Chapter 2
Debate and Switch

Later that evening, Simon wiped his fingers on a towel and regarded his altered appearance with a sigh. "Well?" he asked the three people behind him.

"It's better than in London," said Kato. "The kidnappers won't have to be six stories away for you to pass."

"I'm afraid it won't hold up if these people have met the Green Hornet before," countered Scanlon. "You've done a good job of hiding your moles and the cleft in your chin, but your face is longer and narrower than Britt's, and his mouth is much broader."

"My voice will give me away long before my face will in that scenario," said Simon. "My New York accent is far more believable than my Texan, but it's difficult for me to sustain a pitch as high as Britt's usual without a broad Southern accent. As I said this afternoon… all we can do is hope for the best."

The dye brush slid through Simon's hair twice more before Casey shoved it back into the dye pot and turned away to stifle a sob.

Simon turned and caught her wrist. "I will bring him home, Casey, I promise."

"I'm sorry," she choked out. "I do trust you and Kato. It's just… I was thinking about his hair, and… sorry, it's silly of me…."

"No. No, it's not silly at all."

"I mean, it's not… you don't look like you, but you don't look like him, and…" Casey took a deep breath and pulled herself together. "Kato and Mr. Scanlon are both right. If the kidnappers have never met the Green Hornet before, you'll pass easily. You look more like Britt than Dan Scully did, and he fooled a lot of people even without having Kato and the real Black Beauty."

Simon stood and pulled off the tissues shielding the collar of his white shirt. "Let's try it with all but the hat, Kato. Best to give the dye a bit longer to dry." The dye was formulated somewhat like mascara, quick-drying and easy to wash out, but he still didn't want to risk smearing it on the inside of Britt's hat.

Kato nodded and handed him Britt's scarf, green greatcoat, gloves, and mask, which Simon put on in quick succession.

"Say, that does look better," Scanlon admitted. "I have to look a lot harder to see the differences, even though I know they're there. How about the accent?"

"I make it my business to know things," Simon quoted Britt, aiming for a neutral Midwestern accent and landing somewhere around Edward G. Robinson's natural speaking voice.*

Scanlon grimaced. "Well, at least you know you can't imitate Britt's voice. How long can you keep that up?"

Simon shrugged a little. "I spent about thirty-six hours undercover as Carl Munster," he replied in his normal accent. "But I'll try to say as little as possible tonight."

Kato checked the clock. "It's time, Mr. Templar."

Simon nodded, bade Scanlon and Casey farewell, put on the hat, and followed Kato out to the garage. There he was treated to a demonstration of the switch from Britt's convertible to the Black Beauty, which ended with the car's left-side doors opening automatically. With a small smile, Simon slid into the back seat while Kato sat behind the wheel. Memories of the previous summer came flooding back as he shut the door behind him, and with them came a wave of grief that he was alone in the seat this time. He was still friends with Amos Klein, but that relationship hadn't gone very far romantically, and of course the car wasn't the same without Britt. But a word from Kato pulled Simon out of his reverie, and after a few preliminary equipment checks, they were off.

They arrived at the warehouse precisely at 10 and were shown through without a word to a windowless room furnished like a bare-bones office. Inside, Britt was seated beside a desk with his hands and feet tied and a black hood over his head, and behind the desk sat a dark-haired weasel-faced man in a pinstriped suit and fedora and an air of trying to look more important than he really was. Kato gave Simon a subtle signal that he'd never seen the man before, which put Simon somewhat at ease about the accent problem. Then Kato slid over to stand behind Britt.

Kato needn't have bothered signalling, however. Weasel-face grinned and stood as the door closed. "Well, well, the Green Hornet," he said and came around the desk. Simon recognized the voice as that of the man who'd called to arrange the meeting, which only confirmed his gut instinct. "Y'know, I've wanted to meet you for some time now."

"You new here or somethin'?" Simon returned in his best gangster voice, and he sensed more than saw Britt's confusion.

Weasel-face's smile slipped. "Pardon?"

"I thought everyone in town knew by now. I don't talk to subordinates. If your boss wants to make a deal, I wanna talk to him directly."

"I am the boss. Name's Jack Hamill."

"Quit wastin' my time, Hamill. Get your boss down here, or forget the whole thing. And when he does come in, I talk only to him, nobody else."

