Thoughtfully, the redhead moved over to the wheelhouse.

“Mike, you know what?” Sylvester whispered. “They have such a good time on the Santa Clara, they buy her a new engine! A gift to me. They even dirty it up so I wouldn’t have to pay more property tax. Is new, expensive engine-Gray Marine-but looks old. Fools the tax collector.” He laughed again, in childish delight.

“Give it to me slow,” Shayne said. “You never saw these men until a few weeks ago, but they dug into their pockets and bought you a new engine-just because they like you?”

“Tha’s what I been trying to tell you, Mike.”

“Was the old engine bad?”

“Not bad, not good.” Sylvester shrugged. “But this one the best. Slim even work on it to supercharge it some. He is expert mechanic. Now this engine lift the Santa Clara like a flying fish out of the water. After a while maybe I show you, if they let me. They don’t like for me to let it out. What for a fast engine if you don’t go fast, Mike?”

“That’s a good question.” Shayne massaged his left earlobe gently. “Is this Slim a mechanic at home?” Where would a mechanic get the money to come to Florida on an extended vacation and, further, engage in such altruism?

“Is hobby mechanic,” Sylvester said. “Do-it-yourself man, he says. To make money he is a contractor. Very rich. They are all rich. To them to buy a new engine the expense is nothing. Still”-his round face sobered-“how many rich men would do such a nothing? I am most lucky.”

“Looks that way.” Shayne rubbed his lean jaw thoughtfully.

With its V-bottomed hull and narrower-than-ordinary stern, Sylvester’s boat had been faster than it needed to be for fishing, before. He had never outgrown a boyish passion for speed, and had been willing to sacrifice a little pay-load for it. But now it had the new engine that could “lift the Santa Clara out of the water” bought for him by strangers who liked him and had dirtied it up “to fool the tax collector.” But they didn’t want him to speed with it. Why? Why, even, had they bought it for him?