Dracula of the Apes 3 Read online

  DRACULA OF THE APES

  Book Three: The Curse

  G. Wells Taylor

  Copyright 2014 G. Wells Taylor

  Smashwords Edition

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  Cover Design by G. Wells Taylor

  Edited by Katherine Tomlinson

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  Table of Contents

  Dedication

  African Coast 1912

  Chapter 1 - The Castaways

  Chapter 2 - The Mutiny

  Chapter 3 - Dark Moringa

  Chapter 4 - Better than Steerage

  Chapter 5 - Gazda

  Chapter 6 - Weight of the Crown

  Chapter 7 - Fire and Smoke

  Chapter 8 - Savage Breast

  Chapter 9 - Passion and Pulse

  Chapter 10 - Out of the Black Fog

  Chapter 11 - A Day of Toil

  Chapter 12 - The Winding Trails

  Chapter 13 - Theories and Shadow

  Chapter 14 - Survivor in the Sand

  Chapter 15 - Thief in the Night

  Chapter 16 - Action at Sunrise

  Chapter 17 - By Vine and Branch

  Chapter 18 - Forest Rescue

  Chapter 19 - Huntress and Savior

  Chapter 20 - Jungle Bower

  Chapter 21 - Ship of the Trees

  Chapter 22 - Miss James’ Dilemma

  Chapter 23 - Hunter and Huntress

  Chapter 24 - Salvation of Science

  Chapter 25 - Dark Discovery

  Chapter 26 - Death and Dreams

  Chapter 27 - The End Considered

  Chapter 28 - Signum draconis

  Chapter 29 - Prey in Sight

  Chapter 30 - View of the Kitchen

  Chapter 31 - March to the River

  Chapter 32 - A Mother’s Vigil

  Chapter 33 - When She Rises

  Chapter 34 - Attack

  Chapter 35 - Fire and Death

  Chapter 36 - Nothing but Revenge

  Chapter 37 - Salvation by the Sea

  Chapter 38 - Cast Away

  Chapter 39 - Lords of the Jungle

  Chapter 40 - The Order of Things

  Chapter 41 - The Crew’s Fate

  Sample more Vampires of the Kind in Bent Steeple by G. Wells Taylor

  Other titles by G. Wells Taylor

  Acknowledgments

  About the Author

  Connect with the Author

  Acknowledgments:

  A special thanks to the irreplaceable Katherine Tomlinson who edited these books.

  This trilogy is dedicated to the authors of the classic novels that inspired its creation.

  Bram Stoker

  Dracula

  &

  Edgar Rice Burroughs

  Tarzan of the Apes

  African Coast

  1912

  CHAPTER 1 – The Castaways

  A savage roar rose out of the dense jungle and charged toward the beach like a hungry carnivore after blood. Too terrified to do more than shudder, the seven castaways remained in place in the shadow of their stranded lifeboat, paralyzed by their fear.

  As the last echo died, they returned to the task of unloading cargo and as a group stared wide-eyed into the dense foliage that edged the pale sand and gradually climbed east into the highlands. They had seen the distant mountains before they’d been put ashore.

  A heartbeat later, another feral call sounded from a point much farther south, and all eyes turned to a member of their group, a man of some 50 years of age who was silently studying the treetops with keen scientific interest.

  “What the devil was that?” someone asked in a high-pitched voice.

  The scientist remained silent, his gaze focused on the high branches.

  Beside him young Phillip Holmes hissed in frustration, his pale blue eyes desperately whipping back and forth as he searched the heavy jungle’s leading edge for whatever so captivated his older companion.

  The clean-shaven Holmes was dressed in fashionable tweed Norfolk jacket, matching breeches and knee-high leather boots. A brown derby hat covered short hair of the same color.

  An Englishman in his mid-20s, he had been aboard the S.S. Dunwich which was steaming from London to Cape Town and the captain of that ship had invited him to join him and the Quarrie family for dinner. Young Lilly Quarrie’s charms had kept Holmes near her ever since.

  “It is an ape,” answered Dr. Joseph Van Resen finally, adding a curt nod that caused the thick iron gray curls atop his head to quiver. His rumpled green sack suit had tears in the left shoulder and along the seam of one arm. “Though, I have never heard such a variety of call—which was very strange, I’m sure you will agree. By the volume and power, I suspect it was a large animal—a gorilla most likely.” He spoke with a German accent.

  “Sounded more like a madman. What an awful racket to make!” cried Abigail Quarrie, and her husband, Clive, quickly agreed. The pair were in their mid-60s and barely managing to contain their fright where they clung to each other upon the savage shore.

  Like the other women in the group, Mrs. Quarrie had chosen a tailored suit for travel. Hers consisted of matching blue jacket and skirt set off by a silk scarf and broad-brimmed hat. Her husband wore a black sack coat and embroidered gray vest with brown trousers and shoes.

  He had lost his hat in all the commotion, but would never mourn it. The narrow-brimmed Homburg was a weak imitation of the ten-gallon Stetson he wore back home, and it had only been at his wife’s insistence that he wore the ridiculous thing at all.

