The burly man smoking a cigar sidled up to Tiger Joe. “Well, brother, what’s the hitch?” His voice was like a horse walking through dry cornstalks.

  Tiger Joe leered. The man opened his coat. The gleam of polished nickel escaped.

  “This is Mr. Turk, the house detective,” said Coves. “Mr. Turk, Mr. Connolly.”

  “Okay, brother,” rasped Mr. Turk, “you got your bill.” He put his hand suggestively into his coat pocket.

  Tiger Joe’s shoulders sagged a trifle. He looked down at the bill in his hand. “But — I wasn’t planning to leave for a while.”

  “You heard what Mr. Coves said. So cough up, then blow. This ain’t no hangout for yeggs.”

  “But — I ain’t got any dough with me now,” protested Tiger Joe. “I got a touch to make, then I’ll be floating. In the meantime —” he turned back to Coves, tried to suffuse his countenance with wistful persuasiveness “— maybe you could find me a room?”

  “You’re not quite the class of trade I want,” said Coves.

  “Oh, I was just jokin’ last night,” said Tiger Joe.

  “I’m no snob, Mr. Connolly,” said Coves, “but you do bring down the tone of the establishment … That suit, unpressed, spotted —”

  “I got another,” said Tiger Joe eagerly.

  “Those yellow shoes,” winced Coves. “That tie —”

  “I’ll go up and change,” offered Tiger Joe. “I got a nice tie, green with yellow arrows.”

  “Well,” said Coves, “your mannerisms are offensive, your — ah, selection of terms.” He glanced at Rexie, still staring lambently at Tiger Joe. “You even startled Rexie.”

  “Well — I didn’t mean it.”

  “Don’t think Rexie’s feelings don’t get hurt just like anybody else’s,” said Coves, “because they do.”

  Mr. Turk cleared his throat. “Throw the bum out, Mr. Coves, and —”

  “Oh,” said Tiger Joe, “is his name Rexie? By God, that’s a smart-looking cat! Well, sure, I’m sorry if I scared him. I didn’t mean nothing by it, naturally. Tchk — tchk — tchk — hey, Rexie, howsa boy?”

  Tiger Joe nodded to Coves. “Yep, that’s sure a fine figure of a cat. Nice coloring too. I don’t know much about things like that — but I’d call that cat a — a — a poem of color. Yes sir.”

  Coves gazed fondly up at the perplexed Rexie. “Yes, I think he’s rather handsome. He’s got a well-shaped body — an excellent head.”

  “I’ll bet his fur’s as soft as — as soft!” marveled Tiger Joe. “Look at it shine!”

  Mr. Turk snorted and flung himself into a nearby chair, where he sourly watched Coves and Tiger Joe discuss Rexie. And all the while, the vain Rexie preened and put himself through a series of attitudes on top of the mail cabinet.

  Tiger Joe looked down at his bill, which he had quietly unfolded and smoothed. “Well,” he sighed regretfully, “if you want me to leave — sure, I’ll leave. But if you could find a room somewhere — anywhere, front or back — I’d sure appreciate it. And I’ll have some dough in tonight.”

  “Well —” Coves hesitated. “Very well, Mr. Connolly. But you understand we don’t tolerate any boisterous conduct — and those yellow shoes …”

  “I’ll change right now,” said Tiger Joe, and he hastened upstairs to his room.

  Mr. Turk came over to the desk. “Is he gonna stay on?”

  Coves fiddled with the register. “Yes. I’ll give him another chance. But at the first irregularity, out he goes.”

  Mr. Turk shrugged. He swung his eyes around the lobby. He had only arrived this morning, summoned by Coves’ urgent demand to the employment agency, and Bird Island Hotel was still novel to him. “Of course, if it was me, I wouldn’t clutter a nice place like this with hoods.”

  “Oh well,” said Coves.

  Mr. Turk strolled out on the terrace. Mrs. Winslow Denstrie Sipe, elegant and soignée, strolled into the lobby on the arm of Mr. Cecil Lissacutt, and Coves trotted over to ask if they were finding everything satisfactory.

  In Room 243, Tiger Joe kicked off his yellow shoes, cursing Coves, Mr. Turk, Rexie the cat and Mrs. Charmington in as many breaths. He doffed his rust-colored suit, his red tie, and in their place assumed black shoes, a dark suit, the green tie with the yellow arrows — an ensemble he disliked exceedingly; in fact, it was the outfit issued him by the penitentiary at the time of his discharge. He gave his sparse hair a lick with the brush, glared at his reflection in the mirror, yanked open the door, stormed out into the passageway.