Hamill angrily opened and closed his mouth a couple of times before storming out. Simon closed the door and belatedly realized that there was no phone in the room. By the time he turned back to Britt, however, Kato had untied Britt's hands and was working on his feet, and Britt was pulling off his hood.

"Who—" Britt started to whisper but broke off when Simon motioned for silence.

Kato pulled the ropes off Britt's ankles and tapped his knee, which Britt correctly interpreted as a sign to stand up. Simon promptly began taking off the costume and passing the pieces to Britt, who quickly put them on despite his confusion. Then Kato handed Simon a flannel they'd loaded with cold cream and wrapped in plastic; Simon unwrapped it and swiftly cleaned the makeup off his face. Britt drew a deep breath and relaxed as he finally recognized Simon. For his part, Simon handed the flannel back to Kato, who wrapped it up again, and switched places with Britt. As soon as he was seated, he pulled on the hood and held still while someone—Britt, probably—tied him up in a way that would look secure but that he could easily get out of if need be.

Simon hadn't been sure he'd have the chance to swap with Britt. In fact, he'd expected the opposite. But now that the opportunity had presented itself, he was glad he'd planned for it and felt much more at ease with the situation. Whoever Hamill's boss was, they didn't need to worry whether he'd ever met the real Green Hornet, now that the real Green Hornet was back in his rightful place.

After finishing his last knot, Britt squeezed Simon's shoulder, then Kato's, and tried to stop shaking and start breathing normally again. He didn't know why he hadn't recognized Simon through the disguise—well, it had been a good disguise, and he'd had only a bowl of oatmeal with some bacon crumbled in it to help him fight off the dregs of the sedative. Maybe the fact that his captors had told him he was going to a meeting with the Green Hornet had thrown him more than he'd thought, or maybe it was the accent Simon had used. Still, he should have realized… well, it didn't matter. What mattered was getting his feet back under him and working out what he was about to face.

The name Jack Hamill wasn't much to go on without a background check, but Britt didn't have time to run out to the car and call Frank. He had a vague memory, though, of Hamill's name coming up in connection with… who was it… Carlos Romero. He had met Romero before, early in his career as the Hornet. In fact, he'd been in the process of working out how to take Romero down when Romero himself had botched a bank job and gone to prison for five years without the Hornet needing to do anything. Romero wasn't stupid—Britt would rate him slightly higher than Steve Gant, not brilliant but clever enough in his own ways—but he did tend to let his underlings do his thinking for him, which meant he didn't always recognize the shortcomings in a plan that looked good on paper. Britt wondered whether that pattern held true in this case.

"Did you bring a bug?" he whispered to Kato in Cantonese.

"Already planted," Kato whispered back in the same language.

Britt nodded and took another deep breath to steady himself. "When they come back, you guard the door. We do not need the young dog to listen in."

Kato nodded back. "The young dog said his master wanted to make a deal concerning you. He told the Hornet to come alone."

"Mm." That raised several questions, including why Hamill had tried to claim he was the boss. Had he thought the Hornet wouldn't recognize his voice? Or did Romero not know what was going on?

Britt didn't have long to wonder. Only a minute or two later, the door opened again to admit Romero. Kato waited until Romero had entered before herding Hamill back and closing the door behind him.

"I see you and your man haven't changed," Romero remarked, giving the door a bemused look before turning back to Britt.

"Been a long time, Romero," Britt said.

"Five years." Romero gestured toward an empty chair beside Simon, which Britt took, and went around the desk to sit in the chair Hamill had vacated. "I've been hearing a lot about you while I was in prison. I'm glad to know I hadn't crossed you last time."

"True, you hadn't. But I'm a little surprised you didn't remember my rule about not talking to subordinates."

"Ah, sorry about that. Jackie insisted. I tried to tell him you wouldn't like it, but this is his caper, so I figured I had to let him take the lead."

"What caper? And what does it have to do with Britt Reid?"

Romero leaned back in his chair. "I hear you're friends with Simon Templar."

"We've met," Britt conceded.

"Then I suppose you know he's in town, supposedly for Reid's wedding."

"I had heard as much. But why do you say 'supposedly'? It's no secret Reid and Templar are friends."

"Yeah, but the wedding ain't for two more weeks, and Templar came to town today. My boys think he might be after something else."

"Such as?"

"You familiar with the DeLukens Diamond Company?"

"You could say that."

