I

Mike Shayne bought the early morning edition of the Miami Daily News at the corner stand a block from the Tamiami Coffee Shop.

“Don’t bother with the change, Carl,” he told the blind newsdealer. “That’s only a one spot.”

“Thank you, Mr. Shayne. How are things with you these days? You haven’t been by for awhile.”

“Short vacation, Carl. I went down to Key West for a little fishing with a friend of mine, Pete Foley.”

“Any luck?”

“A little,” Shayne told him. “We went for tarpon and then drifted out in the gulf stream for a few days after broadbills. Pete and I landed a 150-pound beauty. But you should have seen the one that got away. He was a monster!”

Carl laughed. “When I was a kid and could see, the biggest ones always got away.”

Shayne quickly changed the subject to cover his slip. “How’s the wife?”

“Ailing a little, complaining a lot, but that’s the way it goes when you’re married, Mr. Shayne. We get along. How’s a big redheaded fellow like you escaped matrimony so long?”

Shayne chuckled. “Just lucky I guess.”

“One fine day your matrimonial luck is going to run out, Mr. Shayne.”

“I’ll be past tomorrow,” Shayne promised Carl and went along to the Tamiami.

He settled in a booth and ordered ham and eggs, hot biscuits, a side of hash brown potatoes and told the pretty Cuban waitress who usually waited on him, “Keep the coffee coming.”

“Where is it you have been lately?” the waitress asked in careful, nearly unaccented English. “Me and our cook, George, have missed you.”

Shayne grinned. “I’ll bet. Tell George I’d like those eggs over easy, and you’d better bring me a glass of orange juice to start. How have you been, Dolores?”

“Muy bueno, Señor Shayne. Very good. It is the next week when Ramon and I finally marry. He has received the promotion and a raise.”

“Good for Ramon,” Shayne said. “Give him my congratulations, will you?”

“That I will do, Mr. Shayne,” Dolores said. “I will squeeze the oranges for your juice myself.”

“Thank you,” Shayne said and unfolded his copy of the Daily News.

He read Tim Rourke’s column first. Shayne’s reporter friend was deploring the rise of street crime in the seedier sections of Miami and Miami Beach and praising a system of neighborhood patrols being organized by some of the young men in those sections.

Shayne chuckled. Tim he knew would get a blast about that from Chief of Police Will Gentry who had the professional’s dislike of anything resembling citizen vigilante action.

“Damn it, though,” Shayne muttered to himself. “Somebody has got to look after these elderly people getting mugged just about every time they venture out into the streets.”

He wished the young citizens’ patrol luck.

Shayne read his morning paper as he did just about everything else, in a hurry, scanning heads and subheads, snatching a vital paragraph here, another there, scanning the obituaries. But one head deep in the paper caught his full attention.

Later Shayne would try to explain to Lucy Hamilton, his long-time secretary, confidante and alter ego, why that particular article alerted him.

“I suppose the word golden did it,” he told Lucy. “With people buying gold bars as if they were pancakes as an inflation hedge and rumors going around that the OPEC oil sheiks are thinking of taking gold instead of dollars for their damned oil, it couldn’t miss catching my eye.”

“I take it, Michael, you still refuse to believe there is such a thing as Extra Sensory Perception?” Lucy said with a mischievous glint in her eyes.

Shayne stretched lazily. “Do you know what I’m thinking right now?”

“You want me to mix drinks.”

“Bullseye. Now is that or is it not E.S.P.?”

“It is not,” Lucy said. “Call it telepathy if you wish. Now if you knew I’m not about to mix the drinks...”

“Got the message.” Shayne grinned. “It’s my turn.”

“Over and out,” Lucy said. “Out to the kitchen and hit me lightly.”

That morning, after his breakfast at the Tamiami Coffee Shop, Shayne drove to his East Flagler Street office wondering what the new day would bring. After a week’s vacation something interesting, he decided, should be on his desk. The last two cases the big detective had worked before leaving for Key West had been dull and routine.

Dull and routine paid bills, and that was good. But tracing an absconding bank official to the gaming tables of Reno and Las Vegas, and finding a man’s missing wife honeymooning in Acupulco instead at the bottom of Biscayne Bay hadn’t been the sort of challenges Shayne liked.

“Hello, fisherman,” Lucy greeted him when he reached his office. “You look bright and bushy-tailed this morning. You forgot to call in yesterday.”

While fishing on Pete Foley’s boat Shayne had kept in touch with Lucy and office routine by radiophone.

Shayne patted her cheek, then kissed her. “Missed you, Angel.”

Lucy returned his quick kiss, then said in a brisk voice, “Urgent telephone call for you yesterday afternoon.” She looked at her notes. “A Dr. Feldman from the Institute of Oriental Studies, and that’s out at the University of Miami in case you didn’t know. He comes across as a very nice man. I’ve made reservations for you to fly out of here tomorrow for Los Angeles and from there to Taiwan. Your passport is in order and on your desk.”

Shayne scowled. “You know I seem to have missed something. You’d better run that past me again, Lucy.”

“All right. You had an urgent phone call yesterday from a Dr. Feldman. I’ve made reservations for you to fly...”

“Hold it right there.” Shayne held up his hand. “I’m to fly to. Los Angeles and from there to Taiwan. My passport is in order and on my desk.”

“You really are a quick study,” Lucy said.

“And you are sending me up,” Shayne said in a good-natured voice. “You haven’t mentioned why I’m on my way to Taiwan tomorrow.”

“Didn’t I?” Lucy was all innocence. “How very careless of me. It seems Nationalist China has an extensive collection of early Buddhist art that has been loaned to Dr. Feldman’s department for a tour of the United States.”

“As a cultural counter to the recent warm-up of relations between United States and Communist China and withdrawal of diplomatic recognition of Nationalist China,” Shayne told Lucy while she gaped at him. “Among the collection is the famous Golden Buddha carved from solid gold to resemble the original Hsinkao Shan temple Buddha cover with gold leaf. It is reputed this collection may outshine the recent King Tut artifacts sent to tour this country.” He grinned at her astonishment. “So what else is new?”

Shayne reached across the desk and gently raised Lucy’s lower jaw. “It was my turn to be a smart aleck,” he told her. “Now tell me what I’m supposed to do when I reach Taiwan.”

Lucy had recovered and glanced at her notes again. “The collection will be coming by ship and accompanied by a Dr. Scott. It seems Dr. Scott wants someone with your accomplishments to accompany him and the collection until it is safely here in Miami to begin the national tour. I take it there are rumors adrift that somebody, somewhere, isn’t pleased with the publicity Nationalist China is about to receive.”

“I’m in the picture,” Shayne told Lucy.

“Tim Rourke wants you to meet him for lunch at the Scotch and Sirloin,” Lucy said. “He wants a favor so the lunch is on his expense account.”

“I have a sneaking hunch what he wants, Lucy. Can’t you phone him that I’m still fishing?”

“Michael...”

Shayne shrugged his wide shoulders, “Okay, okay. I’ll meet him at twelve thirty.”

He went into his office, closing the door behind him, and cleared a space on his littered desk for his feet. Rolling back in his swivel chair, he picked up the phone. Because Lucy was phoning Tim, he had to wait a minute before she answered.

“Angel, get me this Dr. Feldman who sounds so nice on the phone,” Shayne told her. “By the way, you’ve arrived at a fee with him?”

“Certainly.”

“Any complaints?”

“He haggled a bit. Pled departmental budget, but I strongly suspect the Nationalists are picking up the tab.”

“Glad that’s taken care of,” Shayne said. “Now ring him for me, will you?”

Shayne heard the call go through the university switchboard before a cultured voice said, “Yes?”

“Shayne here.” Studying the toes of his oxfords, Shayne decided he’d better get them shined. “Miss Hamilton has made all the arrangements for me to fly to Taiwan, Dr. Feldman. I thought you might want to fill me in on a few more details. I understand that I’m to accompany Dr. Scott back with the Buddha exhibit.”

“Ah yes. Just a moment.” Shayne could hear the murmur of Dr. Feldman’s voice as he spoke to someone in his office before He came back on the line. “Yes,” he said again. “Can we meet somewhere for lunch? There’s a rather decent cafeteria here on the campus.”

“I have a lunch date,” Shayne said. “Can I run out there this afternoon?”

“I’m afraid not,” Dr. Feldman told him. “I have a seminar on oriental art scheduled and then a faculty meeting, the bane of a cloistered existence, I assure you, but it can’t be helped. Since we’re to deal with budgetary matters it will last into the evening.”

“What can you tell me over the phone that I should know before I leave?” Shayne asked.

“You’ll meet Dr. Scott at the International Hotel in Tapei. We are informed there are some very ugly rumors circulating.”

“Rumors of an attempted hijack?” Shayne asked.

“I believe so. Our phone connection was not very good and Dr. Scott is dedicated but somewhat of an alarmist. So much is involved, however, that we don’t dare take any risks. Direct orders and more information will come from Dr. Scott when you reach Tapei.”

“Just out of curiosity,” Shayne said, “what is this Golden Buddha part of the exhibit worth?”

“It weights more than five hundred pounds and is pure gold,” Dr. Feldman told Shayne. “Divide that by troy ounces at $400 each, or whatever the world price is at any particular time, and you have the intrinsic value of the Golden Buddha, but that’s like figuring the true worth of a Rembrandt by calculating the cost of paint and canvas. Let’s just say that it’s priceless in the true sense of the word.”

Shayne whistled softly. “I begin to see why your Dr. Scott is worried.”

“We all are,” Dr. Feldman assured Shayne. “By the way, I’m in charge of the exhibit when it arrives safely, with Dr. Scott as my assistant, but the financial backing of the project for the most part comes from the Seberg Foundation.”

“That’s a new one as far as I’m concerned,” Shayne said. “Who are they?”

“I don’t really know for certain,” Dr. Feldman admitted. “I’ve only met their emissary, a young Chinese. I suspect, despite the name, it is a foundation of wealthy Nationalist Chinese here in the states. I wasn’t encouraged to ask too many questions. But I’ve cleared the matter with our Department of State. Everything is in order.”

“How is the material including the Golden Buddha being shipped stateside?” Shayne asked.

“By ship. Dr. Scott has made all the arrangements. If will be unloaded in San Francisco and brought in trucks here to Miami. It is far too bulky for air shipment.” Dr. Feldman added as an afterthought, “My department here at the university is defraying part of the shipping cost and paying your fee.”

“What about insurance?” Shayne asked.

“Even Lloyd’s of London won’t touch it,” Dr. Feldman said. “You see the Republic of China, so-called, claims the Golden Buddha as part of their national treasure. Should they somehow get their hands on it...”

