Pearl Of Patmos

CHAPTER 1

It was one of those perfect days which so rarely come to England. The first day of June. The sun was golden, the Channel deepest sapphire, the air drowsy with bee hum and bird song. The Dorset littoral was a rolling quilt of mustard and dun over which cuckoos wheeled and emitted their plaintive cries, searching for foster nests.

Richard Blade, sunning himself in the skimpiest of breech cloths, lay on his hard flat belly and squinted over the corundum waves that came lazily in, wearing flecks of lace at their throats. Far out, under a canopy of brown smoke, a coaster was making for the Thames and London. Blade, who had read poetry at Oxford and promptly forgotten most of it, found some of Masefield's popping unbidden into his mind.

… dirty British coaster with a salt-caked smoke stack … with a cargo of ivory, and apes and peacocks, sandalwood and cedarwood acrd sweet white wine…

No matter that the poet had not written it so-Blade's version better fitted the day. He turned over and closed his.eyes, peering into the red lagoon at the dark shadow play. He drowsed, relaxing, watching the sciomachy behind his eyelids, the amorphous and fluid Rorschach blots that melded and intersticed and-and blotted out the sun? His face was in full shadow now although there were no clouds in the sky. A trickle of sand, hourglass slow, bounced off hig muscled belly like a miniature avalanche.

He had not heard her approach.

Blade's first impression, when he opened his eyes and stared up into hers, was of green glacial ice. Not so much a coldness as a reserve, narrowed at him in a mix of curiosity and indifference. From a small brown fist she continued to pour sand on his stomach. Blade said nothing.

«They told me in the village that this cove is usually deserted at this time. I came here because I wanted to be alone. Now I find a huge creature like you taking up practically all of it.»

Her supply of sand ran out and she dusted her hands. Blade, whose training made such observation automatic, noted that her hands were ordinarily well kept but now had crescents of dirt beneath the nails. She was wearing a simple looking mini-dress which he guessed was expensive. Her feet were bare, as were the long slim legs vanishing into brief black pants. He gave her a faint smile.

«Well-intentioned of the locals,» he said. «And ordinarily they would be right. I don't usually come here at this time. Today-well, today is a little special.»

J had called that morning. Lord Leighton had the master computer ready. The next day, Blade was due to go through the machine for the seventh time. To explore another Dimension X.

For a moment she pouted, and the pursed small mouth spoiled her face. Then she smiled and was beautiful again. The ice-green eyes watched him with a glint of private amusement.

«You're looking up my dress,» she said.

Blade nodded. «So I am. Considering our relative positions it would be hard not to. Of course you don't have to stand like that. I have an idea that you are what is commonly known as a lady. Ladies are supposed to be fairly modest, are they not?»

She tilted her head to one side and stared down at him. She had a Grecian beauty, narrow-faced, full-mouthed, straight high-bridged nose. Her arms were slim and well formed, rather muscular, and Blade doubted that she was wearing a bra. Their glances locked and held for a long moment. She was the first to laugh, displaying small even teeth that were white but did not dazzle.

«I'm not, very,» she said.

«Not what? Modest?»

«Uh huh. I have never been. Mother was always at me about it, but it never took. Anyway it doesn't really matter, does it? I do have pants on.»

Blade nodded. He had the impression, gone immediately, that he had seen this girl before. Or someone very like her. He yawned and clasped his big hands beneath his head. The girl put her toe in his armpit and tickled the black hair.

«You don't shave under your arms.»

Blade closed his eyes. He shook his head. «No.»

She continued to tickle his armpit with her toe. «Do you think it is unmanly or something?»

«No.»

Blade was silent. He kept his eyes closed. He could smell her body, a compound of clean woman flesh and light sweat. She took her toe away and for a moment there was silence.

She said, «You aren't going to go away and let me have this little beach, are you?»

«No.»

«You aren't exactly a gentleman, are you?»

