“You’re a member of the Guild?” Lew blurted, taking the proffered member.
“Sure. You don’t think we’re letting scabs work down here in Byrdland, I hope.”
“You mean the business with the bear—and the spear—the whole thing was just a skit?”
“Hardly a skit, Jantry. An important human document, delineating the plight of the haughty Kabloona when plummeted into the harsh Antarctic environment to which he has driven the patient Eskimo.”
“That sounds like Hugo Fleischpultzer. And when did the white man ever drive the Eskimo into a harsh environment?”
“About fifty thousand years ago. Didn’t you ever view any anthropology on educational TV?”
“Is that why you tried to stick me with that bloody great harpoon?”
“Stick you? Are you kidding? I tossed it a good quarter inch wild.”
“And what about the bear? He wasn’t kidding!”
“Yeah—too bad about that. Busted wide open. One of Hugo’s ideas. It was a mech, you know. We got no live ones around, except a couple in the zoo. Too hot for ’em, since the big melt.”
“Hot? Out there in all that ice?”
“What ice? Project Defrost cleared all that away years ago. But tourists come all this way to see Eskimos in their native habitat, they want to see snow. So—snow they get. Plastic snow, like this igloo.”
“A plastic igloo?”
“Sure. It’s part of the Native Village. A big grosser.”
“But—why a mechanical bear?”
“The bear houses the number two aux camera. It shoots through the mouth. I was remoting it from the ridge. Got some swell shots of the clobber-in, then tried to dolly in for some CU’s of you encountering the savage natives—that’s me—”
“How did you know where I was going to crash?”
“Think I can’t read a script? I was out there a good hour early, picking my camera angles. I got to hand it to you. You made it look good, Jantry. I was surprised to see you walk away from it.”
“I made it look good?” Lew yelped. “Are you kidding? That thing was on full automatic the whole time—” He broke off. “Hugo planned it that way! He programmed the heli to crash—with me in it—”
“So? It figures. But it worked out OK. I got the death scene in the can. Great footage.”
“Death scene?”
“Sure. I try to save you with my trusty spear, but the bear gets the both of us. It’s the Noble Savage Gives Life for Paleface bit; wows ’em in the sticks.”
“But—I came here to make a ninety-hour documentary on the colorful natives! Why kill me off in the opening sequence?” Lew broke off as a man in a gray coverall appeared on all fours in the entry tunnel, pushing a briefcase ahead of him.
“Thanks for sitting in for me, Charlie,” he said to the Eskimo. “If you’ll excuse us now, I’d like a word in private with Mr. Jantry.”
“Sure.” Charlie left. The newcomer rose, dusted his knees, showed Lew a small gold badge pinned inside his lapel.
“I’m Clabbinger, CIA,” he said. “I can understand your confusion, Jantry. Of course the business of a role was merely a cover story enabling us to spirit you out of the States without attracting attention.”
“Huh?” Lew said.
“Your true destination is the South Pacific Nature Reserve; place called the Cannibal Islands,” the CIA man said crisply. “And it’s not a play, Jantry. It’s for real.”
3
Lew stood on the deck of the LSP, shivering in a scanty sarong.
“The whole thing is illegal,” he complained for the seventy-third time to Clabbinger, who stood impassively beside him, looking out through the pre-dawn mist toward the distant sound of surf. “I see now it was a put-up job from the beginning: me getting fired, the phony documentary—and now this! Threatening to blackball me in the industry if I don’t sign a paper saying I volunteered!”
“It’s your patriotic duty,” the CIA man said calmly. “We know something’s going on inside the Reserve. Naturally, we can’t just blunder in and demand to search the entire archipelago.”
“Why not?”
“Policy,” Clabbinger said tersely. “Now, as I said, someone—no doubt in the service of a Certain Power—”
“You mean Russia?”
“Please let’s keep it impersonal. Now these Russians—I mean this Certain Power has infiltrated the Reserve in defiance of solemn international commitments, and has set up some sort of secret installation—”
“How do we know that?”
“Our intrepid undercover men on the island reported it. Now, just what they’re up to, we don’t know. That’s your job, Jantry: to tell us.”
