The Measure of Temperance (The Adventures of Ichabod Temperance Book 6) (9 page)

“Poltergeisting”

“Onna tropical Sea.”

“Inna Ghost ship.”

“It’s kinda spooky dont’cha see?”

“Fresh flesh.”

“We’re as hungry as can be.”

“We just keep haunting, on-n-n,”

“ah-wah-awnne.”

…......................

“Never again,”

“Will we ever see dawn’s light.”

“We lost the privilege,”

“And now we don’t have the right.”

“No mirrors aboard,”

“They provide too big a fright.”

“We’re onna a perpetual cruise,”

“Every Caribbean night.”

…............................

“We exist in eternal miseryyyyyy.”

“Though we’re so cooked that we can’t seee”

“Of late Oy’m thinkins it occurs to meeee,”

“What a lo-o-o-o-o-o-ong,”

“Unusual voyage it’s been.”

“Aye, the lads be singing a mournful lament, do they naughtte Ickety?”

“Enh. Kinda lame to my ears.”

“My word, is it just me, or does the ship seem to be spinning?”

“Truly, your observation is correct, Persephone. The drab, gray, colouring of our surroundings has taken on the indistinct stylization of a French impressionist painting.”

“Oye thinks Oye may lose me cookies as Oye succumb to directionless dizziness. Oye can’t be tellin’s up from down nor in from out. With a body like this and inna dress as revealing as this one, this is important information to possess.”

“Are we still here, y’all? Am I speaking inside my head or yelling out loud, I really  can’t tell.”

“Aye, as we all lose connection with one another and drift into a gray teleportational void, I ken only surmise that we are on our way to dark and secret VooDoo Island of San Monique.”

P.O.V. Multiple

“By Sir Raleigh’s Coat, Persephone, you’re alive!”

“I say, yes, Kit, I do think that I am.”

“I can’t tell you how that news pleases me, my dear. If you will look to your left, you will see what I have just awoken to find, that being our little five person rescue party laid out as neat as pins on this forsaken beach. We are still in the dark of night; however, I have no idea what the actual time may be.”

“Indeed, Kit. I do believe our erstwhile companions to be regaining their consciousness as speak. Yoo, hoo-oo-oo, Officer O’Hagan, Mr. Temperance, and Miss Froust, do I see you awakening to enjoy an extension of existence in our very own physical world, eh hem?”

“Ohhh, Oye feels as if Oye’ve been run ovuh by a Fleet Street Coggle wagon, Oye does.”

“Yes, Ma’am, Miss Mimi Ma’am, my head feels like it’s thicker than pitch puddin’ in January.”

“Aye, me skull feels as if it were used as the hammer of a steam pile driver.”

“Say, do you all reckon’ we’ve ended up on the mysterious Island of San Monique?”

“I do feel safe in making that assumption, Temperance, old boy. It is the sense I get from the dark, jungle foliage that towers over our heads, the reflective coloured lights of unknown predator eyes winking at us intermittently from the alien shadows, and the general sense of foreboding whose cold fingers of fear grasp my heart, freezing it with a nameless dread. However, my intuition is confirmed in this suspicion by this island’s central mountain range with its bare rock jutting out high above the tropical forest in a natural formation that so unfortunately and disquietingly resembles an upturned screaming skull. The bonfires burning in the monument’s eye sockets go a great way towards advancing the impression of active and animated life.”

“These here first few streaks of dawn’s approaching early light are helping to illuminate our progress along this rocky beach. Ain’t it something how the jungle overgrowth constantly pushes seaward so that we have to cling to a narrow shoreline? It’s like we’re just barely even on this little ol’ hidden VooDoo island.”

“My word, I think I could very well do without the ubiquitous examples of snakes in the trees over our heads. Yes, quite, I say.”

“Upon my word, Persephone, the low rumble of large feline growls that I occasionally am aware of maintain that, ‘about to be eaten’, sensation that we felt on board the ‘Flying High Dutchman’.”

“Aye, I thaughtte that being ette by skeletal seamen would have been waerse than a wild animal, baughtte somehow, now that eventuality is of equal fright value.”

“Ouoo! Spoidez! Oye hates spoidez, Oye do! Icksi, come keep them away from me!”

“Yes Ma’am, Miss Mimi Ma’am.”

“The sky over the water remains dark, as the sky landward grows more light as the sunrise occurs on the other side of the isle. This helps me to gain me bearings of East, West, North, and South. Hello, what’s this? As I push past this lush tropical jungle palm frond, I allow a view to a cleared section of beach.”

“Lookey there, y’all! There’s a whole passel of little fishing boats!”

“Yes, Mr. Temperance, and if you will look beyond and inland, you will see a small village.”