He did not open his eyes, but had to grin. «Sometimes I am. In some matters. Depends on the place and time and the people, and my mood. In this case you are the interloper, not me.»

«Interloper? I like that! Anyway this is not a private beach. Anyone can use it. They told me so in the village.»

Blade smiled. «You have stumbled on the one village in England in which all the inhabitants are idiots. This is a private beach, but they will never admit it. Makes sense, I suppose, from their viewpoint. They are all descended from smugglers. Some of them are still at it, without doubt. I've had the cottage for five years now and they still think I'm with Her Majesty's revenue. A spy. But I do own the beach rights.»

«I came down here because I fancied a swim.» She sounded pouty again. She went on, «Do open your eyes. I can't abide people who don't look at me when they talk.»

Blade opened his eyes. He propped himself up on an elbow. The affair had to be straightened out. Obviously she was not going to go away. He was not quite sure, looking at her again, that he wanted her to. Tomorrow he'd go through the computer. Today was, well, today. And his life of late had been monastic.

She stood very near him, hands on her hips, wide-legged, black pants still plainly in view. He stared pointedly until she twisted about and fell to her knees beside him, trying to pull the mini-skirt down with no success at all. Her inner thighs were tender brown velvet, rubbed and polished.

The green eyes considered him and seemed not so glacial now. «You do look at a person, don't you. But somehow I get the impression that you are a gentleman. Even if you are so huge.»

Blade chuckled. «I've never heard that size kept a man from being a gentleman.»

«No-o. I suppose not. But there is such a lot of youl And muscles. Are you an acrobat or an athlete or something?»

Blade, who had taken blues (similar to American letters) in every major sport at Oxford, nodded. «I was an athlete. In my long lost youth. Never an acrobat. And never a something, whatever that is.»

«All right.» She nodded vigorously, her brown hair rippling about her slim shoulders. «I will take it that you are a gentleman. And I wish to swim. I have no suit. So you will let me have the beach, please? I promise I won't be long. No more than half an hour.»

Something in her eyes-some hint of tease, or promise? — caused Blade to answer as he did. It was, — he divined, the answer she wanted to hear.

«Swim all you like,» he said. «With my permission. But I intend to remain here. This is my beach, remember.» He grinned. «I have no intention of being evicted by an interloper.»

She feigned indignation well. «But I have no suit! I told you that. I, well, I can hardly-«

There was no mistaking the tease in her green eyes. She leaned toward him, chin in hand. «You really don't know who I am, do you?»

Blade was about to admit his thought of a few minutes earlier, that she was vaguely familiar, but checked the impulse. It just might, somehow spoil the game that was slowly, but gaining points every moment, developing between them. Blade was, suddenly very much interested in the game. He was not a man to be unappreciative of what the gods send.

He shook his head. «Haven't the faintest idea who you are. Should I know? Are you someone important?»

Again the hint of pout. «No-o. Well, maybe some people think so, but not really. If you see what I mean?»

«I don't. Does it matter?»

The girl stood up. «No. Not the slightest: I like it. We'll have a game, shall we?»

Blade smiled. «By all means. What kind of a game?»

«We won't tell names. Now or ever. And we must each promise never to try to see the other again: Will you do that? We're strangers now and we'll stay strangers. We will never, never see each other again. Whatever we say, or whatever happens between us, will be forgotten when this day is over. It will be like it never happened. Do you promise?»

«Whatever happens? What do you expect to happen?»

A shrug of slim shoulders, a liquidity of unrestrained breasts beneath the dress. «I don't know. Neither do you. This is part of the game. We just let things develop naturally. Maybe nothing will happen.»

Blade laughed. «That I do not like to think about. But all right, I promise. When does the game start?»

She knelt beside him again. «Right now. But first we have to have names-no, don't tell me your real one. I mean made up names. Hmmm-let me see.»

Her eyes roved over his body. She traced a finger through his chest hair. «I think,» said Blade, «that I am going to like this game.»

