Sitting at a table at the hotel’s patio alfresco restaurant, Jason and Judith listened to the buzz of conversation around them, all on the same topic: the attack and near murder of a man in the plaza just in front of the hotel last night. There seemed to be two versions. The first held that the event was simply a brutal mugging.
A chubby woman with a distinct New York accent at the next table stated her anxieties at venturing forth from the sanctuary of the hotel at night, tossing curls that possibly could have been that blond twenty years ago. Her companion, a young man who might have been her son were it not for his dark Latino complexion, told her that one of the guests, unable to sleep, looked out of a window and saw a woman. Perhaps a lovers’ quarrel turned near deadly?
Judith used her fork to spear the last pineapple section of her fruit plate. “If everyone here speaks the truth, we had an audience as big as the Super Bowl.”
Jason nodded before popping the final bit of omelet into his mouth. “Something exciting happens, everybody is a witness. Until subpoenas start getting handed out, that is.” He wiped his mouth with the napkin. “Then nobody saw anything, nobody remembers anything, nobody wants to get involved. By the way, that was some fancy footwork on your part last night. And slapping the knife aside … Sure you never had Special Forces training?”
“May as well have. Had three brothers, all older. And I was ticklish. You learn quick.”
“Any of them survive?”
She smiled. “All of them, but they learned early on that their baby sister could take care of herself.”
Jason held up the coffeepot. She shook her head. He drained it into his cup, lowering his voice. “I’d like to take a look at this house. Calle Luna, is it?”
Judith nodded. “I doubt they are giving tours.”
Sarcasm along with agile feet.
Jason ignored it. “‘Tour’ sounds like an idea. Maybe we should take a walking tour of Old San Juan.”
Judith glanced at her watch. “He will be in the Parque de las Palomas in ten minutes.”
“Who?”
“The tour guide from the service I called this morning. They give walking tours, mostly for cruise-boat passengers, but they can fit us in.”
Maybe bringing Judith along was not as bad an idea as Jason had thought last night.
Park of the Pigeons was aptly named. At the lower end of Calle Cristo, it was located on top of the old city wall with a view of the cruise boats in the harbor below. Beyond, a curtain of clouds was already devouring the green slopes of the El Yunque rain forest. Like the Piazza San Marco in Venice, pigeons and their droppings were everywhere: coating the old stone wall, the few benches, tree limbs, and anything else that was still for more than a few minutes, including the occasional unfortunate tourist. Like their Italian counterparts, the birds feared no man, as if well aware of their protected status.
An old woman, occupying a lime-drenched bench, tossed pieces of bread into a seething mass of feathers.
Judith wrinkled her nose. “Pigeon fecal matter causes fungal infections,” she announced disgustedly. “Filthy!”
“‘Fecal matter’?”
“‘Pigeon shit’ to you.”
“Sky rats,” Jason agreed.
A minivan with a cruise line’s logo on its side stopped at the entrance to the small park. Ten or so people were climbing out. None was under fifty. All had varying degrees of sunburn. Each wore white sneakers, white socks, white shorts, and T-shirts from various Caribbean Islands. Only the types and sizes of hats and cameras differed.
“This must be our group,” Judith said.
“What was your first clue?”
By this time a man in a polo shirt and khaki shorts was herding his charges into a group. Jason and Judith went over and introduced themselves.
An hour later, the tourists had seen the crafts market, the old jail (now the tourist bureau, but with a few cells sanitized and preserved for viewing), the one remaining old city gate, and several museums, including one of primitive Caribbean art, with emphasis on primitive.
As the day got warmer, the tourists moved at a slower pace uphill toward the old fort.
Just as they drew abreast of the intersection with Calle Luna, Jason suggested, “There’s a place down the street there. I’ll bet they have cold drinks.”
A number of his companions held up nearly empty water bottles.
“Yeah, let’s take a break.”
“I could use something cold. My water is warm as bathwater.”
Their guide impatiently checked his watch. “OK, but no more than ten minutes. I’ve got another group on the hour.”
The small bodega, little more than an open storefront with two tables on the sidewalk, did indeed have cold drinks, in addition to a surprisingly lengthy menu. Better yet, from Jason’s point of view, it sat across the street from Number 23, the house into which Judith had seen last night’s assailant retreat. Other than its pale-blue exterior, a cursory glance did not distinguish it from its neighbors. Standing in what little shade was available, Jason studied the building. Unlike most of the others on the street, the windows were shuttered tightly.
Cap pulled low over his forehead and swigging from a rapidly warming can of Coke, Jason crossed the cobblestones to feign interest in an elaborate brass door knocker on the adjacent building. The ornament was barely five feet from the common wall with Number 23. This close, Jason could see minor nicks in the paint on shutters, window frames, and door. Instead of the dark wood exposed by cracks and chips in adjoining woodwork, there was gray steel. He stepped back, seeming to admire the knocker. Was that a trace of wiring along the top of both windows and door? Certainly that reflection of glass in the shadows of the entrance bespoke some sort of camera.
The residents of Number 23 Calle Luna had a great deal more interest in security than the rest of the street, and Jason intended to find out why.