"They're due to get a new shipment of stones from Tanzania Sunday night. Mostly diamonds, but some other rare gemstones as well, like tanzanite. Shipment's supposed to be worth $10 million."

Britt frowned slightly. "How do you know about it?"

"Oh, I have my sources," Romero hedged. "The point is, I know about it and have plans for it, but my boys are worried that Templar might be after the shipment himself. He is the greatest thief in the world, after all. Only we don't know how to get hold of him, so we thought maybe you could take a message to him."

"Which is?"

Romero gestured toward Simon. "We've got Reid. We want Templar to stay out of our way. If he does and if we get away clean Sunday night, we'll send word Monday morning of where Templar can pick Reid up. Anything goes wrong, and Reid dies."

"Why didn't you say so?" Simon piped up.

Romero jumped and stared, then pulled the hood off. Simon gave him an infuriatingly bland smile.

"What—how—" Romero stammered.

"Well, as you said yourself, I am the greatest thief in the world," said Simon and untied his own hands. "More to the point, I don't like being blackmailed."

"That was Jackie's idea, Templar, I swear. Can't—can't we—"

"Work something out? I suppose we can, provided you're prepared to cut the Hornet and me in on the operation."

Romero glanced warily from Simon to Britt and back several times. "You ain't going after the stones yourself?"

"Well, I wasn't," Simon admitted. "Now I'd need adequate incentive, and as you no longer have Britt, you've lost your leverage."

Romero looked at Britt again. "Don't you usually take half?"

"Usually," Britt allowed, "but in this case, I'd be willing to split that with Simon."

"Two and a half million apiece would still be a good haul," Simon mused, crossing his arms, "especially as we'd be taking none of the risk. Of course, it's not likely to be quite so much in the end."

"What do you mean?" Romero demanded.

"Ten million is the legitimate market value, but you won't get that much from a fence. Rare stones may be more valuable than the average, but they're also easier to trace and harder to fence once they're stolen."

Romero's face fell. "Well… s-say we don't take those ones, just the diamonds. That's still—ah, Jackie's the one with the numbers, but I think it's something like $7 million."

"We could make the math easier and settle for $3 million," said Britt. "That would give Simon and me a million and a half each and still leave you enough to pay your gang."

"Fair enough," Simon agreed.

Romero rubbed the back of his neck. "The boys won't be too happy about that, but… I guess this way we still get some money out of it instead of going to jail for trying to fence the rare stuff. All right, it's a deal."

"Fine." Britt stood while Simon untied his own feet. "We'll be in touch after the job."

"However," Simon added as he stood, "if you or your men go after Britt again, the deal's off."

Romero nodded. "I'll tell the boys."

Simon nodded, and he and Britt left, collecting Kato on their way out of the warehouse. But Britt didn't relax until they were safely in the Black Beauty and driving away.

"Are you all right?" Kato asked then.

"Starving," Britt admitted. "They didn't feed me much. But we can fix that when we get home."

"Right," Kato agreed.

With that settled, Britt picked up the phone and called the house.

Casey answered on the second ring. "Mr. Reid's residence."

"Hi, honey, it's me," Britt replied.

"Britt!" Casey gasped. "How are you?!"

"I'm all right. We're on our way home. Is Frank there?"

"Yes, he's here. Did you want to talk to him?"

"Not right now, but tell him we've got some information for him."

"Okay. I'll fix some coffee. Do you want anything else?"

"Food sounds good."

"Anything in particular?"

"Just food."

"All right, I'll see what I can find, as long as Kato doesn't mind my using the kitchen."

"Hold on." Britt covered the phone. "Kato, do you mind if Casey uses the kitchen?"

"It would be faster if she starts a meal now," Kato allowed.

"He doesn't mind," Britt relayed.

"Okay," said Casey. "I'll try to have something ready by the time you get in."

"Thanks, darlin'. We'll see you soon."

After a few more farewells, they hung up. Then Britt took another deep breath, let it out again, and switched on the speaker for the bug, which he belatedly realized was already recording.

"But Boss—" Hamill was protesting.

"But nothing," Romero snapped. "I told you the Hornet wouldn't like it. Templar didn't, either. We're lucky they only asked for a piece of the action."

"What about Reid? Supposing he calls the cops?"

"He can't tell 'em nothing except that he was kidnapped, and he didn't see faces, so that won't do 'em any good. Now c'mon, let's get outta here."