“Just so, Persephone. Deucedly strange how the quaint little hamlet is deserted, though, I say.”

“Shh! Oye think we woke ’em up! Oye hear the stirrings of voices and movements in the cottages. Oh, Oye’m to be gobbled up boiy ’orrible cannibal natives in dis village of the Damned!”

“Aye! From all around and all at once, a hundred dark- coloured folk appear at every window and door!”

“Sacrebleu! What is this? Do we have visitors?”

“Oui, Jean-Trevour, five delightfully startled white people have stumbled into our little village!”

“Oui, oui! Oh, happy day! Bonjour, bonjour, Messieurs and Mesdemoiselles !”

“Let us make them feel at home, everyone say, ‘bonjour’.”

“Bonjour!”

“My word, how very nice. What a relief it is to be met with such a charming welcome, I say.”

“Ha, ha! What is this? You are English speakers? Ho, ho, I beg your pardon! Everybody say, ‘hello’.”

“Hello!”

“Aye, please tell me, me festive friends, what is the name of this loovely village?”

“You are visiting the humble fishing village of São Vinaigrette!”

“And if ye could joost add in the name o’ this island, eh? Aye, that would be joost grand.”

“We reside upon the unsurpassed jewel of the Caribbean Sea, Monsieur, the Island of San Monique!”

“San Monique!”

“What absolutely divine news you bear my good man, for this
is
our destination. I do admit, Jean-Trevour, that we were unable to locate this tropical paradise in any travel brochure. Nor were we able to find anyone that possessed an iota of information about your lovely isle without some amount of difficulty. Yes, I say. Tell me kind sir, could you fill in a bit of your island’s history please? Eh, hem?”

“Oui, but of course, pretty young British girl. This Caribbean isle was originally discovered by a Portuguese armada of conquest in 1547. Several attempts at settlements ended in horror and mystery. Few of the settlers survived the ordeal. They were not prepared to contend with the magical elements of this island. In 1660, the French ship, ‘Bon Homme Atticus’, established a colony here. The
‘Horned Plateau’
that rests between the mountain ranges proved to be a fertile ground for the growing of sugar cane. Slaves from the wild and unchartered continent of Africa brought my forebears to this place. My people’s disposition towards this island’s unusual spirituality more easily adapted to the rigors of living in a place that is in constant struggle between the light and the dark. The overseers abandoned the island to us. The people of San Monique have learned to maintain a balance between these opposing forces. For almost two hundred years, ancient spells intoned by our ancestors have kept this island hidden and safe from the rest of the world. Eight years ago, our earth was visited by the
‘Revelatory Comet’
, oui? Well, it seems that a member of our island’s populace was affected by the passing of the aethereal fireworks. This is a terrible and mean man! He foolishly pursues the dark and evil side of VooDoo practice instead of the good. He has raised the resting dead of this island from their rightful slumber. He entrances the living to do his bidding as well. His power is such that he was able to lift the island’s protective curtain of spells. Utilizing his VooDoo might, this terrible man reached out with his mind to trick an unwary passing ship to dock at the old, abandoned Portuguese port. The ship and crew were captured and fell under his hypnotic spell. The VooDoo mystic was able to leave the island and to spread his odious evil. San Monique remained under his control, even in his absence. We know too, that he has just recently returned.”

“Jolly good, for you see my good fellow, this particular resident of some infamy to which you refer is exactly the chap we are here to see. I am quite certain of it. We wish to speak with, a Monsieur Sku Le’Bizarre.”

“Ah-hahahahahaha!”

“Ah-hahahahahaha!”

“Ha, ha! That is a very funny thing to say, monsieur! I think you make a mistake my handsome, black-haired, white-man, friend. That is, unless you wish to be eaten by that awful man, ha, ha, ha!”

“Ha, ha, ha!”

“Or devoured by his legions of walking corpses, ho, ho, ho!”

“Ho, ho, ho!”

“Or to be turned to one of these cannibal zombies, hee, hee, hee!”

“Hee, hee, hee!”

“I say, my word, eh, hem, I assure you, none of those options are among our desired intent, rather, we are committed to freeing our friends from this fiend’s malicious grip and to thwart what I believe to be a disastrous plot with planetary implications. The fulfillment of this evil mystic’s machinations menace all Mankind.”

“This terrible man has been absent from our island for many months. Life has been relatively serene here in his absence, but now Sku Le’Bizarre has returned to San Monique! If you are here to confront the monster that lives in man form, then I wish you good luck, Mademoiselle! You’re going to need it! Oui!

“Oui!”

“Howdy, y’all, my name’s Ichabod.”

