All the way - By Charles Williams Page 0,1

I spent any more on fishing trips.

I wondered about the girl again. Propping myself on an elbow, I glanced round at her. “What’s the world record for dolphin?”

I expected a blank stare, of course, or one right out of the deep freeze, but instead she said calmly, without even looking up, “Hmmm. Just a moment.” She leafed back through the book and ran her finger down a column. “Seventy-five and a half pounds. It was taken off East Africa.”

It caught me completely off-balance. She glanced up finally. Her eyes were a very dark blue, almost violet, in a thin but fine-boned face. They regarded me with urbane coolness, but then amusement got the upper hand. “All right. I was listening.”

I sat up and slid over by her. Picking up the book, I glanced at the jacket. It was a volume on salt-water fishing. “I wouldn’t have said you were a fisherman.”

She reached for the packet of cigarettes at her side. When I held the lighter, she smiled at me over the flame. “I’m not, as a matter of fact. If you’d asked me for the world’s record Striped Limbo, I’d still have tried to look it up.”

“Then why the book?” I asked.“Your boy friend a fisherman?”

She shook her head. “No, it’s not that. I just wanted to try it.”

“Why?” I asked. She still didn’t look like an outdoor type.

“A man I used to work for. He talked so much about marlin and sailfish I decided if I ever had a chance I’d see what the attraction was. Maybe you could tell me something about the boats.”

“Sure,” I said. “The charter fleet ties up over in Garrison Bight. Along Roosevelt Boulevard, I think it is. Most of them charge sixty a day, but a few are higher. The only one I’ve fished with is Captain Holt, of the Blue Runner. He’s good, and so is his Mate; they’ll put you into fish if anybody will. He charges sixty-five.”

“They’re rather expensive, aren’t they?”

“Nothing’s ever cheap about boats,” I said. “And don’t forget you’re hiring two men all day, plus gasoline, tackle, bait, and so on. Plus a lot of skill you can get only with experience. Are you alone?”

While I was speaking I noticed the same intent expression on her face I’d seen before. It puzzled me. “Oh,” she said abruptly, as if she’d been thinking of something else. “I—yes, I’m alone.”

“Well, look,” I said, “if you want to go out tomorrow, why don’t we team up? It’s a lot less expensive—thirty-two dollars fifty apiece.”

She appeared to think about it. “We-ell—”

”Come on, I’ll buy you a drink,” I told her. “We can talk it over.”

She smiled. “All right.” I helped her up, and gathered up her towel and my robe. She was a little over average height, I noted, and very slender. Too slender, I thought, to attract much attention among all the stacked and sun-gilded flesh lying around on Florida beaches, but she was smart-looking and exquisitely feminine and she moved nicely. She appeared to be around thirty.

The bar was located on a screened porch at one end of the dining-room. It was empty at the moment except for the white-jacketed barman and two men arguing about the Detroit Lions. We sat down at one of the small tables along the screened wall facing the beach. The barman came over. She ordered a Scotch on the rocks, and I asked for a Martini. A big fan in the corner blew humid air across us.

“My name’s George Hamilton,” I said.

She dropped the book on a chair beside her. “Forsyth. Marian Forsyth. How do you do, Mr. Hamilton?”

“Have you been here long?”

“Just two days,” she replied.

“You know, I keep thinking I’ve seen you somewhere before.”

Again I was conscious of the urbane amusement in the eyes. “Really? I thought we had by-passed that one.”

“No,” I said. “It’s on the level. There is something familiar about you. Where are you staying?”

“The Hibiscus Motel, just up the street.”

“Then we’re neighbors. I’m there too.”

“That might have been where you saw me. In the lobby, perhaps.”

“I suppose so,” I said. “But I don’t see why I’d be so hazy about it. You’re quite striking, you know. I mean, the Black Irish coloring, and the classic line of that hair-do. It sings.”

She propped her elbows on the table, with her chin on her laced fingers, and smiled. “And what other personality problems do you have, Mr. Hamilton, besides shyness?”

I grinned. “I’m sorry. Seriously, though, if any Charles or Antoine