly. And dropped her. She smacked down on the water, and Thelma kept going.

I was on my knees by then, in spite of the bash to my nuts. I turned to look for the others.

Back at the sleeping area, Connie was sitting up and staring in my direction. Of course, she was too battered to come running to the rescue. And Billie didn’t dare leave her behind. Billie, on her feet, a spear in her hands, was standing ready to fight in case Wesley should spring an attack on her and Connie.

I got to my feet and hurried toward the inlet.

Thelma was lunging through thigh-deep, black water. I couldn’t see her very well. Suddenly, I thought she was coming back. Which scared the hell out of me. I stopped short. I fought with an urge to turn around and make a run for it.

If I ran, she would finish off Kimberly.

I had just decided to go back for the ax and fight to save Kimberly when I realized that Thelma was smaller than before. Nothing showed below her waist—because she was in deeper water. She wasn’t returning. She’d been wading away, the whole time.

I hurried to help Kimberly.

She was on her hands and knees, head hanging, her face a few inches above the surface of the water. When I reached her, she didn’t look up.

“Are you okay?” I asked.

She didn’t answer.

“Kimberly?”

“Go and get her,” she muttered. “Don’t let her get away.”

I looked for Thelma. At first, I couldn’t find her. Then I spotted a dim shape way out near the point.

“She’s awfully far away,” I said.

Kimberly muttered, “Damn it, Rupert.”

“I wouldn’t be able to catch her.”

She groaned.

“Can I help you up?” I asked.

“Don’t touch me.”

She sounded disgusted.

“I’m sorry,” I said.

“You’re sorry, all right. Jesus H. Christ.”

“I almost got killed.”

“That would’ve been a big loss.”

Man. I was beginning to wish Thelma had killed me.

“Okay,” I said. “I’ll go after her. If that’s really what you want. What do you want me to do if I catch up to her? Am I supposed to try and bring her back? Or do you want me to try and kill her? Maybe I’d better take along a knife, or something. Can I have your knife?”

Head still hanging, Kimberly said, “Forget it. Just forget it. Go to bed, or something. Shit.”

I’d never felt so low. I mean, you could tell she was completely disgusted with me and thought I was a waste and a loser.

Which is true. I am.

I decided to follow her advice, and go to bed. The problem with that, though, was Billie and Connie. They were there waiting for me, and I was crying pretty good by then. I just couldn’t help it.

“What happened?” Billie asked. She didn’t sound disgusted with me. She sounded like she cared.

“I’m sorry,” I said. “Thelma got away. I let her get away.”

“Neat play,” Connie said.

“Hush up,” Billie said. Then she poked her spear into the sand and came over to where I was standing and put her arms around me.

It was one of the nicest things anyone has ever done.

She was all soft and warm and gentle, stroking my hair with one hand and my back with the other while I cried against the side of her neck. She kept murmuring, “It’s all right, honey. It’s okay. Everything’s fine.”

She’s the best woman I’ve ever known.

I calmed down pretty soon, thanks to Billie. Then Kimberly came along, so I got out of Billie’s arms and turned around to face the music.

“Are you okay, Rupert?” she asked.

“No. I really screwed up.”

“You’re not hurt, though?” I shook my head.

“How the hell did she get loose?” Connie asked.

“I… I untied her hands.”

“You outa your fucking mind?”

Billie put a hand on the back of my neck, and rubbed me.

“We’ll talk about it in the morning,” Kimberly said. “Everybody go back to sleep, now. I’ll keep watch.”

“I’m sorry,” I told her.

“What’s done is done,” she said. Then she turned away and walked back to the fire.

That’s about it for last night.

More than enough, if you ask me. Aside from the fact that so much happened—good stuff and bad stuff and some very weird stuff—it’s taken me most of the morning to write it down.

And I’m not even caught up yet.

The Inquisition

Anyway, I had all last night to worry about explaining the fiasco with Thelma. I wanted to make up a good story about it, so I wouldn’t look totally stupid and gullible and perverted.

Also, there was a whole lot I didn’t want to talk about.

