The Mystery of the Kidnapped Whale - Marc Brandel [18]
Why not? Jupe wondered. What was Paul Donner trying to hide?
Chapter 7
A Dangerous Corner
“PAUL DONNER,” Jupe said. “Where does Paul Donner fit into the mystery?”
He wasn’t really asking a question. He was just thinking aloud.
It was the next day and the Three Investigators were waiting impatiently by the gate of the salvage yard. Constance was taking the afternoon off from Ocean World and had arranged to pick the boys up at the yard after lunch.
“Somehow I think he’s part of the story,” Jupe went on. “Constance had never heard of him before she met him at Slater’s yesterday, but he seemed to know all about her father’s little trips to Mexico.”
“And he was snooping around Captain Carmel’s house,” Bob added.
“Exactly,” Jupe agreed. “And he’s a friend of Slater’s, so he may have been the other man in the boat that first morning when Slater saw us rescue Fluke.”
“He isn’t a very open friend then,” said Bob. “He didn’t let Slater know he’d met us before in San Pedro.”
“There’s one thing for sure,” Pete put in. “He knows more about us than we know about him. He recognized us at once as the Three Investigators when he met us in San Pedro.”
“If you ask me,” Jupe said thoughtfully, although nobody had, “I think he knows about everything. About the smuggling and the storm and those lost pocket calculators, and Slater’s plan to use Fluke. He knows, but he doesn’t seem to fit into it anywhere - “
He broke off as Constance’s white pickup truck stopped at the gate. The Three Investigators climbed aboard. Jupe was carrying a small metal box as he settled into the seat beside Constance. He handed it to her.
“I hope it’s what you wanted,” he said.
“You finished it already?” She was obviously pleased.
Jupe nodded. He had gotten up at five o’clock and spent all morning carrying out the instructions she had given him the night before. He showed Constance how the box opened.
Inside was a battery-powered tape recorder with a microphone and a speaker. Jupe had fitted two thin plastic disks into the side of the case so that the recorder could pick up or broadcast even when the box was sealed.
He had tested it in the bathtub before Constance arrived and it had worked. The recorder functioned perfectly underwater and not a single drop had leaked into the case.
“You’re a real whiz at electronics, aren’t you?” Constance complimented him.
“I don’t know. It’s just a hobby.” Jupe privately thought he was practically Thomas Edison when it came to inventing and making things in his workshop. But he didn’t want to boast about it. He preferred to let his products speak for themselves.
The Three Investigators had brought their scuba masks and flippers with them. As soon as they arrived at the ranch house, they changed into their swimsuits and gathered at the pool.
There was no sign of Slater or of his friend Paul Donner.
“I warned them they’d better leave us alone,” Constance said. “If they don’t, I’ll –” She didn’t finish the sentence.
“You wouldn’t really quit, would you?” Bob prompted her anxiously.
She shrugged. “I can’t quit. Dad needs the money too badly. We’ve got to find that cargo.”
“How is your father?” Pete asked.
“He’s still pretty sick. But he’s a tough old man. A real Mexican hombre,” she said proudly. “The doctors think he’ll be okay. They only let me see him for a few minutes every day, and he can’t talk much. When he does, it’s usually about the same thing. He keeps saying –” She paused, pulling on her flippers.
“You’re investigators,” she went on. “Maybe you can make sense of it. He keeps saying, ‘Look out for the two Poles. Keep them in line.’“
She slipped into the pool and Fluke glided eagerly to greet her.
“The two Poles,” Jupe said, pinching his lower lip. “Keep them in line.” He looked at Bob and Pete. “Suggest anything to you?”
“Poles,” Bob repeated. “I guess Paul Donner could be Polish. He does have, well, not a foreign accent. But the way he talks –”
“Good observation,” Jupe told him. “It’s the precise way he picks his words. But if he’s