The Whale's Footprints - Rick Boyer (24 page)

"Yeah. Little did they know poor Mary doesn't
own any genuine ice. Or hardly anything . . ."

Joe looked over at his forlorn sister. Poor Mary
Adams. "Yeah, right. Except poor Mary Adams is gonna fix all
that with her new book, right?"

Mary beamed and blushed, and turned in her canvas
director's chair to gaze off over Cape Cod Bay.

"What book?" I said.

"
Your wife's writing a novel, Doc. Remember the
book we talked about?"

"Mare, is this true?"

"Well," she blushed, "Joe mentioned to
me yesterday that I had a gift with words, and that maybe I could put
my . . . some of my past experiences into a romance novel."

"What past experiences?

"Oh, you know, just experiences. The title's
great, isn't it, Joey?" She spun her head toward me. "I'm
calling it Hills of Gold, Men of Bronze."

"
Hills of Gold, Men of Bronze? Christ almighty."

"I tink it's great, Mary." piped Moe,
looking up from his book, "I tink it—"

"Nobody asked you," I said, turning back to
Mary. "What experiences?"

"Hmmmph!" she sniffed, snapping her head
away from me.

"You wanna find out what experiences, you gotta
read the book, right Joey?"

"Right."

"Well, when am I going to get a chance to sample
this masterpiece?"

"When I start writing it. Right now, what I'm
doing is, I'm just thinking about it. You know, getting ideas."

"
Oh I see. Moe, when did you hear about this?"

"
just now. And you know, Doc, Mary's got a
creative mind. Her pottery proves that. I tink dis is a great idea.
And who knows? She could be very successful at it."

It figured Moe would like the idea. Good old Moe, who
wouldn't say shit if he had a mouthful. I gazed out at the bay. The
water was a deep turquoise, with occasional whitecaps.

"Okay, Doc, so Keegan's having trouble making
the charge stick. That's no surprise. But Hartzell's been arrested
and detained on the charge; the whole thing will hinge on the
probable cause hearing."

"Moe, do you think Lionel Hartzell killed Andy,
searched his rooms, and then sacked the cottage?"

"I think it is possible, Doc. Perhaps, given the
lack of other suspects, it is even probable. Joe says a hearing, wid
a cross-examination, could reveal or disprove it."

I rose from my chair and paced the wooden planks. I
wasn't satisfied. I turned back to Joe.

"You think the two break-ins are related or just
coincidence?"

"C'mon! They were related, of course. To call it
coincidence is lunacy. But they weren't similar. For instance, the
burglary in Woods Hole wasn't forced. The burglar went right in the
front door. But Hartzell could have used a key he had taken and
copied, something he could have easily done, sharing an office with
Andy. But he couldn't get a key to the cottage, so he forced the rear
door."

"Yeah, I'd say he forced it,Joey," said
Mary, opening a bottle of nail polish. "He smashed the window."

"No. No, he didn't smash it. He didn't have to.
Here, let me show you something."

We joined him at the kitchen door, which had a
cracked pane of glass nearest the lock and a hole in it big enough
for a hand to go through. Joe took a pointed can opener—the type
you used to use to open beer cans—and placed the point on an
unbroken corner of the shattered pane of glass.

"I know you installed shatterproof safety glass
in all the doors facing the ocean, Doc. Maybe it was smart, since
you're worried about flying objects during storms. But watch what
happens when I press this point against it."

We saw three tiny lines ooze out from the point of
the tool as Joe slowly pressed it against the glass.

"Keep watching," he said. The cracks grew
longer, and four others joined the original three. After half a
minute, we could see a spider-web pattern of shatter marks. Another
minute and the point of the can opener pushed through the pane with a
soft crunch. Joe then pulled out the squarish glass fragments with
his bare fingers, leaving a hole exactly like the one already in the
pane.

"See? No fuss, no muss, no noise. And no cut
fingers, either. Safety glass is safe. It can also be pressure
fractured in total silence. I tell ya, crooks love it."

