The Killer Touch by Ellery Queen Read Free Book Online Page B

held up a mop and a bucket. “Miss Joss, how I’m cleaning cabin two?”
    â€œYou’ll have to wait, Jata. Mr. Keener wants to be there when you clean.”
    The old woman’s blue-black, wrinkled face settled slowly into a mask of fury. She turned and strode off, somehow managing to convey injured dignity in the way she planted her large bare feet on the sand. Burt regarded Joss with a question in his eyes, and Joss looked down into her coffee. She spoke defensively:
    â€œIt sounded perfectly reasonable when he explained it this morning. I … didn’t realize how it would sound.”
    â€œYes. He’s very logical … in his own way.” Burt frowned. “I wonder what valuables he had that he couldn’t take with him.”
    Joss wasn’t listening. She gulped down her coffee and stood up. “I’d better go soothe Jata’s pride. See you at lunch.”
    Burt breakfasted on soursop juice, fried breadfruit and red snapper. Boris was sorry, but the rats had stolen the eggs and the mongooses had eaten all the chickens and there was no way to get off the island until Mister Keener returned.
    Burt felt a new twist of unease: “If he weren’t here how would you get off?”
    â€œWe would cut the glass, sir.”
    â€œCut the glass?”
    â€œTake the mirror, go up to the piton , catch the sun and flash it to the fishing boats.”
    â€œAnd if there’s no sun?”
    â€œIf there is no sun, then you wait. The sun always return.”
    After breakfast, Burt climbed the steep stony path which had been hacked through the shoulder-high grass. By the time he reached the base of the three black crags, he had to stop and massage his aching leg. Maybe I’m pushing too hard, he thought, can’t afford to get crippled up at this point.
    At what point? Well, before it happens, whatever Rolf is going to make happen.…
    A six-foot watchtower had been built on the highest crag, dating from the days when the French and English had been killing each other to plant their flags around the world. The eminence was a paved area no larger than a shot-put ring, with a waist-high parapet halfway around it. The rest of the parapet had fallen a breath-taking five hundred feet to the rocks below. Burt leaned his elbows on the parapet, breathing heavily as he scanned the horizon. The mist-laden wind cooled his flushed face. Clots of low gray clouds floated over the white-capped sea below, seemingly anchored by silver streamers of rain. To the north, the populus island of Bequia formed an irregular crescent, pointing a gnarled finger at the southern tip of St. Vincent. To the south, a score of smaller islands thrust up from the sea, some so close together that it was hard to see where one began and another ended. He had visited all of them in the past; he recognized the jutting red peak of Battowia, inhabited by a few native fanners; he saw the wooded, rolling hills of Cannouan, the twisting spine of Baliceaux, the yellow-green pastures of Mustique, and the jagged thousand-foot spires of Union. Most of the smaller islands were waterless and uninhabited except for semiwild sheep and cattle, and voracious sandflies. There were none of the usual fishing boats bobbing between the islands, and no sign of Rolf’s power cruiser.
    He left the tower and strolled aimlessly around the island. At least, he thought he was strolling aimlessly; he realized his subconscious had taken charge when he found himself regarding once again the padlock on cabin two. There was nobody in sight. He walked around the cabin looking for a means of ingress. The windows were small and hooked on the inside. The padlock hung on a rusty hasp screwed into rotting wood; he could have ripped it loose but he wanted to leave no sign.
    He stumbled over an accumulation of litter from the cabin: broken bottles, rusty cans, and charred newspapers, all damp and glistening. One small pile had not yet been