  But it was a meek Tiger Joe who descended the staircase, a Tiger Joe quietly shod and suited; a Tiger Joe who nodded at Coves, stooped to pat Rexie, continued outside, and strode across the island. He panted up the slope to Milo’s ridge, turned up toward the center of the island. The trees presently met him, surrounded, merged above him, and he passed onward through a pleasant land of prismatic green light, the smell of balsam and sappy wood, the occasional whistle of a bird. But Tiger Joe’s mind was far away, and the landscape made little impact on his senses.

  He crossed the plateau at the top of the mountain, started down the long opposite slope. Ten minutes later he stood before Mortimer Archer’s house.

  The door was locked. He knocked. Footsteps approached within, a little spy window slid open, a liquid brown eye looked forth. The eyelid quivered.

  “Okay, Slippy,” said Tiger Joe. “Open ’er up.”

  The window closed. Tiger Joe rapped again, then thumped with his fist. The knob turned, the door opened.

  “Well, come on in, Joe,” said Archer heartily. “Sure is good to see you. How did you ever locate me?”

  Tiger Joe stepped swiftly forward. Archer tried to leap back. Tiger Joe swung an arm behind him, pinioning him. With his other hand he removed the little revolver from the pocket of Archer’s robe. Then he released Archer.

  Archer jerked his robe back into place, licked his lips. “What do you want? When did …” He stopped.

  “When did I get out?” leered Tiger Joe. “Oh, a little bit back, Slippy. Took me a while to catch up with you. I made it, though … Got any cold beer? Hot walk over here.”

  Archer strode away to the kitchen, chewing at his neat mustache. Tiger Joe followed, stood in the doorway while Archer produced the beer. He let Archer precede him back to the living room. “Nice layout you got,” said Tiger Joe. He contemptuously picked up a Town and Country from Archer’s coffee table, flipped through the pages, tossed it back down, overturning a small porcelain mandarin. Archer raised his eyebrows in pain. Tiger Joe crossed the room, peered through an open doorway into the photographic studio.

  “Still at the old racket, hey?” he asked jocularly.

  Archer sipped his beer. “What do you want?”

  “Well,” said Tiger Joe, grinning, “I might be coming for what you owe me.”

  Archer set down his beer. “Let’s get this straight. I don’t owe you a cent.”

  Tiger Joe’s leer became more pronounced. “I took the rap, didn’t I? While you was living high on the rake-off? Well, I figure I got something coming on that.”

  Archer shrugged. “All of us took the same chance. You didn’t make it. That doesn’t give you any claim on me.”

  “Not even for my cut on the deal?”

  “That’s water over the bridge,” said Archer. “I had to live. You were getting your board and room free — I wasn’t.”

  Tiger Joe stared at Archer for several seconds, then took a gulp of beer. “One thing, Slippy, you still got your nerve.”

  Archer shrugged.

  “How come you happened to locate here?” inquired Tiger Joe casually.

  Archer made a vague gesture. “I got a good buy on the property. It’s a quiet place for any little business I feel like handling.”

  “That all? You wouldn’t be fooling a poor old jug-owl, would you, Slippy?”

  Archer rose to his feet with an expression of humorous candor. “Well, Joe, I’ll be perfectly frank with you. Remember Big Ben Manzio?”

  “Sure I remember Big Ben Manzio.”

  “I heard that this was his island, and that he left a lot of boodle around here somewhere.”

  Tiger Joe sneered. “You expect me to believe that, Slippy?”

  Archer shrugged. “Suit yourself.”

  “That’s just what I’m doing,” said Tiger Joe, relaxing into the seat. “We’re partners again, Slippy. You owe me a lot. I could take it out of your hide and maybe I will. But I’d prefer taking it out of your pocketbook. If you’re looking for Big Ben’s loot, we’ll look together. If it’s something else — well, it’s something else. ‘Share and share alike’.”

  “Now look here,” blustered Archer, “the day for that kind of stuff is over. I’ve put aside all my old associations, and that includes you. Where Manzio hid the stuff I don’t know. If you can locate it, you’re welcome to it, but you do it on your own. I’ve built up a front here, and I don’t want you around to ruin it. I won’t have —”

  “Slippy,” Tiger Joe said, “go get me another bottle of beer.”