"Good God! What do we do now?" asked Mary.

"What you do is nothing. Except replace the
safety glass—on your door anyway—with wire-impregnated glass."

"Wait a second, Joe. You mean to tell me that
old Lionel Hartzell, the wacko professor who's trying to grow silver
in sea squirts, is up on the latest burglary techniques? And you
think he also lifted the valuable stuff in this cottage too, just to
make it look like a regular B and E, when he was really searching for
stolen papers that were never stolen?"

Joe leaned back against the wall and tapped the can
opener idly against his palm.

"There are some problems with it. I never said
there weren't problems."

"Too many problems. I agree the two break-ins
are connected. We can start there. But I think the burglars were
looking for something real, not imaginary. And when they didn't find
it in Woods Hole, they came up here."

"Looking for what?" asked Moe, joining us
in the kitchen. "And did they find it?"

"If we don't know what they're looking for,"
said Mary, "then how do we know if they found it or not?"

"Right," said Joe. "Except you ask me,
Andy could have buried it in the sand, the whatever-it-was. Then we'd
never find it."

"And what about Lionel Hartzell?" I asked.

"What about him?" answered Joe. "He's
our new suspect."

"You still think he did it? All by himself?"

"Look: he is a suspect. It's always good to have
a suspect and a bunch of leads you're following. You don't have
these, the public thinks you're just screwing around. Know what I
mean? So, as I say, he is our suspect at this point in time. And
also, if you haven't  forgotten, it's looking better for Jack.
And how do we know that Hartzell's papers weren't stolen, eh? He may
be a goofball, but Andy was no babe in the woods, either. He could've
waltzed into that lab, stolen some valuable research stuff, and
waltzed out again with nobody the wiser. And what was he gonna do
with it? Sell it, a ' course, to some pharmaceutical company or
something. He can't leave the goods there, so he brings it up here
with him for safekeeping over the weekend. And, hey! That could also
explain the phone call."

"You mean he was trying to make contact with a
buyer or something?" asked Mary.

"Sure. Hell, maybe there's a third party who
knew about Hartzell's research beforehand, and just hired the kid to
lift it. There you go—"

"Sounds like the pieces fit to me," said
Moe. "That's as good an explanation as any."

So Moe and I went for a search-run along the beach.
Joe said he'd stay home and guard the bar and help Mary cook.

We decided to jog and walk, and went at it for two
hours, going first up and down the beach three miles in either
direction and scanning the scrub and grass-covered bluffs as we went.
At every blowing plastic garbage bag, container, overturned boat, or
pile of debris or driftwood, we stopped and poked around. We searched
for curious-looking disturbances in the sand. There were none, and of
course we both knew that ten days of Cape wind and weather would have
obliterated them anyway. Moe suggested we find cottages or buildings
that were vacant and look inside. Good idea, if we could've found
any. But we didn't, and took to the back roads, sweeping our eyes
everywhere for likely hiding spots that Andy could have found in the
dark.

"Zip?" Mary asked as we trudged,
sweat-soaked, up the bone-colored wooden stairs from the beach to the
cottage deck. We nodded, and she said that at least we'd worked up
good appetites. We went in and out of the sauna for another hour and
emerged, showered and starved, at six, ready for food and drink.

We sat at the deck rail, sipping wine, feeling the
cool bay breeze blow over us, and watching the sky turn yellow-gold.
Then it was time to tuck into Mary's calamari.

"Well, whoever they are, they found what they
were looking for," I announced as I sat down.

"
What makes you so sure?" asked Moe,
peering at me over his wine goblet.

"Nothing. I'm just sick of worrying about it.
Pass the pasta."
 

SEVENTEEN

Poor Maria! She curled up on her pallet of fur and
animal skins inside the tent. She could hear the hoof beats of the
horses as the riders came and went in the night. The mountain air was
cold, and her flimsy garments were scant comfort. She shivered and
wept.

