Thick as Thieves Read online

  Carefully he took aim at the raft.

  Chapter 13

  WHAT AM I DOING? Joe thought with a jolt just before he pulled the trigger. He was about to kill a man, and killing wasn't his style. He wanted to bring Chavo to justice, real justice.

  That's what Frank would have wanted, he told himself.

  He lowered the nose of the flare gun as he fired. An arc of flame shot across the night and exploded in fire and smoke on the ocean. In the blaze, he could no longer see the tiny life raft.

  Jolly raised the binoculars to his eyes. "As near as I can tell, a perfect hit." He set them down and patted Joe's shoulder while the others cheered. "Welcome back, Kid. Now we've got to prepare for the main event. The world, as they say, is ours."

  ***

  Something burst on the ocean.

  Frank raised his head in alarm, to see that the sea was on fire just behind the raft. "What was that?" he asked.

  Chavo ignored it. "Flare. We were the target. Let's use it to our advantage, as cover for an escape." He took one of the oars from Frank and began paddling. "So that's how he's going to do it."

  "You mean the Director? You've figured out the caper?"

  "Si," said Chavo. "Puerto de Oro is a self-contained island. It has few police and few buildings. If one were to take, say, the gas stolen from the naval base, and flood the buildings with it, then—"

  "Then once you've knocked everyone out, you could wander through the buildings at will and take whatever you wanted," Frank continued. "Everyone would be dead. No witnesses."

  "And they'll have plenty of time to leave the island without anyone contacting the mainland police. It's the perfect crime."

  "Good thing you waited to figure this out until there's no possibility we can get help," Frank said with more than a hint of sarcasm.

  "I'd hate to think we might need some backup to invade an island that's entirely cut off from the outside world and might be controlled by criminals."

  "When we reach Puerto de Oro," said Chavo, "there I will get help."

  "Chavo," Frank asked, "can I ask you a question?"

  "Go ahead."

  "Are you really a cop, or what?"

  A burst of laughter erupted from the Mexican, and he said nothing else the rest of the way.

  "Welcome to Puerto de Oro," Chavo said as they stepped onto the land ahead of the group on the barge. They had left the life raft in a massive harbor filled with private yachts and walked the rest of the way to the beach. Frank marveled at the sight of casinos and hotels styled like medieval castles, yet gleaming white, even at night. Electric lights made the streets of Puerto de Oro almost as bright as day.

  But there was no one on the streets.

  "This way," Chavo said, motioning down a street. "We must reach the police station and warn them. There's a radio, too. Men are waiting on the mainland for my orders."

  As he ran, Frank's feet slid and skidded across cobblestones moistened by the sea air. Which men did Chavo mean? Was he really going to call the Federales, or did he have some gang of his own stashed in Tijuana, waiting to come and horn in on the Director's master plan?

  Frank resolved he would not turn his back on Chavo until he had the answer.

  The police station was plainer than the other buildings, a simple box of stucco and stone. There were bars on all the windows. From inside came the tinny sounds of a mariachi band, played either on an old record player or a cheap radio. It seemed as peaceful and quaint as the rest of the island.

  Chavo knocked on the door, yelling something in Spanish. From inside, a voice yelled, "Que desea us ted?" Chavo shook his head.

  "He asked us what we want," Chavo said.

  Frank pushed past him. "Your problem is that this is a resort that caters to rich Americans. Let me give it a try." He pounded on the door, shouting, "Help! Robbery!" Frank looked at Chavo. "How do you say I want to report a theft'?"

  "Quiero denunciar un robo," Chavo replied.

  "Quiero denunciar un robo," Frank repeated, pounding again at the door.

  Finally the door opened a crack and a single brown eye peered out. "Come back tomorrow," a Hispanic voice called. "We cannot help you now."

  Chavo hurled himself into the door, shoving it open. The figure at the door fell backward, and Frank and Chavo pushed their way in.

