第74节

ng confines

of a sanitised, sparkling-blue pool and within easy reach of the

edge.

He was confident he had the strength to reach the islands but he was

not overjoyed at the prospect of having to traverse such a huge stretch

of open, and possibly hostile, water.

As a precaution, Steve had prepared buoyancy bags using four large

deerskin pouches borrowed from members of the posse. The inflated bags

were primarily to support a light frame-work of branches on which he

had tied a fully-loaded air rifle, a machete, and his combat knife. He

had debated whether to take his quarterstaff and decided to leave it

behind. It 'was a lethal weapon but it would be of no use if he could

not get within range. If the three remaining mexicans were on the

ball, they could drop him with a single volley at seventy-five yards

and more than twice that distance if their rifles were fitted with

infra-red night scopes.

Finding a satisfactory spot, he stripped down to his underpants - the

only item of Tracker clothing he had re. tained - and donned the

sleeveless flotation jacket that the helmsman had been wearing. He

exchanged the traditional hand slap with his escort then slipped

quietly into the water, pushing the bag-raft ahead of him. To break up

its outline, he had covered it with leafy twigs.

The water was cold, but not unbearably so. He tried not to think about

the dreadful nameless things that might be lurking beneath the

surface.

A couple of hundred yards out from the shore, when something slimy

brushed across his belly, he began to think that the Mute's decision to

stay on dry land wasn't so stupid after all.

At the halfway point, after several brushes with the unseen denizens of

the lake, Steve was relieved to find he was still in one piece. Having

overcome the wave of panic generated by the first unwelcome contacts

and the inevitable nightmare visions of needle-sharp teeth gnawing at

his dong, he proceeded with growing confidence, his mind now

concentrated on the task that awaited him once he reached dry ground.

The second half-mile seemed shorter than the first. As he drew closer,

the broken clouds drifted further apart, uncovering more of the

star-studded sky. The islands of which there were five - were no more

than rocky islets on which stunted trees and scrub had gained a

tenacious toe-hold. The two nearest Steve were giant, steep-sided

chunks of stone with virtually no cover and, of the others, only one

measured more than fifty yards across.

In the distant past, even before what the Mutes'called the Old Time,

subterranean earth movements had forced the rocky bed of the lake to

bulge upwards and peak above the present water level. Subsequent

faulting had exposed striated layers of rock, like a pack of ice cream

wafers that had been snapped in two, and several thousand years of wind

and rain had smoothed off the rough edges.

Steve paddled silently towards the largest islet, No lights pierced the

dark. Everything was deathly still; the only sounds his own breathing

and the light slip-slap of water rippling against the flank of the

rocks ahead which rose sheer out of the water to a height of four or

five feet.

Towing the bag-raft behind him, Steve used his free hand to haul

himself sideways around the islet, looking for a suitable place to come

ashore.

Given the fact that the Mutes could not swim and would not cross deep

water, the islet made an ideal refuge. Steve found it hard to

understand why the mexicans had chosen to camp overnight on the shore

instead of crossing directly to the islet. The only explanation he

could think of was that they had reached the lake during the evening

and had been reluctant to make the boat trip at night. He, himself,

had adapted with remarkable ease to overground conditions; a fact which

led him to forget that the majority of Trackers were extremely nervous

of the dark - and that included most wingmen and mexicans. And very

few would have dared swim the lake - even in daylight.