“I get the point,” Shayne said. “Luck, Shayne,” Dr. Feldman said.

Shayne chuckled. “Sometimes I have to make my own luck. But your Golden Buddha and the rest of the material for exhibit will be delivered to you here in Florida. One more thing. Advise your Dr. Scott that I’ll listen to suggestions, but taking orders is something else again.”

“Well now, Shayne.” Dr. Feldman was obviously disturbed. “You have been hired...”

“I like retained better,” Shayne interrupted. “I’m taking full responsibility and I’ll have to handle security in, my own way. If this isn’t a satisfactory relationship, you’ll have to get someone else. I can name a few reliable private investigators who will jump at the chance to go to Taiwan, all expenses paid.”

There was a pause. Shayne pictured the scholarly man on the other end of the line scratching his head as he tried to make up his mind.

“All right, I accept your conditions,” Dr. Feldman finally said, “but you’ll have to handle matters with Dr. Scott.”

“I’ll manage,” Shayne promised and hung-up. He pressed the button that rang the phone on Lucy’s desk. “Angel, do me a favor,” he said. “While I’m wading through this mail and the reports on my desk that stacked up last week, try to get a line on this mysterious Seberg Foundation Dr. Feldman tells me is popping for the Golden Buddha exhibit to tour this country.”

“I never heard of that one,” Lucy said.

“Neither have I, and Dr. Feldman knows precious little about the people bankrolling his pet project. I don’t want to find out I’m working as an agent for a foreign power without registering with Uncle Sam until it’s too late.”

“I’ll get back to you,” Lucy promised. “Tim will meet you at the Scotch and Sirloin at twelve thirty. He said you’d find him at the bar.”

Shayne laughed. “Where else? How Tim wraps himself around all those boilermakers and stays reasonably sober I’ll never know.”

“He says it’s a thin man’s knack,” Lucy said. “By the way, you’re booked first class all the way through to Taiwan and back.”

“You can cancel that return reservation,” Mike said. “I’ll be coming back to San Francisco on shipboard.”

“Sometimes I think you have all the fun, Michael,” Lucy pouted.

II

An hour before he was to meet Tim Rourke at the Scotch and Sirloin, Shayne rolled down his sleeves and shrugged into his sportscoat tailored to Conceal the bulge of a shoulder holster and .45 automatic. He had two reasons to visit Will Gentry on his way to meet Tim.

One thing he was going to need special permission to board an air carrier carrying a weapon or packing one along in his suitcase. Will Gentry had made arrangements with the airline before for Shayne.

But another reason was the neighborhood patrols Tim was touting in his column. Shayne owed the reporter a favor. He was certain this luncheon date was Tim’s bid to collect.

Will Gentry and Tim, as a reporter, had an uneasy relationship. Covering the crime beat Tim needed the cooperation of Will from time to time. Yet Rourke was an investigative reporter and stepped on official toes when he had to do so in order to get a story.

Shayne suspected his would be the role of peacemaker. Tim’s column that morning was certain to have raised Will’s blood pressure. Gentry was a sometimes irascible man. The suggested citizens’ patrols in high crime areas of Miami Beach, Gentry’s jurisdiction, was certain to have sent Will Gentry through the ceiling of his office.

Will was a good cop who’d reached his present job by coming up through the ranks, but he had a tendency to go by the book. It had taken him quite awhile to get used to some of Shayne’s more unorthodox methods.

“No problem,” Will Gentry said when Shayne asked him to intervene with airline security. “We’ll do it the way we did it last time. You’re on special assignment for the department.”

“I am?” Shayne said. “What am I supposed to be doing this time?”

“Before you get out of San Francisco I want you to check in with a Lieutenant Francis of the SFPD. He has a prisoner out there we may want back here when the State of California is finished with him?”

“Who would that be?” Shayne asked.

“A two-bit grifter named Tully Franco. We think he offed a character named Fritz the Fixer over a slight disagreement. I’ll give you the file. You question him. Francis has him for some scam or other. When you’ve read the file on the plane tomorrow, question the punk. If you think he may be guilty and we have a chance of putting him away for murder one, I’ll try to get him extradited.”

“Have a heart, Will. I only have a few hours in San Francisco between planes,” Shayne said.

“Then you’ll have to work fast,” Gentry said with a smug grin.

Shayne pointed to the morning paper on Gentry’s desk. “Have you read Tim Rourke this morning?”

The police chief reddened and bit hard on the stub of a cigar in his mouth. “I’ve read it and it stinks. I need more uniforms. Tim knows it, you know it, everyone but the city council knows it. As the crime rate rises, inflation paints me into a corner, and any chief of a city this size will tell you the same thing. Uniforms, Shayne! Not a bunch of half-baked ghetto kids playing vigilante.”

“It’s working in the New York subways,” Shayne said in a mild voice. “The Red Berets are making a real difference.”

Gentry regarded Shayne with a steady stare. “Yeah, so I’ve heard.” he said finally.

“The cops felt exactly as you do before these subway patrols started.”

“If you’re trying to make a point, come to it,” Gentry said. “We’ve known each other long enough to speak frankly, haven’t we?”

“All right, it’s none of my damned business, you’re the head cop, but if I were in your shoes I’d handle these do-good ghetto kids with kid gloves. That way you can keep them under police scrutiny, if not supervision.”

“You’re saying I should go along with this citizens’ patrol idea?”

“Would it hurt?”

Gentry scowled. “I’ll think about it.”

Shayne glanced at his watch and got up to leave.

“How about a Dutch Treat lunch in the police canteen?” Gentry asked. “I want to hear about all those big fish that got away from you and Pete.”

“I’m meeting Tim in half an hour at the Scotch and Sirloin. Come along, Tim’s buying.”

“I haven’t that much time today,” Gentry told Shayne in a gruff voice. “By the way, I forgot to ask. What sends you to Taiwan?”

Shayne quickly filled Gentry in on the details of what he’d come to think about as the Golden Buddha Caper.

“You have yourself a piece of cake with chocolate frosting,” Will Gentry grumbled. “Why don’t we swap jobs one of these days, Shayne? I get all the trouble while you’re having fun.”

“Will, good friend, without you shuffling paper behind that desk nobody would sleep soundly at night in Miami Beach. You are their White Knight in the battle against crime and corruption. I’m just a peasant gumshoe in your fief.”

Gentry cocked an eyebrow as he lit a fresh cigar. “Get the hell out of here, peasant, and take your blarney stone with you,” he said before he choked on cigar smoke. “Tell Rourke to come see me,” Gentry went on when he’d recovered his breath. “I have a message for his ghetto kids on the side of law and order.”

Shayne found the lanky reporter for Miami News slouched on a barstool in the Scotch and Sirloin, owlishly regarding his first boilermaker of the day.

“In these pensive moods, Tim,” Shayne said, sliding onto the adjoining barstool, “has anyone ever told you there is a marked resemblance between you and a basset hound who has just had his tail caught in a crack?”

“Flattery will get you nowhere, Shayne,” Rourke said without looking around. “I’m contemplating with my inner eye the injustice of Big Government and the IRS.”

“Don’t tell me you’ve been audited again,” Shayne said.

“No. I got a raise.”

“Hurrah.”

Tim finally looked around. “It’s moved me into a higher tax bracket.”

“Not good?” Shayne asked.

“Very ungood,” Rourke said. “If my figures don’t lie, and I’m afraid they don’t that raise amounts to exactly $1.69.”

“Why complain?” Shayne asked. “That should buy you a cup of coffee, a pack of cigarettes and maybe a morning newspaper.”

The bartender, with a cheerful, “Good to see you again, Mr. Shayne,” served the big detective a Martell’s on the rocks.

Shayne nodded his thanks. “I read your column this morning,” he told Tim.

“The question is, has Will Gentry read it yet?”

“Affirmative,” Shayne said. “I stopped by to chat with him on my way here.”

“And?”

“Go see him. Those ghetto kids have a good idea and I believe Will Gentry can be a lot of help getting them organized,” Shayne said.

“That’s welcome news. What about you? I had in, mind you helping them out, they’ve all heard about you one way or another. This is why I’m breaking a precedent and popping for lunch.”

Shayne finished his drink; Rourke ordered another boilermaker.

“I’ve talked with some of the victimized elderly people trying to make it on fixed incomes,” Tim went on to say. “It’s one hell of a problem! Half the muggings never get reported for fear there will be retaliation. These people can’t afford the rents in better sections of this town and Miami.”

“I know,” Shayne said, scowling. “I wish I had the time right now to help out, but I’m off to Taiwan tomorrow morning. When I get back let’s talk about it again. Okay?”

“Taiwan?” Tim Rourke was wide awake now. “What takes you out there?”

“A security job,” Shayne said. “I’m to babysit the Golden Buddha and some other valuable bric-a-brac being shipped by the Nationalists for a tour of this country.”

“Can I print this?”

“Talk to a Dr. Feldman out at the university,” Shayne told him. “He’s the honcho who retained me for the job. A certain Dr. Scott expects a little dirty work at the crossroads before the Golden Buddha arrives here in Miami.”

“Who’s Dr. Scott?”

“Some fusty old antiquarian I suspect,” Shayne said. “The nervous type, from what I hear. I’ll be meeting him on Taiwan.”

Tim finished his boilermaker. “Let’s eat.”

“Suits me,” Shayne said.

Rourke ordered corn beef and cabbage, which he stated was his idea of health food. “We’re having one of our periodic health fads at the newspaper,” he told Shayne. “Just about everybody is jogging and eating wheat germ on organic lettuce.”

“Sounds great for rabbits,” Shayne said. “I think I’ll stick to meat and potatoes.”

A man of his word, Shayne ordered an extra-thick sirloin with baked potato, sour cream and chives.

“Did you ever hear of the Seberg Foundation?” Shayne asked while they were eating.

“Seberg?” Rourke scowled. “I don’t think so. Why do you ask?”

“They’re sponsoring this Golden Buddha thing,” Shayne said. “Dr. Feldman either doesn’t know much about the foundation or isn’t saying.”

Long ago Shayne had discovered a question such as the one he’d just hazarded aroused the bloodhound in Tim Rourke, the instinct that made the man the good investigative reporter he was. He was certain before tomorrow morning and his departure on a flight to San Francisco that Tim would have some information for him. Added to what Lucy Hamilton would be able to garner — and she was no mean investigator herself he’d learned. By the time he was on the plane, Shayne expected he would have a fairly complete picture of the mysterious Seberg Foundation.