  Frank helped the man on the floor to his feet. He was in his twenties, scrawny, and dressed in the uniform of a Mexican police deputy. Quickly he pulled his hand away from Frank and nervously brushed some dust off his khakis. In the meantime Chavo began to rummage frantically through the office. It was as small as it looked from outside, but it was packed with file cabinets. Next to the main desk was a teletypewriter. Chavo ripped pages from the teletypewriter, scanned them, and scowled.

  "The radio," he insisted. "Where is your radio?" When the deputy refused to answer, Chavo stormed into the next room, toward the jail.

  Frank expected the deputy to be angry about the breakin, but instead there was nothing but fear in his eyes. Those eyes weren't focused on Frank, but on the room that Chavo had just entered. He wondered why the deputy was so uneasy. There could be only one reason.

  "Chavo!" Frank yelled as he flung the deputy aside. "It's a trap." He sprinted toward the door, but a man appeared in his way. The man was dressed in a white suit. A thick mustache adorned his upper lip, and grim mirth danced in the man's black, ratlike eyes.

  It was Cat Willeford.

  "Come in," he said, waving a gun at Frank. He motioned to the deputy. "You too."

  "You won't shoot us," Frank said. "You'd bring the whole island down on you."

  Willeford raised the pistol and fired at the ceiling. Powdered plaster rained down like a dust storm as the deafening roar echoed through the police station.

  "Coming?" Willeford asked, and Frank and the deputy filed past him to the jail area.

  Two others of the gang were also in there, tossing an unconscious Chavo into a cell. "Too bad," said Willeford. "I had to quiet him down." He flagged Frank and the deputy into the cell and slammed the door.

  In the next cell Frank saw the chief of police and another deputy. He assumed that was all the law on the island.

  "You're going to leave us here?" he asked Willeford.

  "Not quite," the rat-eyed man answered before he vanished with his cronies into the outer office. Willeford returned a moment later, wearing a gas mask and holding a canister. He lifted up the mask. "Pleasant dreams." It sounded like a farewell.

  Then he slipped the mask back on and crouched down. With a flip of his thumb he knocked open the valve on the canister. A white gas began spraying into the police station.

  With a cheerful motion, Willeford dropped the cell-door keys on the floor outside Frank's cell, and then left.

  As soon as the door closed, Frank was on his stomach, reaching through the bars. He stretched to grab the keys, but Willeford had dropped them just outside his reach. They lay there, tantalizing him, as the white cloud filled the room.

  Coughing, his eyes stinging from the gas, Frank slapped Chavo. He wouldn't wake up. Frank slapped him again. Finally, the cell blurring before his eyes as the gas threatened to overcome him, Frank clamped a hand over Chavo's mouth and pinched his nose shut.

  Chavo gasped awake, choking from the lack of air to his lungs. Before Frank could explain, he sized up the situation. The police chief and the deputies were flat on the floor, trying to reach the keys.

  Chavo gave it a try and failed. He started to stand up, and then he sniffed at the gas. His eyes widened in terror, and he dropped back to his knees. Frank thought he looked sick.

  "Knockout gas?" Frank asked, but he saw by the look in Chavo's eyes it wasn't so.

  "Poison gas," Chavo replied weakly. "To kill us."

  He threw himself against the bars, straining for the keys just out of reach as the cloud of death descended. Chavo slumped and shook his head. "It's no use."

  They were trapped.

  Chapter 14

/>   FRANK PEELED OFF his shirt, holding it over his nose and mouth. Chavo ordered the others to stay down, breathing the air that remained under the thickening cloud. But Frank knew the dense gas would eventually force all the air out of the building. He had to reach the keys.

  He got on his stomach again and stretched for the keys. Three inches, he thought. If only his arm would stretch three more inches!

  He rolled onto his back, gasping for air. The gas stung his nostrils, choking him. He flattened against the floor, trying to stay beneath the cloud.

  Something hit against his leg. Frank patted the floor with his hand, but there was nothing under his leg. He reached into his pocket.

  There, forgotten, was the knife he had taken from Jolly on the barge.