  Archer met his gaze and the words he had been about to speak numbed in his mouth.

  “You run the business, Slippy. You’re in entire charge — because I know that whatever it is, you’re making money at it, and a pretty stiff slug. No, the ideas — that’s your job. Also the financing. Mine will be the rake-off.”

  There was a long silence. “Well, you got me where I can’t argue with you,” Archer said presently, and his voice had changed somewhat. “As a matter of fact, I can use some help.”

  “Attaboy, Slippy.”

  Archer appraised the massive form of his new associate. “Maybe you’re just what the doctor ordered.”

  “What’s the deal?”

  “Well,” said Archer, “it’s like this. I have some friends who’ve been running bundles in from Mexico. Heroin mostly. The going’s been pretty bad. The beard’s got a clamp on the border, and about a month ago we lost a whole planeload, forced down over Arizona. Lost about three hundred grand, not counting the plane … Well, I happened to hear something interesting about this Bird Island here. It seems all the driftwood and floating junk in the ocean piles up on the beach. Some kind of trick of current.”

  “Ah,” said Tiger Joe. “I’m startin’ to get you.”

  “I made some tests. Numbered some bottles, took them out in a boat, threw ’em in at different spots, marking down on a chart where I dropped ’em. Then I waited till the bottles began appearing on the beach, and now I know pretty close just what’ll happen when something’s dropped into the ocean offshore.”

  “Sounds good,” said Tiger Joe. “You figure to run a plane out, or a boat?”

  “Either one. Whatever works out best. We’ll ship out of Mexico, Panama, South America — anywhere. Bring it to the area I’ve got charted, toss it overboard. The current does the rest.”

  Tiger Joe drank his beer thoughtfully. “Of course there’s the hotel right along the beach. Somebody else might find it.”

  Archer laughed. “That’s the angle we’ve got to work. We’ve got to take over the island.”

  “Yeah? How?”

  Archer rose to his feet, strode back and forth. “We’ve got to scare ’em off, buy ’em off, or make it too expensive for ’em to stay. But we’ve got to do it in such a way that there won’t be any suspicions, no law nosing around. In other words, we just can’t liquidate everybody. Take Coves, for instance. Every cent he could lay his hands on he’s got sunk in the hotel. If he has to spend any more money, or if he has a bum season, he won’t be able to make ends meet. He’ll go under, and we’ll buy him out. And Green, up on the cliff. He’s got his nose to the grindstone paying off his house. He’ll be easy. There’s an old coot from Alaska that’s got some kind of pipe dream about whales. I don’t know just yet how to handle him. And there’s Ottenbright, next door to me. Maybe we could frame some scandal. Then there’s the girls’ school —”

  “Hah!” said Tiger Joe, a gleam in his eye. “That’s my department.”

  Archer shook his head. “We’ve got to do this careful, Joe. No rough stuff. We can’t get people talking.”

  Tiger Joe said regretfully, “You got any ideas?”

  “Lots of ’em.” Archer leaned forward. “Listen …”

  Chapter IX

  8:00 A.M., with the sun bright and yellow. Milo, in sand-colored shorts and Army shoes, worked his road down the ridge — digging, leveling, scraping, tamping.

  Just ahead, an elbow of quartzite humped across the road, and Milo considered how best to defeat the obstacle. Should he fill in at either side, raising a hillock in the road? Or should he obliterate the barrier with dynamite? Perhaps the rock would yield to pick and sledge hammer. He exerted a few tentative blows and stood back, inspecting the terrain. But no other route was practical; the ridge at this point fell off on either side in steep, rocky steps. Milo shrugged his shoulders. There would have to be a hillock in his road. He laid down his shovel, wiped his hands on his shorts, and started for the house. After breakfast he would settle himself on the terrace with freshly sharpened pencils, pads of paper, a rhyming dictionary, and work till noon, composing verses for greeting cards. He had not abandoned his ballad, but the greeting card verses at least kept the house in groceries and might possibly make a dent in the bank payment.

  At Miss Pickett’s academy, the girls trooped out of the refectory, clean, neat, alert. Several, including Madeline Cheabrough, wore a sulky pout. Miss Pickett had forbidden lipstick, nail polish, bop records, jive talk and the cha-cha.