But I couldn’t concentrate very well. I was lying there on my “bed,” trying to focus on coming up with a good lie, but all I could think about was what had actually happened. I kept reliving everything in my head. Not just remembering, but sort of feeling most of it—the confusion and fear and excitement and revulsion and arousal and terror—though in milder forms than when all of it was going on for real. And in jumbled order.

I couldn’t even get away from Thelma by falling asleep. My nightmares were worse than what had really happened. I don’t remember much about them, just that they had a lot to do with sex and razor blades, and that they were awful.

I was glad when morning came, so I wouldn’t have to suffer through any more nightmares.

After everybody was up, we gathered around the fire and ate the last of the canned ham for breakfast.

Have I mentioned the canned ham before? It was one of the things Keith and Andrew salvaged after the explosion. We got into it for the first time a few days ago when we didn’t have any fish. Anyway, now it’s gone—and we’re starting to get low on things to eat.

We’d started off on the trip with a lot of stuff, a great deal more than eight people could hope to finish off during a week at sea. The explosion happened when we still had four days left, and I guess that Keith and Andrew recovered about half of the food that was left. Including some good stuff like the canned ham.

They didn’t fare nearly so well with the drinks—we must’ve had enough soda, beer and hard stuff on the boat to keep an army happy. All that survived the explosion, though, were a few bottles of booze. (Nothing carbonated—soda, beer and champagne—survived the explosion. They all blew.) Anyway, I’d say we were pretty lucky to end up with as much as we did.

For most of the time here, there have been only four or five of us to share it. We eat fish whenever possible. So we’ve stretched out our food supply pretty well. It should last a few more days, if we’re careful. Then we’ll have to concentrate on fishing, hunting, gathering edible fruit and vegetables from the jungle, etc.

That shouldn’t be much of a problem, except that we have to contend with Wesley and Thelma. With them out there, getting enough food isn’t exactly on the top of our priority list.

Man, this was a lengthy digression. I think I’m loopy from so much writing today.

After we finished the ham, it was time for the Inquisition.

“You want to tell us what happened last night?” Kimberly asked.

“Not especially,” I said.

Nobody appeared amused.

I sighed. “Where do you want me to start?”

“Why did you untie her hands?”

Relief. An easy one. “I had to. You know how you untied her before she went to the latrine last night? Well, when you tied her back up again, you made the rope too tight. It was digging into her wrists.”

Kimberly frowned at me. “That’s nonsense.”

“It isn’t. I checked. The rope was way too tight.”

“Not when I tied her up. I was very careful…” She glanced from Billie to Connie. “Did either of you retie her last night?”

Billie shook her head.

“If I was gonna do anything with her rope,” Connie said, “I would’ve strangled her with it.”

“Maybe she tightened the rope,” Billie suggested. “Did it herself, so she’d have a reason for asking Rupe to untie it.”

“How could she do that?” Connie asked.

“With her teeth?” Billie said.

“I guess it’s possible,” Kimberly admitted. She frowned as if thinking for a few seconds, then said, “Shit, it sounds exactly like something she might pull. She goes around acting like a lame-brain, half the time, but she can be… crafty. Very crafty. She used to be, anyway. Maybe she’s changed, but I doubt it. Once a sneak, always a sneak.”

“What sort of things did she do?” I asked. I was somewhat interested in hearing about Thelma’s sneaky ways, but mostly I hoped to delay the interrogation.

“She was always doing stuff. But… one time when she was pissed off at me, she chopped up her _own_ Barbie doll—cut off its hands and feet and head—and hid them under my mattress. Then she acted all innocent, went around and asked Dad if he’d seen her Barbie doll anywhere. When it finally turned up, I caught living hell.”

“From your mother?” Billie asked.

Kimberly shook her head. “From Dad. This was after Mom had died, and before he met you.”

“Did he beat you?” I asked. I was suddenly breathing harder than a second ago, and my bean was thudding.

“Who?” Kimberly said. “Dad?”

“Yeah. You said you caught living hell.”

“Right.” She looked a bit offended. “He didn’t beat me, though. Are you kidding? Dad? He gave me a talking to. Which made me feel lower than a snake, and I hadn’t touched the damn doll. You should’ve seen Thelma. She was so proud of herself for pulling it off and getting me in hot water.”

