The Mystery of the Kidnapped Whale - Marc Brandel [12]
Below that eye, but not below the left one, was a curious fold of puckered skin. It was almost like a scar. Either the man was used to wearing a monocle, Jupe guessed, or, more likely, he spent hours every day with a jeweler’s glass screwed into place over his eye.
“We were looking for Mr. Diego Carmel,” the First Investigator said politely.
“Yes?”
“You’re Mr. Carmel?”
“Captain Carmel. Yes.”
The man half turned in the doorway. Jupe could hear the phone ringing in the office behind him. For a moment Captain Carmel looked as though he was going to open the door and answer it, then he shrugged his narrow shoulders in a hopeless way.
“What’s the use?” he asked. “I lost my boat last week. In the big storm. People call, they want to go fishing, and I have no boat.”
“I’m sorry,” Bob said. “We didn’t know.”
“Do you three boys want to go fishing?”
Captain Carmel spoke perfect English. You couldn’t say he had any foreign accent. But there was something in the way he picked his words that made you realize English wasn’t his native language.
Maybe he was from Mexico, Bob thought, and had spent most of his life in the United States.
“No. No, we just wanted to talk to you, Captain Carmel,” Jupe said. “We have a message for you from your daughter.”
“From my daughter?” He seemed a little surprised. “Ah, you mean from Constance?”
“Yes.” Jupe was trying to hide his satisfaction. His hunch had paid off. Captain Carmel was Constance Carmel’s father.
“And what was the message?”
“Oh, it wasn’t anything very important. We just happened to see her at Ocean World this morning and she asked us to tell you she may be working late tonight.”
“Ah.” He looked at Jupiter and then at Bob and Pete. “And you?” he asked. “Would you be by way of being The Three Investigators?”
Pete nodded. He wondered how Captain Carmel had recognized them. Then he remembered that Jupe had given Constance one of their Investigators’ cards. She must have told her father about them. The three of them – and especially Jupe, with his round face and his stocky build – were easy enough to describe.
“I am very pleased to know you.” Captain Carmel held out his hand and they all shook it. He smiled.
“Now, what do you say? Don’t you think we could all do with a hamburger? There is a place down the street here.”
Pete thanked him, accepting the invitation. There were very few times when Pete Crenshaw couldn’t do with a hamburger.
They found the place, a lunchroom, and settled into a booth. The hamburgers were very good. While the boys ate, Captain Diego Carmel told them about the storm and the loss of his boat.
He had been bringing a man named Oscar Slater back from a fishing trip to Baja California. The storm caught them without warning some miles off the coast. He did everything he could to get into port but the seas were too heavy. The charter boat swamped and sank. He and Oscar Slater had been lucky to come out of it alive. They had swum for hours, supported by their life jackets, until a coastguard cutter picked them up.
Pete and Bob told him how sorry they were. Bob was going to ask if the boat was insured, but Jupe interrupted him.
“Your daughter’s a wonderful swimmer, Captain Carmel,” he said. “It’s great the way she trains those whales.”
“Ah. Yes. At Ocean World.”
“Has she been doing it long?” Bob asked. He could see that Jupe wanted to get Captain Carmel to talk about Constance.
“Several years.”
“It must be a long trip for her, going to Ocean World every day,” Jupe said. “All the way from here.”
“From here?”
“I’m sorry. I guess I thought – Doesn’t she live with you here in San Pedro?” Jupe persisted.
Captain Carmel nodded absently. He seemed to be thinking about something else. He finished his coffee.
“As a matter of fact,” he said slowly, with a curious emphasis as though he wanted to make sure the Three Investigators heard and remembered every word he was saying, “it just so happens that Mr. Slater is very interested in training whales too. Most interested. He has a