There was some grumbling from Hamill and his men, but they left.

"I wonder what Romero meant by having sources," Simon said as Britt switched off the speaker.

"So do I," Britt admitted.

"DeLukens—as in the late Bela deLukens?"

"Yeah. I'd met Bela as Britt Reid, but after he died, his widow Yolanda found out a local scientist was working on a method for synthesizing diamonds. She planned to sell the synthetic ones alongside Bela's genuine ones. My reporter Pat Allen got too close to finding out the whole story, so she had him killed. The Green Hornet put an end to her operation. Then Bela's nephew Jaap took over the company."**

"Do you suppose Yolanda has anything to do with the current case?"

"I doubt it. She was executed two months ago. And Jaap's honest—almost too honest. He hired independent auditors when he took control and nearly shut everything down when he found out the experts from the International Diamond Merchants' Association couldn't tell the difference between the synthetic diamonds and the real ones by chemical or refractive analysis. Luckily, one of the auditors found enough of a paper trail to prove that Yolanda hadn't started mixing Prof. Miller's diamonds in with Bela's yet, so the only questionable ones were the one Pat had and the ones Yolanda had been showing off to her co-conspirators the night I busted them."

"I see. So it's not likely to be a case like Alan Uttershaw arranging to have his own diamond shipment stolen so that he could collect the insurance and still have the diamonds to sell later."

"No, I think Jaap would be horrified by the idea. And Romero did seem surprised by your pointing out that he couldn't fence the tanzanite. He wouldn't react that way if he hadn't planned to fence the stones in the first place."

"True. But that doesn't rule out the leak being an inside job. It only means the leaker probably wasn't deLukens."

"Yeah. I'm inclined to let Frank take it from there, at least for tonight."

"Good idea. You have had a day of it."

With that, they fell into a companionable silence for the rest of the trip home. It was a greater relief than Britt could say to finally see the Kissin' Candy Mints ad, the tunnel, the back patio, and his own garage. And it was an even greater relief than that to walk into the house and straight into Casey's waiting arms.

No kiss had ever tasted quite as sweet as this one.

While Britt and Casey had their reunion and Kato switched back to his butler's livery, Simon went through to the study to find Scanlon setting a coffee tray on the desk. "I take it everything went well?" Scanlon asked when he saw Simon.

"As well as it could have," Simon answered. "We pulled off the switch without anyone being the wiser—and you should have seen the look on Romero's face when I revealed myself."

"Romero? Carlos Romero?"

"I never heard his first name, but Britt knew him. Seems he'd gone to prison for five years without the Hornet's involvement."

Scanlon nodded and poured Simon a coffee. "That's Carlos Romero."

Simon accepted the cup with a nod. "He has an underling named Jack Hamill. Apparently Hamill's the one who planned the kidnapping."

"Why? What was he after?"

"DeLukens Diamond Company is receiving a shipment of gemstones worth $10 million Sunday night. Hamill plans to steal it and wanted me out of the way. He thought he could blackmail me with Britt's safety."

"I see," said Scanlon thoughtfully. "I'll have the police pick up Romero and his gang."

"Not yet, Frank," said Britt, coming in out of costume but still with his arm around Casey. "We still need to find out where Romero got his information. And if you pick them up now, they'll know Simon and I blew the whistle."

Simon nodded. "It might be better to plan to catch them in the act."

Scanlon sighed. "Do you have any details about the robbery plan?"

Britt shook his head. "He didn't give us that much." He handed Scanlon the tape from the bug. "Here's everything we do have."

"Thanks. I'll contact Jaap deLukens in the morning."

Just then Kato brought in the meal Casey had cooked for Britt, which smelled delicious, and Simon finished his coffee and went upstairs to wash the dye out of his hair. When he got to his room, however, he started to switch on the light but paused with his hand on the switch. He had no idea why, but something told him to look out the window first. Leaving the lights off, he eased over to the window and carefully moved the curtains just enough to see out. Nothing on the street caught his eye… but when he looked up at the roof of the building across the street, he saw a hint of movement and the glint of the streetlight on a rifle barrel.

The house was being watched. Instinct told Simon it wasn't the police. But who was watching the house and why? Was it Romero's men or someone else? And how long had they been there?

