Gloria leapt to her feet. “Oh, Arch. I can’t stand to talk about this. Please, let’s dance. The thought of you being hurt...”
Arch led her to the dance floor but flashed Jim a “what else can I do?” look over his shoulder.
“Did you?” Mary scooted a few inches farther from Jim but swiveled to face him. “Did you find it? How?”
“One of my petty officers. The gun captain. He noticed drops of water below a panel box—there was no source of water inside. I investigated and told the captain. That’s when we found it.”
She covered her mouth, her eyes enormous. “Oh my. I’m glad you investigated.”
He smiled and nudged her with his elbow. “Thanks to you.”
“Me?” Her slender hand lowered from her mouth.
“If you hadn’t talked about your suspicions, all those rumors, I wouldn’t have thought anything of it.”
She raised a playful smile, and a defiant glint flashed in her eyes. “So my Nancy Drew ramblings aren’t so silly after all.”
“Of course not. Never were.”
“Thank you. It means so much that you believe in me.” Her expression softened, and she laid her hand on Jim’s arm. “Have they said anything about the suspects?”
Suspects? The only thing in his consciousness was her hand on his wool-encased arm. What would be most gentlemanly? To cover her hand with his own? To squeeze her hand? To raise it to his lips with a debonair smirk?
“Well?” she asked. “Have they?”
Jim blinked. “No. But they think it’s a Nazi because of the swastika.”
“The swas—” She clapped both hands over her mouth. “Swastika?”
Jim had lost his hand-holding or hand-smooching opportunity, but he leaned closer and lowered his voice to a whisper. “The saboteur painted a red swastika in the panel box behind the bomb. And the words ‘Sieg Heil.’”
Mary leaned back in the divan and gazed out over the swaying couples toward the stage, where the band played “Moon Love.”
He knew that analytical look. “What are you thinking?”
She crossed her arms. “I don’t know. It’s too obvious, don’t you think?”
“That thought occurred to me. It’s like a scene out of a low-budget spy movie, with a dastardly Nazi villain twisting his tiny Hitler mustache.”
“Yes.” She snapped her gaze back to him. “If I wanted to sink a ship, I’d use a bomb, but why the swastika, the note? If the bomb exploded, the note would be obliterated. Why bother?”
“It’s as if he wanted the bomb to be found.”
“As if he wanted it to look like a Nazi planted it.”
“As if he wanted to frame the Germans.”
“Yes.” Mary’s eyes darted, sparking with ideas.
Jim drew nearer. The thrill of thinking together, of completing each other’s thoughts—that made his heart float higher than thousands of bubbles would have.
“So many suspects.” She tapped her fingers on her crossed arms. “Ira Kaplan—he can’t stand Heinrich Bauer and lets everyone know. He certainly has the technical expertise and the access to the ship. And he’s brilliant. He studied for two years at MIT, then dropped out to work at the Navy Yard, his bit to support the Allied war effort.”
“He’s that hothead I saw on board theAtwood, right? He even said, ‘Sieg Heil’ when he mocked the German man.”
One corner of Mary’s mouth puckered. “Yes, he’s hotheaded, but I don’t think he’s dangerous. Then there’s Mr. Winslow. He has even more of a desire to see us in the war than Mr. Kaplan does. He’s smart enough, and he knows naval architecture, but I’ve never seen him on board ship. And he doesn’t seem strong enough. Oh, and there are so many more.”
Jim loved watching her face as she thought things through, the flashes of insight in her eyes, the doubt twisting her lips, the glow of delight in the puzzling-out process.
