Sandra Moore - The Orchid Hunter

As it was, Noah was a nice alias. Most of us used stage names to hide our identities from Fish and Wildlife and Customs. I’d already had six last names in the past three years, with passports to match. “Robards” was my favorite so far. I’d hate giving it up in a few months.

Then there was a crash and thunk, like they’d pulled the desk apart. Scrabbling. A creak. Nails being ripped from boards.

“Wait, I’ve got it!” the one inside the office said.

“This isn’t a map—”

“No shit, Sherlock.”

Silence for a long moment. Annoyance flared in my chest. It was unfair. So I’m not Nancy Drew. I got here first. I just don’t bust up the furniture to find the loot.

“What are all the numbers?” the whiner asked.

“He wrote everything in code. I’ll get one of his students to translate it. Let’s go.”

“So we don’t need Noah?” the whiner asked as they passed the bedroom on their way out.

“Not if this turns out to be a map.”

I waited until they closed the front door to slip downstairs after them. They headed off the condo’s grounds and further into town, toward the River Walk. I followed, playing native San Antonian out for an early evening stroll.

The one I assumed was the Whiner was a thin little guy about my height sporting a bad haircut and a limp. The other one, the Brain of the outfit, needed to take an iron to his Dockers and was losing his hair in back. He was kind of cute if a girl could ignore the haughty look he threw at her as he shrugged on his light windbreaker. Jerk.

They crossed the Crockett Street Bridge and dropped down to the River Walk below, where the trees, flowering shrubs and flowing green water lowered the temperature several degrees. I hadn’t been on the Paseo del Rio since the Danube case three years ago, but a glance at a walk map refreshed my memory. The restaurants and shops might have changed hands, but the river itself was still the same.

Fair enough. The dinner crowd was just picking up. Bumping into the Brain and the Whiner would be a cinch.

I eased down the stone steps to the Paseo del Rio, letting them get a little ahead so I could judge their purpose without being spotted. It seemed weird that they would have lifted the map leading to the Death Orchid and then just meandered down the River Walk for an evening meal. Where was their sense of professional urgency? Maybe I was feeling enough urgency—because of Scooter—for all three of us.

They stopped at a pink oleander-shaded menu stand and stood with their hands in their pockets, browsing. A gang of teenagers migrated past, jostling the Brain, who glanced up in annoyance. Then his attention went back to the menu.

Better to approach them one at a time. The Brain walked on. The Whiner lingered over the appetizers. I strode forward, turned my head to look at Boudro’s Texas Bistro, and gave the Whiner a full-frontal press.

“Oh, I’m sorry,” I spewed, smiling my sweetest smile as I pawed his trousers as though trying to cop a feel while maneuvering my shoulder bag. Nothing in his pockets. The map had to be on the Brain.

“That’s all right.” The poor guy looked almost grateful to have been groped.

Then the Brain turned to look for his buddy and stared me in the face. His eyes widened. He clearly recognized me from somewhere, but I had no idea where. His face—innocuous, bland, shocked—meant nothing to me. In a split second, he pivoted and sprinted away, one hand reaching for his left windbreaker pocket.

Eureka.

“Hey! Wait!” the Whiner yelled behind us.

The Brain didn’t slow. He dodged through the walking crowd alongside the river like a freshman running back. I got hung up around a waiter carrying a tray of steaming seafood, slid underneath his arm, and took off again. The Brain’s distinctive bobbing head kept me posted amid the sun visors, suits and golf shirts.

He abruptly turned up a steep stone staircase to Commerce Street. I took the steps two at a time, jostling a bevy of well-dressed tourists and earning a chorus of “Hey!” A guy wearing a navy sports jacket and a power tie with green accents—not a good combo—grabbed my arm but I twisted free. The interference slowed me down enough to let the Brain make the street without me and lose himself in the shopping crowd spilling onto the sidewalk.

Damn.

I jogged further south, thinking he wouldn’t be so stupid as to double back to pick up the Whiner. At the Market and Alamo intersection, I came upon another set of steps leading down to the River Walk. From the Market Street bridge, I could see a good bit of the river and the people walking along both sides of it. On the north side, not much happening except for a maintenance barge puttering south and a bright pink river barge loading up with dinner passengers. On the south side, the terraced Arneson River Theater seats had filled up with spectators for whatever was going on onstage across the river, which was loud salsa….

Bingo.

Thinning hair, beige windbreaker, and a furtive look over one shoulder. Had he not looked, I’d have had to think twice. I swung down the stairs, jumping the rail on the last five steps to land next to a startled restaurant hostess with flaming red hair and a Clinique-ly perfect face.

“Sorry,” I mumbled.

I was nearly on him when the Brain caught sight of me and bolted toward the stage. On it, several brilliantly costumed Mexican dancers wheeled in some traditional hoedown. Mariachis jammed on a little platform behind the dancers. Across the river, spectators sprawled on the terraced seats leading up a steep hillside. A tourist barge moseyed in our direction, the driver giving the usual historical spiel as he steered his boat between the stage and the seating area.

Perfect place for a takedown.

The Brain jumped a barricade blocking off any pedestrians who might wander onto the stage and caught his trailing foot on the wood. He nearly fell, taking the barricade with him. Great. He was tiring. I sprinted over the downed barricade. He catapulted onto the stage. The crowd gasped. I jumped up after him. Dancers scattered like gorgeous tropical birds spooked by a cat. A running leap and I tackled him, shoving him down face first onto the wooden flooring.

“Gotcha!” I shouted over the mariachis. The Brain wriggled like a worm on a hook. “Hold still a minute, will ya?” I reached for his map pocket.

I caught a glimpse of dark green uniform in my peripheral vision as the Brain wrenched himself loose, throwing a much lighter me to one side. I scrambled to my feet. Dark green uniform meant the Parks and Wildlife cops. The dancers faded back when I lit out after the Brain again, chasing him up the walk toward Presa Street.

The Brain threw a frightened glance back at me and then did something I’ll never forget: he jumped from the sidewalk onto the oncoming river barge, skidded behind the driver, hopped from there onto a maintenance scow headed the other direction, and then finished with a mad leap to the other sidewalk. A second later and the boats had passed each other, leaving me looking at twelve feet of water between us.

Nice trick. And there wasn’t a footpath close enough to cut him off. I watched him scramble up a retaining wall. He disappeared.

The dark green uniforms pounded my way, so I took a page from the Brain’s book and skedaddled up an ivy-covered wall. On the other side, I sprinted over Market Street to the River Bend parking garage and my first floor Rent-A-Wreck. Thirty seconds later I motored sedately out into evening traffic.

Only after I knew I wasn’t being followed did I pull over so I could study the paper the Brain had so graciously given up, unbeknownst to him, in our scuffle amid the gorgeous dancers.

Harrison’s proprietary code covered the page. I scanned through the gibberish, finding nothing but lots of notes to self about insects, repellants and allergies. The poor Brain had got himself bamboozled. Then a set of letters and numbers caught my attention. I translated, tried not to get too excited.