I put no liquor in mine.

She murmured thanks when I gave her the drink. I had observed her drinking habits. One swallow at a time, one minute between swallows, until it was all gone. The taste seemed to suit her.

A breeze moved the cruiser, nudged it gently against a piling.

“She oughta be here pretty soon,” Dee said. “If she doesn’t come, the hell with her, lover. Who needs her?”

“She’ll be along,” Junior Allen said.

“Just the three of us, we could have a ball,” Dee said. “She’s not much of a swinging thing. Who needs her?” She yawned. “And she’ll be drag-assin‘ around, crying over Pete anyways.”

Dusk had deepened into night, and I saw the stars, and two planes winking, and heard the cheeing of the night insects mingled with the sound of music.

Deeleen yawned vastly and said, “I can’t keep my eyes open. Lover, I’m going to go sack out for a while.” She stood up heavily. She looked at him and made a kissing sound. As she passed me, she dragged her fingertips across my cheek. She went below, wobbling along the narrow area between the bunks as though the Play Pen were in a choppy sea. She bent and rolled herself heavily onto a bunk. From where I sat, I could see a narrow path of light from the galley light stretching diagonally across her, across the downy small of her back, the deep crease of her waist and the high gluteal round of her hip. Sweet dreams, sweet girl. Slide way way down. Stay out of the action.

I talked with Junior Allen. He didn’t have his mind on it. He was crouched in the brush, and he could taste lamb, and he was alerted for the first shy sound of the little hoofs coming along the trail. I gently and indirectly advanced the idea of my coming along, and he firmly closed the door. He got up and sprang nimbly onto the dock, snapped the weak dock light on, checked his lines, adjusted a fender and came aboard again, restless.

Suddenly a man came onto the dock out of the shadows. He wore a gaudy shirt, wrinkled pants and a bright red fishing hat.

“Anybody here name of Mister Allen?” he asked in a soft voice.

“I’m Allen.”

The man fumbled in his shirt pocket and took out a piece of paper. He swatted on the edge of the dock and held it out and said, “Apex Taxi, Mister Allen. You’re to call the lady at this here number.”

Junior Allen snatched it and turned it toward the light and looked at it. “What lady? She give this to you?”

“No, sir. I got called over the radio and put it down on that paper. They say come here and find you and give it to you.” He straightened up and hesitated for a moment, and then went back the way he had come.

“Probably from Patty” I said.

It was the spur he needed. He hesitated, and I could sense that he was considering ordering me ashore and locking up, locking Deeleen on the inside. I slumped deeply in the canvas chair and said, “If it isn’t her, and she should come while you’re off phoning, I’ll tell her you’ll be right on back.”

“You do that,” he said. He sailed up onto the dock and went off. He had a springy and muscular gait, like a Percheron in a spring pasture.

I counted to ten and then went below. I found the lights and turned them on. I went through that boat like a nervous whirlwind, yanking out the drawers and dumping them, pawing through stowage areas. I had little hope of finding a thing, but I wanted it to look like a thorough search. And as I yanked and scurried and spilled, I was pleading with Lois. “Keep him going, baby. Keep him hanging on the line. Keep him hooked.” We had planned some interesting things to say to the monster. In spite of the racket I was making, Deeleen did not make a quiver.

I selected a spot very carefully, a lighted place where his glance would fall naturally, and I placed the fake sapphire precisely, right where it could have fallen from the hand of a hasty thief. I put a fifty-dollar bill on the cockpit deck where the interior lights shone out upon it. I turned the dock light out and snapped the switch off, breaking it. Then I clambered quickly to the cabin roof and flattened myself out on the far side of the dinghy. I checked my observation points. I could hold on to the safety rail and lean over and look through the port into the small forward cabin, or hitch back a few feet and look the same way into the larger cabin.

I thought I knew exactly what he would do, what he had to do under those circumstances. Lois had been very dubious about this part. And she had been worried about somebody coming along. But she had been wrong there, and would be wrong again, I knew.

I heard his hasty footsteps on the dock. I kept my head down. I heard the thump and felt it as he leaped down into the cockpit. I heard his grunt of consternation.

He would have to find out, and find out quickly. I leaned over cautiously and stared in, my head upside down. I saw him snatch the gem up, stare at it, shove it into his pocket. He whirled toward his marine radio rig, grasped the wooden drawer directly under the rig and pulled it all the way out. A strange resonant buzzing began.

He reached back in the place where the drawer had been, and the buzzing stopped. He worked at something in there, and then pulled his arms out, a cloth bag in one hand and a small plastic bag of paper money in the other. He examined them. He stowed them away again, started the buzzer and replaced the drawer. As soon as the drawer was in place, the buzzing sound stopped.

He went to the sleeping girl. He took her brutally by the hair, lifted her and wrenched her around. His back was to me. It was a very broad back. Her eyes opened, wide and absolutely vacant, and she seemed to stare so directly at me, I almost yanked myself away from the port. She closed her eyes again. He slapped her. They stayed closed. He dropped her.

Suddenly he reached into his pocket and took out the stone. He moved closer to the nearest light. His body seemed to tense, shoulders lifting. I pulled myself back up, sensing that he would whirl, that he would catch me.

I wormed my way toward the stern, onto the overhang, working the silk sock out of my pocket. The lights below began to go off quickly, one after the other. I had not counted on that. I closed my eyes tightly for several seconds and then opened them wide, trying to hurry night vision. I heard him coming. Moving swiftly. I wanted one good chance, and I had to take a risk to get it. I slid head and shoulders over the edge as he came out.

He heard or sensed the movement and tried to turn, but I got him very nicely and solidly, better than I had expected. He took three wandering sideways steps and went down onto his hands and knees. I dropped, landing on toes and knuckles, and as he straightened, I gave it to him with more precision, more of a wristsnapping impact. He went back down onto his hands, shaking his head, sighing. I marveled at the toughness of his skull. I snapped him behind the left ear and his arms quit and his face smacked the teak deck. For a moment, standing and breathing hard, I debated lashing him up. But after three of those, I guessed he would last more than long enough for my two chores, finding and taking his treasures, and disabling his boat.

The drawer arrangement was tricky. He had a battery buzzer back in there. I couldn’t find his manual switch, so I yanked the wires loose. The compartment was directly behind the drawer, with a sliding lid. I shoved the money into one pocket. I jounced the cloth sack. It made a glassy clinking sound. It stirred an old memory. Glassies won in the school yard long ago, a heft marking many victories. I shoved the sack inside my shirt. They had a strange coolness through the cloth against my skin. A Himalayan coolness perhaps, cold as smuggled gold. Or cell bars. Or those small blue eyes above the lovable smile.

The boat would be no problem. Hoist a hatch, tear off a handful of wiring. But then I remembered the fake stone. If I couldn’t send it back, Harry would want a lot more than it was worth. I squatted beside Junior Allen and felt it in his right trouser pocket. I worked my hand into the pocket.