The Adventures Of Indiana Jones (34 page)

She stuffed a few more grapes in her mouth and smiled at him, standing there like a busboy in the doorway.
If driving fast cars you like, If low bars you like, If old hymns you like, If bare limbs you like . . . She rolled up her sleeves and peeled a banana. If Mae West you like, Or me undressed you like, Why, nobody will oppose . . .

He smiled back at her. The desperate girl. She obviously wanted him badly. Well, he didn’t mind. She had what it took, and he certainly wouldn’t refuse a little pick-me-up. He inched a step toward her.

“You’re a nice man,” she purred. “You could be my palace slave.”

In fact, she’d been looking better each day. Gave him that old funny flutter to watch her now. “You wearing your jewels to bed, princess?”

“Yeah, and nothing else,” she countered. “That shock you?” Anything goes.

“No.” He moved up to her. “Nothing shocks me. I’m a scientist.” He took the apple from her, chomped down on a mouthful.

“So,” she said, “as a scientist, do you do a lot of research?”

“Always,” he intimated.

“Oh, you mean like what kind of cream I put on my face at night, what position I like to sleep in, how I look in the morning?” This was getting kind of randy; she hoped he made his move soon.

Indy nodded as if he’d heard her thoughts. “Mating customs.”

“Love rituals.”

“Primitive sexual practices.”

“So you’re an authority in that area,” she concluded, untying his tie. He was looking better all the time.

“Years of fieldwork,” he admitted. Love in the tropics.

They kissed. Long, soft; controlled, but picking up speed.

They came up for air. “I don’t blame you for being sore at me,” she half-apologized. “I can be a real handful.”

“I’ve had worse,” he replied with
noblesse oblige.

“You’ll never have better,” she promised.

“I don’t know,” he smirked, starting to close her door behind him. “As a scientist I hate to prejudice my experiment. I’ll let you know in the morning.”

Experiment!
she thought, turning livid.
Like I’m his performing rat or something!
“What!” she hissed. She would be a lover, with pleasure; she would not be a conquest.

She opened the door he’d just shut. “Why, you conceited ape! I’m not that easy.”

“Neither am I,” he said, puzzled, then riled. “The trouble with you, Willie, is you’re too used to getting your own way.” He stalked out, to his own door across the hall.

“You’re just too proud to admit you’re crazy about me, Dr. Jones.”
That
was
really
his problem: he had to be in control all the time, and being passionately in love with her made him feel too vulnerable, too much at her mercy. Well, she would show mercy—if he acted more like a gent.

“Willie, if you want me, you know where to find me.” He stood in the doorway to his suite, trying to sound cool. She’d be around, soon enough.

“Five minutes,” she predicted. “You’ll be back here in five minutes.” He wanted her more than he cared to admit; that was clear. He wouldn’t last long in that state, poor boy.

Indy made a big show of yawning. “Sweetheart, I’ll be
asleep
in five minutes.” He closed the door.

“Five minutes,” she repeated. “You know it, and I know it.”

Indy opened his door a crack and peeped out, then closed it again. Willie slammed hers like the last word.

Indy stood in his room, leaning with his back against the door. No footfalls outside; no apologies forthcoming. Well, the hell with it. He walked over to his bed and sat down. Really steamed, and with good reason.

Willie marched away from her door, sat on the bed. She sank into the down mattress, muttering grimly. He’d be back. He wasn’t all that smart, but he was a man—and she was a lot of woman. She picked up the clock by the bed and challenged it: “Five minutes.” She took off her robe.

Indy took off his jacket. He glowered at the bedside clock. “Four and a half minutes,” he grunted. Ridiculous. She was a ridiculous woman, this was a ridiculous palace, they were in a ridiculous situation, and he felt simply . . . put-upon.

Willie paced around her lavish suite. She blew out candles, turned down lamps, paused in front of the full-length mirror, began to primp. Her hair was really kind of a mess in all this dampness; could that have been the problem? She wished he hadn’t stormed out
quite
so abruptly. But he’d be back.

Indy looked in his bureau mirror. So what was wrong with how he looked? Nothing, that’s what. Of course she was a handsome woman, there was no denying that—but that was no reason to expect him to come groveling.

He walked over and tucked Shorty in on the couch. Ah, to be twelve again. Along the wall there were full-scale portraits of Rajput princes on prancing horses, palace landscapes, dancing girls. Dancing girls. Dancing girls.

