Dear Sylvia,

You know how you're always telling me I solve my cases by sheer luck? Although I don't agree, this time you may be right.

A couple of days ago I was sitting at a table outside La Cabanita mapping out my strategy for combing Ensenada for anything that could help get Kravitz out of the "Federale jail". Luis, the owner of the place, brought over the fish tacos I'd ordered and started complaining to me about a bad deal he'd gotten on some fish. He'd ordered and paid for high quality tuna and what they delivered was only so-so. He ended up making tuna tacos out of the fish--and serving them to me.

I didn't think all that much of it until something caught my eye as went out back behind the restaurant on my way to the mens room. I glanced down at a garbage can and noticed a slightly scarred fish tail sticking out of it. It looked strangely familiar. I plucked it out of the trash and asked Luis if I could take it back to the hotel with me. "By all means, take it away from here! You'll be doing me a favor. It just reminds me of how I got ripped off. Look at that thing. It's barely fit for cat food." Cat food and the tacos he'd just served me.
I brought the tail back to the hotel and pulled out the photos I'd taken of the fish Kravitz caught. Just as I thought, the gashes in the fish tail from La Cabanita matched the ones in the tail of Kravitz's fish. (Hold up a magnifying glass to the photo. See the missing section near the tip of the tail on the right?)

If I had just eaten the fish Kravitz caught, it obviously wasn't the same fish Eddie had used to smuggle his drugs since the police were still holding Eddie's fish in custody. This tail could be the key to spring Kravitz from jail.

To gather more ammunition before I confronted the police, I went back to the cold storage place where Kravitz had kept the fish overnight before selling it to Eddie. The foreman there wasn't too anxious to talk at first. But when I slipped him a few bucks, he spilled the whole story.

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