Simon considered his options and decided to go ahead with his shower as he'd planned. There would be time enough to alert the others later. But he didn't change for bed after he'd cleaned up; instead, he put on the suit he'd been wearing for travel, just in case he needed to go out again.

He had just started down the stairs when the doorbell rang, and as he rounded the corner, Kato opened the door to admit a worried Axford. "Evening, Templar," Axford said, handing his hat to Kato with a nod. "I came as soon as I could—we've still got a few minutes before we put the paper to bed, and I wanted to see if there were any updates to the story about Britt. I know you said to run it in the mid-day edition, but…."

Simon didn't comment on the fact that Axford could have called. "Come through," he said instead.

"Thanks." Axford nodded to Scanlon, who was sitting at the bar, but froze as he reached the bottom of the steps down to the living room. Britt and Casey were sitting on the sectional, out of sight of the door, and kissing as if they were alone.

"I told you I'd get him back," Simon murmured and patted Axford's shoulder.

Britt broke the clinch and grinned at Axford. "Hi, Mike."

"Britt!" Axford cried and rushed over to hug his boss.

Britt stood and let himself be hugged, laughing a little as he patted Axford's back. "It's all right, Mike. I'm fine."

Axford pulled back but didn't let Britt go. "Why didn't you call me?"

"I haven't even been back half an hour," Britt noted and gestured for Axford to sit down.

"What happened?" Axford asked as he did so. "Was it the Green Hornet?"

Britt sat down beside Casey again. "No. Off the record, it was Carlos Romero and his gang. They were trying to use me as leverage against Simon, but Simon helped me escape before they could do anything."

"Oh. Well, do you want me to kill the story about the kidnapping?"

"No," Simon answered before Britt could. "I think it needs to run just as it is."

Everyone else in the room frowned, but it was Scanlon who spoke first. "What makes you say that?"

"Someone's watching the house. I saw them on the roof across the street just now—not well enough to make out faces or even numbers, just enough to know someone's there."

"You think they'll try again?" Britt asked.

"They shouldn't, but someone else might have the same idea." Simon came around the end of the sectional to serve himself another coffee. "Again, off the record, Romero's after a shipment of gemstones intended for DeLukens Diamond, and he wanted to ensure I'd stay out of his way. I told him I would as long as he left Britt alone. The question is whether information about the shipment leaked to anyone other than Romero."

"Want me to look into it, Boss?" Axford asked.

Britt shook his head. "No, not tonight. Let's give the police a chance to investigate first. You get some sleep—it's been a long day for all of us."

"Well, you may as well have some coffee first," noted Scanlon. "Whoever's watching the house might be suspicious if you leave too soon."

Axford nodded, accepted a coffee from Casey, and brought Britt up to speed on what he'd missed at the office. Britt responded with what editorial wisdom he had for the next day's news cycle—print, television, and radio. Simon stayed out of it, confining himself to coffee and some sticky buns that Kato had whipped up while Simon was in the shower.

As the conversation wound down, Axford said, "You know, Britt… maybe you oughta make these guys think you've left town."

Britt frowned. "Left town? How?"

"Well… you and Templar were talking about going out on your yacht. Maybe you oughta do it for real."

Britt hummed thoughtfully. "What do you think, Simon?"

"It's not the worst idea I've ever heard," Simon allowed. "Perhaps you could move the boat an hour or so down the coast, and I could meet you there in the car and drive you back. If Romero is the one watching the house, that might convince him that we are staying out of his way."

Britt nodded. "We can try it. I've got maps on the boat, so we can plan the best meeting point from there."

"All right."

Then Britt turned to Casey. "Want us to take you home on our way to the marina?"

Casey shook her head. "Thanks, but I don't think I can take being alone right now. Even knowing you're safe, I'd just… I'd rather stay here."

Britt nodded. "Okay. We'll be back in a couple of hours."

After a round of farewells, Axford left first, followed by Scanlon, who left through the hidden lift in the study. Then Simon and Britt went out to the garage and raised the convertible's top so that Britt could hide in the back seat and give directions while Simon drove. The moon wasn't due to rise for another couple of hours, so Simon hoped that would give them plenty of time to get the yacht moved and get back before they had to contend with more than streetlights.

When they arrived at the marina, however, the place was dark—too dark. There were no lights at the yacht club or in the parking lot and very few lighting the docks. Simon immediately felt uneasy.

