Mystery Of The Sea Horse (17 page)

"Chris, won't you—?"

The door opened and closed. She was alone.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

The winds had died. The night sky over Santa Barbara was calm and clear. Uncle Dave, in a tropical shirt and candy-striped pants, was making another circuit around the pool. "Enough time's gone by to try it again," he said to himself.

Back in the living room, he seated himself next to the phone. He punched out the number of Diana's bungalow court down in Mexico. He'd memorized it by now.

"Buenas noches,"
answered the desk clerk.

"Is Diana Palmer in yet?"

"Is this Senor Palmer once again?"

"Yes, is-?"

"I am very sorry, senor, she remains out."

"And Mr. Walker?"

"He also, senor," replied the clerk. "It is as I told you on the occasion of your first call. Senor Walker asked after Diana Palmer this afternoon and then went out to look for her. Neither of them has returned."

"Okay," said the old man. "When either one comes in, have them call me."

"Yes, of course, senor. But do not worry overly. When two people are young and on vacation in Mexico, even in the off season, they . . ."

Diana's uncle hung up. "Something's not right," he said. Diana was to have called him today. When he hadn't heard from her by late afternoon, he put in a call to her, learning she and the Phantom had been out since midday. Uncle Dave rubbed at his stomach. He had one of his hunches that something was wrong.

The doorbell rang.

Agents Marcus and Busino were at the door. "Good evening," said Marcus after stepping inside.

"Have you heard anything?" asked the old man.

"About what?" asked Busino.

Leading them into the living room, Uncle Dave said, "That's right. You two don't even know what I'm worried about."

"No, we came over to talk about what we're worried about." Marcus sat in a sofa chair, tugging out a crumpled pack of menthol cigarettes. "But what's bothering you?"
^:
"'

"Oh, it's probably nothing. But I haven't been able to get in touch with Diana all day. It's got me worried."

"Your niece is in Mocosa, Mexico, right?" said Marcus.

"Yes," the old man answered.

"Suppose you tell us why she went there?"

"Don't tell me you still suspect—?"

"No, not at all," said Marcus. "But I want to know."

"Well, Walker had something to take care of down there."

"Something to do with all this Chris Danton business?"

Uncle Dave nodded, saying, "That's the way I figure it. You don't know him as well as I do. He plays his cards pretty close to the vest."

"Everybody," said Busino, watching the pack of cigarettes in his partner's hand, "seems to be traveling to Mexico."

Marcus shook out a cigarette and passed the

pack to Busino. "Your niece or Walker didn't tell you anything else?"

"What do you mean by everybody?" the old man asked Busino.

'We've been trying to round up Danton's known associates," he replied. "It looks like most of them have headed south."

"We have been able to get our hands on one guy, a peripheral character named Gabe Rich," said Marcus. "He tells us he drove this Laura Leverson down to Tijuana and left her there."

"A long way from Mocosa," said Uncle Dave.

"Rich says the girl was going to contact somebody there in Tijuana and get herself a ride somewhere else," said Marcus. "We even know the name of her contact."

"What's he say?"

"We asked the Mexican cops to check him out," said Marcus. "Seems the guy has suddenly dropped from sight."

"He on the run, too?"

"It might also be due," said Busino, "to that wandering assassin."

"According to Gabe Rich," said Marcus, "a guy who sounds very much like Fulmer's sidekick leaned on him and made him tell where he'd taken the Leverson dame."

Uncle Dave said, "So there may be some truth in all this about Chris Danton being an ex-Nazi?"

"Right now," said Marcus, "I'll believe most anything."

The yellow Cessna hummed through the night.

"You understand," the pilot, a chubby man in his late thirties, was saying, "that that was the landing field we passed back there, senor?"

The man who now called himself Helmann was

sitting with his head pressed against the window, whistling softly. "Yes, I understand," he answered. "I want to take a look at the entire island before we turn around and land."

"A little flea-ridden island inhabited by a bunch of fishermen," said the pilot. "At night, you'll see even less than during the day, which isn't much."

"I'm paying you," Helmann reminded him, "a handsome fee to indulge my whims. No more comments, if you please."

"As you say, senor."

