White Cargo

34

“I’m supposed to have everything between St. Augustine and West Palm Beach.” Dell smashed his fist down into the water.

“Easy,” Cat said. “Don’t call attention to yourself.”

They were in the pool. Dell pushed off and swam a couple of fast laps, and when he stopped he was breathing hard. “In a couple of years I’d have had enough money to last me the rest of my life, anywhere in the world.”

“If you’d lived long enough,” Cat said. “Look, Dell, the way it’s done is, you get some education, you find a kind of work you like, you get good at it. You rise in a company, or you go off on your own, the way your uncle and I did. First, you make a living. Later, if you’re good enough and lucky enough, you make some money. It may sound dull, but it’s very satisfying.”

“It may be good enough for you, but it’s not good enough for me,” Dell said. “I know you don’t understand that, but it’s just not fast enough. I don’t want to wait until I’m your age. That’s why I’ve got to do it. That and the fact that if I go back without at least the million I brought down here, I’ll get blown away by my own partners.”

“Look, Dell, I’ll make up what your partners have lost. What is it, seven hundred thousand? I’ll sell something — the house, if I have to.”

“What about my three hundred grand? You think I didn’t bust my hump for that? Risk a lot?”

Cat fought hard to keep his temper. “All right,” he said finally, “I’ll make that up, too. It may take some time; I can’t sell company stock without Ben’s agreement.”

Dell whirled on him. “Listen, there’s fifty million bucks in cash in that house, and I know where it is. It’s in a big closet hidden behind a wall in the communications room. Straight ahead, as you walk in the door; a bookshelf pulls out. Not a vault, or anything, just a closet. I ought to be able to carry away four or five million.”

“That place has got to be manned twenty-four hours a day, you know. What are you going to do about that?”

“Whatever I have to,” Dell said. “I’d have a better chance if you helped me.”

“I’ve offered to help you, already,” Cat insisted. “I’ve offered to get you out of here alive, for a start; I’ve offered to make good yours and your partners’ losses. What else do you expect from me?”

“Help me get at that cash.”

“No,” Cat said quickly. “This is the way it’s going to happen. Some time between seven and nine tomorrow morning, I force Prince down to the clearing, and I force the helicopter pilot to fly us all out of here. That’s it. If you want to come, be there early, don’t get seen going or arriving. Stay in the brush until we’re all there.” Cat hauled himself out of the pool, grabbed a towel, and walked briskly back to the cottage. He was sweating again by the time he got there, and he reveled in the cool of the air-conditioning on his skin.

Meg came out of the bedroom. “Did you find Dell?”

“Yes. He wants to try and steal some of the cash we saw the other night.”

“Jesus! Is he nuts?”

“Yes, probably. I’ve told him the plan. We’ll take him with us if he’s there. It’s all I can do.”

“You’re right, it is all you can do. I’m glad you’re smart enough to know that.”

“There’s something else.” He paused.

“Yes?”

“Well, I don’t really know; it’s just that Jinx winked at me when I was in Prince’s suite today.”

“Winked at you? What does that mean?”

“Well, it’s something we used to do, since she was a little girl. It was sort of a private joke; we’d wink at each other when nobody was watching.”

“You think she’s coming out of it, then?”

“Maybe, and that worries me.”

“Why does it worry you? Won’t it be a lot easier to get her out of here if she knows who she is and what we’re doing?”

“I hope so, but I don’t know. I don’t know what sort of mental shape she’s going to be in, in the middle of all this. You said, yourself, that in her present state, she might resist coming with us.”

Meg came and stood behind him and rubbed his shoulders. “Look, there’s no use making yourself crazy about this. You know what you’re going to do, and chances are, it’ll work. Try and relax.”

Cat sighed. “There’s just so much that can go wrong — so many loose ends, so much I have no control over.”

The telephone rang, and they both jumped. Cat answered it.

“Mr. Ellis, this is Vargas. Will you come to my office, please? We’ve found your burglar.”