Shayne’s insatiable curiosity about everyone and everything involved in whatever case he happened to be working had more than once been the difference between success and failure, sometimes life and death.

“I’ll do some snooping,” Tim promised.

“I’d appreciate it.”

When he returned to his East Flagler Street office Shayne was surprised to see a puzzled expression on his secretary’s pretty face.

“I’ve tried the library here in town, the Library of Congress, even the IRS, Michael,” she said. “Nobody seems to know much of anything about this Seberg Foundation.”

“Are they listed in Miami Beach, Miami or anywhere else here in Florida?”

Lucy had been poring over telephone directories, “I don’t think so.”

“Will Gentry called. You’re cleared to carry a weapon aboard tomorrow’s flight.”

“That’s good. You know I’d better get packed for this junket. Can you hold the fort here if I take you out to supper this evening?”

Lucy smiled. “That’s what you pay me for, Michael. Supper would be a nice perk, however. Any special place in mind?”

“You decide.”

“There’s a new Cantonese restaurant over on Biscayne Boulevard,” Lucy said tentatively. “Maybe we’d better tune your taste buds for Taiwanese cooking. What do you say?”

Shayne nodded. “Sounds good, Angel.”

“I’m glad you approve.”

“By the way,” Shayne said. “I mentioned this mysterious Seberg Foundation to Tim Rourke at lunch and he’s promised to come up with something.”

“You’re a bit worried about this Golden Buddha thing, aren’t you, Michael?”

“No more than I usually am tackling something like this,” Shayne told her, “but a few things don’t make sense... yet. For example, why me?”

“What do you mean?” Lucy asked.

Shayne sat on the comer of her desk. “The Nationalist government has plenty of security people. They could guard the shipment until it reaches San Francisco.”

“I asked Dr. Feldman that question,” Lucy said. “While we were haggling about your fee. He said this Dr. Scott had already talked with officials out there and they weren’t willing to guard the shipment.”

“Did he say why?”

Lucy shook her head. “No.”

“Maybe they’re miffed about withdrawal of diplomatic recognition,” Shayne said, “and then, again, maybe there’s more to it than that.”

“I’ve done some figuring,” Lucy told Shayne. “Do you have any idea how much 500 pounds of gold is worth?”

“A heap, I’d say. How much?”

“Well, there are twelve troy dunces to a pound when you’re weighing gold.”

“I never realized that.”

“So now you know,” Lucy said pertly. “When you multiply by the 500 pounds, and say gold is now $400 an ounce, a troy ounce, you’re talking about $2,400,000.”

Shayne whistled softly. “We’re sitting into a high stake game, aren’t we?”

“You and this Dr. Scott are,” Lucy pointed out. “I’ll just be sitting here working my fingers to the bone while you skylark in the Far East.”

“Come along then,” Shayne invited.

“I can’t and you darned well know it,” Lucy said. “Somebody has to watch the store.”

Shayne leaned over, raised her face and gently kissed Lucy Hamilton.

“What was that for?” she asked.

“Just a passing fancy,” Shayne teased. “Now I’d better move along and let you get some work done. Is it all right if I pick you up about six thirty?”

“Make it seven. I need to wash my hair.”

“Will we need reservations?” Shayne asked.

“I made them this morning just in case you should ask me to dinner,” Lucy said. “Don’t forget to pack a toothbrush.”

When he reached his apartment, Shayne discovered his Cuban cleaning woman had been there before him. The bed was made up and everything was in apple pie order.

Shayne took down a blue flight bag from a closet shelf and, whistling to himself, packed extra shirts, pajamas, a sweater, and toilet articles (not forgetting a toothbrush).

For the cruise from Taiwan to San Francisco he would have to buy additional wardrobe in Taiwan before embarking, but Shayne looked forward to bargain prices on that island.

Tim Rourke called about the middle of the afternoon. “Hey, Mike,” he said, “I really had to dig to find out about this Seberg Foundation, so you owe me one now.”

Shayne chuckled. “You scratch my back, I’ll scratch yours, so what do you have?”

“It was founded in 1950 by Joseph Seberg, a Swiss citizen. It’s rumored he made his fortune by smuggling gold out of Nazi Germany info Switzerland. Also works of art. That last is documented. Recently he’s paid a visit to both mainland China and Taiwan.”

“This gets interesting,” Shayne said when Tim paused. “Do we know the purpose of those two visits?”

“No,” Tim told him. “But Joe gets more interesting. He’s one of these multimillionaire sleepers. Nobody really knows a hell of a lot about the man himself.”

“Where is his foundation registered?” Shayne asked.

“It isn’t,” Tim said. “My main source says it’s a front, but he hasn’t any real proof.”

“A front for what?” Shayne asked.

“Your guess is as good as anyone’s, Mike. The thing is, whatever Joe backs turns him a very neat profit. Sweet charity for charity’s sake is something the Seberg Foundation knows nothing about.”

“Thanks, Tim. Anytime you need a good backscratch you know where to find me.”

“That’s for sure,” Tim said. “I’ll be around, don’t worry.” Then he dropped the bantering tone. “Be careful out there, Mike.”

“You can depend on that,” Shayne told the reporter. “I know better, but maybe you’ll tell me who your main source is?”

“You know better,” Tim said and broke the phone connection.

Shayne went to his bar and poured himself a brandy on the rocks. He sipped it thoughtfully, staring out the window of his apartment.

As a member of the International Association of Private Investigators, or AIAI, Shayne given time could have cabled a Swiss, Antoine Teller, and asked about Seberg. From time to time Shayne supplied information for other association members in all parts of the western world. But he had never had occasion to contact Teller, nor had the Swiss ever needed his services.

Shayne decided whatever scam Joseph Seberg was up to this time was none of his business. He’d been retained to see the Golden Buddha and the rest of the exhibit from Taiwan to Miami.

He did pull a reference book covering China and the Far East from his shelf to learn that the highest peak on the large island off the coast of China was Hsinkao Shan, towering 13,113 feet, and correctly assumed the Hsinkao Shan Buddha came from some ancient temple on the slopes of that mountain.

Chilung was Tapei’s port, so the Golden Buddha would be shipped out from there.

Bathed and shaved, Shayne selected a gray suit that had just come from the cleaners and a light blue shirt with a dark blue tie. He also remembered to shine his shoes. Addicted to slacks and sports coats, Shayne had only recently begun to style up his wardrobe, gently prodded by Lucy Hamilton. It would be a long time, however, before the rugged redhead would vie for the distinction of the Best Dressed Man in Miami Beach.

When he called for her, Lucy was ready and waiting. She’d donned a smartly tailored pants suit that exhibited her fine figure to the best advantage, and wore a white silk scarf knotted loosely about her throat.

It never ceased to amaze Shayne how much Lucy changed when one of their nights on the town rolled around.

“You’re a walking dream,” Shayne complimented Lucy. “What did you do with your hair?”

“Washed it, silly.” Lucy’s quick smile sparkled. “Shall we go?”

III

Pressed duck, Cantonese style, with various candied vegetables and brown rice, accompanied by cups of warm rice wine as well as tea, left both Shayne and Lucy in a mellow mood when they’d finished their dinner in the small private dining room shut off from the rest of the restaurant with delicately painted screens.

Demure young Chinese girls had served their meal. It had been a leisurely dinner and Shayne had become accustomed to sitting on a mat to eat from the low table. He stretched and sighed.

“Now this is living,” he told Lucy. “Maybe we should move our office to Taiwan.”

Lucy laughed.

“What’s funny?” Shayne asked.

“I was picturing you in a kimona.”

“Don’t the Japanese men wear those at home?” Shayne asked. “I don’t know what Chinese men wear.”

Lucy shrugged her slender shoulders. “You could be right.”

“What should we do with the rest of the evening?” Shayne said.

“I just happen to have wine chilling, my stereo stacked with the kind of music we like and a cold late supper ready to serve,” Lucy told him. “But if you have something more exciting in mind...”

“Bite your tongue,” Shayne said. “You’re pure and unadulterated excitement with your womanly wiles and ways. Let’s get out of here.”

Lucy sighed. “I thought you’d never ask.”

Shayne grinned. “Like hell you didn’t.”

The next morning Shayne took a taxi to the airport to catch his early flight. “So you’re Mr. Shayne?” the pretty young woman at the check-in counter said.

“It’s early to tell,” Shayne said, “but I think I am.”

The woman smiled and reached to the cubby holes behind the desk. “Message for you, Mr. Shayne.”

Tully Franco now charged with murder one in California, Shayne read. Never mind contacting Francis. Have a good trip and bring me back a Geisha girl.

The message was from Will Gentry.

“Do they have Geisha girls on Taiwan?” the uniformed woman behind the counter asked.

“Not to the best of my knowledge,” Shayne told her with a grin.

She made a note on his boarding pass. “This gets you aboard armed,” the woman told him. “Just don’t hijack us please.”

Shayne’s flight was abroad a 747 with its two layers of passengers, non-stop to San Francisco. The extra roominess in the first class section was a relief for Shayne after his last tourist flight. Folding his big frame into tourist section seats had been a harrowing experience! When he arrived at Miami International he complained to Lucy about having high-altitude bends. He silently blessed his secretary for booking him through to Taiwan as a first class passenger.

Shayne had only three hours between planes when he reached San Francisco International, so he was relieved Will Gentry had changed his mind about questioning Tully Franco in the SFPD’s custody. He ate a hearty meal in one of the terminal restaurants to fortify himself for the long hop to Honolulu and on to Tapei.

Shayne had his boarding pass and was waiting for his flight number to be called when the PA system announced, “Mr. Michael Shayne, please report to the Orient West counter.”

“What next?” Shayne grumbled to himself. He hoped Chief of Police Will Gentry hadn’t changed his mind.

When Shayne had identified himself the man clerk said, “Mr. Shayne we have a rather extraordinary request.” He pointed toward a slender Chinese girl sitting on a bench near the counter. Dark glasses with their wide oval lenses couldn’t disguise the fact she was a beautiful young woman. “She is on your flight as another first class passenger.”

“Do you have her name?”

The clerk glanced at a slip of paper. “Dr. Mary Su Lin of the University of San Francisco,” he said. “She wants you to look after her on the flight. Her destination is the same as yours.”

Shayne looked around at the Chinese girl. She sat as she had before, looking into space, hands folded in her lap.

“I don’t quite understand this.” Shayne frowned. “She seems perfectly capable of taking care of herself. If she isn’t, flight attendants will be aboard. I have no idea how she got my name or knew I would be taking this flight.”

“The girl is blind, Mr. Shayne.”

“Oh. Well, in that case...”

