Hurricane Gold Read Free Page A

eyes! Are you going to let him get away with this? We’re all prisoners here. We might just as well be in Alcatraz or San Quentin. He’s bleeding us dry. He takes our money and then what? Ask him. Ask him what happens when your money runs out. Go on, ask him …’
    ‘Carry on, please,’ said El Huracán. ‘There are more of my pets who are just dying to meet you.’
    King spat, as much to show his contempt for El Huracán as to clear the foul water from his mouth.
    ‘What if I just stay here?’ he said bitterly. ‘I don’t reckon your three stooges are gonna want to follow me through there.’
    ‘By all means stay if you like,’ said El Huracán, and he laughed. ‘Perhaps I can make it more comfortable for you?’
    King, who was still standing in about 6 inches of water, suddenly sensed a movement beneath his feet and something punched upward from the stone floor. He cried out and jumped backwards. A spike had stabbed the sole of his left shoe and gone right through it into his foot.
    He hopped and staggered along the alleyway as rusty steel spikes began to shoot up all over the floor. He saw that it was studded with small holes and there was no way of knowing where the next spike would emerge.
    The crowd of men following his progress found this hugely entertaining. They whistled and roared and screamed with laughter, forgetting that less than an hour ago King had been one of them.
    King had to keep moving now or risk being stabbed again. As he stumbled along he left a trail of blood and water behind him.
    Muttering cursses under his breath, he tried to outrun the spikes, ignoring the pain that jolted up through his leg every time he put his injured foot down.
    One spike grazed his ankle and another snagged his trousers; a third one went through the front of his right shoe. Miraculously, though, it somehow slid between his toes and caused no damage.
    ‘Go on, King, you can do it,’ someone shouted. ‘You’re nearly there.’
    There were more cheers of encouragement from above. King knew that they didn’t care about him at all; they just cared about their bets. Not one of them would have bet on him going down this early, but it was plain that if he fell over now, one of the spikes could kill him.
    He made it to the end of that stretch of the run and was now faced by what appeared to be a solid wall. He looked wildly around, hearing more spikes slicing up through the stones with the sound of knives being sharpened.
    At last he spotted a narrow gap along the bottom of the wall, just wide enough to squeeze through. He threw himself on his belly, at any moment expecting to feel one of the spikes drive into him.
    He wriggled forward unable to see what was ahead of him. His hand touched something. It felt like dry twigs, but as he brushed them aside, he felt a nasty sting in his wrist.
    From above, the watching men could see that King now had to get through a chamber filled with scorpions. He would have to crawl all the way, as horizontal steel bars prevented him from standing up.
    The watchers followed King as he wriggled along, every now and then his body jerking as one of the scorpions got him with its tail. He would twist away each time, only to put himself within range of another insect. Then he would squirm and writhe in the opposite direction.
    ‘Ek Chuah,’ said El Huracán, ‘the Mayan scorpion god.’
    King screamed. One of the insects had got him in the cheek. He could feel his whole face swelling up. He moved more quickly. The nasty little bugs skittered and rattled around as he roared at them and vainly tried to protect himself from their stings.
    The exit was only a few feet away. He concentrated on it, trying not to think about the terrible pain he was in.
    He had been bitten in the heel and the belly, stabbed in the foot and now stung all over.
    What next?
    He soon found out. At the end of the scorpion chamber he was faced with a drop. He didn’t hesitate. He just wanted to get out of there fast.