She put a hand over his mouth. Her fingers were cool and crusted with sand. «Be quiet. Ummm, yes. Hercules. No help for it. It's obvious, and a little trite, but you will just have to be Hercules. You agree?»

Blade reached for his cigarettes and lighter on a nearby blanket. «I suppose I must. As long as I don't have to clean out my stables. Who are you going to be? Something mythical and classical as well?»

«Of course. I am Diana»

Blade nodded. «Good choice. It suits you, I think. Goddess of the moon. And of huntink.»

The green eyes narrowed at him. «I am-very good at hunting.»

Blade leaned back and- exhaled smoke. «And I the willing prey, Diana. Now-are you going to swim or not? I have just remembered a bird and bottle at the cottage. A couple of birds, in fact, and all the bottles we need. Interested?»

«Very much. After my swim»

She glanced up and down the little cove. The beach was small, a scallop of sand and shingle eroded by the sea at the base of overhanging cliffs. Some hundreds of yards down the cliff facade a wooden stair switchbacked precariously up to the rim.

«Can anyone see us?»

Blade flipped his cigarette away and smiled at her. He was still not quite convinced that she would do it, but was prepared to be pleasantly surprised.

«The villagers may be idiots and smugglers, but I doubt there are many Peeping Toms around. They leave me pretty well alone. Of course there is old Professor Wright. He strolls along the cliffs sometimes. But he's nearsighted and more than a little around the bend. He wears an Inverness cape and a deerstalker cap and thinks he is Sherlock Holmes in retirement. He even keeps bees.»

«Professor Wright sounds like an old darling,» said the girl. «I shouldn't mind him seeing me. As long as there are no cameras-«

There was a clue in that last imperfect sentence, but Blade let it slide past. At the moment he did not care who she was. What she was-that was the important thing. And what she was kept him speechless for a moment.

She pulled the mini-dress over her head in a single motion and let it drop on the sand. She faced him, wide-legged, hands on hips, half-smiling and half-serious, with no preening of her body. She simply offered it for inspection.

The black pants were skintight and plain, with elastic in the waist and leg bands. Several long curly tendrils of brown hair strayed beneath the elastic near her mons pubis. Her legs, Blade thought, could only be called elegant. An old-fashioned word, but it fitted. Her legs were so good, so slim and sweetly curving, with thighs and knees barely kissing, that they did not need the arch decoy of high heels to show them off.

Her breasts were beyond description. Blade forgot words and simply gazed, his loins excited and moving. He was something of a connoisseur of breasts and he immediately recognized that hers were hybrid, half Nordic, half Mediterranean. Not tanned pears, but with a hint of conoid; not warm melons, but swelling to found fullness. Her nipples were hall-awakened rosebuds.

«You chose your name well,» Blade admitted. «You are Diana. In the flesh. As she must have been imagined by the ancients.»

She tossed her thick brown hair behind her shoulders. The movement set her breasts to rippling. She regarded him steadily, lower lip caught in upper teeth. «When you have looked your fill,» she told him, «we can get on with the game. There are rules, especially one. I think you had better know about it.»

«There are always rules,» said Blade with a mock scowl. «They usually spoil things. What particular rule did you have in mind?»

«You can look at me, but you may not touch.»

«Oh?» He made no effort to disguise his dismay.

«Until I say you can-if I ever do. Do you agree? If you don't we must stop the game here and now.»

«Oh, I agree,» Blade said hastily. Under his breath he muttered, «La belle dame sans merci.»

She stuck out her tongue at him. «Maybe not. Not entirely. We shall have to see. Are you going to swim with me?»

He reached hastily for another cigarette. «Er, not just this minute. You go on. I'll have a smoke and watch. I wouldn't go out too far-there are some undercurrents that can be nasty at times.»

There was pure and joyous malice in the green eyes. She stared at his breech cloth. «You daren't stand up,» she laughed. «You're afraid I'll see how excited you are.»