The clerk was relieved. “Thank you, Mr. Shayne. Have a most pleasant flight.”

Shayne approached the seated Chinese girl. “Hello, Dr. Su Lin. I’m Michael Shayne.”

She turned her face in his direction and held out a slender hand. “Good of you to help me,” she said in a soft voice.

Shayne gently shook her hand. “They are about to call our flight and open the gates.”

When Mary Su Lin arose from her bench, Shayne discovered the top of her head didn’t quite reach his shoulder. She took the arm he offered.

“This is good of you, Mr. Shayne,” she said. “I suppose I could have managed alone, but since we have a common interest I decided you might not mind being burdened with a sightless person.”

As they walked, Shayne, matching his usually long strides to Mary’s short steps, said, “What is it we have in common?”

“The Golden Buddha.”

The long hours ahead crossing the Pacific would be time enough to find out her interest in the Golden Buddha of Hsinkao Shan, Shayne decided, and concentrated on leading Mary through the crowded air terminal to their boarding gate.

Aboard the plane Shayne helped Mary fasten her seatbelt. As the 747 moved out and down the blacktop alley for the head of the runway the pilot would use for take-off, Mary Su Lin seemed to shrink in her seat and Shayne noticed that her hands were trembling.

“Are you afraid to fly?” he asked.

“Always.” She managed a stiff smile, but her olive-skinned face was pale.

Shayne put an arm around the slender Chinese girl’s shoulders. “Satchel Paige had something to say about flying,” he told her, then decided against quoting Satchel to the frightened girl until they were safely airborne.

“Sat-chel? What an extraordinary, name. Who was he?” she asked.

“You’d have to be a baseball can to remember Satch,” Shayne told her. “He was a pitcher in the black leagues who finally made the majors at the end of his career.”

The pilots had been cleared for take-off. As the huge plane gathered speed the jet-engine whine rose to a banshee scream.

“What did he say?” Mary asked.

“Tell you when we’re in the air,” Shayne said.

The plane’s nose tilted and the 747 went into a 45 degree climb, the maze of criss-crossed runways-quickly dwindling until San Francisco International looked like some sort of board for a child’s game.

Finally the captain announced on the PA that they were at 33,000 feet, doing 500 knots with good weather-predicted between the west coast and Honolulu.

Shayne helped Mary unbuckle her seatbelt and tuck it away.

“Now tell me what it was this Satchel person said about air travel?” she insisted, no longer pale and trembling.

“Oh?” Shayne was wishing she’d forget what he’d started to tell her. “The airlines ain’t goin’ to hurt you” he quoted, “but they may kill you.”

To his surprise Mary laughed, and her laughter was as sweet as a tinkling temple bell. “Your Mr. Satchel could have been Chinese with that sort of philosophy,” she told him. “Fatalism is our defense against fear, but I’m too Americanized to be a good fatalist.”

San Francisco’s famous skyline rode on a pillow of clouds behind them, a toy city, and the blue Pacific below was dimpled and flecked with tiny crests of white foam.

“How do you feel now?” Shayne asked the girl.

“Much better.” She gave him a fleeting smile. “Forgive me for being such a coward.”

“On one condition.”

“And what is that?”

“Tell me two things; why we have a common interest in the Golden Buddha; and how did you know I was booked on this flight?”

A pert stewardess picked that moment to ask, “May I serve you something to drink, Miss Su Lin and Mr. Shayne? Luncheon will be served in half an hour.”

“What will you have?” Shayne asked Mary Su Lin.

“A gimlet please.”

“Make mine a double brandy, Martell’s if you have it aboard,” Shayne ordered. “Just ice.”

“I believe we have your brand,” the stewardess told Shayne, and disappeared into the dim after-reaches of the 747.

“The size of these double-deck birds always amazes me,” Shayne told the girl.

“Me too,” she said. “It’s as if we were a small airborne world.”

“It’s question and answer time,” Shayne reminded Mary.

“Dr. Feldman, when I called him yesterday, referred me to your secretary,” she told him, “so that answers your last question first.”

“You’re with the Seberg Foundation?”

The girl frowned slightly. “In an advisory capacity only. My field is Oriental art and philosophy.”

“My interest in the Hsinkao Shan Buddha is to see it reaches Miami safely,” Shayne said. “But Dr. Feldman must have told you that. Now tell me why you’re flying out to Taiwan?”

Mary laughed. “Don’t you enjoy a good puzzle, Mr. Shayne?”

“I’m Mike to my friends,” Shayne told her.

“Mike it is then.”

“I don’t like puzzles,” Shayne said. “Not when I have a job to do.”

“Perhaps my mission is the same as yours,” Mary Su Lin said in a teasing voice.

The stewardess brought their drinks. Mary sipped her gimlet. “Excellent.”

Shayne ignored the Martell’s on the rocks on the small fold-down tray in front of him. “Stop playing the role of an Inscrutable Chinese, Mary,” he said. “If we’re to deal in perhaps, maybe you’re a mainland Chinese agent.” Shayne said it blandly, but looked for an answer in his companion’s expression.

Mary sobered. “I hate the Communists!”

“And love the Nationalists?”

“No. Love isn’t the right word. Let’s say I respect them for standing up against the Communist terror... and stupidity,” she added.

Shayne finally sipped his drink.

“That isn’t your brand,” Mary said.

“How would you know that?”

“When you can’t see nature compensates by making your hearing, sense of smell and taste more acute than the average person’s,” she told him. “One of my uncles owns a Chinatown bar in San Francisco. While I went to school I worked as one of his bartenders so I could pay my readers. I became quite good at distinguishing brands of whisky by sniffing the corks.”

“I seem to be learning everything about you except why you’re on your way to Taiwan,” Shayne told the girl.

“Do you suppose we could have another drink before lunch?” Mary Su Lin asked.

Shayne rang for the stewardess. “Do you know this Dr. Scott?” he asked.

“No Dr. Scott is the reason I’m flying to Taiwan.”

When the stewardess came she brought with her their fresh drinks.

“Do you read minds?” Shayne asked.

The stewardess smiled. “It comes with the job. By the way, I haven’t served you Martell’s. We’re out of that brand.”

Mary Su Lin’s was a knowing smile.

While they sipped their drinks, the Chinese girl explained, “The Hsinkao Shan Golden Buddha is an important national treasure for the Taiwanese. Dr. Scott isn’t completely trusted by the Nationalist government. They have been in touch with Joseph Seberg and he cabled me to assume her responsibilities. That is as much as I know, Mike.”

“Does Dr. Feldman know about this?” Shayne asked.

“I don’t believe so. Mr. Seberg can be a very capricious man and many times his left hand doesn’t know what his right is doing.”

“This leaves me in a rather odd position,” Shayne said. “I was hired to work with Dr. Scott.”

“We’ll sort things out quickly enough in Tapei,” Mary told him. “I’ll deal with Dr. Scott.”

Their layover at Honolulu International was a brief one. There was a short refueling stop at Midway, then a night flight on to Taiwan. Mary Su Lin, in response to his questions, filled Shayne in about the stormy history of the island, once Formosa, 100 miles off the South China coast.

“The original Formosans,” she told him, “were a brown-skinned people, probably Malays. The Dutch first conquered the island and held it against the Spanish.”

“After them the Japanese?” Shayne asked.

“No. Koxinga or Cheng Ch’eng-kung drove out the Dutch and brought Chinese to Taiwan. It was a refuge back then in 1662 from the Manchu rulers of China. From the island Cheng, like Chiang Kai Shek, tried to drive the Manchus from the Chinese mainland. In 1682 the Manchus seized the island and then the Chinese migration increased.”

“What happened to the original Taiwanese?” Shayne asked.

“As the saying goes, they took to the hills,” Mary Su Lin told him. “Three quarters of the island is mountains you know. On the east they drop a sheer 6000 feet into the sea. The western coastal plain is about twenty miles wide and ninety long. That is where the Chinese live and farm. The Japanese had the island ceded to them in 1904 after the Sino-Japanese war and, as you probably know, held it until 1945 when it was returned to China.”

She went on to mention that the native Formosans in their mountain strongholds were head hunters until shortly before World War II.

“Should history repeat itself, as it has a way of doing,” Mary Su Lin told Shayne, “we can expect the Communists, like the Manchus, to make an all-out effort in the not too distant future to invade Taiwan, especially since the Nationalists can no longer be certain of United States support.”

Flying into the dawn, Shayne first saw the towering mountain spine of the island. As the plane closed the distance the cliffs Mary Su Lin had mentioned came in sight. Minutes later, they landed at the Tapei air terminal.

An official of the government, a young Chinese in a business suit, was waiting for them at customs. He introduced himself as Chung Lee and Shook Shayne’s hand, then bowed to Mary Su Lin.

“Please be welcome to Free China,” Chung Lee said in unaccented English. “I have the honor of being your friend and guide while you are our guests here on Taiwan.”

“Then you can guide us to the International Hotel,” Shayne told him. “We’re to meet Dr. Scott there.”

Chung Lee frowned gave his round face a pained expression. “Dr. Scott today is in Kaohsiung, our other port city,” he said. “She is making final shipping arrangements for the Golden Buddha there. She is sorry not to honor your arrival with her presence.”

“Did you say she?” Shayne asked. “Dr. Scott is a woman?”

Chung Lee nodded. “A most beautiful woman in western eyes. I’m sure you will agree.”

Mary Su Lin asked, “You mean Dr. Feldman didn’t tell you?”

“No, he didn’t. In my rush to get away, we spoke on the phone for only a few minutes.”

“It’s Dr. Stephanie Scott,” Mary Su Lin told Shayne. “You might remember that she was a rather prominent campus activist in the 1960s. She’s a graduate of the University of California at Berkeley.”

Shayne shook his head. “There were too many to remember them all.”

“Please come,” Chung Lee said. “A car is waiting.”

Shayne, with Mary Su Lin’s arm tucked under his elbow, followed the Chinese through the crowded terminal to a side door. Two husky Chinese with shaved heads, in chauffeur’s livery, took their baggage and loaded it into the trunk of the black Mercedes.

Shayne noticed both men were armed but, in a foreign country, thought nothing of it.

The jammed city streets fascinated Shayne. It wasn’t the sort of first glimpse at an Oriental city he expected. With its gleaming high-rise buildings and smart shops, Tapei could have been any other new western city if it weren’t for the signs in incomprehensible Chinese.

He became so much a tourist, as a matter of fact, that he didn’t notice the Mercedes was moving through thinner traffic as it neared the edge of the city.

“Is this your first visit to our island?” Chung Lee asked Shayne.

