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                         Transcriber's Note:

    This etext was produced from Weird Tales October 1936. Extensive
    research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S. copyright on
    this publication was renewed. [Illustration: "One hand closed on his thin neck, and the other, a
                    rock-like fist, made a bloody ruin of his mouth."] Isle of the Undead


                       By LLOYD ARTHUR ESHBACH


     _A gripping, thrilling, uncanny tale about the frightful
      fate that befell a yachting party on the dreadful island of
      living dead men_

       *       *       *       *       *




_1. A Horror from the Past_

A drab gray sheet of cloud slipped stealthily from the moon's round
face, like a shroud slipping from the face of one long dead, a coldly
phosphorescent face from which the eyes had been plucked. Yellow
radiance fell toward a calm, oily sea, seeking a narrow bank of fog
lying low on the water, penetrating its somber mass like frozen yellow
fingers. Vilma Bradley shuddered and shrank against Clifford Darrell's brawny
form. "It's--it's ghastly, Cliff!" she said. "Ghastly?" Darrell leaned against the rail, laughing softly. "One
cocktail too many--that's the answer. It's given you the jitters. Listen!" Faintly from the salon came strains of dance music and the
rhythmic shuffle of feet. "A nifty yacht, a South Sea moon, a radio
dance orchestra, dancers--and little Clifford! And you call it
ghastly!" Almost savagely his arms tightened about her, and the
bantering note left his voice. "I'm crazy about you, Vilma." She tried to laugh, but it was an unconvincing sound. "It's the moon,
Cliff--I guess. I never saw it like that before. Something's going to
happen--something dreadful. I just _know_ it!" "Oh--be sensible, Vilma!" There was a hint of impatience in Cliff's
deep voice. A gorgeous girl in his arms--dark-haired, dark-eyed, made
for love--and she talked of dreadful things which were going to happen
because the moon looked screwy. She released herself and glanced out over the sea. "I know I'm silly,
but----" Her voice froze and her slender body stiffened. "Cliff--look!" Darrell spun around, and as he stared, he felt a dryness seeping into
his throat, choking him....

Out of the winding-sheet of fog into the moonlight crept a strange,
strange craft, her crumbling timbers blackened and rotted with
incredible age. The corpse of a ship, she seemed, resurrected from the
grave of the sea. Her prow thrust upward like a scimitar bent
backward, hovering over the gaunt ruin of a cabin whose seaward sides
were formed by port and starboard bows. From a shallow pit amidships
jutted the broken arm of a mast, its splintered tip pointing toward
the blindly watching moon. The stern, thickly covered with the
moldering encrustations of age, curved inward above the strange high
poop, beneath which lay another cabin. And along either side of her
worm-eaten freeboard ran a row of apertures like oblong portholes. Out
of these projected great oars, long, unwieldy, as somberly black as
the rest of the ancient hulk. Now a sound drifted across the waters, the steady, rhythmic
_br-rr-oom, br-rr-oom, br-rr-oom_ of a drum beating time for the
rowers. Its hollow thud checked the heart, set it to throbbing in
tempo with its own weary pulse. Ghostly fingers, dripping dread,
crawled up Darrell's spine. Stiff-lipped, Vilma gasped: "What--what is it?" Cliff answered in a dry husky voice, the words seeming to trip over an
awkward tongue. "It's--it's--it _can't_ be, damn it!--but it's a
galley, a ship from the days of Alexander the Great! What's it
doing--here--_now_?" Closer she came through the moon-path, a frothing lip of brine curling
away from her swelling prow. Closer--her course crossing that of the
_Ariel_--and the watchers saw her crew! They gasped, and the blood
ebbed from their faces. Men of ancient Persia, clad in leather kirtles and rusted armor, and
they were hideous! In the yellow moon-glow Cliff could see them
clearly now--a lookout standing motionless in the stem, the steersman
on the poop-deck, the drummer squatting beside the broken mast, the
rowers in the pit--and all, _all_ were a bloodless white, the skin of
their faces puffed and bloated and horribly wrinkled, like flesh that
had been under water a long time. Dead men ... men whose movements were stiffly wooden ... as dead as
their faces. But most horrible was the fact that they were there, that
they moved at all! *       *       *       *       *

"A queer mirage, isn't it?" A hollow voice spoke suavely behind them. Vilma gasped at the sudden sound, and they whirled. A foot away stood
the tall, lean figure of the _Ariel's_ captain, Leon Corio. A queer
smile twisted his thin lips. "What's the idea--sneaking up on us?" Darrell demanded angrily. He
didn't like this man, hadn't liked him from the moment he had
approached Cliff to sell him the yacht. But Cliff had bought the craft
because she was a bargain, and in accordance with their agreement he
had hired Corio as captain. The tall man's smile remained fixed, and he bowed gravely. "Sorry,
sir. I always walk softly. A habit, I suppose." He gestured toward
the galley. "It looks quite life-like, don't you think so?" "Life-like?" Cliff spoke between his teeth as he again faced the black
ship. "It looks _dead_ to me!" The galley had almost reached them _now_, _veering sharply to draw up
beside_ the _Ariel_. The drum quieted, and the oars trailed in the
water, motionless except for the swaying imparted by the waves. A
musty, age-old odor filtered through the air like a breath from a
grave. The music and dancing had stopped. A fear-filled hush shrouded
the yacht. Vilma drew Cliff's arm about her shoulder. He glanced back at the
motionless captain. "_Do_ something, Corio!" he rasped. "Don't stand there like a dummy!" Corio nodded with his same queer smile. His hand darted to an inside
pocket, came out bearing a curious instrument like four twisted cones
of silver bound together with silver thongs. As he raised this to his
mouth, his eyelids were slits behind which burned the embers of his
eyes. Out over the sea crept a single note, deep, hollow, laden with eery
minor wailings--a sound that summoned imperatively, yet a sound that
repelled. It was a moan, hideous as the moan of a dying demon. It
raked the heart with fear-tipped claws. It rose, and fell, and rose
again, and as it died, it awakened the crew of the ancient galley to
motion, sweeping them in a horde to the rail of the yacht. Cliff swung toward Corio in bursting fury, fury mingled with dread. His fist lashed out at that glittering silver instrument and the face
behind it, but Corio avoided him like a wraith, still smiling fixedly,
the horn again at his lips. Cliff cursed, and hurled himself through
the air.