Cat hung up. “Vargas says they’ve found the burglar.”

“Maybe you’ll get the radio back.”

“Christ, I hope so.” He got into some clothes and walked quickly to the main house. Vargas’s office was empty. He went into the communications room, where a lone man was on duty.

“You seen Vargas?”

“He was there a minute ago,” the man said. “He’s probably gone to the can or something.”

Cat looked around the room at the equipment. The printer manual with his photograph was still on the shelf where he had put it. Then he saw something he hadn’t seen before — a small radio with the name “King” on it, the same name as the radios in his Cessna. Cat pointed at the radio. “You talk with airplanes?”

“Just with the chopper you came in on, and we can only reach him a few miles out. We don’t have much height on our antenna, and he always flies low.”

“Who do you talk to on the high-frequency radio?” Cat asked.

“Whoever we want to,” the man answered. “We call a marine operator — which one depends on the time of day — atmospherics and all that. We give ’em an account number, and they call whatever number we want, just about anywhere in the world.” He looked up at Cat. “You’ve got to have an approval, though, from the Anaconda or Vargas.”

“Oh, I don’t need to make a call,” Cat said. “I just wondered how it all worked.”

“Mr. Ellis?”

Cat jumped. Vargas had walked up behind him.

“I have something for you,” Vargas said, walking back into his office.

Cat followed him. “You’ve caught the burglar?”

“Yes,” Vargas replied, “a kitchen worker at the discotheque. He committed the murder, too. He has already been dealt with.”

Cat didn’t want to know what that meant. “Did you find my pistol?”

Vargas opened a desk drawer and placed the .357 magnum on the desk. “Yes, but I will keep it for the duration of the conference. It will be returned to you when you depart.”

Cat nodded. “Okay.” He turned to leave, hoping against hope.

“Oh,” Vargas said.

Cat turned around. “Something else?”

Vargas placed the radio on the table. “We found this, too.”

Cat smiled. “Oh, good.” He picked up the radio. “Thanks a lot.” He turned and left the room, feeling Vargas’s eyes on his back, hoping he hadn’t had the radio inspected by one of his communications specialists.

On the path back to the cottage, he made a point of not looking at the radio, but as soon as he was through the door, he went over it carefully. There was a large dent in the case. He turned the power knob. Nothing happened. It should be making static noises, but nothing happened.

“Does it work?” Meg asked.

“No. Do you have a small screwdriver, by any chance?”

“No.”

Cat thought for a minute. “How about a manicure kit?”

“Sure.” She went into the bedroom and came back with a small leather pouch.

Cat took one of the small tools and got the screws out of the back of the case. It was densely packed with electronic bits and pieces, most of which looked familiar.

“Can you fix it? You are some sort of engineer, aren’t you?”

“That’s right, but before I can fix it, I’ve got to figure out what’s wrong with it. So far, everything looks normal.” He chose another tool, and with some difficulty, removed a circuit board to reveal another layer of electronics. “Oh, shit,” he said.

“What is it?”

Cat picked up the tweezers and reached into the radio. He came out with some small pieces of material.

“What is that?”

“It’s what’s left of a printed circuit board. Whatever made the dent in the case smashed it into several pieces. It looks like custom work, nothing standard.”

“Can you fix it?”

Cat shook his head. “If I had it in my shop, and most important, if I had a schematic of the board, maybe. Probably not even then. Certainly not here and with nothing.”

“Well,” Meg sighed, “at least we’re no worse off than we were this morning.”

“Maybe not,” he said. “On the other hand...”

“What?”

“How did it get damaged? It looks as if someone stomped on it. Why?”

“It was probably an accident.”

“I hope so. I hope nobody’s had a look inside the thing. Anybody who knows anything about radios would know it’s no ordinary Sony.”

“Oh, come on. If Prince knew anything, he’d have been all over us by now.”

“Maybe. But if he is onto us, he knows now that we can’t hurt him. Maybe he’s playing cat and mouse with us.”