“As a matter of fact it is,” Shayne told him.

Mary Su Lin touched his arm. “The International Hotel didn’t used to be this far from the air terminal, Mike.”

The car was spinning along a wide road that skirted the mountains, and rice paddies stretched away on either side of them.

“Where are you taking us?” Shayne asked their guide.

Chung Lee smiled. “You and Dr. Su Lin are honored guests of the Red Brigade, Mr. Shayne.” He extended his hand. “You will please give me the weapon you are carrying.”

Shayne considered the odds.

The chauffeur not driving had an arm hooked over the back of the front seat and a machine pistol in his other hand.

“Your weapon please,” Chung Lee said.

IV

“What is happening?” Mary Su Lin asked Shayne.

“We’ve been suckered and shafted,” he told her in an even voice that had a bite. Carefully removing his Colt .45 from the shoulder holster, he passed the weapon to Chung Lee. “This is one hell of a welcome to Taiwan! What sort of game are you and the goons up front playing?”

“It was the Manchus who stole the Hsinkao Shan Golden Buddha from the people of China,” Chung Lee told him. “The Red Brigade will return it to its rightful owners, the People’s Republic of China. Unless the Nationalists do this, and promptly, you and Dr. Su Lin will be executed.”

Mary Su Lin’s hand found Shayne’s, but she said in a cool voice, “Your grasp of Chinese history, Mr. Chung, leaves something to be desired.”

“You, a woman, choose to enlighten me?” Chung asked in a sarcastic voice.

“Someone should,” Mary Su Lin told him. “I know more than you do about Oriental objects of art. It was Cheng Ch’eng-Kung who commissioned the Golden Buddha to honor his favorite wife who was Buddhist. That was here on Taiwan in 1664 and when the Manchus invaded the island it was hidden in a mountain cave. Later the shrine on Hsinkao Shan was rebuilt and the Golden Buddha restored to his rightful place, only to be hidden again during the Japanese occupation. Your Red Brigade should try to keep their facts straight, Mr. Chung.”

“Does that straighten you out?” Shayne asked Chung. “Chairman Mao, if he was still alive, would be ashamed of your ignorance.”

Chung Lee’s mouth was a straight line and anger glinted in his eyes but he said, “No matter. Whatever is Chinese belongs to the Chinese people who followed Chairman Mao instead of that traitor, Chiang Kai Shek.”

“Communist rhetoric isn’t easy to understand, Mike.” It was Mary Su Lin’s turn to be sarcastic. “To put it simply, what belongs to them is theirs and what belongs to you is also theirs.”

The black Mercedes was laboring up a steep slope in the mountain road, vertical cliffs on either side. At each sharp curve the car’s tires spit gravel over the sheer drop on their right. They were climbing so fast Shayne fished a stock of gum from his pocket to ease the popping of his eardrums.

“Where does Dr. Stephanie Scott fit into this clever little plot of yours, Chung?” Shayne asked the Chinese. “Is this kidnapping for ransom her bright idea or did you think it up all by yourself?”

Chung Lee stared straight ahead, Lips pursed, and refused to answer Shayne’s question.

“Uncle Sam isn’t going to take to this kindly,” Shayne went on. “At this juncture in their international relationships, trying to cozy up to the decadent capitalists of U.S.A., I doubt your mainland friends will pat you on the back and strike a medal either.”

“Running dog imperialists!” Chung Lee spat at the pair.

Shayne grinned. “Flattery is going to get you nowhere, friend.”

They were finally coming to the end of the narrow mountain road. Shayne estimated from his shortness of breath that they must be at least 9000 feet. They could see through misty clouds to the western ocean cliffs, and the eastern lowlands checkerboarded with small fields and what looked like toy houses.

The air was clean and crisp.

Beyond the end of the road, on a mountain-side plateau, was a rustic lodge built of bamboo. The mountain retreat, Shayne speculated, of some minor government official anxious to escape the humid lowland part of the island during the monsoon season.

On the porch were another pair of shaven-head Chinese, or perhaps Mongols, Shayne thought. Like the two stolid chauffeurs they were armed with machine pistols. They stood more or less at attention as Shayne and Mary Su Lin followed Chung Lee out of the backseat of the black mercedes.

The two chauffeurs got out of the car, too, and Chung Lee slid under the wheel. “You will be guarded by these men until the Golden Buddha is on its way to Canton,” Chung Lee told Shayne and Mary Su Lin. “I would not advise any attempt to escape from them. Their orders are to shoot to kill under such a circumstance.”

Shayne stretched and yawned. “Wouldn’t think of such a stupid move, Chung,” he said. “We rather like it here with your thugs. Do any of you cretins speak English?”

Chung Lee’s was a mocking smile. “Of course not. They know better than to accept any sort of bribe anyway, so save your breath. Red Brigade discipline is very strict.”

“I’m sure it must be,” Shayne said. “By the way, how are you going to negotiate for the Golden Buddha?”

Chung Lee couldn’t resist a smug smile. “It is with me the Red Brigade will barter,” he boasted. “This sort of thing comes within the jurisdiction of my department. Just say your prayers that my immediate superiors will strike a swift bargain.”

Shayne shook his head sadly. “A traitor in high places.”

“A patriot!” Chung Lee insisted with some heat.

Shayne had found out what he needed to know. The Red Brigade had no plans to set either himself or Mary Su Lin free. Chung Lee would never risk being exposed as an agent of Red China.

This information the Chinese had given so carelessly narrowed Shayne’s options.

He would have to figure some way to escape their captors, and quickly, then manage to get down the rugged mountain and back to Tapei. The blind girl would be a burden when they got free — and Shayne didn’t consider if they managed to elude the four guards — but she was game. If he had to, Shayne would carry her down the rugged slopes piggyback!

Shayne set a forty-eight-hour deadline for them to make their escape. He had a strong hunch Chung Lee wouldn’t dare keep them alive any longer than that. It would be too risky.

“I suppose this is your place,” Shayne said, gesturing at the mountain lodge.

Chung Lee nodded. “My duties are rigorous. I need somewhere I can relax.”

Shifting gears, Chung Lee drove away and one of the guards gestured Shayne and Mary Su Lin to enter the bamboo lodge.

Shayne smiled at the man. “You’re a yellowskinned son of a bitch,” he told the guard in a pleasant voice. “Which doesn’t reflect much credit on the maternal side of your family tree.”

The man blinked but the expression on his sullen face didn’t change.

The other three guards showed no indication that they understood English either.

“Would you say they don’t understand what I just said?” Shayne asked Mary Su Lin.

“I’d have to see their faces to be sure,” she told him, “but insulting that man’s ancestral mother should have earned you a cracked head.”

The four men were talking among themselves so Shayne asked, “Do you understand them?”

“They speak a Mongol dialect,” she told him. “I can only catch a familiar word here and there. I’d say they come from the Gobi Desert of Outer or Inner Mongolia.”

“That’s great!” Shayne said. “Cousins of Ghengis Kahn.”

Shayne and Mary Su Lin were on the porch of the lodge. One of the guards opened the door for them. Inside, they found themselves in a room that ran across the front of the small bamboo building. It was sparsely but tastefully furnished. At one end were sleeping mats for the guards, and stacked against the wall were AK47s with clips of ammunition.

There was a brazier set up on the floor where the guards cooked their meals.

The stolid guards herded Shayne and Mary Su Lin down a narrow hall to a room at the back of the lodge. As soon as they’d stepped inside the room the door behind them was bolted.

“Hello.” The calm, husky voice belonged to the woman sitting in a dark corner, hugging her knees. “Nice to finally have some company. I was getting lonely.”

Mary Su Lin’s head swiveled in the direction of the voice, as Shayne’s eyes adjusted to the darkness after bright sunshine outside he discovered the owner of the voice had honey-gold hair and, as she rose, a ripe, shapely body.

“Who the devil are you?” Shayne asked in a blunt voice.

“Dr. Stephanie Scott.”

With a blink Shayne absorbed this information. “Meet Dr. Mary Su Lin of the University of San Francisco,” he said, nodding toward the Chinese girl. “I’m...”

“Mike Shayne,” Dr. Stephanie Scott finished for him. “If he fooled you two, I don’t feel too badly about falling into Chung Lee’s trap. Clever people, these Chinese. Begging your pardon, Dr. Su Lin.”

“If no offense given, none is taken,” Mary Su Lin said. “You two fell for his plot with your eyes open. In my case the seeing led the unsighted, to garble a biblical passage.”

Shayne detected a sharp edge to the Chinese girl’s voice he hadn’t heard before.

“You’re blind?” Dr. Stephanie Scott asked.

“Unsighted,” Mary Su Lin corrected. “We like that term for our handicap better.”

The small room was Spartan, with only sleeping mats and, in a far corner, screened sanitary facilities. There was a single window. Shayne prowled to it and tugged at the cord that raised the bamboo blind. It was glazed with oiled paper. Shayne slid the window Open.

The lodge was poised on the brink of a steep cliff and provided a breath-taking panorama of the Taiwan mountain spine with its snowy peaks. The lodge was only a foot or two from the edge of the precipice.

Shayne could see down into a deep, rocky valley more than 2000 feet below.

Dr. Stephanie Scott joined Shayne at the window and her shoulder rubbed his.

“That one is Hsinkao Shan,” she told Shayne, pointing to a peak glistening with white snow in the middle distance. “A sacred mountain to the ignorant and superstitious Buddhists. From it they believe one can commune with the Lord Buddha, wherever he may be these days.”

Shayne craned his neck from the window to study the precipice on which they were poised. An expert mountaineer, he decided, could probably go down that cliff, given the proper equipment. With a woman and a girl, and no equipment, it was an impossible task.

And if it was possible, the guards could easily pick them off as they tried to make the descent. So that avenue of escape was closed.

Shayne moved away from Dr. Stephanie Scott. Mary Su Lin had calmly seated herself on one of the sleeping mats, naturally assuming the Lotus position

“Penny for your thoughts, Michael Shayne,” the woman said.

“Chung Lee doesn’t plan for us to leave this place alive,” Shayne told her. “My thoughts start with that premise. He’ll keep us among the living until and if he can strike some sort of deal, but after that,” Shayne said with a grim smile, “we become very poor life insurance risks.”

Dr. Stephanie Scott extended a slender hand. “Nice to meet another pragmatist,” she said, her blue eyes studying Shayne’s craggy face. “What do you suggest we should do? Prayer to an almighty but unseen God isn’t exactly one of my fortes.”

“There’s only one thing to do,” Shayne said.

“And what would that be?”

“Break out of here and get back down the mountain to Tapei, what else?”