“Did you get even with her?” I asked.

Kimberly gave me an odd look—as if she suspected that something was up. “Yeah. What’re you getting at?”

I could hardly force the words out, but I managed. “She said you used to beat her up.”

“What?”

“That you’d… you were always forcing her to wrestle with you. You’d throw her down on the floor and put head-locks on her… make her cry out for mercy… stuff like that.”

Kimberly smirked and shook her head. “She would’ve liked that.”

“You didn’t wrestle with her?”

“She’s five years older than me. She always outweighed me. And she had a cruel streak. There’s no way I ever would’ve wrestled with Thelma. The one time we actually had a fight, I pulled her hair and she stabbed me in the arm with a pencil. It went in. I had to go to the doctor and get shots.”

“She said you used to wrestle with her all the time.”

“Really?”

“Yeah.”

“Maybe in some alternate universe.”

I was tempted to go on and explain that they’d been naked and their father had joined in—that the matches were supposed to be some sort of sadistic sexual romp.

Already, though, I figured Thelma must’ve made up the whole wrestling business.

“So you two were over here last night talking about make-believe wrestling matches between me and Thelma?”

“Yeah.”

“Why did she tell you that stuff?”

“I don’t know. We were just talking.”

I felt sort of cornered, and wished I hadn’t brought up the subject. It was a relief, though, to discover that Thelma’d been lying. If she’d lied about the wrestling, it stood to reason that the torture and incest stuff probably hadn’t really happened, either.

I felt a little cheated, a little disappointed. Part of me had gotten sort of excited, picturing Kimberly mixed up in that sort of thing. Mostly, though, I was relieved.

“She must’ve had a motive,” Kimberly said.

“Not that I…”

“I know,” Connie said. She gave me one of her snotty looks. “I bet Thelma was trying to get him to wrestle with her.”

I almost denied it. But the idea seemed to have some merit. I sure didn’t want the truth coming out. “Well… That’s sort of… She did want me to have a wrestling match with her.”

“What on earth for?” Billie asked, half of her mouth rising in a crooked smile as if she were amused but baffled.

“She made it a challenge,” I explained. “If she won, I’d have to let her get away. If I won, she’d let me tie her hands back up. See, she’d pulled them away when I tried to loosen the rope for her.”

“That’s when you should’ve called for help,” Kimberly said.

“Sure, and have everyone think I was some kind of a worthless jerk for being dumb enough to untie her.”

Kimberly grimaced a bit. She lowered her eyes and looked ashamed. She didn’t actually apologize, but she regretted being so sharp with me last night. You could tell.

“Boy,” Connie said, “that Thelma read you like a book.”

I looked at her and didn’t make the mistake of asking, “What do you mean by that?” I kept my mouth shut, but it didn’t help.

Billie asked, “What do you mean?”

“She knew just which buttons to push. Amazing. Rupert’s got sex on the brain. There’s no way in the world he’s gonna miss out on the chance to wrestle with a woman.”

I felt like my face might go up in flames. I said, “That’s bull. We’re talking about Thelma. God almighty, she’s the last woman I’d ever want to wrestle with.”

“Yeah, right.”

“She’s disgusting.”

“As if you’d let a little thing like that get in your way.”

“Yeah,” I said, “look at you.”

“Go fuck yourself.”

Kimberly raised a hand. “Let’s not get sidetracked here, kiddies.”

Connie sneered at her and gave her the finger.

Kimberly ignored it. To me, she said, “So, did you agree to have this wrestling match?”

I frowned and tried to decide on the best way to answer. After a while, I said, “Well… she pushed me into it. She called me a chicken, and said I was too much of a wimp and a loser to beat her in a fair fight.”

“So you went for it?” Kimberly asked.

“I had to.”

Billie sighed. “You didn’t have to prove anything to Thelma. She was just manipulating you.”

“I guess… Well, not all the way. I mean, at first I agreed to wrestle her. But then she started to take off her clothes. She wanted us doing it naked.”

“You figured you’d died and gone to Heaven,” Connie said.