  The Quarries hailed from a very dry part of Texas, so the vast Atlantic at their backs did nothing to sooth their nerves.

  “That was an animal?” Virginia James, the Quarrie’s governess, offered with a well-polished drawl. “It sounded human enough to give me goose bumps!”

  Miss James had the formidable task of turning the rambunctious and headstrong teenaged Lilly Quarrie into a lady. It was a full-time position that Virginia had held since the girl was a mere child, and was expected to continue for years to come, especially now that she’d reached her mid-30s and had no reasonable prospects for marriage.

  Her companions thought it a shame for there were no external indications as to why she was headed for the spinster life. Virginia was beautiful, with milk-white skin and long brown hair that she kept tied up under her gray hat, the headgear held in place by a pale scarf that swept over it and was tied under her chin. From boots to collar, her suit was of modest earth tones.

  “Gorillas, like the other apes, share many similarities with men—be they mad or simply English, Miss James,” the scientist said reassuringly. “Of course, it is unlikely that we need to worry. Research on captive specimens suggests they are herbivores—excuse me, plant eaters. However, the science is in its infancy, and few of the creatures have been studied in the wild. Hunters given the task of collecting specimens report that the beasts are capable of great violence when defending their young.” He smiled and then stroked the moustache and goatee that jutted out from his narrow face. “Do not be concerned, my good friends. Apes may be terrifying to behold...” He looked toward Holmes. “But the evidence suggests they would prefer eating apples to a gentleman’s leg.”

  “Suggests?” Holmes blurted, completely unnerved.
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  “Africa is a vast continent,” the scientist explained. “It would be profoundly arrogant for us to presume that Victorian biologists have identified all classes and varieties of anthropoid ape which means the greater mystery will have to be solved by 20th century minds.” He frowned. “We may find a carnivore among them yet...” Then he smiled. “Similar to a species, perhaps, from which our own fine families may have sprung...”

  “Oh, doctor, you’re not starting up on Darwin again,” Mrs. Quarrie interjected weakly. She remembered their conversations aboard the ship and had detested his views.

  “Come dear, we need to find safety,” her husband interrupted, nudging her elbow from behind as he sought the scientist’s eye and his agreement. “Surely this conversation can wait...”

  He was anxious to keep a sense of calm about the proceedings. On this desolate stretch of beach, with such a noise still echoing in their ears, these musings were ridiculous and provocative—but he knew fear goaded his wife on.

  She insisted, “I refuse to believe that we are related to the beasts...whether they bear some comic resemblance to us or not. Christianity tells us...”

  “...much that remains to be seen, Mrs. Quarrie,” the scientist finished her sentence, taking a step toward the thick vegetation that crowded the edge of the beach. “And indeed you might very well see it, for here stands a veritable laboratory for the biological sciences.”

  He bowed toward the forest, sweeping his hands apart, before returning his gaze to his companions. “In this place, we can study the plants and those creatures that consume them such as giraffe and hippopotamus and monkeys, yes, even the ape. As we can also observe the beasts that prey upon those life forms in turn: the lion, the jackal and yes as I have mentioned, perhaps the ape again.”

  “Darn it, doctor!” Clive Quarrie grumbled. With his frustration came a pronounced Texas twang. Additionally, his fleshy face grew red and caused his thick sideburns to gleam the whiter. He could see that his wife was growing more terrified despite her calm demeanor, and her part of the conversation was born of her nervous disposition. “We must find some shelter. The women...”

  “Mr. Quarrie forgive my practical nature, but neither you, I, nor the women will have time for superstition if we are to survive...” Dr. Van Resen took a step toward the others to emphasize his point. “In lieu of fact, doubt is a more welcome replacement for ignorance, and religious certainty has no place here at all.”

  On the water behind them, thick black smoke rose from the steamer’s funnel. The mutineers had killed the officers and honest crewmen of the Lancet, thrown their bodies overboard in the night and commandeered the vessel before sunrise.

  “We must embrace this—our reality—to understand its nature and identify its threats,” Van Resen snapped, crossing the sand to the group as his face darkened and a sad look came over him. He reached out and caught up Mrs. Quarrie’s soft hands.

  “Forgive me, my lady,” he said, and then begged the same of the others. “I am a pragmatic man who is inclined to empirical evidence—a student of Descartes—and so I can seem painfully blunt when my heart is broken. I believe that is why I so miss Captain Seward’s company.”

  Van Resen hung his head. “He did not allow for hopelessness.”

  Captain Theodore Seward had been hired a decade past to guard the Quarries and their small entourage back home in Texas and he had steadfastly fulfilled that duty on their many trips abroad. His companions had joked on their most recent that the retired ranger stood out in the streets of London as though Buffalo Bill himself had ridden into town.

  With his sweeping gray moustache, tall “Stetson” and folksy ways right down to bolo tie, piping on his frontier lapels and the seams of his riding britches, the man drew a crowd whenever he performed his duties in the public eye.

  The captain had suffered the exposure with a dignity that belied his extreme discomfort, so he had been tickled pink to learn that his employer Archibald “Gusher” Quarrie wanted him to accompany his parents Clive and Abigail, daughter Lilly and retinue on a journey that would take them from foggy England to South Africa where Gusher had been engaged with an expedition to discover and secure oil supplies.