Blade busied himself with the lighter. It was running low on fuel. «Don't talk nonsense. You forget who I am. Hercules would never be bothered by such a thing.»

Her laughter came in a full-bodied shout. She bent over, her breasts pendants of symmetry. «You're embarrassed. You really are embarrassed. Hercules is embarrassed by Dianal»

«Like hell he is.» Blade joined her in laughter. He stood up, hoping that he was right about the seclusion of the cove. He had never been disturbed here, but that meant little. There could be peepers, and binoculars, and if so there would be, to paraphrase the old Yank song, a hot time in the old village tonight., Tongues would be clacking in the pubs. Blade thought of J's probable reaction, should he ever hear, and had to grin. J was something of an old woman. Astute, cunning at his job, but on the prim side. Lord Leighton, that scandalous old man, was another matter. He would revel in such a contretemps. Would demand details and relish them with goatish laughter.

«Ohl» She was staring at the massive bulge in his breechcloth.

«Is something wrong?» he inquired innocently.

«Oh, my Godl»

She turned and ran into the seas. Blade followed her, glancing up at the cliff rim. No sign of anyone. No revealing glint of sun on glasses. They were, Blade thought as he plunged into the cold water, probably going to get away with it. For the sake of all concerned he hoped so. The local constable, Bob Anderson, was a stolid man and capable enough but lacking in imagination. Blade went deep into the blue water, down to where it shaded into a cold green, the color of her eyes, and nearly choked at the thought of Diana and Hercules in magistrate's court.

When he surfaced there was no sign of the girl. He swam out a hundred yards, cutting effortlessly through the wavelets, noting that the coaster's flag of smoke had nearly vanished. He did not worry. Such a girl, Diana, could surely handle herself in the water.

There was a frothing explosion near him. She shot out of the water like a porpoise, in a rainbow of spray, laughing at him. Water sequins sparkled as the sun caught her breasts. She splashed water at him, treading easily, tossing her sodden hair behind her shoulders.

«This is marvelous. I haven't been in the water since I got back from the south of France. I think I must be part mermaid. I love the water so.»

Blade, also treading water, kept his distance. He frowned. «I much prefer that you remain Diana. From the pictures I have seen of mermaids there seems to be an essential~part missing. And no merman ever shouted, `vfve la difference.' In fact I have always felt sorry for mermen-they must get some very nasty shocks'.»

She moved a little closer to him. Her eyes widened and she caught her lower lip in her teeth. «You know, Hercules, there is something about you, At first I thought you were just a big beautiful muscle-bound oaf, but I was wrong about that.»

«Hercules,» Blade said smugly, «was always underrated.»

«Be serious for a minute. I almost wish we weren't playing the game. So we could tell our real names andand maybe see each other again sometime.»

«The times are out of joint,» he said. Tomorrow he'd go through the computer into Dimension X. The future, his private future, consisted of the hours between this moment and the time he sat down in the chair in Lord L's laboratory. Beyond that there were no certainties. That he had always come back meant nothing. The time would come when he, or, if his luck held, another man in his place would not come back.

Diana moved a bit closer. «What does that mean? The times are out of joint? Don't you, wouldn't you, want to see me again? If we could, I mean?»

Blade smiled at her. Stop the glooming. Helll He had come back six times. He would come back this time.

«Hercules' mother raised no fools,» he told her. «And it is only a game, you know. Shall we stop playing it and get to know each other?»

For a moment he was certain she would agree. The look in her eyes, colored a darker green and warmed by the sapphire water, told him that. Then she shook her head. «No. We can't: I was just thinking crazy for a momenf. We're still playing the game.»

Blade was put out. He ached for her. «Then let's get on with it.» He was gruff. «That bird and bottle is still waiting at my cottage.»

Again she shook her head. «I think not. I've changed my mind about that.»

Blade scowled, not altogether in jest. «I never read that Diana was a tease.»

