Big Kiss-Off by Day Keene Page A

the
Sea Bird
.
    Cade glanced through the dark at the small oval face of the girl standing beside his elbow. To save her new dress and shoes and hose, Mimi had changed back into her borrowed white pants and shirt. The black-haired girl wore well. The more intimately Cade knew her, the better he liked her. There was no pretense about her. Mimi was for you or against you. She had been bitterly disappointed at failing to find Moran in New Orleans, but had refused to cry. She hadn’t called out once or shown any outward signs of fright on the precarious trip down river. Nor had she asked any foolish questions. When he had told her he intended to head for Barataria Bay and a showdown with Janice and Moran, she had accepted his judgment without question. In the country she came from the men made the decisions. Such pants as the women wore were merely for ornamental purposes.
    He said, “I’m trying to make up my mind whether I ought to stop in Bay Parish and replace what fuel we’ve used.”
    “We do not ’ave enough to get to this Barataria?”
    “Plenty. If we don’t run into a blow.”
    “A blow?”
    “A storm.”
    “There is apt to be a storm?”
    “I wouldn’t know,” Cade said wryly. “This is the season for them but it’s a little too dark to see if the small craft warnings are flying and under the circumstances I don’t think it would be smart to check with the Coast Guard.”
    Mimi proved she was only human by asking her first foolish question. “Why not?”
    “For two reasons,” Cade told her. “One, you’re in the country illegally. Remember? Two, there is the little matter of the man I dropped into the river. For all I know, I may be wanted for murder.”
    Cade decided to stop at Bay Parish and eased his throttle forward. He’d been right about the lights. They indicated Venice on the west bank. He could see the lights of Bay Parish now. Cade felt his way inshore as far as he dared and dropped anchor. The cruiser immediately swung around and held, nosed into the current, rising and falling with a gentle motion.
    “I’ll swim in from here,” he told Mimi. “You won’t be afraid to stay on the cruiser alone?”
    Mimi bobbed her head. “Yes. I ’ave been ver’ afraid all the way down from New Orleans. But that does not make any difference. You are
captain
. I will stay where you tell me to stay.”
    Cade patted her and wished he hadn’t. Her flesh attracted his hand like a magnet. It was still a long way, a hell of a long way, to Barataria Bay. He hoped he could control himself. Only time would tell. He wrapped his gun in oiled silk and put it in his side pants pocket.
    “I shouldn’t be too long. I’ll be back as soon as I find out where we stand and make arrangements to refuel.”
    The water looked dark and oily and somehow sinister. He knew how Mimi must have felt when she had swum ashore. And she had swum ashore from mid-stream. It would be nice to be loved by a girl like Mimi. As an afterthought, Cade handed her a flashlight. “If I can’t locate the cruiser and have to hail, flash this down on the water, shore side, but only flash it once.”
    “Whatever you say,” Mimi said. She raised on her tiptoes and kissed him lightly, without passion. “For good luck.”
    Cade held her tighter and longer than necessary. It was exquisite torture. This, too, was a part of his dream, except that in his dreams the girl had been Janice and his need had been satisfied. Mimi freed herself from his arms gently.
    “I should not ’ave done that.”
    Cade stood, fighting himself. He wasn’t afraid of her knife. He could have the knife in the river and Mimi on her back before she could say Caracas. He could take Mimi on one of the bunks, on the deck plates of the cook-pit, up against the rail. Anywhere with Mimi would give him the relief he needed. Still, it would be a breach of faith, as well as a breach of the flesh. Mimi trusted him. She liked him. He was
capitan
. It was the old army game all