“I did not! I told her no. I said the deal was off, there wouldn’t be any wrestling match, and I wanted her to hold out her hands so I could tie them. She wouldn’t listen, though. She didn’t pay any attention, and started taking off her clothes. It was like we were going to wrestle, no matter what I said. Before I knew what was happening, she had her blouse wide open and her shorts down. I didn’t know what to do.”

“Probably had a boner on you the size of the Washington Monument.” Connie said that. Who else?

“I did not.”

“Yeah, right.”

“Leave him alone,” Billie told her.

“The thing is, that’s when I knew it had all gone too far. I started backing away from her. I was planning to go for the ax, and make her quit messing around, but all of a sudden she attacked me with a straight razor. She almost killed me.” I met Connie’s narrow eyes. “If you don’t believe me, we can probably find the razor. I knocked it out of her hand. It’s probably in the sand around here someplace.”

Kimberly, who was wearing Keith’s Hawaiian shirt this morning, slipped her hand into its left breast pocket and pulled out the razor. She flipped the blade open.

Billie pursed her lips and made a “Whuuu” sound.

I grimaced, myself, getting a good look at it in daylight and realizing how close it had come to slicing me up the middle.

“Has anyone ever seen this before?” Kimberly asked. She held it between her thumb and forefinger so that we could see the handle—which looked like mother-of-pearl.

Connie shook her head.

Billie said, “Wicked-looking thing.”

“Do you recognize it?”

“Me? No. I haven’t seen a razor like that in years. My father had one that folded like that, but his had a green handle.”

“How about you, Rupert?”

“I saw it last night. When she came at me with it.”

“It’s probably Wesley’s,” Connie said.

Kimberly nodded. “Maybe. It might even be Thelma’s, for that matter.”

“She didn’t have it when I frisked her,” Billie said. “I couldn’t have missed a thing like that.”

“Well,” Kimberly said, “she sure got hold of it somewhere.”

“Why didn’t she just use it?” Connie asked.

“She tried,” I pointed out.

“No, I mean to cut herself loose?”

“Maybe she couldn’t get to it while her hands were tied,” I suggested.

“But she must’ve gotten her hands undone before she came over to you,” Billie said. “If we’re right that she’d retied the rope to make it too tight, she would’ve probably had to untie it first.”

Connie scowled. “This is getting too complicated.”

“Yeah,” I said. “We’ve got her untying her hands so she can tie them more tightly so she can come over here and trick me into untying them for her. That doesn’t make any sense at all.”

“Yeah. It does.” Kimberly nodded and nibbled her lower lip for a few seconds. Then she said, “Yeah, it makes a lot of sense. We’ve been looking at it wrong. This wasn’t about Thelma getting herself untied so she could escape. This was about killing Rupert.”

“Terrific,” I said.

She raised a finger. “Here’s what I think happened.” Looking at me, she said, “Back at the lagoon, Thelma tried to kill you by throwing that rock over the falls. She missed you, and hit Connie by mistake.”

That’s according to Thelma’s version of what happened,” Billie pointed out. “Might not be the truth.”

“Whatever Wesley has in mind, he wants all the men dead first. That’s how I see it,” Kimberly said. “The thing is, he was too injured to try for Rupert, himself, so he ordered Thelma to do it. She screwed up and hit Connie. Then—her story—Wesley trashed her, so she killed him and came back to join up with us. I don’t think so.”

“You don’t think he trashed her?” Billie asked.

“Somebody sure did,” Connie said.

Kimberly nodded. “Yeah, Wesley probably did it to her. Or some of it. I bet most of it was self-inflicted.”

“Would she do that?” Billie asked.

“Beat herself up? Maybe. I don’t know. It wouldn’t surprise me.”

“You think she’s a masochist?” Billie asked.

Connie snorted. “She’s gotta be, she married Wesley.”

“She couldn’t have bitten herself in all those places,” I pointed out.

“Not in all of them,” Kimberly said. “I think it was probably a joint effort. The beating was supposed to be Thelma’s excuse for killing Wesley, so it had to look good. She almost had to do some of it, herself. The beating was just too severe for Wesley to manage it by himself. In his condition? He might’ve given her some bites, but he couldn’t have slapped her around and whipped her like that. She had to do that to herself. Most of it, anyway.”

“Sick,” Connie said.