“So we can blow the whistle on Mr. Chung Lee, honorable gentleman that he is,” Dr. Stephanie Scott said in a sarcastic voice. “You’ve come half way around the world at some expense to Dr. Feldman’s department to state the obvious. Congratulations, Mike Shayne, but I wish Feldman had sent a contingent of U.S. Marines instead.”

Shayne ignored the woman’s sarcasm. “Chung Lee has my Colt .45,” he said. “Did he happen to leave you any sort of weapon?”

Dr. Stephanie Scott was wearing a rather tight slit skirt, in the Chinese fashion, with a loose silk blouse. She turned her back and raised the blouse. Tucked into the top of the skirt was a dagger.

The handle nestled in the small of Dr. Stephanie Scott’s back and Shayne mentally complimented her on knowing the best way to conceal a weapon, but at the same time wondered where she had learned. When he reached to draw the dagger from its soft leather sheath his fingers brushed the woman’s warm skin, and she shuddered slightly.

Shayne found himself looking at a needle-sharp double edged dagger. He carefully returned it to its sheath and Dr. Stephanie Scott let her loose blouse tail fall back in place.

“Why did they leave you with that?” Shayne asked.

“Three of our Mongol friends planned to conduct a most complete body search,” she told him with a slight flush. “The fourth saved me from being stripped and raped. He repeated the name Chung Lee several times during his tirade, so I assume my eventual ravishment will be carried out by that son of a bitch... before he kills me.”

Shayne was thoughtful. “When will we be brought something to eat?” he asked the woman.

“Like an animal in a zoo I’m fed boiled fish and rice once a day in the evening. The priggish Mongol I’ve mentioned seems to be the chief cook and bottle washer around this lovely mountain retreat. At any rate he serves my food. I’d assume they won’t vary the routine for two additional guests. Why do you ask? You getting hungry? I hope you like fish and rice. I don’t.”

“For Mike to get us out of this mess he needs to know the routine they follow,” Mary Su Lin told the woman.

Dr. Stephanie Scott raised an eyebrow. “Is Miss Know-it-all your mistress, Shayne?”

“I am not!” Mary Su Lin said hotly. “I came along with Mike as a watchdog for the Seberg Foundation. It seems Joseph Seberg doesn’t trust you.”

“Well, now that’s nice!”

“What we don’t need is for you two to get into a hair-pulling contest,” Shayne said in a crisp voice, “so knock it off.”

Dr. Stephanie Scott took a deep breath. “So all right. You’ve made your point, Shayne.”

“I hope so. We hang together or be hanged separately, as the cliche goes. What happens while you’re eating, Stephanie?”

When Shayne used her first name, it seemed to touch a cord that dissolved the woman’s brash manner. She’d used it to cover the squirming worms of naked fear assailing her.

“They leave the door open.” Stephanie’s voice dropped to its normal husky register. “When I’ve finished eating the cook, or whatever he is, comes back to make sure I haven’t eaten the plate and chopsticks too. God knows I stay hungry enough to do that if I could!”

“What are you given to drink?” Shayne asked. “I’ve noticed we’re not left any water.”

“Green tea and that’s all. Water up here is either bad or scarce. It’s bitter stuff served in a glass.”

“Bitter?” Mary Su Lin asked.

“Yes. Very.”

“Green tea shouldn’t be,” Mary Su Lin told Stephanie. “Not if it’s made properly.”

“Or drugged,” Shayne said.

Stephanie’s eyes widened. “Why didn’t I think of that? I’ve been sleeping like a baby since they brought me up here. Usually I have to take a pill.”

“Drugging the victim is S.O.P. with kidnappers,” Shayne told the woman and the girl. “Where’s the guard while you eat with the door to this room open?”

“Out in the hallway.”

“All right,” Shayne said. “Here’s the way we make a break this evening.”

V

“Very well and good,” Stephanie said when Shayne had laid out their course of action, “but what then? We’re stranded on a mountain somewhere in Taiwan. What do we do, hitchhike?” She nodded to where Mary Su Lin was sitting quietly. “And what about her?”

“What about me?” Mary Su Lin spoke up.

“You’re blind. It’s going to be hard enough for Shayne and me to scramble off this mountain without having to play seeing-eye-dogs to you.”

Before Mary Su Lin could speak, Shayne said, “Just knock it off, both of you!” He turned to Stephanie. “Let me have that dagger.”

Without a word she handed it, in its soft leather sheath, to him. Shayne raised the left leg of his pants and tucked the sheathed dagger into his sock, but hot without first testing its edge with his thumb.

“Where in the world did you get the dagger?” he asked Stephanie.

“I found it in a shop in Tapei when I first came to the island,” she said. “I bought it for a friend back in the states who collects weapons, but decided I’d better carry it until you came.”

“Why?”

“My hotel room was rifled twice shortly after I arrived,” Stephanie explained. “And there have been some other suspicious things happening.”

“Such as?”

“I’ve been followed wherever I go. That’s why I asked Dr. Feldman to send someone like you out here.”

“Where is the Golden Buddha now?” Shayne asked.

“Aboard a ship named the oriental Trader with the rest of the exhibit. It’s docked at Kaosiung on the southern end of the island instead of Tapei’s port, Chilung. I checked out of my hotel to stay aboard ship until you arrived. I thought I’d be safer there.”

“How did Chung Lee grab you?” Shayne wanted to know.

“He offered to drive me down to Kaosiung,” Stephanie said. “Instead I wound up here.”

“Did you leave a message for me at your hotel?” Shayne asked.

Stephanie made a wry face. “Our dear Chinese friend said he’d take care of that.”

Chung Lee’s plotting was clever, Shayne realized. The American consul on Taiwan would have no reason to believe anything was wrong and institute a search for them.

The ship now in Kaosiung, if the Nationalists took Chung Lee’s bait, would be on the high seas for a southern mainland port before Americans on Taiwan knew three of their citizens were missing. And he suspected Mary Su Lin, Stephanie Scott and Mike Shayne, when they didn’t appear, would be implicated by Chung Lee in the plot. Shayne was certain the man was clever enough, and had the connections, to cover himself in that way.

The sun was down and darkness was coming quickly. The aroma of cooking fish and rice had invaded the room where they were held captive half an hour ago. Shayne had rehearsed both Mary Su Lin and Stephanie Scott in the roles they were to play.

“Don’t spare your lungs,” he’d warned the woman.

“Not to worry,” she’d told him.

Shayne stood at parade-rest facing the bolted door, Stephanie was by the window, ostensibly admiring the view, Mary Su Lin was behind the corner screen that hid the sanitary facilities.

The dagger was clasped in Shayne’s right hand behind his back.

The bolt on the outside of the door was shot by a guard with a machine pistol dangling from a strap over his shoulder. Shayne heard the footsteps of the man bringing their food. He would have his hands full.

When that guard was framed in the doorway, Shayne stepped aside, ostensibly to let him pass. Unsuspecting, the Mongol stepped into the room.

Shayne brought his left fist around in a sharp arc, catching the guard carrying their food on the nape of his neck. As the man went down, Stephanie let out a piercing shriek. It was enough to confuse the guard in the hallway fumbling for the machine pistol he was carrying. Shayne had that weapon, slashed it loose with the knife, then drove the dagger into the Mongol’s throat, jerked it free as blood spurted, stabbed him a second time just below his rib cage to pierce the heart.

The guard he’d struck was on his hands and knees. The running feet of the other two guards shook the lodge floor as Shayne kicked the kneeling man over on his back and drove a foot into his exposed throat.

The other two were pounding toward the room from the front of the lodge.

“Out!” Shayne ordered Stephanie.

She scrambled through the window to crouch on the narrow ledge overlooking the cliff. She screamed again.

Shayne had the machine pistol cocked and ready. The first guard to arrive stumbled over the body in the hallway, slipped in the pool of blood widening around it. A burst from Shayne’s weapon slammed him back against the opposite wall. His machine pistol clattered to the floor as he crumpled at the knees, then pitched headlong into the doorway of the room.

Shayne stood back and stitched the thin hall partition, hoping a lucky shot would down their fourth captor now that he’d lost the element of surprise. He heard the Mongol yelp with surprise then the sound of his pounding feet as he retreated toward the front of the lodge.

“Damn it!” The machine pistol in his hand was empty. Dropping it, he went after the weapon of the man he’d dropped in the doorway. “Back in,” he ordered Stephanie. “The shooting is over here.”

She came squiming through the window to stare at the three Mongols Shayne had just killed. She paled and a hand jumped to her throat.

“You play for keeps, Shayne!” Stephanie said.

Mary Su Lin had ventured forth from behind the corner screen, hands held out in front of her. The room reeked with the smell of cordite and freshly spilled blood. The girl bent over, retching.

Shayne pushed Stephanie toward her. “Keep her down flat and you stay on the floor too,” he ordered. “These flimsy partitions wouldn’t stop a BB pellet.”

“What are you going to do?” Stephanie asked.

“Stalk Number Four, what else?” Shayne said, and in two quick strides was at the window. “You two stay low and quiet, understand?”

It was a close fit but Shayne squeezed out the window onto the narrow ledge. Back to the house wall, in the quickly gathering dusk, he sidestepped toward the back corner of the house, reasoning the surviving guard would circle around and come in that way

As Shayne sidled along, stones dropped off into space and once he almost slipped. Somehow he managed to keep his balance without dropping the machine pistol in his sweaty hand. There was a cold bite to the evening breeze at that altitude but Shayne’s shirt was soaked with sweat.

He was thankful the sheer drop in front of him was to a valley floor already flooded with inky darkness.

Shayne paused when he reached the corner, holding his breath and listening. The sound he was waiting for, when it came, was behind him, at the front of the house! It was the distinctive snick of another machine pistol being cocked.

Shayne swung himself around the corner a split second before the space he’s occupied was shredded with the scream of bullets.

Turning the corner, he’d dropped his weapon.

It lay out on the edge of the precipice. If he reached for it a burst of fire could cut off his arm. Now sweat was blinding him. Shayne wiped his eyes with his forearm, and the pounding of his heart was like a drum in his ears.

“Don’t panic now,” he told himself, taking a deep breath.

The guard he hoped would expect him to come around the house. Shayne waited in the gathering darkness. Finally he made his move. It was to reach for the fallen machine pistol. There was no burst of fire. Tucking it in his belt, Shayne started sidling back along the ledge, having removed his shoes. As he approached the front corner of the lodge he eased the pistol from his belt and made sure the safety was in the off position. It was already cocked.

