He shook his head, clenching his jaws together. Jigger felt the cheek muscles grind beneath her hand.
She straightened again, breaking contact, putting both hands on her hips. “You’re in a bind, Charley,” she said. “You’ll be telling somebody, sooner or later. You want to tell me, or you want to tell B. B. Bernard.”
“There’s nothing to tell,” he Skid stubbornly. He was staring into the middle distance, beetle-browed.
“All right,” she said. “Get ready for a good scream.”
She’d barely turned away again when he said, quickly, “There are others involved. I can’t take the responsibility, I can’t say a word.”
She looked back at him. “What others?”
“They’ll be at the boat,” he said, staring blindly upward and a little to her left. “Take me to the boat. If they say it’s all right, then I’ll tell you.”
Jigger considered. This one on the floor here, this Kelly Bram Nicholas IV, wasn’t a dangerous type, that was obvious, and if he was the one sent on the missions, what could the ones back at the boat he like? And she was more and more curious. What was going on here? And was there anything in it for her?
“Okay, buster,” she said. “On your feet. I’ll take you to your boat.”
(7)
Jigger Bound
“He isn’t there,” frank said. He and Robby were walking along the deck toward the boat, in which no light was shining.
“Maybe he’s asleep,” Robby said.
“Kelly? Now?”
“I guess not.”
They’d waited at the house, turning down the Major’s halfhearted offer of a ride back, but Kelly just hadn’t showed up, and when at last the party was down to themselves, a few unconscious drunks, and the servants, they’d given it up, called a cab, and come back to the boat. Which was in darkness.
Or was it? They both saw it at the same time, a small light flickering palely on the boat, moving this way and that, then disappearing.
“A flashlight,” Robby whispered.
“Something’s up,” whispered Frank.
They crouched, and tiptoed through the darkness toward the boat. Occasional boards creaked beneath their feet, but boats were creaking on both sides of them, so their own small noises disappeared in the general muffled hubbub.
The Nothing Ventured IV was broadside to the dock, with a gangplank canted up to the forward deck. Frank and Robby moved cautiously up this gangplank, crossed the deck, and went silently down the steps into the main cabin.
The flashlight was behind them now, in the forward cabin under the deck they’d just crossed. In with Starnap. Frank and Robby inched their way to the open door.
Frank peeked around the edge, and in there he saw a girl with red hair, a shiny white plastic top, shiny yellow plastic mini-skirt, and shiny white plastic shoes, bending over Starnap, studying it with the aid of a shiny chrome pencil flash.
The light switch was just inside the door. Frank hit it, the light came on, and the girl jumped, her pencil flash bouncing off Starnap and landing on the floor. “Okay,” Frank said, stepping into the room, and the girl lammed him across the side of the head with her tiny shiny white plastic purse. Frank careened away into a wall and the girl ran out of the room and into the arms of Robby.
Frank came blundering back through the doorway, hurried past Robby and the girl, who were spinning around like a mechanical toy from Hong Kong, opened a drawer in the utility wall, and took out a pistol. It was unloaded, merely a possible prop in the kidnapping, but she wouldn’t know that. He turned around, pistol in hand, and shouted, “Cut it out!”
The toy from Hong Kong continued to spin a few seconds longer, till both parties spotted the gun, and then it ran down. The girl stood panting and glaring, and Robby reeled over to collapse on the sofa, saying “Whoosh!”
“Now,” Frank said, turning on lights, keeping the gun pointed at the girl, “we’ll find out what’s going on around here.”
“You think so,” said the girl, breathing hard, partly from rage.
Frank said to Robby, “Get her purse.”
She didn’t want to hand it over, but with Frank holding the pistol on her, she didn’t think she had any choice. She slapped it bitterly into Robby’s hand when he came panting over to get it from her. “If you don’t mind,” she snapped, “I’ll sit down now.”
“Go right ahead,” Frank told her.
She sat, folded her arms, crossed her legs, and sourly watched Robby go through her purse.
“Hmm,” said Robby, and held up so Frank could see them Kelly’s glasses. “Kelly’s glasses,” he said.
Frank looked at the glasses, then at the girl.
“One lens broken,” Robby said.
Frank returned the girl’s glare, saying, “What have you done with Kelly?”
“I’ll trade you,” she said.
Robby said, “Trade what?”
“I’ve got your buddy,” she said. “You tell me what you three are up to, I’ll tell you where he is.”
“You’ll tell us first,” Frank said threateningly, “if you know what’s good for you.”
“Don’t make me laugh,” she said. “You three are about as dangerous as a flea act.”
Robby said, “Maybe you’d like to talk to the police.”
“And maybe you wouldn’t,” she said. “I caught your buddy taking pictures of somebody else’s notebook in Sir Albert Fitzroy’s house. You want me to start talking to the cops?”
Frank and Robby looked at one another. Robby said, “What now?”
“I don’t know,” Frank said, and something thudded.
Hushed, Robby said, “What was that?”
The something thudded again, and one second later the girl was off and running, trying for the stairs. Robby tackled her in mid-flight, Frank ran around them like a referee at a wrestling match, and in the middle of it all the something thudded again.
They got her off the floor at last, and back into the chair she’d started from, and Frank stood directly in front of her, pointing the gun at her nose. Breathing hard, he said, “It’s in the bathroom, Robby, take a look.”
Robby went over and opened the bathroom door, and in there was Kelly, bound and gagged and sitting on the toilet. “It’s Kelly!” he shouted.
Frank smiled thinly at the girl. “So much for the trade,” he said.
She folded her arms and glowered at the opposite wall.
Robby went into the bathroom and removed Kelly’s gag. Kelly immediately began to babble: “There’s a girl, there’s — watch out for her — there’s a girl, she knows, she’s been—”
“We’ve got her,” Robby said. He was untying Kelly’s wrists.
“You’ve got her?”
“We’ve got her,” Robby said, and untied Kelly’s ankles. “Can you walk?”
“I think so.” Holding Robby’s hand, Kelly hobbled out to the main cabin. “Glasses,” he said. “In the drawer under Starnap.”
“I’ll get them,” Robby said, and hurried away.
The girl said, “Starnap? What’s that?”
Blinking blindly around, Kelly said, “Is she tied up? Don’t let her get away.”
“Don’t worry,” Frank said. “We’ve got her.”
Robby came back with the glasses and fitted them to Kelly’s face. Kelly blinked two or three times, shook his head, looked around, and said, “Right.”
Robby said, “What happened?”
“No time for that now,” Kelly said. “We have to feed the new information into Starnap.”
“What about her?”
“Lock her aft. She knows too much, we’ll have to keep her.”
Robby said, “You mean, take two of them?”
“Can’t be helped,” Kelly said briskly. “We let her go, she’ll ruin everything.”