“I’m relieved to find that she has been found,” Sard said. “So that ends that.”
“You see,” Mr. Waycock said, “this is five or six days ago.”
“Did you ever hear the nickname B. or Mr. Sagrado B.?” Sard asked, “in connection with rum-running or plotting against the Dictator?”
Mr. Waycock had a broad, smooth, pale face, tranquil like the face of an image of Buddha.
“I know no one with such a nickname,” he said, “and there is no rum-running from Santa Barbara. There may be rum-running from the coast far to the west, six hundred miles from here, where the rum is made, but none from here. This fiction of the rum coming from Santa Barbara is made by the Las Palomas police, Mr. Harker. And as for plotting against the Dictator, you meant, I suppose, the Don José faction. Who would shoot the Dictator to put Don José in his place?”
“Don José would, for one,” Sard said.
Mr. Waycock laughed. “He hasn’t that reputation in Santa Barbara,” he said.
Sard suddenly felt that he was in the presence of one of Don José’s backers.
“One thing, Mr. Waycock,” he said, “if Douglas Castleton isn’t plotting or fetching rum, what brings him to Santa Barbara?”
“He comes for letters, Mr. Harker; twice a year he comes to Santa Barbara for letters.”