Shayne made it to the corner, and jumped out into the open, fully expecting to be fired at by his waiting antagonist. He was just in time to see the Mongol making a stealthy approach to the far corner of the house.

“Back here!” he shouted.

As the man spun around, Shayne nearly cut him in half.

Pausing, Shayne sucked in deep breaths of the cold mountain air, waiting for his heart and pulse to slow. Then he entered the lodge to face Mary Su Lin and Stephanie.

The woman and the girl were backed into a corner of the room, huddled against each other, Stephanie’s arm around Mary Su Lin’s slender shoulders.

“It’s finished here,” Shayne answered the question in Stephanie’s eyes. It was dark now so Shayne lit the oil lamp in the room. He lit a cigarette from the same match and inhaled deeply. “We’d be damned foolish to blunder around this mountain in the dark. Why don’t you two move up to the front room while I do something about...” Shayne indicated the three bodies with his hand. “You might try to rustle up something for us to eat.”

When they were gone he used one of the sleeping mats to roll each body for carrying. There was no shovel and the soil was rocky. For quick disposal he threw the bodies over the cliff, then walked around the house to do the same with the last Mongol guard he’d dropped.

It was grisly work and twice Shayne had the dry heaves before he finished. He’d found and jammed a fresh clip into the machine pistol tucked under his belt. Shayne didn’t intend to be surprised by the return of Chung Lee.

The moon was high. There was a narrow path leading away from the lodge toward the sound of rippling water. He went up on the porch and thrust his head in the doorway.

“Get me a bucket,” he called. Mary Su Lin was fanning the charcoal fire under the brazier on which their fish and rice would be cooked.

Stephanie found one somewhere and brought it to Shayne.

“Back in a minute,” Shayne told her.

A short distance down the path Shayne found himself in a sort of grotto that sheltered a deep spring and the stream flowing from it. When he’d drawn a bucket of water he stripped and forced himself into the bubbling ice-cold water. Jumping out he shivered until his big, scarred body was partially dry, then pulled on his slacks and shirt. His teeth were still chattering, but it felt good to be clean!

As best he could Shayne inspected his shirt and pants for bloodstains. It seemed as if there were a few, as careful as he’d tried to be.

What he’d done had to be done, with three lives at stake. Too often killing became part of his job. Taking a human life was something he could never quite accept as routine. What had happened here, Shayne knew, wouldn’t stay buried in his subconscious; there would be dreams, sometimes nightmares. But that, too, came with the territory.

Shayne’s mind was already worrying about the problem of what to do next. He forgot the bloodstains on his clothing.

When Shayne returned to the lodge, Mary Su Lin had prepared broiled fish, instead of boiled, to be served on mounds of brown rice carefully fried. Stephanie had made tea. The three of them settled down to a feast.

It was a quiet meal. No one had anything to say because the girl and woman were drained by the experience they’d just been through; Shayne was busy figuring their next move.

“I see it this way,” he said when they’d finished eating. “There’s no telephone, no radio, so Chung Lee has to come back either tomorrow or the next day. When he does, he’ll bring us wheels.”

“What do we do about him?” Mary Su Lin wanted to know.

“We’ll let the American consul earn his pay trying to figure that out,” Shayne told her. “We need to get aboard the Oriental Trader and out to sea as soon as possible. Chung Lee didn’t try this caper alone.”

“The Nationalists lead a nervous political life,” Stephanie told Shayne and Mary Su Lin. “They’re paranoic about infiltration into Taiwan’s bureaucratic infra-structure by Communist agents. And I’d guess they should be.”

“What of the men you had to kill?” Mary Su Lin asked Shayne.

“When their bodies are found,” Shayne said, “with any kind of luck we should be back in the states.”

“God willing!” Stephanie breathed.

“Amen,” Mary Su Lin murmured.

“You two try to get some sleep while I wait up for our friend Chung Lee,” Shayne told the woman and girl. “I doubt he’ll try to come up this mountain road in the dark, but I want to be bright and bushy-tailed just in case he does. Is there any tea left?” he asked Stephanie.

“A little. You sleep,” she told Mary Su Lin. “I’ll keep Shayne company.”

“I’m sure Mike will be very grateful,” the Chinese girl said in a sarcastic voice.

VI

It was three o’clock in the morning and Shayne was alone on the porch of the mountain lodge with the machine pistol across his knees. From where he sat he could see the narrow mountain road that wound down the steep slope. The headlights of any automobile negotiating that road would be visible a mile away.

Shayne was smiling to himself because Stephanie had given up trying to come on to him half an hour ago and bedded down with Mary Su Lin.

“Damn it all, Shayne!” Stephanie had finally exploded. “I’d rather be sitting up with a cigar store Indian than you.”

“Why don’t you get some sleep then?” Shayne asked. “We’ve had a busy day here and tomorrow may be just as busy.”

“I’m not used to being sent off to bed alone,” Stephanie sulked.

Shayne gave her bottom a sharp pat. “Have sweet dreams.”

“You’re impossible!” Stephanie said.

“That’s because I try harder,” he told her.

Stephanie had flounced into the lodge.

There were no familiar night sounds this high on the mountain. No birds rustled on their perches; if there were crickets they were silent. The only sounds were the low whistle of the night wind and the just-distinguishable murmur of the spring and creek. It was a moonless night with unblinking stars punched out of the dark sky canopy.

Shayne’s thoughts wandered back to Miami Beach and Lucy Hamilton, Will Gentry and Tim Rourke. He wondered whether it was day or night there, yesterday or tomorrow.

Far down the road he saw two tiny spots of light. They disappeared, appeared again, were gone, then resolved themselves, when he saw them once more into automobile headlights.

Shayne was on his feet. Was it Chung Lee and if so would he be coming up the mountain alone? Shayne moved from the porch to the turn-around in front of the lodge.

Crouched on his heels, he watched the car coming closer. It was coming up the final grade in low gear. Shayne moved back to the edge of the turn-around where the headlights wouldn’t catch him in their glare.

With a final surge the black Mercedes made it onto the gravel turn-around and stopped, the headlights bathing the empty porch in front of the lodge.

The driver stayed in the automobile, evidently puzzled by the absence of the guards, at least one of whom should have come out to meet him.

Shayne silently approached the car at an angle and from behind, careful that his image wouldn’t be caught in the rearview mirrors. There was only the driver in the Mercedes.

The headlights were turned off.

“Just keep both hands on the wheel,” Shayne ordered in a low voice, pressing the machine pistol’s cold muzzle to the driver’s right ear.

There was a startled gasp.

“Now get out from behind the wheel,” Shayne told him, “but keep your hands in sight. I have a very itchy trigger finger.”

The driver did as he was told, drawing quick breaths but moving deliberately, while Shayne pressed the machine pistol muzzle against his spine between the shoulder blades.

“Hands on top of your head now,” Shayne snapped. “No wrong moves.”

The man obeyed and stood quietly while Shayne frisked him to find his own .45 Colt carried in its underarm rig. Shayne was glad to have the familiar heft of his weapon back in his hands and tucked the machine pistol in his belt.

“Can I turn around now, Governor?” the driver asked with a plaintive British accent.

Shayne had been so certain it was Chung Lee who’d driven the Mercedes up the mountain that he nearly dropped his .45.

“Just who the hell are you?” Shayne wanted to know. He found himself facing a slight man with pleasant snub-nosed features and a blond moustache. “What’s happened to Chung Lee?”

“Donald Forbes-Robertson is my name, or I guess you Americans would call it my moniker.” The Englishman eyed the weapon Shayne still leveled at him. “Do you mind very much, old boy?” he asked. “Firearms pointed in my direction make me nervous and always have.”

“Let me have the shoulder rig,” Shayne said.

“Of course. I’ll have to slip out of this coat you know.”

“Go ahead.”

When Shayne was adjusting the straps to his larger fram with the .45 nestled in its worn holster, Forbes-Robertson said, “Chung Lee, I’m afraid has been a very naughty boy. By the way, I’m British Intelligence on loan to the Nationalists here on Taiwan. I’ve had a weather eye on friend Chung for quite sometime. This latest little ploy of his brought things to a head, as you Americans would say.”

“Where is he now?” Shayne asked.

“Unfortunately he’s flown the coop, as you...”

“Americans would say,” Shayne finished for Forbes-Robertson. “How did he manage to do that?”

“Hopped aboard a junk, as...” Forbes-Robertson’s quick grin was engaging. “I rather like the way you Americans express yourselves, as you may have gathered.” He lit a cigarette with a gold lighter. “That heathen Chinee must be half the distance to the mainland by this time. We do have a few failures in British Intel, although I must say our track record is much better than your CIA. That Bay of Pigs fiasco for example.”

For the moment Shayne was satisfied that Forbes-Robertson was who he said he was, and he could ask later how he just happened to have the Colt .45 Chung Lee had relieved him of, as well as the black Mercedes.

And why he’d come alone to the lodge when he must have known they would be well guarded.

“Where are the birds?” Forbes-Robertson asked.

“Sleeping,” Shayne said.

“The guards?”

Shayne pointed to the lip of the precipice on which the lodge perched and the dark valley below.

Forbes-Robertson whistled softly. “Good show! We’ll talk later about how you managed that, Yank. Now let’s whistle-up the birds and be on our way to Kaosiung. I’m sure all three of you are ready for a sea change.”

“You can say that again,” Shayne sighed. “You driving us there?”

Forbes-Robertson shrugged. “It’s the least I can do, old boy. The Nationalist Intel apparatus wants a low profile for Chung’s attempted coup. They have enough on their plate since you Americans pulled out of their corner. Rather alarming, that, if you’re a Nationalist Chinese. My orders are to get you and the birds aboard ship as soon as possible. Do you mind?”

Before Shayne could answer that question Stephanie joined them in the cool morning darkness. “Who the devil is this?” she asked Shayne.

“Forbes-Robertson is the name he’s given me,” Shayne answered.

Stephanie brushed blonde hair away from her face to peer at the slight Englishman. “Haven’t we met somewhere?” she asked.

Forbes-Robertson grinned. “That we have, dear. At the cocktail party Chung Lee threw when you first arrived here in Taiwan.”

“Oh yes,” Stephanie said in a flat voice. “You were drunk and almost fell into the punchbowl.”

Forbes-Robertson winced. “I’ve been telling Shayne here that Chung Lee is... how do your American gangsters put it?”

“On the lam?” Shayne said.

“That’s it.”

“Why are you here?” Stephanie asked bluntly.

Forbes-Robertson told her what he’d just told Shayne. By that time Mary Su Lin had joined them. She took Shayne’s arm. Drawing him apart she whispered, “I don’t like this.”

