“You don’t call that stealing?”
He shook his head. “I figured the same way Cunningham did when he started sleeping with my wife.”
She winced as though he’d slapped her. Then she caught hold of his arms. “Don’t do it, Dick. You’re making a terrible mistake. Don’t leave me!”
“Why not?”
“Bob means nothing to me; he never did. They’ll arrest you. What will happen to me then?”
“You may find it hard to believe, but I don’t care. Now, shut up and get out!”
He pushed her from the room, knowing that he’d lied — knowing that he did care — and locked the door. She pounded on it, but he paid no attention. He went on packing — frantically.
The pounding had stopped but she was still outside the door. He could hear her talking, partly to him and partly to herself. The words came in disjointed phrases. He tried to stop his ears.
“What can I do? What can I do? If only you hadn’t been so hard! They’re sure to catch you, and it will be too late—”
He heard a far-off roar that rapidly came nearer. Her voice grew louder and had an hysterical undertone.
“The police will stop you. I’m going to call the police—!”
The roar was deafening. He unlocked the door and ran out on the balcony. She came back from the stairs, held out her arms.
“Oh, darling — please!”
He pushed her. She fell against the flimsy railing. There was a splintering sound. She screamed once as she fell.
It was an accident. That’s what he told himself as he went down the stairs. She lay on the tiled floor, her neck flung back at an impossible angle. He looked at her, and knew what had happened — and somewhere, something burst...
5
It was morning. Juanita brought him fruit juice, and he dressed in swimming trunks and a sports shirt. The padlock had been removed from the green gate when he went down to the car port. He backed out the convertible.
The road ran downhill toward the boulevard. Halfway down was the house he had noticed the day before. A man ran out of it and waved him to a stop.
“You’re an American, aren’t you? For God’s sake, keep your gate locked. Last night I was robbed for the third time in a month!”
He was like an excited, mammoth baby, fat and pink and bald. The infantile appearance was heightened by his lack of clothes. He was barefoot and wore only a pair of brief white shorts.
“Thieves everywhere! The lousy ladrones can steal the tongue out of your mouth!” His naked torso was half-inside the car. A horn tooted. A beer truck wanted to get by. The bald man called, “Un momentito!” and turned back.
“Where you from?”
“Arizona. That truck’s going to blast me off the road.” Pete nervously let in the clutch.
“How long you going to be in Acapulco?”
He stepped on the accelerator in reply. At the foot of the hill he turned right into the boulevard. He left the car in a parking lot at Caleta Beach. There was a line of cafes on the ocean side of the lot. He sat at a rickety table under a palm tree, and three waitresses in flowing skirts converged on him.
The first to reach the table was pretty in a bosomy, broad-hipped sort of way. “I talk you inglés, boy,” she said, and shrieked at the other waitresses. “Is mine! Largo de aqui! Go ’way!”
“Black coffee and toast, please.”
“No tostados, boy. You like tortillas?”
“Just coffee.”
“Okay, boy.” She left him alone with a swarm of flies.
The mosquitos were bad, too. He was ready to leave when the waitress returned with a thick cup. She put it in front of him and sat down herself. The day was hot and she did not use a deodorant.
“Chucha, me. Who you, boy?”
“Pete.” He sipped the coffee.
“Pete. Is pretty name. You think me pretty?”
“Gorgeous.”
“You talk me inglés so I talk good?”
“Sometime.” He put the money on the table and got up.
Chucha was surprised. “You no like coffee?”
“Changed my mind,” he said, and walked away.
Crossing the parking lot he looked back. Chucha still sat at the table. She was drinking the rejected coffee and staring moodily out to sea.
Then he noticed a cafe he had overlooked before. The walls were of bamboo, the roof was thatched. The interior looked dark and cool. A sign above the entrance read Tahiti Bar. He opened a half-door and stepped inside. Directly ahead was a flagged terrace. It was spotted with low tables around which only a few people lounged. Beyond the tables was an azure cove reached by a stretch of clean, white sand. More people were on the sand. Surfboards and kayaks were sprinkled over the water, and far out he saw the sails of a white yacht. There were no mosquitos and no flies.
He sat as close to the beach as he could get, and ordered toast and coffee. Both were hot and good. He killed time for an hour and watched the place fill up.
A man sat down beside him. “See you found my hangout.” It was the baldheaded man who had been robbed. “Bohemia,” he told the waiter, and looked at Pete. “Have one? Better beer than we get in the states.”
“No, thanks.” Pete braced himself against the questions sure to come.
They came and he answered them consistently. His home was in Yuma and he expected to be in Acapulco about three months. He was in the trucking business. That last, he thought, was a neat touch.
The fat man introduced himself as Jack Pascault. He knew everyone in town and was a self-admitted gossip. Pete listened to his mildly ribald stories for a while, then suddenly lost interest. His attention had been caught by a girl who was coming up the beach. She carried a straw mat and wore a dark blue swimming suit. She spread the mat on the sand and sat down not more than fifteen feet away.
Pete had never seen the girl before, but there was something familiar about her. She was slender, with lovely, long, brown legs. Her features were delicate and her fair hair, swept straight back from her forehead, was secured by a fillet of black ribbon.
Pascault was grinning. “Nice, isn’t she?” he said, and Pete found that he disliked him intensely. On the other hand, nothing so stamps a vacationing businessman as an amatory interest in a pretty girl.
“Very nice. Who is she?” he asked.
“Karen Brewer. That’s her aunt, the one with the musclebound Adonis in red trunks.”
He indicated a woman who had followed the blonde girl at a more leisurely pace. She had a forty-year-old face and an eighteen-year-old body, and she wore a yellow play suit puffed out at the hips. Her hair was short and unnaturally bronze. Her hand rested on the forearm of a sullen young man, but with no effect of clinging. She seemed to be steering him as though he were a rather stupid horse.
The young man was decorative, but not much else. He had a deep chest, small hips and thick, sloping shoulders. His light, curly hair looked as though it had been carefully set in the morning and expected to stay in place all day.
She dismissed him as they neared the terrace. “You’re still hungover, Andy. Go take a nap.” The young man scowled at her and went back the way that he had come. The woman saw Jack Pascault, climbed to the table and sat down.
“Hi, folks.” Her accent placed her as having come from Texas. “Scotch,” she told the waiter. She smiled at Pete. “Hello.” She had an unexpectedly youthful and attractive smile.
“Pete Welles, Fran Garvey.” Pascault called the waiter back. “Make that two Scotches.”
“Make it three,” Pete said.
Karen Brewer came up from the beach. She stood beside her aunt. “Do I rate a chair?”