  Celia was conducting her class in the history of music, and with great dignity confronting a group of girls only two or three years younger than herself, pretending she was as stern as her indomitable aunt. So far, no one had dared to challenge her.

  Ike rose from his bunk at six o’clock, stretched, yawned, belched, pulled brown corduroy trousers up over his long undergarments. He slipped on his shoes, fired up his stove and set water to boil for coffee.

  The rising sun beat in through the window like a bugle call. Ike shuffled to the window and looked out across the ocean. He blinked, nodded sagely to himself, scratched his beard. Pulling a mackinaw over his shoulders, he went out to his dogs. He fed them, filled their water pail, rubbed mange ointment on the back of Jupe. Wiping his fingers on a bit of burlap, he re-entered the cabin, cooked and ate his breakfast, reflecting as he did so that a woman around the camp could take the doctoring of the dogs off his hands, as well as performing various other duties.

  At seven o’clock he sauntered down to the dock where his launch swung on the lazy swell. He loaded two five-gallon cans of gasoline on the floorboards, also some lard pails full of a viscous liquid. He started the engine, cast off, steered across the cove, through the gate in the barrier, which he took care to lash wide ajar. Then Ike set out to sea.

  The day was fine, the sun warm, the motor of the launch ticked over like an expensive watch. Ike felt the urge toward music. First he hummed, then he broke into song — a ceremonial chant of the obscure Bakulchuk tribe. It was a ditty Ike would sing on his way home from trading fur for cornmeal, a new squaw and rye whiskey.

  The launch became a black dot on the horizon, disappeared.

  Four or five hours later the black dot appeared once more. This time it was followed by other hulking black forms, thirteen in all. Ike stood in the stern of the launch with a spoon, ladling gobs of the viscous liquid into the wake. Blowing, puffing, thrashing the water with their mighty flukes, the whales drifted forward, impelled by no visible agency.

  Bird Island loomed close; the great semicircle of piles curved directly ahead. The gate stood open. Ike ran the launch through the gate, and after him came the whales.

  Ike closed the gate, steered his launch to the dock, tied up. For an hour he stood watching while the whales drove angrily about the enclosure, battering at the piles. At last they lay sullenly on the surface, swirling the water behind them with sudden furious sweeps of their flukes.

  Ike heaved a sigh. “Thirteen whale. Most meat I’ve ever had at one time … And all I got to do now is keep ’em clean of sucker-lice and barnacles.”

  Rexie sat on the desk beside the register, and beside him Coves busily tended his bookkeeping.

  A great figure suddenly appeared around the corner of the desk: Tiger Joe Connolly. Rexie flattened his ears, backed against the wall, spat defiantly. Tiger Joe bent over him. “Howsa little pussy today? Nice kitty, purty kitty.” He reached out and stroked Rexie’s head.

  “That’s sure a purty cat, Mr. Coves,” said Tiger Joe. “Almost wish I owned him.”

  An indulgent smile touched Coves’ lips. “Yes, Rexie’s all right.”

  Rexie relaxed a trifle.

  Tiger Joe spied Mrs. Pedro Charmington hobbling across the lobby, and bounded forward to offer his arm. Coves noted that Tiger Joe was almost correctly dressed in a new suit of herringbone tweed, two-toned shoes, a blue sports shirt with collar tabs the size and shape of falcon’s wings.

  Fougasse appeared at Coves’ elbow, leading a sullen Mario.

  “M. Coves, I must beg that you do not mingle in the kitchen arrangements! Tonight the brioche paste must be executed, and this buffoon informs me that you have permitted him the evening away!”

  Coves glanced from one to the other. “Why, I told him it was all right with me, if you gave him permission.”

  “And I asked you,” burst out Mario. “It was this morning — and you said yes, yes, anything, so long as I got out the eggs without clouding the yolks. Eggs Monaco, it was.”

  Fougasse strode back and forth. “It is unthinkable! With the brioche paste to prepare? Who then is to knead! Charles? He is engaged with the foie-gras rissoles. I? M. Coves? No less impossible. M. Mario, I will not have it! The brioche must marche!”

  Mario shrugged despairingly, turned away to the kitchen.

  Fougasse sighed. “The folly of that one’s nature. Have you heard the latest? Cloves in the Chicken portugais! I must watch his every move.”