must also believe in the potency of a curse symbolized by a doll.
He patted Lucy’s knee when he got in the car and backed it out the drive. Near the shrubbery where he had glimpsed the movement of a few minutes before, he stopped long enough to call softly to Martin on the shag job. “Nice going, Bill. Let me know when Dan Milford-or anybody-comes in.”
Out on the road the gray Buick picked up his trail again. He put his arm on Lucy’s shoulder, drawing her over so he could feel the warmth of her body beside him. She seemed tense.
“Don’t worry, angel. Somebody’s going to see me take you home, that’s all. And if it’s a spy from a morals squad, he can go back and report I didn’t eat breakfast at your apartment.”
“I’m not worried about that-it’s Clarissa.”
“She was only crying on my shoulder.”
“I know. I feel terribly sorry for her.”
“So do I. She’s in love with her no-good husband, and from the way it looks now, he’s got some of the answers we need.”
8
Shayne rose early the next morning, showered, shaved, dressed and ate breakfast and, twenty minutes later, was striding through the downstairs lobby to the door. He stopped suddenly, turned back to the desk, picked up the phone and dialed Sylvester’s home.
Mrs. Santos answered, her voice tired and worried. No, Sylvester hadn’t come home or called and she didn’t know where he was. Shayne pronged the receiver, made for the door again and long-legged it to where he had parked his car the night before.
The gray Buick was parked a few cars behind it. The redhead passed, then whirled impulsively and stared boldly for half a minute at the man behind the wheel. He didn’t recognize the face but he would again, undistinctive as it was. The man was about average height with straight black hair thinning a little on top, and lidless eyes, like a snake’s. His skin had that peculiarly dry look which comes as the result of a bad case of acne at puberty. He wore a wilted seersucker suit and no hat. Under Shayne’s gaze, he shifted uneasily, lifting one hand to wipe self- consciously at his long upper lip. The hand was thin and bony, with big knuckles and visible veins.
Shayne waved genially, wryly amused at the startled and defensive look the gesture brought, turned and strode to his own car.
Speeding along Biscayne Boulevard, he turned east to the Causeway leading to the Beach. The morning was already hot. Sun beat on the road, making a mirror of it and intensifying the vivid flower colors along its edge. There was no wind, Spanish moss hung stiffly from the trees.
Through the rear-view mirror Shayne kept an eye on the tailing Buick, realizing suddenly that a green car which had pulled out from the curb too when he left his apartment was holding close behind the Buick. Was it possible that, this morning, he had two tails?
He crossed the Causeway and turned south, the two cars still with him, finally pulling in the parking lot at the head of the long slip where Sylvester’s boat was moored. Most of the other boats were already out, leaving the Santa Clara almost alone.
Near her on the wharf, a tall man was bent over, concentrating on something. As Shayne strode closer he recognized him as Slim, the lazy one from Philadelphia, who had lain on his back all day without doing anything more energetic than tilting a rum highball. He was the do-it-yourself man whose hobby was mechanics, according to Sylvester. This morning he had a different hobby. He was cleaning a fish.
He looked up from the mess of blood and guts as Shayne’s shadow fell across him. “Oh, hello, Mike.”
“Good morning. Is Sylvester around?”
“No, he’s down the coast somewhere. Be gone a day or two, he said.”
“What did he do, walk?” Shayne eyed the Santa Clara.
“Nope. Got a lift.”
“Boat or car?”
There was an instant’s hesitation before Slim said, “Car.”
“What did he go for?”
“There’s a boat he wanted to look at.”
“How come?”
“I think he’s considering a trade.”
“What’s the matter with this boat? You boys just put a new engine in her, didn’t you?”
“Turned out to be a dog.”
“Since yesterday?”
Slim shrugged and went on scraping his fish with the thoroughness of a good Dutch housewife.
“I thought the engine sounded pretty good,” Shayne persisted.
“Doesn’t develop the speed it ought to. Sylvester said his old one was faster. Sylvester’s hell for speed.”
“How’d he know? You boys never let him let it out?”
“He did, I guess. When we weren’t with him.”
“Yesterday he was telling me how good it was.”
“That was yesterday. Today he didn’t like it. You know how these Portuguese are.”
“He’s not Portuguese. He’s Cuban.”
“Same difference.”
Shayne was silent. The only sound was the rasping of Slim’s heavy knife against the fish scales. Without looking up, Slim said, “This is that grouper you caught yesterday. Hope you don’t mind.”
“I don’t mind.”
“Want a piece of him?”
“No.”
“Got to thinking-” Slim seemed to feel it necessary to explain-“it’s kind of silly to be down here in the world’s fishing paradise and never eat any fish. So I came down this morning to get this one. I’ll clean it up and have the chef at the hotel cook it for me.”
“It’s a pretty big fish.”
“I’ll need it. Some of the boys are coming in to play poker this afternoon. Fish and beer and poker-that ought to be a good combo, hull?”
“Pretty good.” Shayne frowned down at the bloody mess on the wharf planks. “You know, they’d clean it for you at the hotel as well as cook it, if you asked them.”
“Yeah, but I’ve got a thing about fish. I got to know they’re cleaned good. Never eat ’em unless I clean ’em myself.”
“That’s a lot of blood from one fish.”
“It’s a big fish.”
“It’s still a lot of blood.”
Slim shrugged, still not looking up. “I wouldn’t know. I heard groupers are running bloody this season.”
“Hogwash! A grouper’s a grouper, this season or any other.”
“Maybe you’re right.” The knife kept scraping. The scales spattered.
Shayne shot his half-smoked cigarette irritably into the water. A black depression was growing within him. “I think I’ll go aboard for a minute.”
Slim looked up for almost the first time since the redhead had come. “O.K. Help yourself.”
Shayne stepped across and prowled around the cockpit, cabin and deck. It was the same as last night; everything was in place. He leaped from the gunnel back to the dock and then, looking back, he noticed that the coil of rope on the deck forward had no anchor attached to it.
“Where’s the anchor?”
Slim had finished cleaning the fish and was lowering a bucket on a rope over the side of the dock to get water to sluice away the blood and fish offal that was already attracting flies. “Anchor ring needed a weld. Somebody picked it up for the fix after we came in last night.”
