Indiana Jones and the Army of the Dead Read Online Free

order breakfast, as long as it’s steak and eggs. I can ask where the bathroom is. Beyond that . . .” He shrugged.
    “The locals call the place Zile Muri-yo, which means pretty much the same thing as the French name. Since that’s where we are going, we need a guide who knows the area. It’s not even on the map. Thus, here we are.”
    The woman who answered their knock at the door was stunning.
    She was tall, a few inches shorter than Indy, with black hair and dark eyes, and skin the color of heavily creamed coffee. Her face was handsome, with balanced features, and when she smiled, her teeth were even and white, save for one slightly crooked one that gave her expression character. Indy guessed she was in her early to midtwenties. She wore a white blouse with an off-the-shoulder cut, a long blue cotton skirt, and sandals. There was a small silver cross on a chain around her neck. She smelled like sandalwood.
    Taken altogether, she was quite striking.
    Indy was suddenly much aware that he was several days from a real bath, that he needed a shave, and that his clothes could stand washing.
    And that he was old enough to be her father.
    “Messieurs?”
    “Good afternoon,” Mac said. “I’m George McHale and this is Professor Indiana Jones. Do we have the honor of addressing Mademoiselle Arnoux?” Mac’s French had a strong Belgian accent, no surprise given the amount of time he had spent there.
    “Oui, I am Marie Arnoux.”
    “Dr. Jones and I are archaeologists. We are seeking an antiquity that we believe is on Zile Muri-yo, and we understand that you are familiar with the island. We would like to engage your services as a guide.”
    She smiled again, revealing that endearingly crooked tooth.
    “Ah. Well, you must come inside,” she said.
    The house was small but clean and neat, and somewhat cooler than the outside. The young woman led them to a wicker couch and bade them be seated.
    Indy noticed a set of icons on the wall, but they were too small for him to make out the subjects of the tiny paintings. Catholic saints? There was also some kind of tribal mask he didn’t recognize on a narrow table next to the wall. He wanted to go and examine these more closely, but he held himself in check. Not everybody understood an archaeologist’s passion for snooping.
    Arnoux left the room and returned shortly with a pitcher of liquid and three glasses on a copper tray. “Tea,” she said. “But I am afraid the ice has all melted this late in the day.”
    Indy sipped at the tea, which tasted as if it had been sweetened with cane syrup. It was refreshing. They all smiled at one another. This was Mac’s show, so Indy leaned back to let him speak.
    The woman beat Mac to it: “So, what could be on such a small island unknown to many but the locals to draw a British and an American archaeologist such a great distance?”
    Indy frowned. Mac’s accent could have given her the Brit connection, but how did she know Indy was an American? He hadn’t said a word.
    As if reading his mind, she said, “Indiana is an American state in the Midwest, so I am assuming that a man bearing that nickname would be from the United States, non?”
    “You seem knowledgeable about U.S. geography.”
    She smiled yet again, and it made Indy want to smile in return. “I spent four years at a women’s college in New York State in the late 1930s,” she said.
    It took Indy a second to realize she had switched from French to English.
    “Majored in history, with a minor in comparative religion,” she went on.
    “Really?”
    “I’m a Dodgers fan. I saw Waite Hoyt pitch his last game in ’38. The Merry Mortician. Go, Brooklyn.”
    Now Indy did smile. Hoyt had worked as an assistant undertaker in the off-season, hence the nickname.
    “So, speak of this artifact.”
    Mac and Indy exchanged glances.
    “Come, gentlemen, if I am to act as your guide, I will need to know the proper questions to ask the locals—unless you have a map that shows the