  Apparently things had gone well, and the Quarrie patriarch was in the midst of signing contracts with the ruling government that would engage him and his company for several more years in the development of those resources.

  So Gusher wanted his family near.

  And Captain Seward had been only too happy to oblige. The idea of traveling to the Dark Continent and going cheek and jowl against dusky warriors and savage beasts appealed more to him than the “polite” society he had been plunged into while wrangling the Quarries.

  “I like looking my enemies in the eye,” he had said to Dr. Van Resen during their first meeting on the S.S. Dunwich. “Some of these dinners the Quarries go to, hell, it’s gotta be something like Custer felt in the long grass at Little Big Horn.”

  Van Resen had quickly warmed to the big fellow, something he’d soon attributed to their mutual preference for honesty and the truth—painful or not.

  “I like it plain, Doc—same as I enjoy my liquor,” the Texan had said in the salon aboard the Dunwich after his charges had retired for the evening. He and Van Resen had made a habit of meeting late for a nightcap of one sort or another. Captain Seward had brought along several bottles of his favorite, tequila, which Van Resen had immediately regretted sampling.

  They took up this tradition each night aboard the S.S. Dunwich, and continued it when they later changed vessels.

  Captain Seward had originally booked passage to South Africa on the large British steamship, but a wireless message from Gusher was relayed en route that they should transfer from the S.S. Dunwich to another ship at Freetown.

  The plan was for a South African business associate’s private steam yacht the Lancet to meet them there at the end of its long northern journey, and would then be available for their use on the return trip.

  Seward was not one to like surprises, but as he said, “I know who waters my horse,” so with his employer’s permission he had asked his new acquaintance Dr. Van Resen to join them on the faster ship, along with the pasty Holmes fellow who had somehow talked young Lilly into inviting him aboard.

  Neither Seward nor Gusher, his employer, had come up with an effective defense to the cherished youngster’s requests, so she had a habit of getting her way.

  The only other souls on the sleek new ship were the 25 or so that made up the command and crew, and Seward had judged the owner negligent in his hiring practices. He told Van Resen none too quietly that he had deep reservations about the sailors he had seen.

  “They put me in mind of the bandits and riverboat gamblers that I run across in my travels,” he had said. “Who knows what company they keep between jobs, and a rich man’s ship like this Lancet draws the wrong kind of attention, if you ask me. Hell, I done my reading. It wasn’t that long ago that pirate corsairs sailed up and down this here coast.”

  Van Resen had worked to dismiss the big man’s concerns by speaking of the steam yacht’s virtues. Small and powerful, the Lancet had been chosen for her speed, and maneuverability. She could sail much shallower waters than the Dunwich, and if the Texan was concerned about pirates; well, few ships could catch the one they were on.

  Seward was never convinced, and sadly Van Resen was soon to share his new friend’s reservations. Neither of the men was wholly surprised when the “pirates” were exposed to be among the crew.

  “Oh, Theodore...” Van Resen whispered the words huskily, turning to look south along the beach as his companions struggled with their fears.

  Memory of their nightly tradition caused Van Resen’s eyes to water and throat to close like they had when he’d tried the Texan’s favorite drink.

  Captain Seward would have been a great help to them there on the edge of a wild continent. He was resourceful: a marksman, accomplished Indian fighter and totally fearle
ss. In the end, that last quality had proven the castaways’ greatest blessing and had sealed the big Texan’s doom.

  CHAPTER 2 – The Mutiny

  Captain Theodore Seward had appeared to be unconscious or dead at the feet of the mutineers when the scoundrels forced Van Resen, Holmes and the black butler Jacob Raines along with his charges, the elder Quarries, into the lifeboat.

  All of the men looked worse for wear sporting bruises, bloodied noses and torn clothing after losing their recent battle for freedom. Around and under them on the lifeboat were piled bags and wooden crates along with most of their belongings—any of those things that were not made of precious metal or had been judged by their captors to be of little value.

  Distantly, the breakers had roared against the African coast as the mutineers glared down from the deck of the Lancet.

  Those nefarious men were led by a pig-faced little sailor of indeterminate heritage named Mr. Manteau. For reasons Van Resen had not immediately understood, Manteau had said that instead of killing the passengers as they had the officers and loyal crewmen; he would maroon them on the African coast.

  The scientist later suspected the arrangement would allow the wealthy Texans to be used as hostages, either for Manteau to claim a reward for information leading to their recovery or as insurance to buy the mutineers a pardon from the hangman’s noose should they be captured.

  But Manteau had said nothing about keeping the younger women: Lilly Quarrie the blonde-haired beauty of 17, and as fair as any princess, and her governess, the lovely Miss James.

  When that came to light, Manteau had spoken of them as hostages, but when one of the mutineers leered at Lilly, Van Resen and his companions had read the situation as more dire, and they stormed out of the lifeboat to attack the criminals.

  The mutiny had begun the night before when the sound of gunfire in the wheelhouse set Seward going room to room, gathering up his companions and taking them to the elder Quarries’ cabin.