"Oh, that's not good," Britt murmured, leaning forward to rest his arms on the back of the front seat while Simon tried to find a parking space. "For this many lights to be out, something must have happened to a transformer—and the dusk-to-dawn lights are all supposed to have their own solar power supplies so they stay on even if the main power goes out."

"Sabotage?" Simon asked.

"I wouldn't bet against it. And since it's common knowledge that I'm vice commodore of the yacht club here…."

"You think someone may have done something to your boat."

"Too much of a coincidence for me to think otherwise."

"Should we call it off?"

"No. Better we find out tonight so Frank can get the police working on it."

"All right. Do you have a torch—er, flashlight in the car?"

"Yeah, it's in the glove box."

Simon parked and retrieved the torch, and Britt warily led the way down the dock to his yacht. There were sounds of an ongoing party further away, probably from a cruiser a few hundred yards away that Simon could see had all its shipboard lights on, but the dock at which Britt had berthed his boat was quiet and dark. A number of the berths were empty, including the ones on either side of Britt's boat, and the other boats they passed seemed not to have anyone on board. That fact made Simon uneasy—there would be no witnesses to Britt's departure, but there had also probably been no witnesses to any sabotage that had taken place earlier.

Once on board, Britt retrieved another torch, and the two men made a careful search of the yacht by torchlight. They found no booby traps on the deck or in the cabins, which was only a mild relief; they could at least plan their routes in safety. When they searched the bridge, however, Britt suddenly whistled just loud enough to get Simon's attention and shone his torch on a pair of wires running down from the ignition but not caught in the cable ties holding the boat's standard wiring bundle together. When Simon had seen them, Britt followed them with his torch to a panel that was very slightly ajar. Simon gestured for Britt to wait while he ducked back into the cabin for a notepad and pencil. When he came back up, Britt was examining the panel to make sure it wasn't booby trapped. Satisfied that it wasn't, he moved it gingerly… and revealed a bomb large enough to kill anyone on the bridge and probably also sink the boat.

Britt and Simon exchanged a look. Then, while Britt went to get a pair of gloves and some tools, Simon made an initial sketch of the thing. As he did so, he noted a timer set for five minutes, a battery, and a phial of acid that would presumably trigger the bomb if it were moved. He pointed these features out when Britt returned. Britt made short work of removing the acid phial (which Simon secured in a jar) and the outer casing of the mechanism, but when he stopped to let Simon sketch the inner workings, he started tracing the wiring with his screwdriver and grew increasingly grave. Simon could see why: the bomb was wired to the boat's starting battery as well as the ignition. Not all of the wiring was visible, but it was a pretty safe bet that the bomb was now stable only as long as it was drawing power from both batteries. That probably also meant there was no safe way to disconnect it entirely from the ignition; depending on the circuitry, that could cause too much of a voltage drop. But starting the ignition would trigger the timer, which had enough time on it that if the bomb went unnoticed, the boat would go down in deep water and anyone who survived the blast would be unlikely to reach help in time. And the detonator was inaccessible under at least one layer of thick metal, a solid inverted box that was first bolted to the base of the bomb and then the edges welded down at a distance that would have kept heat and sparks away from the explosive. There was no way of getting to it without using a cutting torch, which would set off whatever was inside.

After Simon finished his second sketch and put the paper in his jacket pocket, they adjourned to the cabin. "Any idea where to get hold of some liquid nitrogen?" Simon asked.

Britt shook his head. "No, not at this hour. I don't even know if the bomb squad has any. And I wouldn't bet against there being some sort of thermostat trigger under that inner housing anyway."

"Someone does seem awfully determined to blow you to kingdom come."

"Or to blow us to kingdom come."

Simon frowned. "You think so?"

"If they were just after me, they could have planted that bomb any time, or put it in my car when I was out after dark."

"True. Of course, the only people who knew we were coming out here tonight were thoroughly trustworthy—but then again, a bomb like that isn't the sort of thing one can arrange on the spur of the moment."

"No, but if someone who was at the paper this morning and overheard us talking about going fishing was in league with someone who's after the diamonds, they might have planted the bomb tonight with the intent to kill us tomorrow."

Simon nodded as he considered the idea. "Do you suppose it was Romero?"

"Offhand, I wouldn't have thought so. That's a sophisticated design—I don't recognize any of the hallmarks—but 'sophisticated' isn't usually in Romero's MO."

