Twenty Blue Devils

conducting a training session, and Rudy was off somewhere. As a result, they found themselves looking through a string of empty cubicles at Nick Druett, sitting alone in his Spartan office at the far end. Even through four partitions of cheap glass, they could see the scowl on his face.

'Nelson was right, how does that grab you?” was his muttered greeting when they rapped on the glass wall of his cubicle.

'About what?” John asked.

'About Tari.” He slammed shut the account book he'd had opened on his desk. “The guy has screwed up everything he's gotten his paws on.” He banged the book with the flat of his hand. “The only difference I have with Nelson is that I don't believe it's a bunch of innocent mistakes; I think the big bastard's been ripping us off from here to Patagonia.” He puffed his cheeks and let out a long, exasperated breath through his mouth. “Or who knows, maybe I'm wrong, maybe the guy's just dumb. Rudy's in there with him right now, trying to get it all sorted out. Hey, sit down, sit down.'

Without asking he poured them coffee from a jug on a side table. Blue Devil, Gideon thought appreciatively at his first sip.

'Listen, Gideon, I've already said this to John, but I want to apologize to you too.” He was wearing an honest- to-God shirt, with buttons and sleeves (short) and a collar, apparently in honor of Bertaud's impending visit. “For the runaround.'

'That's not necessary, Nick.'

'Yeah, it is. I'm sorry I gave you such a hard time. You were right—you were both right—and I was wrong. If you hadn't stuck to your guns we still wouldn't know what really happened to Brian. So thanks for...well, thanks.'

'I'm sorry it's been so tough on your daughter,” Gideon said awkwardly.

Nick smiled vaguely, joylessly. “Yeah, me too. But believe me, she's happier going through this than if she knew she was letting somebody get away with Brian's murder,” He sipped mechanically from his mug. “John, who killed him?” he asked softly.

'Who knew where he was camping?” John replied.

'Are you kidding? Everybody knew. He used the same spot year in, year out. I've got thirty acres on Raiatea. That's where he set up camp—on the plateau.” He shook his big head slowly back and forth. “I'll never build them now, that's for sure.'

Gideon's mind had been running along a side track of its own. “Nick, just how was Tari ripping you off?'

'Well, he was—” Nick looked at him sharply. “You think there's a connection? To Brian?'

Gideon shrugged. “Could be.” When a lot of funny things are going on together, Abe Goldstein had pointed out more than once, they got a funny way of turning out to be related. The Law of Interconnected Monkey Business, his old professor had called it.

'Well, he was skimming,” Nick said. “Not hard to do in a business like this, where there are a million different prices and they change every day. Say we're buying five thousand pounds of green beans from a farm in Java to go into the Weekend Blend or one of the other low-end products—” Gideon winced. “—and they're charging us a buck- eighty a pound. Well, Tari just adds a little zero, records the price as ten-eighty a pound instead of one-eighty, and keeps the difference. The people in Java get their money so they don't complain, and the books balance, and we don't know any better. So Tari just walks away with nine times five thousand.'

'Fifty thousand bucks,” John said.

'Forty-five thousand,” said Nick bitterly. “Let's be fair to the guy. And that's only one example. I can give you at least two more and I guarantee there'll be more to come when we really dig into things.'

'But how could he get away with it?” asked Gideon. “That's a big difference, one-eighty to ten-eighty. Surely you, or Rudy, or Nelson, or somebody would know what's what, would know what the price was supposed to be.'

Nick shook his head. “It's not the way we do business. At Paradise when we give somebody responsibility we trust him,” he said righteously, then laughed at himself. “Or did until now. Look. For the past two weeks Tari has been spending half his time at the Papeete office, half here. He's had complete access to everything—the books, the accounts—and complete authority to do anything Brian could do. If he needed help, he asked for it, that's all. We trusted him. Thanks to Maggie,” he couldn't resist adding in a grumpy aside.

'So how did you find out?” Gideon asked.

'We found out because Nelson never trusted the big, ugly bugger and he was keeping an eye on him, and when he finally got together with Rudy and compared the figures they didn't match.'

John suddenly held up his hand. “That was a shot.” He had his head tilted to one side, listening. Gideon hadn't heard anything.

'Nah,” Nick said, “it's just one of the vans; got a problem with backfiring.'

John listened a moment longer, then settled down again. “Probably so.'

'Nick,” Gideon said, “how do you know it's Tari who's doing it and not somebody else?'

'I know because it never happened before Tari got a chance to get his fat fingers in the pie, that's how I know. The skimming started when he started, not a day before. It's real obvious, Gideon, there can't be any doubt about it.” He glanced up over their shoulders. “We're back here, Leopold!'

Colonel Bertaud had arrived promptly on the stroke of eleven, and with him was the large, bearded gendarme who had surprised them at the graveyard. The two men came down the linoleum-floored hallway, Bertaud's small feet pattering twice for every gallumphing step of his giant assistant's. The colonel was in his dapper uniform, the gendarme in his blue shirt and shorts.

'Good morning, Nick,” Bertaud said, in the doorway of the cubicle. He nodded civilly to John and Gideon. “Good day, gentlemen. Thank you for—'

At that moment the rear door of the hut, only a few feet away, burst open and banged against the wall. In the doorway stood Rudy Druett, as pale as death, swaying back and forth, his thin hair disheveled and straggling.