He put down the boarding ladder, then dove off the stern into the bright blue water, which turned out to be exactly the right temperature—about eighty degrees, he reckoned. Maybe later today he’d call somebody in New York and gloat. He swam out about fifty yards into the little harbor, then sprinted back to his boat, hauling himself up the boarding ladder. He got a towel from below, made himself another cup of the awful coffee, and settled into the cockpit to get some sun on his all-too-white body. As he did, he saw the customs officer leave the yacht and, at a dead run, head for the little police shack fifty yards away. Odd.

A moment later, the customs officer emerged from the shack in the company of two police officers, one of them of rank, judging from his uniform. The three men marched rapidly back toward the blue yacht and went aboard, disappearing below. Stone watched with interest to see what would happen next. Ten minutes passed before the young woman skipper appeared on deck wearing a cotton dress. Accompanied by the three uniformed officers, one of them carrying a small nylon duffel, she walked toward the police shack and disappeared inside.

What the hell was going on? Stone wondered.

He kept an eye on the police shack all afternoon. Finally, sometime after five o’clock, the woman left the shack in the company of two uniformed policemen, got into a waiting car, and was driven away. Stone didn’t know what sort of trouble she was in, but he felt for her, alone in a foreign place, at the mercy of the police. He had seen many people in custody, and he had never envied any of them.

Chapter
2

Stone showered, shaved, and got into some of his new tropical clothing—a short-sleeved silk shirt, Italian cotton trousers, and woven leather loafers, no socks. He found it an unexpected pleasure to dress so lightly in January; there was much to be said for winter in the tropics.

As the sun set he wandered across a wide green lawn toward a wide thatched roof covering a bar and restaurant open to the breezes. It was early, and there were few customers. A black bartender stood behind an expanse of varnished mahogany, idly polishing a glass. A television set over the bar was tuned to CNN, the sound muted.

“Evening to you, boss,” he said amiably, with what sounded to Stone like a Bahamian accent.

“Evening,” Stone said.

“And what might be your pleasure this fine evening?”

“Oh, something tropical, I guess, to celebrate my first evening in warm weather.”

“A piña colada, mebbe?”

“Sounds good.” Stone looked up at the television and saw a woman in a heavy coat standing on what looked like a New York City street corner. A blizzard was raging about her. “Could you turn the sound up on the TV for a minute?” he asked the bartender.

“Sure thing, boss.”