More immediately, though, he was indignant because this girl had known all about him when she came into the shop. She’d probably even known about his gimmicking a standard-design submarine listening device so it was really good and really directional. But she’d let him talk, asking seemingly interested questions, when she knew the whole business beforehand. And at the end she’d done a most infuriating thing by paying him in advance for something he’d refused to do, thereby forcing him into the obligation to do it.
He fretted. He needed the money. But he objected to being tricked. He went back to the probably senseless business of taking an inventory. Time passed. Nothing happened. Nobody came to the shop. The police had been firm about La Rubia crewmen calling on Terry to make threats. They’d been equally firm about other people calling to make counterthreats. No casual customers entered. Two hours went by.
At four o’clock the door opened—with the sound of its tinkling bell—and Police Captain Felicio Horta came in.
“Buenas tardes,” he said cordially. Terry grunted at him.
“I hear,” said Horta, “that you leave Manila.”
Terry asked evenly, “Is that a way of asking me to hurry up and do it?”
“Pero no! Por supuesto no!” protested Horta. “But it is said that you have new and definite plans.”
“What do you know about them?” demanded Terry.
Police Captain Horta said pleasantly, “Officially, nothing. Privately, that you will aid some ricos americanos to do experiments in—oceanografia? Some study of oceanic things. That you regret having agreed to do so. That you consider changing your mind. That you are angry.”
The girl, of course, could have inferred all this from his angry charge out of the shop with the money in his hand, too late to stop her taxicab. But Terry snapped, “Now, who the devil told you that?”
Police Captain Horta shrugged.
“One hears. I hope it is not true.”
“That what’s not true? That I leave? Or that I don’t?”
“I hope,” said Horta benignly, “that you do as you please. I am not on duty at the moment. I have my car. I offer myself to chauffeur you if there is any place you wish to go—to a steamer or anywhere else.
If you do not wish to go anywhere, I will take my leave. With no pre… prejudice,” he finished. “We have been friendly. I hope we remain so.”
Terry stared at him estimatingly. Police Captain Horta was a reasonable and honest man. He knew that Terry had contributed to matters giving the police some trouble, but he knew it was accidental on Terry’s part. He would hold no grudge.
“Just why,” asked Terry measuredly, “did you come here to offer to drive me somewhere? Is there any special reason to want me to get out of town?”
“That is not it,” said Horta. “It could be wished that you would—take a certain course of action. Yes. But not because you would be absent from here. It is because you would be present at a special other place. The matter connects with La Rubia, but in a manner you could not possibly guess. Yet you are wholly a free agent. You will do as you please. I would like to make it—convenient. That is all.”
He paused. Terry stared at him, frowning. Horta tried again.
“Let us say that I have much interest in oceanografia. I would like to see certain research carried on.”
“Being, I’m sure, especially interested in fish-driving,” said Terry skeptically. “You sound as if you were acting unofficially to get something done that officially you can’t talk about.”
Horta smiled warmly at him.
“That,” he pronounced, “is a logical conclusion.”
“What’s the object of the—research, if that’s what it is? And why pick me?”
Horta shrugged and did not answer.
“Why not tell me?”
“Amigo,” said Horta, “I would like nothing better than to tell you. I would be interested to see your reception of the idea. But it would be fatal. You would think me cr-azy. And also more important persons. But especially me.”
It was Terry’s turn to shrug his shoulders. He hesitated for a long moment. If Horta had tried to apply pressure, he’d have turned obstinate on the instant. But there was no pressure. First the girl and now Horta tried to lure him with mystery and assurance of interest in high places.
“And La Rubia’s involved in the secret?” demanded Terry.
“Innocently,” said Horta promptly. “As you are.”
“Thank you for faith in my innocence,” said Terry with irony. “All right. If I’m involved, I’m involved. I’ll try to devolve out of being involved by playing along.”
He turned to the workshop space at the back of the store. He found boxes to pack his working tools and the considerable stock of small parts needed to make such things as burglar alarms, submarine ears and the assorted electronic devices modern business finds increasingly necessary. He began to pack them. Surprisingly, Horta helped. Any man of Spanish blood is apt to be sensitive about manual labor. If he has an official position his sensitiveness is apt to be extreme. But Horta not only helped pack the boxes with Terry’s stock of parts; he helped carry them to his car outside. He helped to load them.
Terry turned the key in the door and handed it to him, with the nearly complete inventory of the shop’s contents.
“Jimenez having run away, I leave the shop in your hands,” he observed.
Horta put the key and document away. He started the motor of his car and drove along the Calle Enero. He drove with surprising moderation for a police officer authorized to ignore traffic rules on occasion. Presently the dock-area of Manila was left behind, and then the rest of the commercial district, and then for a time the car tooled along wide streets past the impressive residences of the wealthy. Some of the architecture was remarkable. A little further, and the harbor—the bay—appeared again. The car entered the grounds of Manila’s swankiest yacht club. The design of the clubhouse was astounding. The car stopped by the small-boat pier. There were two men waiting there. Without being given any orders, they accepted the parcels Horta handed out. Also without orders, they carried them out to the float. They loaded them into the brass-trimmed motor tender which waited there.
“They knew we were coming,” said Terry shortly. “Would I have been brought anyhow?”
“Pero no,” said Horta. “But there are telephones. When we left the shop, one was used.”
The men who’d carried out the parcels vanished. Terry and Horta stepped aboard. The tender cast off and headed out into the harbor. There was a Philippine gunboat and a mine-layer and an American flattop in plain view. There were tankers and tramp steamers and a vast array of smaller craft at anchor. A seemingly top-heavy steamer ploughed across oily water two miles distant. The tender headed for a trim sixty-five-foot schooner anchored a mile from shore. It grew larger and seemed more trim as the tender approached it.
The smaller boat passed under the larger one’s stern, and the name Esperance showed plainly. On the starboard side a boat boom projected. The tender ran deftly up and a man in a sweat shirt and duck trousers snubbed the line. He said cheerfully, “How do you do, Mr. Holt?” Then he nodded to Horta. “Good to see you, Captain.” He offered his hand as Terry straightened up on deck. “My name’s Davis. We’ll have your stuff aboard right away.”