Эрл Гарднер - The Amazing Adventures of Lester Leith

“Shogiro,” the undercover man said, “Mah Foy, Charles Sansone, and Silman Shore.”

“Sansone?” Lester Leith exclaimed in surprise.

“Yes, sir.”

“What’s he doing aboard?”

“Apparently just taking a trip to the Islands.”

Leith frowned. “Seen anyone else you know, Scuttle?”

“No, sir.”

“Who’s your cabin mate?”

The undercover man frowned.

“An old gentleman inclined to seasickness, I understand, and something of an invalid, sir. He’ll probably be a nuisance. He asked me particularly to entertain my friends outside the cabin. He expects to spend most of the time in bed.”

“Most annoying,” Leith said. “Too bad you didn’t get a more agreeable companion.”

“Yes, sir,” the valet said, “but I’m quite certain the trip will be very enjoyable. Is there anything you wish, sir? I’ve laid your clothes out and—”

“No, Scuttle. That will be all for tonight. Take life easy and enjoy yourself. I’m dog tired and am going to turn in.”

Leith waved to Ora Sanders. Her face showed disappointment. She moved swiftly to his side and said, “Aren’t you going to watch the Mainland out of sight? Have you no romance?”

He whispered, “I’m setting a trap. Meet me on the boat deck in fifteen minutes.”

Leith said good night to Mah Foy and started in the direction of his cabin, but detoured to the boat deck where Ora Sanders found him a quarter of an hour later.

Leith said, “I want to be where I can see without being seen. Would you consider the duties of your employment too onerous if you sat over here in the shadow of the lifeboat and went into what is technically known as a huddle?”

She laughed. “I’d have been disappointed to think that I was starting on a trip to the Hawaiian Islands unhuddled,” she said.

They sat close together in the shadow, talking in low tones. The couples who promenaded past them grew fewer in number as the ship swung out into the Pacific and the bow began to sway gently to the surge of the incoming swell.

Suddenly Leith exerted pressure on her arm. Ora Sanders followed the direction of his glance.

Beaver, accompanied by a stocky, bull-necked, broad-shouldered man, was promenading past. They heard him say, “It’s okay now, Sarge, I told him you were an old invalid and to keep out of our cabin.”

They walked past.

“Who was that?” Ora Sanders asked.

Leith smiled. “That,” he said, “was Sergeant Arthur Ackley of the Metropolitan Police Force. I don’t wish him any bad luck, but I hope he is highly susceptible to seasickness.”

On the second day out, Mah Foy said to Lester Leith, “I haven’t any definite idea of what you had in mind when you employed me. Certainly it wasn’t to work.”

Leith, sprawled in a deck chair and watching the intense blue waters of a semitropic ocean, smiled and said, “I am a man of extremes. When I work, I work long hours. When I loaf, I loaf long hours.”

“So it would seem. Did you know that Mr. Sansone was going to be on this boat?”

“Frankly,” Leith said, “I did not. I’m sorry if his presence causes you any embarrassment.”

“It doesn’t,” she said, “only he was surprised at seeing me here.”

“I can understand that.”

“Did you know that Katiska Shogiro was going to be a passenger?”

“I suspected that he might go as far as Honolulu.”

“On this ship?”

“Yes.”

“Did you know that Mr. Shore was going to be a passenger?”

“Yes,” Leith said. “I knew that in advance.”

She remained silent for several minutes, then she said, “If you have any work for me, please call.”

“Wait a minute,” Leith said as she arose from the deck chair. “I have one thing to ask of you.”

“What is that, Mr. Leith?”

“Don’t do anything rash. Promise me that you won’t — at least until we are in Honolulu.”

“Why?” she asked. “What made you think I contemplated doing anything you might describe as rash?”

“I have my reasons,” Leith said.

She laughed. “My race has a proverb. ‘Stirring the water does not help it to boil.’ ”

“A very good proverb,” Leith said, “although I don’t subscribe to it.”

“You don’t?”

“No,” he said. “Stirring the water may not help it to boil, but it has other advantages.”

“What are they?”

“Oh, for one thing,” Leith said, “it scrambles the contents of the pot, and makes it difficult for an observer to know that the primary purpose of putting the pot on the stove was to get the water to boil.”

“Are you, by any chance, referring to the mysterious cabin mate who takes surreptitious midnight strolls with your valet?”

“Oh,” Leith said, “you know about that?”

She said, “In my position, I try to know everything.”

“And thought that you should tell me about it?”

“Yes.”

“Thanks,” Leith said, “for your loyalty.”

She met his eyes. “There is one other thing. I was commissioned by my government to recover that necklace, sell it, and bring the proceeds back to China.”

“Thanks for telling me,” Leith said. “I surmised it.”

Leith was reading a book when Ora Sanders, wearing a short-skirted sports outfit, shook off a group of admirers to drop into the empty deck chair beside him.

“When,” she asked, “do we do sleight of hand?”

“Tonight,” Leith said. “An impromptu entertainment by passengers. I have agreed to do a turn.”

“That’s fine,” she said.

“You will, of course, wear your stage costume.”

“I was hoping for that.”

“Hoping?” he asked.

“Yes,” she laughed. “So many of the male passengers have expressed a desire to see more of me.”

“There is always the swimming tank,” Leith suggested.

“I thought it might be better not to give them a preview.”

“Very wise,” he said. “By the way, have you met the captain?”

“Yes,” she said.

“Think you could turn loose the battery of your eyes on him and make a suggestion?”

She nodded.

“At two o’clock tomorrow afternoon,” Leith said, “I notice a skeet shoot is scheduled. I think it would be an excellent idea to advise the captain that we have aboard, in the person of Mr. Silman Shore, a trapshooter of nationwide reputation. It would be very appropriate if Mr. Shore should give a little exhibition for the benefit of the passengers. He—” He broke off at the expression on her face. “What is it?”

“How many people do you have making suggestions?” she asked. “Why?”

“That suggestion,” she said, “was communicated to the captain this morning, shortly after the skeet shoot was noticed on the bulletin board.”

“Who suggested it to him?”

“A Japanese by the name of Shogiro, a very interesting gentleman who has spent much of his time trying to cultivate my acquaintance.”

Leith considered the statement in thoughtful silence. At length, he said, “Proof that great minds run in the same channels.”

“Tell me,” she said, “did my announcement distress you?”

“Not distress me,” Leith said, “but it does give me food for thought — food which must be carefully chewed lest it give me mental indigestion.”

She slid out of the chair with her sports skirt sliding up the well-shaped legs. “Okay,” she said, “I’ll run along before you get a mental tummyache.”

“Don’t do that again,” Leith said.

“What?”

“Distract my attention,” he said. “Remember that your province is to distract the attention of the audience.”

“And I can’t practice on you a little bit?”

“Well,” Leith said judicially, “just a little — a very little bit.”