The Sun Is God by Adrian McKinty Page A

know.”
    Will stripped down to his trousers, sat on the chair, put his boots on Kessler’s trunk, and lit a cigar. Kessler sat on the top of his trunk and loosened the top button of his trousers.
    â€œWell, I suppose we’ll find out who’s lying and who’s not when the others get back,” Will said, blowing out a ring of cigar smoke just as the heavens opened and a hard piercing tropical rain began to fall.

8
    FRÄULEIN HERZEN
    K essler set up his camp bed, a clever Deutsches Heer wooden fold-out affair, with its feet embedded in paraffin wax laced with arsenic to keep out the ants and above it a mesh net on a wood frame for the mosquitoes.
    â€œI like your cot,” Will said with a trace of jealousy.
    â€œI will take the hammock if you wish.”
    â€œNo, no. You keep it, Klaus.”
    There were dinging sounds on the roof and when Will pushed open the shutter and looked through the window he saw hail all over the courtyard. He hadn’t seen hail in the tropics before; he didn’t know that such a phenomenon was even possible.
    Kessler laid down on the bed and took a pinch of snuff. He was comfortable but far from happy. Reports on the Cocovores had been sketchy from the beginning and he had never seriously thought that a few eccentrics on an island would ever give him anything to worry about. He already had enough on his plate. As the senior military officer in Herbertshöhe, Kessler not only had to answer to Governor Hahl but was also responsible for a monthly intelligence report to the Abteilung IIIb of the Imperial Intelligence Service in Berlin.
    Kessler had gotten the bulk of his information about August Engelhardt through the impressive cable which had been laid all the way to Deutsch Ostafrika and from there to Europe. Berlin felt that Engelhardt and his cohorts were harmless crackpots and this had been backed up by Kessler’s only local source of intelligence— Frau Forsayth. But she had completely failed to mention that there were three women among the Cocovores and at least two members of the German aristocracy (one of whom, apparently, was a Höhenzollern!). Berlin would certainly not enjoy hearing that and Kessler shuddered at the prospect of having to fill them in.
    Kessler undid the top two buttons of his shirt and sat on the edge of his bed. “I want to ask you something, Will,” he said.
    â€œAsk away,” Will said, eyes wide with expectation.
    Kessler wondered for a moment if he could confide his concerns to the Englishman. He considered it and shook his head sadly. “Do you play chess?” he asked.
    â€œI don’t play as such, but I know how to play if that’s what you’re asking, “ Will replied suspiciously.
    â€œExcellent. Then we shall eat and have a game until the others return.”
    Kessler had brought schnapps, sausage, and pickles, and, forgetting about poor Miss Pullen-Burry, the men ate and drank and played chess until dusk.
    Miss Pullen-Burry was quite happy to be forgotten about. Before even making herself at home in her new accommodation, she had busied herself with putting pen to paper in her journal. If she was not permitted to write about Kabakon she could at least polish the notes she had made on her experiences over the last few days.
    Nothing is more dismal than Herbertshöhe in its present stage. There are malarial swamps in close proximity to the wharf and the place is fever-ridden. The Germans refresh themselves with lager beer, the refugium peccatorum of these parts, for the tropical afternoons inflict one with indescribable thirst. Mrs. Forsayth’s hospitality and generosity of course are boundless but I am not prepossessed in favor of the miscellaneous, miserable specimens of humanity she brings to me for my instruction. This morning one shy youth was brought forward as the picture of a desirable bridegroom. His teeth, which were blackened, betokened that he was desirous of entering