Willie reclined on her four-poster bed, assuming various seductive poses. Periodically, she would look up, sweetly surprised at her contrite, imaginary visitor: “Why, Dr. Jones . . .” or, “Oh, Indiana . . .”

Her bedside clock said 10:18.

Indy lay on his bed, staring at the ceiling. How was he supposed to go to sleep now? Did she think he was made of steel? Could any man stand this kind of torture?

His bedside clock said 10:21.

Willie grabbed her clock, put it to her ear, shook it to see if it was working. Tick, tock, tick. She tapped her lingers irritably on the bedpost. Could her charms have failed? Was she losing her touch? How could he not be scratching at her door by now? How could he not?

Indy wanted to get up, but he refused to get up. The clock ticked beside him. He could wait her out; archaeology had trained him in the waiting game. Sooner or later she’d break down, give in, come around, hurry over. He just hoped it was sooner.

He looked toward the door. “Willie!” He smiled. The door remained closed. He tried a different voice. “Willie?” No. He tried nonchalance. “Willie. Oh, hi.”

The door remained closed. Short Round kept sleeping.

In her room, Willie was trying new poses, new greetings. “Jones. Dr. Jones. Why, Indiana, hello.”

Indiana’s clock read 10:35. He smashed it to the floor and began to pace.

Willie slid to the foot of her bed, stretched out along the satin coverlet, arms akimbo. She slid off the end of the bed to the floor.

Indy paced back and forth along his row of wall paintings of princes, prancing horses, and dancing girls.

Willie paced back and forth along her row of wall paintings, muttering. “Nocturnal activities, crap! Primitive sexual practices! ‘I’ll tell you in the morning.’ ”

Indy began muttering too, in his truncated promenade. “Palace slave. I’m a conceited ape. Five minutes.”

Willie stopped pacing. She stared at herself in the mirror, dumbfounded, frustrated, bewildered. “I can’t believe it: he’s not coming.”

Indy stopped pacing, stared into space. “I can’t believe it: she’s not coming. I can’t believe it: I’m not going.”

From behind the last wall painting stepped a darkly clothed guard, who slipped a strangling cord around Indiana’s neck.

Jones managed to get a few fingers around the garrote, but even so, he could feel his larynx nearly crushed within a matter of seconds. Gasping futilely for air, he sank slowly to his knees. His eyes bulged as he stared at the tiny, smiling skulls on the ends of the death-cord clutched in the assassin’s fists. With a last, lunging effort, Indiana bent forward sharply: the guard spilled over his back onto the floor.

The guard pulled a knife, but Indiana smashed him in the head with a pot; the dagger clattered to the ground. Short Round began to stir. Indy heard something in the hall and looked up at the door. The guard jumped him again.

In the hall, Willie stood shouting at Indiana’s closed door. “This is one night you’ll never forget! It’s the night I slipped right through your fingers! Sleep tight, Dr. Jones. Pleasant dreams. I could’ve been your greatest adventure.”

Indy flipped back over the guard; the two of them tumbled across the tiles. Short Round woke up with a start. As Indy stood shakily, Shorty grabbed the whip, tossed it over. Indy caught it.

He whipped the assassin’s arm, but the man unleashed himself and ran toward the door. Indy lashed out again, this time catching the guard around the neck. The thug yanked on it; the handle flew out of Indy’s hand, up to the ceiling fan.

The whip twisted around the revolving blades like fishing line around a reel. And like a doomed flounder, the assassin was slowly dragged toward the ceiling. His toes lifted off the marble floor. He let out a short, choked scream . . . His legs twitched . . . and he was hanged.

“Shorty, turn off the fan!” Indy shouted. “I’m gonna check Willie.”

Shorty hit the wall switch; the fan stopped as Indy ran from the room.

He burst into Willie’s suite, wild-eyed.

She lay on the bed, heart a-flutter. “Oh, Indy.” He’d come after all. Sweet man. Maybe he just didn’t know how to tell time.

He dove onto the bed.

“Be gentle with me,” she whispered.

He scrambled across the bed, looked underneath it. Empty. He got up and began a furious search of the room.

“I’m
here”
Willie called.

Indy continued his frantic examination. Willie drew aside the bed curtains. His eyes had doubtless misted with love: he wasn’t seeing clearly.