She laughed, eyes green slits, and splashed at him. «Oh, but she wasl She was a terrible woman, in many ways. Cruel, when she wanted to be. When she was angry, Didn't she change some poor man into a stag and have her dogs tear him to pieces? Just because he watched her bathing?»

«I don't know.» He sounded sulky, and was. The whole bit was becoming jejune. She was putting him on, this strange little bitch from nowhere, and he had been cooperating all too readily in making a fool of himself.

She moved closer. «Hercules is losing his temper,» she gibed. «We don't want that. I suppose I had better relax the rules a bit.»

Her body was against his. She put her arms about his neck and her mouth close to his ear. Her breasts, buoyant in the sea water, flattened against his chest.

She whispered in his ear. «Hercules may kiss Diana if he wishes»

«He wishes.»

They clung together, half-floating, half-treading water, their mouths together. «Let's swim out a little farther. There might be someone watching from the cliffs.»

Blade saw no point in this, but did not demur. At the moment he could not have cared less about peepers. His massive body was crammed with lust for her. He towed her along, feeling her sleek wet thighs against his, caressing her sleek tan hide, watching her rosebud nipples turn into pink needles. He swam out another hundred yards, then a hundred more. Neither was in the least winded or tired. She might, he thought, be nearly as good in the water as he was. Blade could swim twenty miles without breathing hard.

«This is far enough,» she breathed. They kissed. She put her hand down into his breech cloth. «Hercules,» she murmured. «Hercules indeed.»

Still holding him in a firm grip, squeezing and stroking, she arched her back and bowed a little away from him. Mischief danced in the narrowed green eyes and in the little smile.

«People have told me that this is impossible. You know-that you can't really do anything underwater.»

He was finished with nonsense. He tugged at the black pants. He said, «People tell you anything. Now, Diana, will you please shut upl»

«You shut me up. Fill me up.»

He closed her lips with his own and she stopped his mouth with her tongue. She kept her eyes tightly closed as she twisted and helped him strip off her pants.

«Don't lose them. I-«

«Be quiet. Too late, anyway. They're gone.»

«I don't care. To hell with them. Where are you, darling?»

Blade thrust stongly between her welcoming thighs. Her hand found and guided him. «Oh, yes. Yes. I thought I had misplaced you. Oh, yes. There. Just there.»

Without taking her mouth from his she gave a little leap and pinioned his waist in her long thighs. Blade slid easily, deeply, into that moist undersea cavern. She locked her ankles behind him, squeezing and tugging with amazing strength. After a moment she bit his ear and whispered, «I want every bit of you. Every bit!»

A minute passed in which they did not speak. Their bodies spoke, and her sighs and Blade's breathing, but no Words came.

Then she said: «I hope you can tread water for both of us, my love. I shan't be much help. Oh, dear God!»

Blade, frantically exploring the long and narrow grotto that clasped him, that was at once victor and captive, longing to surrender, to be subjected, felt himself near to climax.

As was she. She murmured in his ear. «I shan't be long. Not long.»

He somehow managed the words, «Breathe deep,» barely coherent above the tortured rasp of his breathing. She nodded and clung to him in a fast-rushing last frenzy. They sank beneath the pale blue water.

Downward. Slowly. Turning and twisting and drifting. Through liquid luminescence into growing darkness. Her eyes were closed, her hair a trail of brown kelp, her nose and mouth pinched shut and pressed close to Blade's face. Down and down, both shuddering, convulsing, two intertwined coral statues, two drowned and yet living things. And then not two creatures, but one. Fused. Welded. Sharing the volcanic experience.

The floated upward in gentleness, limbs locked. They surfaced and saw the sun with surprise. Nothing had changed. Eternity had lasted less than a minute.

For a minute or two they floated lazily side by side, silent, each content and harboring secret thoughts that would remain secret. Blade held her hand, small and cold, and at last said, «There is always the killjoy, the practical character, who must drag the balloon down to earth; I guess I'm elected. We are.in something of a pickle, Diana. We have lost your pants.»