Helmann went back to whistling. He'd learned even more in Tijuana than he'd expected. Langweil, or Danton if you preferred, wasn't being anywhere near as careful as he should be. Helmann had had to dispose of the man in Tijuana when he was through with him. He liked to avoid that sort of thing, if possible, it took up too much time. There'd been, however, no workable alternative in this particular instance.

"There is your beloved island," announced the pilot.

Helmann looked down. All he could see were a few tiny dots of light in the blackness. He smiled.

CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

The Phantom had stood up from beside the body that afternoon, and asked Jiminez, "Had he told you anything about where he thought Torres was?"

The other man had taken off his sopping Panama hat and was looking everywhere but at the dead man. "We should leave here now, senor, I suggest."

"We will, after I've looked around."

"You don't intend—am I correct?—to notify the police."

Shaking his head, the Phantom said, "What was this man Ramirez involved in?"

"Many things, I am not certain how many." Jimenez took a few steps backward. "He implied, when I talked to him last evening on your behalf, that he and Torres were partners in something that was going to make a considerable profit."

"Where did he think Torres was?"

"He didn't confide what he thought, senor. However, I have the notion he was himself concerned about Torres's absence. He was hoping to learn something more this morning," said Jimenez. "Then sell that information to you."

The Phantom strode to the sliding doors. "Learn something from whom?"

"A customer, someone who was coming here an hour or so ahead of us."

With gloved hands, the Phantom slid open the doors. The rain was slacking off. "There's been a truck in here recently, some kind of half! rack judging from those marks it gouged in the mud."

At his side, Jimenez nodded back at the dead man. "I notice no blood, senor. What killed him? Perhaps it was natural—"

"You didn't look closely enough," answered the Phantom. "He was strangled." He pointed at the half-open wooden gates outside. "Where does that street lead?"

"Down to the harbor, senor, to the dock area."

"That's probably where our halftrack went."

"It is very easy to find your way there, senor. You won't, I am more than certain, need me to lead you."

"No, you can take off."

"I wish you a good afternoon then, senor." Jimenez snapped his limp white hat back on his head and hurried toward the front door. "I'll try to give the impression, if asked, that I was never here." He left the place.

The Phantom spent another few minutes there. Then he made his way unobtrusively to the harbor. His preliminary inquiries tinned up nothing on the halftrack.

Retrieving his rented car near the All-American Cantina, he drove back up to the bungalows. He'd better talk to Diana, let her know what he was up to, before continuing his search.

He found the girl's note on the floor of his room. But when he went to the market area, he found no trace of her.

The Phantom didn't encounter the fat vendor until after sunset. After searching the entire market plaza area that afternoon, he had returned to the bungalow complex. He'd questioned the clerk, learned nothing, and waited in his room for
a
time. As the day waned, he returned to the plaza to search again for Diana.

"Yes, senor," the fat woman told him, "I saw such a girl as you are asking about.
Muy bonita,
very pretty." While she talked, she ladled steaming meat out of a caldron mounted on her cart, slapped a portion on a flat tortilla, and rolled it up.

He had been asking everyone who worked on the street about Diana. "When was this?"

"Before I left for my afternoon siesta," replied the woman. "It must have been some time around midday."

"Where did she go?"

Pointing with the wooden ladle, the fat woman said, "You see up in the next block, senor, where there is an alley? She walked down there."

"You see her come out?"

"Not dining the final hour I was selling my wares."

"What's down there?"

"That's what is strange, senor. It is only an alley. There is a shabby cafe, but it has been closed for many days."

"Thanks." He started to walk away.

"Perhaps, senor, she was to meet the other man."

Stopping, he asked, "What other man?"

"He was tall, such as yourself, but older," answered the fat vendor. She touched at one temple with the handle of the big spoon. "His hair was gray here. He stopped for a moment to inspect my cart, then entered that very same alley."

"Before the girl did?"

"Yes, senor, that is right."

Nodding, the Phantom said to himself, "Diana must have spotted Danton's boy and decided to trail him on her own."

There was no activity in the alley, only darkness and silence. No lights in the small cafe and the walls on the left and right had no windows.

The Phantom found a door in an alcove partway down the alley. It was locked. He knelt, studying the dusty ground. "Some kind of struggle here recently between a man and two women."

From a short distance away, he heard a truck motor starting up.

There were people talking.