Indy walked around the end of the bed, stood in front of the doors. “Nobody here,” he muttered.

“No, I’m here,” cooed Willie, drawing the last curtain.

Indy moved over to the mirror. Willie jumped off the bed and followed him. He felt a draft by the vase of flowers, coming from somewhere over to the left. The assassin had entered through a secret passage in his room; there had to be one in this chamber as well.

He walked over to a pillar. The draft was stronger here.

Willie still followed him. “Indy, you’re acting awfully strange.”

Indy looked at the pillar: a naked dancing-girl was carved into the stone. He began feeling around the carving’s protuberances: shoes, baubles, hips, breasts.

Willie thought this was
exceedingly
strange. “Hey, I’m right
here.”

The lever was in the breasts. Suddenly the entire pillar disappeared into the wall with a grinding creak, forming an entranceway into a tunnel.

Indy walked in. He struck a match, read the inscription on the wall: “ ‘Follow in the footsteps of Shiva.’ ”

“What does that mean?” whispered Willie excitedly. She was right behind him now.

“ ‘Do not betray . . .’ ” He stopped, removed the small fragment of ancient cloth from his pocket, compared it with the inscription on the wall.

Shorty appeared in the doorway now, and approached the niche.

Indy read the Sanskrit on the piece of cloth. “ ‘Do not betray his truth.’ ” He turned to the boy. “Shorty, get our stuff.”

Short Round ran back to the bedroom as Indy turned into the tunnel.

“
W
HAT
’
S DOWN THERE
?” quaked Willie.

“That’s what I’m going to find out. You wait here. If we’re not back in an hour, I want you to wake Captain Blumburtt and come after us.”

She nodded. Short Round returned with Indy’s bag, whip, and hat, and the two of them started down the secret passage.

Shorty led the way around the first corner, to make sure it was safe for Indy. The shadows looked pretty ominous, though. “Dr. Jones, I don’t think we supposed to be here.”

Indy grabbed him by the collar, planted him to the rear. “Stay behind me, Short Round. Step where I step. And don’t touch anything.”

As Indy moved forward, however, Short Round noticed a door off to the side, a door Indy had missed. Short Round put his hand on the knob and pulled: the door collapsed: two skeletons fell forward on top of him.

Shorty yelled, sitting down hard. He’d seen these guys before—in
The Mummy.
He thought he’d made it quite clear then, to Whoever was in charge, that he never wanted to run into anyone in this condition, especially not in a dark tunnel. Someone must be trying to teach him a lesson.

Indy pulled him erect, half-carried him around the next turn. A hollow wind sprang up here, blowing flayed skins in their faces—human skins, they looked like.

Short Round drew his knife. “I step where you step. I touch nothing.”

More skins flapped in their faces. Shorty broke into a voluble string of Chinese prayers, epithets, and warnings about ghosts. More like
The Invisible Man,
here: tattered coverings falling away from an empty presence. Shorty was glad he’d seen such creatures before, so he wouldn’t be undone now.

“Relax, kid.” Indy smiled grimly. “They’re just trying to scare us.”

They kept walking. The tunnel was stone—cool, moist, solid. The farther they went, the more it seemed to twist downwards into the earth, and the darker it got.

Soon it became too black to see.

“All right, it all gets dark now,” said Indy. “Stick close.”

A few more paces, and Shorty felt something crunchy underfoot. “I step on something,” he whispered.

“Yeah, there’s something on the ground.”

“Feel like I step on fortune cookies.”

“Not fortune cookies.” Indy shook his head. It was moving, whatever it was. He struck a match; they looked around. Before them was a wall with two holes in it. Out of one of the holes exuded an effluent of gooey mung, and millions of squirming, wriggling bugs. The bugs poured out onto the floor, covering it completely: a living carpet of shiny beetles, scurrying roaches, wriggling larvae.

Short Round looked down to see a few of them start to crawl up his leg. “That no cookie.” He winced.

Indy brushed the bugs off. At the same moment, the match he was holding burned down to his fingertip and went out. “Ow! Go!” he shouted, pushing his small friend ahead of him. They ran quickly, dashing directly into the next chamber.

Just past the threshold, Shorty stepped on a small button in the floor. This triggered the mechanism that started a great stone door rolling shut behind them.