“Bonjour, Ichabod!”

“Woah, uh, thanks, you all. Say, we ain’t too familiar with y’all’s little tropical paradise down here. Could you clue us in on a few geographic details?”

“Oui, of course, Monsieur Ixxi-o-bod. I will brush a place here in the sandy dirt clear and flat. With this stick I will draw a hasty map for you. I will start here at the southern coast. This blunt point extends northward in diagonal lines both East and West. They then both cut sharply back inward. This gives the basic shape of our island’s mainland, that is, thin at the bottom and wide at the top but with a slight, inland dip gently sweeping across the Northern coast. It is here, at the North end of San Monique, that we have a most curious aspect to this island’s geography, oui? Two strangely symmetrical, bare rock archipelagos extend up and out to the East and West, ending in rocky points.”

“Oh, wring me knickers, would’ja looks at dat?! The narrow bottom looks loike the snout of an animal. The way it stretches out woide at the tops confirms the impression of a loivestock creature. Adding in the out-turned extensions on top is wot foinally grants this ’orrible oisland its distinctly disturbing shape. The out-croppin’s appear as two great hornnes stickin’s out, makin’s the shape of the oisland to be in the uncanny formation of a goat’s head! Oh, that creeps me so that I feel as if the entire Coldstream Guard just marched ovuh me grave!”

“Oh yeah, you’re right about that, Carnivalle dress lady! Ah-hahahahahaha!”

“Ah-hahahahahahaha!”

“The shape of this island is pretty creepy, ha, ha, ha!”

“Ha, ha, ha!”

“Where on the island does this ol’ Sku Le’Bizarre live?”

“Thankfully, not on this side, ho, ho, ho!”

“Ho, ho, ho!”

“How’s about showin’ us on this here goats head lookin’ map you’ve drawn in the dirt, Jean-Trevour, sir?”

“Oui, of course, Ixxi-o-bod. Our little village is here, on the south-west coast, or goat’s jowl, if you will, hee, hee, hee!”

“Hee, hee, hee!”

“A towering mountain range dominates the geography anywhere you go on the island. This range begins with the awe-inspiring vision of Lady De’athspelle, for it is her legendary features you see jutting from the mountain peak above our heads. The mountains extend northward in two ranges, each to eventually end in the horns at the top of our island goat head. The Western range is sharply ridged with jagged peaks. The most prominent of these are named Mounts Tormentia, Agonia, and Miseriaiaia. The Eastern range is fully made up of jumbled rocks. These impassable piles amount to mountains in their own right. That is of course, except for the Queen.”

“Oh, I say! Royalty! How very good. That then shall be our destination. I merely need to speak with your head of state and I am sure I can sort out this whole sordid affair, eh hem?”

“She is not that kind of Queen, Mademoiselle, ha, ha, ha!”

“Ha, ha, ha!”

“Pray, enlighten me.”

“She is our Queen Tempestia! Our volcano! This is a volcanic isle, Mademoiselle. It was our Queen Tempestia that formed this island. San Monique’s Eastern goat horn extends from her northern flank.”

“I say, old chap, are there many villages on this side of the island?”

“No, Monsieur grande handsome face, not many, but there are two of some note. The first is the very old city of Le Seggheweighe. It is a happy town, oui?”

“Oui!”

“Oh, jolly good, and you may call me Kit, old bean.”

“Oh! Merci, Kit OldBean!”

“Merci, Kit OldBean!”

“Ha, ha! Jolly good! Well then, about this other city that you deem worthy of our knowledge?”

“Ho, ho! That would be San Monique’s one true seaport, Monsieur Kit OldBean, São Cochon.”

“Is it as happy a place as São
Vinaigrette is, and La Seggheweighe purported?”

“São Cochon a happy place? Ah-hahahahahaha!”

“Ah-hahahahahaha!”

“No no, Monsieur, there is no happiness in the port of São Cochon, or ‘Cockaroach’, if you will. The port is only used by Sku Le’Bizarre. He has a ship that is manned by semi-zombies. They are alive, but enthralled in a VooDoo spell by the mystique, Sku Le’Bizarre. His zombie hordes of the dead work the docks and transport involved with rum logistics.”

“Aye, so where is our loovely Sku Le’Bizzarre residing?”

“He lives in a plantation house, mon. This is in the nook of the goat head horns at the northern central plain of the island. This house is in the middle of a sugar cane field. His zombie walkers run his rum factory, churning out a fortune in brown liqueur with little to nothing in manufacturing costs.”

“Jolly good, old chap, how very valuable this information is to our plans, I cannot say. Now, if you could just see to directing us on our way to this fellow’s house, we would be eternally grateful, old sport.”