Libby turned and looked at Tony. “What do we do now?” she asked.
“I’ll call Cliff and tell him what we know. He’ll know who to contact, people who can be trusted. We’ll set up a place and time where we can give them the necklace.” He looked back at Jonathon. “Is there a working phone in the house?”
Jonathon shook his head. “The government men who were here yesterday cut all the wires and shut off all the power in the house when they boarded it up.”
“Where’s the nearest phone from here?” Tony asked tersely.
Jonathon frowned and rubbed the top of his head thoughtfully. “I guess the only place with a phone would be Walker’s Grocery. It’s a little grocery store and boat dock about a mile down the road. There’s a pay phone in front of the store.”
Tony looked at Libby. “We’ll set up to meet Cliff at dawn at this Walker’s Grocery. Let’s get to that phone. I won’t rest easy until we get this necklace to somebody who will know what to do with it.” He touched Libby lightly on the shoulder and stood up. “Thank you, Mr. Maxwell, for telling us everything you did.”
He nodded. “I pray you’ll get it into the hands of good people.” He paused a moment, then continued. “Jasper Higgens was a good man. He’d be devastated if he thought those other men would get his formula.”
Tony nodded, pocketing the necklace once again.
Libby walked with Tony to the door of the fishing shanty, then turned back and looked at Jonathon Maxwell. He looked so helpless, so out of place with his intelligent brown eyes and bald head, sitting on an orange crate in the small shack. “Will you be all right?” she asked with concern.
Jonathon nodded, again with his small, shy smile. “I’ll be fine. As soon as the necklace is with the proper authorities, the men watching my house will go away and I’ll be able to go back home. In the meantime, I’ll be safe here.” He offered her a reassuring smile.
Libby returned his smile, then turned and joined Tony. Together they left the laboratory assistant and the small fishing shack behind.
* * *
Hawk could feel the albino’s anger when they finally realized the woman and the private eye had escaped. Although the albino spoke not a word, his silent rage was a living palpable force in the car as the two men traveled toward Higgens’s lab. It smelled like the spoor of a wild animal, savage and ugly.
“We’ll catch up with them at the lab,” Hawk stated emphatically. “If you’d stuck with me when we got to the motel, we would have had them.” The damn fool had rushed things by going into the cabin alone. He always wanted it all for himself, he thought. He steadied himself and continued, “We have nearly fifty men in the area. They won’t escape.”
The albino turned colorless eyes to Hawk. “No matter what happens, no matter what comes down…the woman is mine.” The emotionless tone of his voice didn’t invite argument.
A momentary flare of compassion touched Hawk’s heart as he thought of the beautiful, blond-haired Libby Weatherby. Her death would not be pretty. She had made a deadly mistake when she’d incurred the wrath of the albino. She would pay a dear price for her error.
The flicker of compassion instantly died, finding infertile ground in Hawk’s hardened heart. He was interested only in the necklace and the formula it contained. If people died in the process of obtaining that formula, well…such was the price of power.