  Quickly he flicked the knife blade and stretched out again. The tip of the knife touched the edge of the key ring. He pulled it toward him. The knife blade slipped away. He tried again, slipping the blade under the ring this time. Slowly, so slowly Frank felt as if he wasn't moving at all, he lifted the knife, catching the ring.

  The key ring slid down the length of the knife until it was in Frank's hand.

  He pressed his face to the floor as far as he could, took one last breath, and stood up. As long as I don't breathe in, Frank thought, it won't get me. The thing that worried him was how long he would be able to hold his breath.

  Frank worked the keys in the lock until the jail door swung open. He could see nothing but the white cloud. His ears and eyes stung as he staggered to the canister, but he held his breath as he tried to close the valve.

  Willeford had broken it.

  He lifted the canister, and the effort made him exhale, then inhale, without meaning to. Gas rushed into his lungs, and he felt himself weakening. With a loud cry, he lunged forward, into the front office, and smashed the canister through a window.

  The bars stopped the canister, bouncing it back into Frank's arms, but the window shattered. The rush of cool air cleared his head. Frank opened the front door to let in more air.

  Standing outside on the steps was one of the men who had been with Willeford in the jail. Like Willeford, he now wore a gas mask. The gun he held was aimed at Frank.

  Frank swung the canister like a baseball bat. It slammed into the side of the man's head, knocking him flat. Frank let go of the canister and fell to his knees next to the gunman, ripping at the thug's mask.

  In seconds Frank had it on his own face. Then he rushed back into the deadly cloud in the jailhouse and, one by one, dragged the others to safety.

  He sat on the ground in front of the police station, catching his breath as the others recovered. Finally he had the energy to remove the gas mask. He decided not to let it out of his sight. It might come in handy, now that the Director's scheme was in motion. Chavo entered a heated conversation in Spanish with the police chief, and when it was over he grabbed Frank by the arm and pulled him to his feet.

  "The first thing Willeford did was smash the chief's radio," Chavo said. "We have one other chance." He jerked his head in the direction of the main hotel. "Brendan Buchanan, who owns the big casino on the island, has a two-way radio in his office."

  Frank flashed Chavo a cocky grin. "Then we'd better get there before someone destroys that one too."

  They moved stealthily and kept low. Frank noticed activity down by the docks. They crept closer for a better look, staying in the shadows.

  The fishing barge was in, and the Director's gang was marching away from it. Each of them carried a large bag, and each wore a gas mask. The seven men marched toward the hotel.

  "Seven?" Frank whispered to Chavo. "Where did they get a seventh from? There were only six on the boat."

  "Don't forget the one who closed the hatch." Chavo watched grimly as the men blocked their path to the hotel. "We are beaten. There are too many of them, and we cannot get past them without them seeing us."

  "Stay here," Frank said. "I've got an idea."

  He slipped on the gas mask to conceal his identity and ran up to the line of criminals, trying not to make any noise. Without a sound, he slipped an arm around the neck of the last man in line, dragging him back. The man struggled, but the mask muffled his cry.

  Chavo jumped up, ripped the man's gas mask off, and knocked him out. He slipped the mask on as Frank took the man's belt off and bound him with it.

  "Perfect," Frank said, eyeing the masked Chavo. "You look like a master criminal again."

  ***

  The hotel was filled with a bright pink gas that wafted in streams around Frank and Chavo as they entered. Elegantly dressed people littered the hotel lobby and stairs, an eerie stillness clutching their fallen bodies. Men in gas masks moved, taking watches, jewelry, and wallets from them and dropping the items in their bags.

  They're breathing, Frank realized, relieved that here, at least, the thieves had not used poison gas.

  They started up the stairs, and for a moment Chavo paused, looking back. Frank saw his eyes narrow. "What's the matter?"

  "The seventh man from the dock," Chavo said. "The one we couldn't identify. I thought I saw him in the corner of my eye. I was mistaken."

  They continued up. More bodies were on the stairs, lying where they'd fallen when the gas hit. From above them came the cry, "It's about time you got here. Let's go. The top floor hasn't been touched."

