“I started out with the cold, hard fact that a shipment of gold coins had been stolen in some mysterious way. You, on the other hand, started out with the warm, human fact that an old man was unhappy and a young boy seemed headed for trouble. I concentrated on trying to find the thieves. You concentrated on trying to help the old man and the boy.”
He paused again and smiled.
“Does this sound like a lecture?”
“Why—no, sir,” Vicki said politely.
“Well, it should sound like one—because it is. A lecture to myself.”
He picked up the telephone. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I think I’ll take a little closer look at a certain importer and a certain travel agent.”
Vicki got up from her chair.
“And one more thing,” John Quayle said. “The next time you see something that doesn’t feel right to your woman’s intuition, come and tell me about it.”
Vicki took an airport bus back to Tampa and got off in midtown. Her head was spinning as she tried to puzzle out the tangled events of the past week and put them together in some logical order. But the sun was too bright and the air was too sweet and clean for gloomy thoughts. Her mind leaped ahead to the fun she’d have in Havana.
She sauntered along the street aimlessly, looking into shopwindows. She stopped in front of an art supply store and was casually examining some pictures that were on display when a familiar figure inside the shop caught her eye. It was the old violinist, Mr. Tytell!