"No, he didn't strike me as the type to go for anything more complicated than a few sticks of dynamite wired to a timer. Not that he couldn't have an engineer on his payroll, like Nat Grendel had Herman Uberlasch."

Britt frowned. "Whatever happened to Uberlasch?"

"He was in Grendel's apartment when Grendel triggered the bomb his boys had planted in my apartment and I'd sent back. It's just too bad we can't return this one to sender, even if we knew who the sender was."

"No, looks the only way to get it off the boat is to…" Britt paused as if realizing something. "To wire longer leads in parallel, cut the original leads, and move it to the dock for controlled detonation."

"I take it that means you don't intend to wait for the bomb squad."

"What good would waiting do? Whoever planted the bomb would only try again, and there could be other people who are planning to target me in order to sideline you. If we set the bomb off in a way that makes it look like I've been killed, it should put an end to the attempts—and it gives you cover for blowing the whistle on Romero."

Simon grimaced. "I can't say I like the idea, especially given what it'll do to Casey, but I do take your point."

"I don't like the idea, either, Simon, especially given what it'll do to Casey. But the bomb's going off regardless, and it's not likely that the bomb squad would be able to get any prints off the components. We may as well set it off in a way we can get some benefit from."

Simon couldn't argue with that, much as he'd like to. "Okay, where do we get the wire?"

Britt went over to a storage cabinet and retrieved a couple of new spools of insulated wire. "I keep some on board in case of emergencies. Hopefully this gauge will be heavy enough to keep voltage drop to a minimum."

"Before we get too far, then, we'd better go ahead and plan what we're doing after we get safely away."

Britt set down the wire and led Simon over to a desk with charts and maps, and they spent several minutes sorting out where to go and how to get there. Then Britt collected the tools they needed, and they set about cautiously rewiring the bomb and easing it off the boat. They made the new leads long enough that Britt would be able to get all the way out of the berth before cutting them; even if that triggered the bomb immediately, Simon calculated that Britt should still be outside the blast radius. Once the bomb was on the dock, both men took a moment to catch their breath, and then Simon helped Britt cast off.

The plan was for Britt to wait thirty seconds, long enough for Simon to get nearly to the parking lot, before starting his ignition. He would then back out of the berth, cut the wires, and make his way out of the marina using radar so that his lights wouldn't catch the eye of anyone who might be watching the marina. As worried as Simon was, he still managed to walk back up the dock and not stop to watch when he heard the boat start up. Instead, he kept walking to the yacht club, where there was a public telephone. After checking that the phone still worked, Simon called Britt's house.

"Mr. Reid's residence," Kato answered, sounding confused.

"Kato, it's Simon," said Simon.

"Oh, hello, Mr. Templar."

"Britt's just getting underway. There have been some developments I thought you should be aware of—though what you pass on and to whom, I'll leave to your discretion."

"Oh?"

Simon explained about the bomb in rapid Cantonese. "It hasn't gone off yet," he concluded, "so I have to assume our plan has worked. But when the police come, you and Casey will have to react naturally."

"I understand. Thank you."

"We should be back in about two hours."

"All right. I'll look after things here."

After they said goodbye and hung up, Simon checked his watch. It had been four minutes since ignition, so he hoped the lack of catastrophic bang meant that the timer had overridden the trigger on the battery connection. Then he went to the car and left. He was just approaching the marina entrance when he heard the explosion.

Despite his nickname, Simon wasn't really a praying man. Yet as he made the turn onto the road, he found himself praying that he wasn't on his way to a rendezvous with a dead man.

.

* Which you can hear in his Batclimb cameo in "Batman's Satisfaction."

** Yolanda's first name is given in the credits of "Programmed for Death"; Jaap is my own invention. (Bela is a Hungarian name, but deLukens appears to be Dutch—Lukens certainly is—and while Signe Hasso was Swedish, Jolanda is a common Dutch name as well. A Watsonian explanation, if one needed it, could be that Bela's mother was Hungarian. In any case, I decided Jaap should have a Dutch name.)

Apparently there are methods by which experts can detect a lab-grown diamond in the present day, with the right equipment and if they know what they're looking for—but the process Prof. Miller demonstrates in "Programmed for Death" is pretty far removed from the actual techniques for growing diamonds in the lab, so it's theoretically possible that his synthetic diamonds wouldn't be detectable as such.