  It was Everest. For a moment Frank froze, sure they'd been spotted. Then he remembered the masks. Everest couldn't see who they were.

  Chavo nodded, and Everest vanished back up the stairs.

  "Let's go," Frank said. "According to the guide we passed on our way in, the manager's office is on the top floor."

  They stopped on a balcony and looked at the activity below. The balcony opened out over a large casino, and masked figures scurried from table to table, robbing the gamblers and looting the money on the tables. For the first time, Frank fully understood just how big this crime really was.

  He and Chavo continued up the stairs. Here and there men in gas masks popped in and out of hotel rooms. "There are more here than I recruited," Chavo said. "The Director must have had other scouts over here already in place."

  "For a job like this, I can understand that," Frank replied. They reached the top of the stairs. On this floor there were no guest rooms, only offices. Frank went from door to door, until he found a plaque that read Manager.

  "Here it is," he called to Chavo.

  Gingerly he turned the knob. The unlocked door swung open.

  The room was dark, and they dared not turn on a light. Wisps of pink gas hung in the air, but it smelled sweeter than the air downstairs. Against the back window, which overlooked the harbor, was an antique desk.

  A man sprawled with his face on the desk. Frank raised the man's hand, and it dropped back to the desk without pause. "Unconscious," Frank said. "I assume this is the manager."

  "Never mind him," Chavo said. "Find the radio." He pulled books off the shelves and knocked open file drawers.

  There was no sign of a radio.

  "It's got to be here somewhere," Chavo insisted. He scratched his head. "Maybe it's one of those new miniaturized jobs. He could have it in his desk."

  Frank stepped behind the desk and gently moved the unconscious manager to one side. He pulled open the desk drawers and rifled through them. Only papers. Exasperated, he slammed the top drawer shut.

  His knuckle brushed against a button underneath the lip of the desktop. Curious, he pressed it.

  A bookcase swung away from the wall, revealing a small room inside.

  "The radio!" Chavo exclaimed, and rushed into the room. In seconds he was working the controls of the shortwave, repeating into the microphone, "Mayday! Mayday! Please acknowledge."

  Frank stepped in, studying the hidden room. Why would a hotel manager install one? he wondered. He pressed his hand against the smooth white wall, and it gave way. As he heard Chavo speaking to the mainland police, he said, "I think we have a problem."

  Behin
d the second wall was a small television studio.

  "You do have a problem," the hotel manager agreed. He stood outside the door, very much awake, a pistol in his hand. "Yes," he said in answer to the shocked looks on their faces, "I am the hotel manager and owner."

  Frank studied the man's face. There was something strangely familiar about him, though Frank was certain he hadn't seen him before. Under the man's nose, almost invisible, were nose filters. That, Frank realized, was how the manager had kept himself safe from the gas.

  The manager gave them a tight smile. "Of course, you may call me the Director."

  Chapter 15

  WEARING HIS GAS MASK, Joe Hardy strolled through the casino. He had walked off the barge with the others, but since then had not joined them in their activities. He only watched as the criminals stripped Puerto de Oro of its wealth. Across the casino, at the roulette tables, two men were cleaning out the cash.

  One crook picked up a diamond necklace and held it up to the light, checking its quality. The thief wiped the lenses on his gas mask with a sleeve, and when he still couldn't see well enough, he slipped the mask off and held the diamonds to the light again.

  A satisfied smile crossed the man's lips. On the other side of the room, Joe's blood began to boil.

  The man with the diamonds was Cat Willeford.

  A thick hand clapped down on Joe's shoulder, startling him. He was at the point when he wanted to hit someone who deserved hitting, and his first thought was to spin around and start swinging. He held himself back. Like the others, this guy's face was masked, but Joe couldn't mistake the voice or the shape.

  "You'd better do your share, Kid," Jolly said. "We wouldn't want you to miss out on your cut of the take, now, would we?"

  "Someone would have to turn me in," Joe replied. "You wouldn't do that."

  Jolly sighed. "I might hate to, that's true. But if the money was right ... "

  "What do we do with all this stuff once we get it?"