a moment he identified it. "Dust!"

"Seems so," Scotty agreed. "Which means he didn't take the trail to the
stations. No dust on those tracks. He must have taken the dirt road to
San Souci."

"But why?" Rick was already moving ahead to where the pavement ended.
"What's in San Souci?"

Scotty chuckled. "Ask Connel. Don't ask me."

"I thought Marines knew everything," Rick gibed.

"Almost everything," Scotty corrected.

The jeep moved onto the dirt road and in a moment their own cloud of
dust obscured any slight haze that Connel's passing might have left.
They were in strange territory now, and Rick slowed down somewhat.
Connel had the advantage of lights. They wouldn't be able to gain on
him.

"He can't get far," Scotty said reassuringly. "The road goes to San
Souci and nowhere else. It can't be much of a town, so we'll find him."

Scotty was right. San Souci wasn't much of a town. There were a handful
of fishermen's huts, a dock with a number of fishing boats, racks for
drying fish, a single store, and nothing else. There was a paved road
leading from the town to the main city of Calor, but Connel hadn't taken
it. Nor was the jeep in San Souci.

Rick's halting Spanish was sufficient to communicate with a fisherman
who spoke equally halting English. He had been taking the air all
evening. No other vehicle had come to San Souci.

"Now what?" Rick asked helplessly.

"He went somewhere," Scotty responded. "And that somewhere has to be a
turnoff between here and the pumice works. We must have missed it
because we traveled without lights. Let's go back and look."

"I'm with you," Rick agreed. "But wherever he turned off must be a
trail, because there are no side roads on the map." He swung the jeep
around and started back. He had turned on the headlights as they
approached the fishing village; he kept them on.

They found the turnoff about a mile from San Souci. The road widened
slightly, and there was an opening in the foliage just wide enough for a
car. Twin gateposts of concrete marked the passage. Rick turned the
jeep, and the headlights picked out a name cut in the concrete pillars:
_Casa Guevara_.

"Someone's house," Rick said. "Name of Guevara. We can't very well go
rolling up a private driveway, can we?"

"Especially with that sign," Scotty added. He pointed to a wooden sign
set slightly to one side of the private road just beyond the gate. It
read _No Entrar_. No Trespassing.

"Question," Rick sa