Cadunes. She willed herself to ignore the cuts on her bare arms. Only when the occa- sional branch caught at her dress was she compelled to stop and tear away the material to free herself.

---

The sound of running feet to her right feet running on pavement froze Irena be- side a small, bushy spruce tree. She stopped, panting, lis- tening to the feet. She was breathing so hard that she felt her bra tighten as she ex- haled. Irena also sensed that Esteban's nipples were enlarged and pushing against the bra's inserts, which were soft, but sensitive just the same. 'She' smiled grimly, allowing a few shivers to settle 'her' tense body. She glanced down at her heaving chest. Irena would look very convincing about the bust if there were someone to admire her now.

The running sound sud- denly changed to a thrashing as whoever it was plunged off the hidden roadway to Irena's right, and into the under-brush. There was a sud- den cry, a thump, followed by several curses. The runner, a man, must have fallen over a tree root. He continued curs- ing, moving more slowly, and Irena hugged her skirt tightly about her as she followed his noise through the brush.

With her night sight im- proving, Irena could see a dark figure limping along the path he'd found between the dark of the trees. Incredibly, the twilight was disappearing, almost in one moment, from the sky. The path was coming to an end, however, as the crunch of gravel told Irena that the man had found some sort of roadway again. There was a metallic click of a car door handle, and suddenly Irena became aware of the low purr of a running automobile engine. She crouched low, nylons and garters straining. In the flash of light from the opening

of the car resting there, Irena realized that the car was parked in a lay-by, a graveled area just off a road. The light, too, re- vealed the runner. It was the slim man who had accompanied Jorge into Conchita's.

neat

Irena also saw the other man, the one who had kept the car idling, waiting for the killer to return. This man was stocky, his beard trimmed into Van Dyke, his grim expression changing to chagrin and then to violent anger as the slim man spoke urgently to him. He motioned savagely for the would- be assassin to get in and close the door. The light went out and the car slid forward across the gravel until it reached the road, where the tires began to whine in protest as the car sped away to Irena's left. Irena's confidence had evaporated as she saw the man in the car. She shivered, felt sick, and remem- bered that she was only Esteban after all. The slashes and cuts from 'her' mad scramble through the pines all began to hurt at once. But all the confusion and dizziness in Esteban's mind, was he really Irena as he'd felt he was just for a few minutes there, could not keep him from shivering as he thought of the identity of the man with the Van Dyke. He had been Irena's lover; or so he was told. Why now would Francisco Fuentes want dead?

**

"YOU

XIII

her

*

CAN'T DO THAT!!! I'M A MAN!!!!”

Patroller Antonio Pascual caught the brunette girl just as she reached the Rivas-Cadune Breja road junction. She was clearly exhausted as well she might be to have come such a distance from the fracas at

-44-

Conchita's. She must have walked all night. She was stumbling when he first saw her, the heel of one shoe gone, her flowered dress torn and tattered but the way each tear showed a little of her underclothing was interesting, even sexy. Antonio Pascual felt the stirrings of something deep within him.

""

"I am Irena.................... the last word was breathlessly garbled by the girl. The relief on her face as she looked at his uni- form was almost palpable. “I need to get to a telephone."

The patrolman smiled broadly. She couldn't see that her makeup was smeared or non-existent in places. Her eyes, however, still retained most of the liner and shadow, and Antonio liked girls like that. He extended his hand to help her into the radio van. She had a soft, slim hand with fine polished fingernails, a little dirty after scrambling through the forest, no doubt. She was young, too. Definitely more than a twenty-a-night, which was the usual at Conchita's, figured Antonio Pascual.

"I'll get you to a tele- phone," he said slowly, baring his straight white teeth. Most girls found that irresistible. He only rarely had to visit a place like Conchita's. “You must be one of Conchita's girls," he added, smiling in understanding.

She straightened in the car seat, her round determined chin lifted. "No, I am not one of her girls," she said firmly, in a sultry, husky voice that re- minded Pascual of someone he'd heard before but he couldn't place it. He hadn't started the van. "Could you please get moving?" she asked while he looked at her in astonishment. Girls like her did not make requests of policemen. “I have a very urgent call to make," she added. Her brunette hair was fuzzy and a mess, rumpled, but Antonio didn't like his women too well groomed.