Somehow he had expected her to laugh. When she did not, when she said nothing, he swirled in the water to see her face better. She was regarding him with languor, her misty eyes still remembering ecstasy. Blade put his cheek against one of her breasts. She stroked his sleek damp head, but after a moment pulled away from him.

«No matter,» she said. «I still have my frock. And my car is.parked in a lane near the cliffs. I'll be all right.»

Blade saw a solution. «I'll go in first and bring your frock out to you. I don't suppose water will ruin it?»

She did smile then, and traced her fingers over his face. «No. I have hundreds of frocks. You're making too much of it. There is something else-l must go. Now. This instant.»

He was not surprised. Had been half expecting it. He glanced at the beach. They were at least a quarter of a mile out.

She read his look «I'll be fine. The distance is nothing.

You you won't try to follow me? To find out who I am-or anything?»

Blade shook his head. «Not anything. The forsaken merman promises. Goodbye, Diana.» He would have had it otherwise, but under the circumstances perhaps it was just as well.

«Goodbye, Hercules. rll never forget you. Or this day.»

Their glances met and lingered. Her eyes were as green as when he first gazed into them, but the glacial ice had melted.

«Neither of us,» Blade said, «is likely to forget this day.»

She kissed him lightly on the mouth, said goodbye again, and was gone.

He floated, treading now and then, watching her slim body cut the water with an expert eight-beat crawl. He scanned the cliff tops and made out a tiny figure wandering along the path. Old Professor Wright. Even at that distance Blade's hawkish vision could make out the cape and the deerstalker hat. Today the old man had a butterfly net with him. After specimens. Blade shook his head and grinned. The Professor was a specimen, no doubt of that, but harmless. He could hardly see beyond the end of his nose. No trouble there.

He saw her leave the water and race to where her dress lay on the sand. She did not look out to sea. Blade began to swim with slow powerful strokes. She was making for the cliff stair now, running easily and with a coltish grace. Blade allowed himself regret. Damn, anywayl It would have been nice, fun, to come to know this lovely stranger. He had been rather at odds with life since he had lost Zoe Cornwall. Apart from his duties, the computer forays into Dimension X, life had been on the bleak side. There were personality changes induced by the restructuring of his brain cells, not all of them for the better, and for a time booze had been a problem. After that it had been women, as he sought, or so J advised him, a surrogate for Zoe. Show girls, barmaids, ladies, and tramps, West End debs and Cockney tarts, Blade had tried them all. None brought him more than temporary surcease. J had voiced concern and alarm and even Lord Leighton, the old rogue, had begun to tch-tch-a bit.

It had ended at last. Since his last trip through the computer Blade had been living in virtual seclusion in the Dorset cottage. Now this girl from nowhere. Gone back into nowhere.

He saw her on the rim of the cliff. She was in silhouette against an apple green sky. She raised a hand and waved once. Blade did not wave back. She lingered for a moment, motionless, and he sensed those green eyes on him. She turned and walked back out of sight.

When he came out of the sea a few minutes later there were only her footprints to prove that it had been no dream, no fantasy. A fantastic experience, but no fantasy. As he went about gathering his things, smoking a cigarette, he again wondered where he had seen her face before this day. He was sure now that he had never met her in person. But he had seen that face. Where?

The path along the cliffs was deserted as he made his way to the cottage. The phone was ringing as he entered and he did not hurry. It would only be J checking on him. Wanting to be assured that all was well. Tomorrow the computer. A journey to hell or paradise.

Blade reached for the strident phone. Between rings he heard, could have sworn he heard, the muffled roar of a high-powered sports car pulling away in low gear.

Blade grinned. He hoped that Diana would go straight home, wherever that was. If not, he hoped she would be very careful how she sat, or bent over. He was still laughing when he picked up the phone.