Shayne considered, then asked, “Any specific reason, Mary?”

“Not yet.” She hesitated. “Call it my feminine intuition.”

What Mary Su Lin had just said triggered a faint alarm bell at the back of Shayne’s mind, and reminded him of his own questions about Forbes-Robertson, but it was too soon to panic.

“We’ll play along,” he told the Chinese girl in a sotto voice. “Trust me.”

“I do, Mike,” she said.

It was the middle of the morning before they reached the dock in Kaohsiung harbor where the Oriental Trader was moored. The rust-streaked freighter with a slight list to port was Liberian registry, Shayne noticed, but flew the Nationalist flag.

It had been a strange trip the length of the island down the flat east coast plain. There was a main highway, but Forbes-Robertson used back roads.

“Nationalist security forces have their wind up,” he explained to Shayne who rode beside him on the front seat of the black sedan.

“So?”

“Have you ever tried to talk your way through a Chinese roadblock?” Forbes-Robertson asked. “It can be sticky.”

On the dock Forbes-Robertson parked the Mercedes out of sight behind a warehouse. He accompanied Shayne, Mary Su Lin and Stephanie Scott aboard the ship.

No sooner were they aboard than deckhands began to unmoor the tramp steamer, pulling aboard the gangplank.

“Do you swim ashore?” Shayne asked the Englishman.

“Didn’t I mention that I’m coming along with the three of you?”

“You sure as hell didn’t,” Shayne said.

The ship was chugging toward the harbor entrance.

“A last minute decision, old boy,” the Englishman said. “You and the birds have staterooms aft.” Forbes-Robertson beckoned to a deckhand standing nearby and spoke to him in Chinese, then turned back to the trio. “The coolie will show you to your quarters, old man... you and Dr. Su Lin.”

They were finally at sea and the ship paused to drop the pilot down a rope ladder to, the bobbing pilots’ boat that had followed in their wake from Kaohsiung harbor. The South China Sea rose and fell in oily swells.

“I need a word with our captain,” Forbes-Robertson told Shayne and Mary Su Lin. “You’d like to make sure our Golden Buddha is still aboard,” he said to Stephanie Scott. “We’ll have a look-see, as you Americans put it.”

Shayne watched the pair move forward toward the bridge superstructure, speaking to each other as they went.

“I get the feeling those two know each other better than they’ve said,” he told Mary Su Lin.

“Word reached Joseph Seberg in Switzerland that Dr. Scott was on intimate terms with a person on Taiwan involved in art thefts,” the Chinese girl told him. “That was why I was sent out here.”

The coolie seaman, grinning, waited to show them aft to the staterooms.

“Did you catch anything of what our English friend said in Chinese?” Shayne asked Mary Su Lin.

“Just a little,” she answered. “It was in Cantonese dialect and I only speak Mandarin fluently, but I believe he instructed the coolie to lock us into one of the staterooms.”

“We’ll see about that,” Shayne said.

They followed the Chinese into a narrow and drafty passageway leading toward the stem of the freighter. Mary Su Lin guided herself by placing a hand on Shayne’s arm.

It was becoming obvious to Shayne that Forbes-Robertson wasn’t who he said he was. He was also now convinced that the Englishman and Stephanie Scott not only knew each other well but were planning to double-cross Mary Su Lin and himself. But what sort of game they were playing he couldn’t be sure.

Mary Su Lin’s temporary safety, however, must be his immediate concern.

The seaman, still grinning, opened the steel door to the left hand stateroom. It was sparsely furnished with a single porthole in the hull of the ship — there was no deck outside — but the double bunks were made up, there was a washstand, a toilet and the stateroom, unlike the rest of the rusty tramp steamer, was relatively clean.

The steel door, he noticed, had a new bolt affixed so it could only be locked from the passageway.

Shayne took Mary Su Lin’s elbow and guided her over the threshold but stayed in the passageway himself. He gave her a brief hug and whispered, “I’ve work to do, honey, but you’ll be safe here.”

She nodded understanding.

The stocky seaman’s grin faded to a frown. Shayne swung around to face him. “Do you understand any English?”

The man shook his head, obviously undecided what to do. Shayne closed and bolted the stateroom door, then asked, “Pidgin?”

“Me catch small pidgin.”

During the Korean War Shayne had picked up “small pidgin” himself on the Pusan docks. He opened the door of the opposite stateroom and waved the seaman to step inside.

“You good fellow, no want to be kill-kill.” Shayne’s Colt was in his hand. “Other fellow tell you lie.”

The seaman’s dark eyes focused on the weapon in Shayne’s hand, then widened with fright. Shayne’s free hand on his chest gently pushed him deeper into the stateroom.

“By-and-bye you fellow stay here,” he said. Reaching into his pocket he pressed a handful of silver into the seaman’s hand. Tenting his hands against his cheek Shayne said, “You fellow sleep?”

The seaman bobbed his head, his grin back.

Shayne closed the stateroom door and heard the Chinese seaman bolt it from the inside. He moved forward in the passageway until he stepped out on the amidships deck.

From the position of the sun Shayne realized they were now on a western course toward the Chinese mainland. Other Chinese crewmen were about their business securing the ship now it was at sea and paid no attention to him as he prowled toward the bridge, certain he would fine Forbes-Robertson and Stephanie up there, as well as the ship’s captain.

Shayne climbed the outside ladder to the starboard flying bridge and found that he had been correct, Forbes-Robertson and Stephanie Scott had their backs to him and were holding a rapt conversation.

As Shayne stepped through the open doorway, the pair spun around to face him, consternation printed on Stephanie’s face, a startled look on Forbes-Robertson’s.

“Shayne, old chap!” Forbes-Robertson regained his composure first. “We were just talking about you.”

Shayne’s hand hovered near his bolstered weapon. “I find that interesting,” he said in an even voice, but Forbes-Robertson caught the glint of anger in the big detective’s eyes. “What did you have in mind for me, a third share when you sell the Golden Buddha in Macao or Hong Kong?”

Forbes-Robertson smiled brightly. “That is our general idea, old fellow.”

“The hell it is!” Stephanie flared.

The Oriental Trader’s captain was framed in the doorway to the chartroom behind the bridge. He was a powerful man with a full black beard and, to Shayne’s surprise, an occidental.

“You’re on my bridge without permission,” the captain growled at Shay he. American, Shayne decided, from his accent. “What is your business here, sir?”

“I request permission,” Shayne said.

Stephanie was livid with anger.

“Granted,” the captain said, glancing from Shayne to Forbes-Robertson to Stephanie, then back at the detective. “What is your business?”

Forbes-Robertson was discomfited and Shayne realized they’d probably conned the captain into taking his ship to a mainland port instead of San Francisco.

“Where are we bound on your present course?” Shayne asked the captain.

“Macao. My first port of call.”

“Shayne, for God’s sake! Let’s discuss this privately,” Forbes-Robertson pleaded. “He doesn’t understand our last minute change of plans,” he told the captain.

“Damn you!” Stephanie lunged toward Shayne before either the captain or Forbes-Robertson could intervene, the dagger was in her raised hand.

Shayne had only time enough to sidestep her charge and missed catching her wrist when she stumbled past him. Stephanie spun around, sheer madness staring at the three men through her eyes, and they backed away.

The frightened helmsman stared over his shoulder.

“Bloody hell!” Forbes-Robertson backed toward the open doorway leading to the port flying bridge. “She’d gone stark, staring mad!”

Backing out onto the bridge he slammed the door shut. The captain had retreated to the chart-room doorway. Shayne, poised on the balls of his feet, confronting Stephanie, said, “I’d better handle this, captain.”

His eyes stayed locked with Stephanie’s.

Nodding quickly, the captain backed into the chartroom. The helmsman, a Chinese, stared at Shayne and the woman, letting the ship drift off course.

“Damn it, Lee, watch your course,” the captain roared at the helmsman.

Lee spun the wheel a few spokes, then huddled as close to the wheel as he could get, eyes fixed on the compass.

Stephanie, crouched, with the knife now ready for a gut-splitting upward slice, circled the bridge as Shayne did.

“The caper’s finished,” Shayne said in a soothing voice. “You and Forbes-Robertson planned it, using Chung Lee and then double-crossing him, isn’t that the way it was?”

Saliva dripped from the down ward curve of Stephanie’s lips and her face was an ugly mask of fury. “A million dollars in gold!” she spit at Shayne. “We had a buyer. The deal was made...”

Shayne held out a hand. “Let me have the knife, Stephanie. Cutting me isn’t going to help. Come on now.”

She threw herself at him. But this time Shayne was ready, anticipated her move, thrust out a foot and tripped the woman. She went headlong to the steel deck. Face down, knife arm pressed under her body, she raised her face to stare into his as Shayne knelt beside her.

“I... stabbed... myself.” Stephanie said it in a wondering voice and the madness faded from her eyes. Her head fell forward and her forehead bumped the deck.

Gently Shayne turned the woman over on her back to feel for the pulse in her neck. There was no pulse. Stephanie’s sightless eyes stared up at the overhead.

Forbes-Robertson came back into the wheelhouse, staring at Stephanie’s body with a horrified expression on his face. “The bird killed herself!”

Shayne faced the Englishman across Stephanie’s limp body.

He saw Forbes-Robertson through a red haze of hate. His seduction of Dr. Stephanie Scott and tempting her with a million in gold had led to this.

“You killed her,” Shayne accused.

“How can you say that, old chap?” She was a greedy bitch. “Now you and I can make a deal.”

Shayne took a quick step toward the man and pumped his right fist into his smug face. All Shayne’s weight and muscle was behind the punch.

Forbes-Robertson slammed back against the steel bulkhead behind him. The hollow thump of his head striking the bulkhead muffled the sharp crack of his neck. Glassy-eyed and gaping, the Englishman pitched forward to fall across the dead body of the woman. His legs kicked convulsively once, twice and then he was still.

Shayne stared down at the bodies, rubbing the knuckles of his right hand. Then he looked up at the captain.

“Take us back into port,” Shayne ordered.

Mary Su Lin and Shayne were aboard a return flight to San Francisco. At Shayne’s suggestion the American consul in Tapei, Joseph Beardsley, had arranged for the Golden Buddha and the rest of the exhibit to be flown directly to Florida aboard an Air Force C130 as a good-will gesture toward the Taiwanese.

After what they’d been through together, Shayne had become more than just fond of the slim Chinese girl, yet he couldn’t find words to tell her how he felt.

Mary Su Lin touched his arm. “If you’re too bashful to say it I guess I must, Mike,” she told him with a sigh. “I want you to spend some time with me when we reach San Francisco.”