“Why do they want to make a Reserve out of these god-forsaken islands anyway?” Lew burst out. “If it wasn’t for that, there wouldn’t be any place for the, uh, Certain Power to set up secret installations in!”
“Opening the islands would destroy a cultural museum that can never be duplicated,” Clabbinger said indignantly. “This is the only spot on Earth where cannibalism and headhunting still flourish, uncontaminated by automation. And the diseases—why, if we let antibiotics in, hundreds of unique organisms would be rendered extinct overnight!”
“Why don’t you send a regular agent into this pest-hole?” Lew demanded. “Why me?”
“We need an accomplished actor to carry this off, Jantry. An ordinary agent would be incapable of passing himself off as a long-lost tribe member returning home after having been carried out to sea at the age of four in a paddleless canoe. He’d be caught and tortured to death in a most gruesome fashion.”
“Swell,” Lew groaned. “I either go and get roasted in my sarong, or refuse and never work again.”
“Still—if you survive, I personally assure you you’ll find your contract at Void Productions renewed for a long term at a substantial increase.”
“What good’s a substantial increase, with ninety-five percent going for taxes?” Lew inquired gloomily.
“Prestige,” Clabbinger pointed out. “And if it weren’t for the tax level, corporations wouldn’t allocate the large tax-exempt advertising budgets needed to support over three hundred major TV networks with round-the-clock programming, nor would we enjoy the enlightened legislation that provides every citizen with a subsistence allowance, plus leisure time to view—and thus you’d be out of work.”
“All right,” Lew snarled. “I guess you’ve got me boxed—but these damned shark’s-teeth earplugs hurt like hell!”
“Ah, that sounds a little more like Daredevil Jack, star of the show of the same name!” Clabbinger clapped Lew heartily on the back. “I’ll confide that I always admired you in that one.”
“I hated it,” Lew said. “I was always afraid of the rest of the cast, they talked so tough.”
A man had come up beside the G-man. “Half a mile offshore,” he muttered. “This is as far as I can go without tripping the detectors.”
“Well, Lew, this is it,” Clabbinger said sternly, shaking the actor’s hand. “Remember: as soon as you’ve located the site and beamed me the coordinates, get out fast. We’ll drop a megatonner right down their stack six minutes later, and let them complain to the UN!”
“Just don’t forget to have that sub standing by in case I come paddling out from shore in a hell of a hurry,” Lew said bitterly.
* * *
Three minutes later, squatting in the outrigger canoe, he was gliding toward the palm-fringed shoreline ahead. The surf, though noisy, was not excessively high. He rode a long swell in, grounded on a sandy beach. He sprang from the boat listening alertly for any indication that his approach had been observed. Stealthily, he moved toward the shelter of the trees. Ten feet from his goal, a beam of dazzling white light speared out from the darkness to catch him full in the eyes. Blinded, he stumbled back, heard the quick rasp of feet—
A bomb exploded in his skull. He was dimly aware of falling, of being roughly rolled on his back.
“Nuts,” a hoarse voice grated. “It’s just another lousy native. Shoot the bum and let’s get back to work.”
“Wait!” Another, more guttural voice spoke up. “Don’t shoot dog of native. Noise might bring unwelcome attention. Instead, tie up and dump out of way someplace.”
Lew struggled feebly as hard hands threw multiple loops of hemp around his wrists and ankles, jammed a wad of oily cloth in his mouth. A man caught his shoulder, another his feet; they carried him well up into the jungle and dropped him into a clump of palmetto. Feet crashed through the underbrush, receding. Silence fell.
The night breeze stirred the fronds above Lew. Mosquitoes whined about his ears. He struggled onto his back, spitting leaf mold past the crude gag. Abruptly, something buzzed sharply, back of his right ear. Lew stiffened, awaiting the bite of the deadly snake—
“Hello?” a tinny voice said. “Clabbinger to special agent LJ. Good work, boy! My instruments indicate you’ve penetrated the beach and are now behind the enemy lines. However, I note you’re lying doggo. Let’s not be too cautious. Remember Daredevil Jack! Play this one the way he would. Go get’em, tiger! We’re rooting for you! Clabbinger out.”