Swimming to Catalina

Virginia?”
    “Right before you got here. Vance told me that she hadn’t gone home, that they had had an argument and that she had just run off somewhere. That made his attitude about the press more understandable. If someone called to ask if they were apart he could deny it instead of just stonewalling and, by doing so, exciting more interest.”
    “Makes sense. When did you learn that Arrington had been kidnapped?”
    “I think I learned that from you.”
    “But I didn’t know.”
    “But you knew something was wrong, and I didn’t, at first. Part of it was your coming out here. I didn’t think Vance would want you here just to settle a domestic dispute.”
    “Good guess.”
    “So finally I went to Vance and said that it was obvious to me that something was very wrong and that I wanted to help. He actually broke down and cried, something I’d never thought I’d see him do. He said that Arrington was in danger and that I had to be very careful not to do or say anything that might make it worse. He was handling it, he said. He actually used the word ‘negotiating,’ so I thought she was being heldfor ransom. It occurred to me that the price of her release might be the Centurion shares, but that didn’t make a lot of sense.”
    “No, it doesn’t, not in a kidnapping. If Ippolito and Sturmack have Arrington, then they obviously want a lot from Vance, probably more than the shares.”
    “That makes sense to me,” Betty said. “I think that if Arrington’s safety depended on his surrendering the stock, he’d do it and try to get the stock back later.”
    “Exactly. Now, what else does Vance have that Ippolito and Sturmack could want?”
    “I don’t know,” she said. “I just can’t imagine what it could be.”
    Stone thought about that. “Does Vance have a contract with Centurion, a long-term contract?”
    “Not in the sense that the old studios had stars under exclusive contract. Vance’s deal with Centurion is as an independent producer; he brings projects to the studio—films that he doesn’t always star in—and they have the right of first refusal. If they don’t buy the project, he can take it elsewhere, as he has done in the past.”
    “Maybe that’s not enough for Ippolito and Sturmack.”
    “What?”
    “Maybe they want more than the studio; maybe they want Vance.”
    “They could never own Vance; he’s too big for that.”
    “Maybe. Tell me, do you know where Ippolito keeps his yacht?”
    “He has several yachts, I think.”
    “I mean the big one,Contessa.”
    “Oh, yes, I’ve been aboard her, as recently as last week, in fact.”

    “To a dinner party that Vance was invited to but didn’t go?”
    “Yes.”
    “I was invited, too, but I didn’t make it.”
    “That was when they tried to…”
    “Yes, but back to the boat; where is it kept?”
    “I know he has a berth at Marina Del Rey, but I think she spends most of the time on a mooring at Catalina. That’s where she was for the dinner party.”
    “Who was at the party?”
    “A lot of the same people who were at Vance’s party, the one you came to. And a lot of others, too.”
    “How many in all?”
    “Nearly a hundred, I should think. It’s a big yacht.”
    “I wonder if Arrington’s aboard that yacht?” he asked.
    “I wouldn’t think he would hide Arrington on the yacht, then invite a hundred people aboard, would you?”
    “No, I guess not.”
    “Why are you so interested in the yacht, then?”
    “It doesn’t matter,” Stone said.

45
    Stone didn’t make it back to his hotel suite until the following morning, the reunion with Betty having kept him at her place all night. When he arrived the message light was blinking on his telephone, and he called for his voice mail.
    “Stone, it’s Hank Cable; you might want to call me.”
    Stone returned the call immediately. “Sorry I wasn’t in when you called. What’s up?”
    “We got the tap into Barone Financial, and it’s paying off already.”
    “What did you hear?”
    “A lot of the phone conversations are conducted in a kind of code, which, of course, makes us even more suspicious. Our people say a lot of the conversations are to do with deliveries, maybe drugs.”
    “You don’t need forty telephone lines to arrange drug deliveries,” Stone said.
    “Good point.”
    “I think it’s money.”

    “There is some wire transferring going on, but not at such a heavy rate to be suspicious.”
    “Then maybe they’re not transferring it