“It was her ticket into our camp,” Kimberly pointed out. “She could come in, show us those terrible wounds, and we’d be all set to believe she’d paid Wesley back by killing him.”

“But we didn’t believe her,” I pointed out.

“No. Not entirely. I had my doubts all along that Wesley could’ve done that to her. But what I suspected—and I think the rest of us did, too—was that she’d been sent in here to set us up. If we believed her about killing Wesley, we’d let our guard down. That’d leave us open for a surprise attack. We also suspected that she might try to lead us into an ambush when we went looking for Wesley’s body.”

“Right,” Connie said.

“But we were wrong. Completely wrong. She didn’t come in to distract us or lead us into a trap so Wesley could nail us. You know what it was? From the very start? It was a one-woman mission to take out Rupert.”

“Kill me?”

“Right.”

“What does it mean?” Billie asked.

“Means, for one thing, Rupert’s a very lucky fellow.”

“That’s me, lucky.”

“Also means that Thelma’s in this all the way with Wesley. She’s perfectly willing to commit murder for him. She’s a lot more dangerous than we thought.”

“And trickier,” I said.

“I always knew she was tricky,” Kimberly said. “I just didn’t know she was homicidal.”

Billie, frowning, shook her head. “Do you think she was in on it with him?”

“In on what?”

“Setting us all up. Blowing up the boat. Trapping us here. Is it possible that Thelma helped Wesley plan it? I mean, I’m beginning to wonder. For that matter, maybe this whole thing was her idea.”

“I tend to doubt it,” Kimberly said. “She might be a hell of an actress, but I think she really and truly believed that Wesley got killed in the explosion. She didn’t know what was going on. She just got into this whole mess when she found us trying to ambush her husband. That’s the way I see it, anyhow.”

“If Thelma wasn’t in on the plan,” Billie said, “then all this was Wesley’s idea like we thought in the first place. So how does Thelma fit into it?”

I saw where she was heading. “If we’re right about Wesley’s motives,” I said, “she’ll be killed like the rest of us.”

“He can’t possibly let her live,” Billie added.

“That’ll be her tough luck,” Kimberly said. “But he won’t kill her as long as he has uses for her. And maybe he doesn’t intend to kill her at all. We suspect he’s doing all this so he can be the sole survivor and inherit and so forth, but we don’t really know what the hell his reasoning is. Or what to expect from him.”

“I expect he’ll try to kill me again,” I put in.

“I suspect you’re right,” Kimberly said, and smiled at me. “We’ll try not to let that happen.”

“Thanks,” I said.

“So, what do we do?” Connie asked.

“Nothing,” Kimberly said. “Not today, anyway. You’re in no condition to go on another hunt for those two. I’m sure Rupert has a lot of writing to do in that diary of his.”

“Big deal,” Connie muttered.

“It is a big deal,” Kimberly told her. “I want him to keep current with it. I want there to be something—a record of what’s happened here. In case we don’t make it.”

“That’s a laugh. I’m sure Wesley’s gonna kill us all and then let Rupert’s little diary incriminate him. Are you kidding me? He’ll burn it.”

“Thanks, Connie,” I said.

“Oh, get real.”

“Anyway, I’m not planning to get killed. I’m gonna make it out of here—I hope we all do. And then I’ll find a publisher. We’ll be famous. I’ll make a ton of money. And everybody who reads my true-life adventure book will see just what a bitch you are.”

“Maybe I’ll burn it myself.”

“Just try, and see what…”

“Knock it off,” Kimberly said. “Both of you.”

“And you leave Rupert’s diary alone,” Billie told her daughter.

Her daughter said, “Yeah, right, take his side, why don’t you?”

That was pretty much the end of the conference. It hadn’t turned out so badly, after all.

Being the intended target of Thelma’s hit, I came out of things looking a lot better than expected. I was now the survivor of an assassination attempt, not the dork who’d let Thelma escape.

I couldn’t help feeling a little scared, though.

It’s one thing to have somebody pull a razor on you because she’s your prisoner bent on making a getaway. It’s a whole different ballgame if she dropped in on us with a battered body and a load of lies just so she could get close to me, late at night, and rip me open.

I’m damn lucky to be alive.