She thought of their leader, Fuente. A head taller
than the others, he was magnificently strong. And, yes, she admitted
to herself, sinfully handsome as well. It was Fuente who had beaten
the ruffian called Pablo silly, then thrown him into the palmettos,
to the laughter and ridicule of the others . . .

Maria knew she was to be Fuente's woman now. She
rolled on the skin and fur floor of the tent, gathering her scanty
rags about her shoulders. But as she thought of the tall dark one,
the man with the features of an eagle, the feeling of liquid fire was
spreading in her.

"Oh for Chrissake's,” I said to myself.

—
and she could not stop this feeling, this
wonderful sensation that the sisters at the convent school had never
mentioned. Who could have never thought that she, Maria Teresa Perez,
the pretty girl who, since the tragic death of her parents and the
loss of La Sombra, the huge family ranch in the steep, cool mountains
of Durango, had studied to be a nun, pure of heart and body, should
be degraded so terribly! She shuddered at the recent memory of that
terrible day when the bandits had ridden down from the high hills,
shooting their carbines in the air, singing and shouting drunkenly,
burning the ranch buildings and killing the shepherds. And then, then
they had found her, hiding like a frightened rabbit in the tiny
chapel . . . And yet, as she saw the light of the campfire flickering
on the wall of her rude tent, and heard the coarse language and rough
laughter of the bandits outside, she somehow felt a strange, wild
release . . .

"Good God . . .," I groaned.

But what was that? What was this sound, coming
closer to where she lay shivering? It was a clinking of metal, and
the sound of slow, strong, footsteps approaching. Then Maria drew in
a sharp breath of fear as she looked underneath the tent flap and saw
the shiny leather boots . . . the gleaming silver spurs that jangled
and rang with each strong step . . ."Maria! Maria, my little
pumpkin! Are you ready for me?"

Then the tent flap jerked aside, and she lifted
her weary head, trembling, to gaze up helplessly at the dark,
aquiline face of Fuente, red-brown in the firelight, his dark
eyebrows and ferce mustache setting of his gleaming eyes, his fine,
white teeth. He looked the brutal bandit, the iron-hard
revolutionary, born of the injustice and poverty of the Mexican
hills. And yet . . . and yet, she did see a sensitivity there, an
inner gentleness that spoke through the sad eyes and full, sw mouth.
What was he like, really, she wondered? Could he ever love? Was he
capable of more than mere lust? Would she ever truly know him?

"So there you are, my little mountain
warbler! My little vixen of the hills . . . you are rested I hope?"
said Fuente in a hoarse whisper. He strode into the tent, clad in
rough leather and metal. The cartridge belts across his wide chest
gleamed gold. He cast them off, threw down his sombrero, and grabbed
her in his iron talons. Too weak and frightened to resist, she let
herself be raised up, and he took her in his powerful arms.

"Iron talons?
Iron
talons?
"

Maria smelled the raw tequila on his breath, and
beneath that, the male smell, the rough, salty-sweet drift of his man
sweat. She felt herself growing weak, a strange dizziness sweeping
over her. Fuente forced his lips on hers. She tried to struggle, but
it was no use. She felt herself melting into him, yielding herself
into his rough strength. The night noises of the wind and crickets,
and the laughing, cursing ruffians around the fireside grew faint as
a new sound rose in her ears, a warm, rushing sound like a million
molten waterfalls—

"For crying out loud," I moaned, "spare
me—"

Truly, this was a man who had known many women,
who knew far more than the simple peasants he rode with. Maria felt
herself blush with shame. Yes, she admitted to herself, yes, it was
pleasure. She could no longer deny it.

She moaned aloud as the heat within her grew. A
wet, liquid, burning fire, like the lava from a young volcano.

She could not speak, but buried her face in his
massive chest, then raised it to seek his mouth again.

What would the mother superior say? Maria Teresa
Perez, turned into a common slut, a slave of the passions of the
flesh, by this brazen bandit! The feeling of liquid fire returned
now, with renewed force and fury. Moaning and writhing on the animal
skins, she realized sadly that she was powerless in passion's grasp.