Amazing Mrs. Pollifax by Dorothy Gilman Read Free Book Online

another corner and two men smoked and gossiped along the other wall.
    It was when Henry glanced up that Mrs. Pollifax also looked to the entrance and became alert. It was precisely eight o’clock and a woman had entered the hotel. She brought with her a quality that changed the lobby so forcibly that Mrs. Pollifax wondered how people continued to walk and talk without awareness of it. What she brought with her—and to Mrs. Pollifax it pervaded the lobby—was fear. No, not fear but terror, amended Mrs. Pollifax: a primitive, palpable terror so real that it could almost be smelled and touched. The woman stood at the edge of the lobby, desperately trying not to be seen as her glance searched the room. Did her eyes ever so subtly drop to the gaudy book that Mrs. Pollifax held upright in her lap?
    She cannot bear exposure, thought Mrs. Pollifax in astonishment; yet as she stood there, lacking the decisiveness to move, she was accomplishing exactly what she did not want: people were beginning to look at her. And certainly she was not a logical person to have entered a hotel lobby. Her dress was torn, old and shabby, the castoff plaid house dress of a European, and she was thin to the point of emaciation. But her face—what a beauty she must have been once, thought Mrs. Pollifax, seeing those deepset haunted dark eyes. Even her clothes, even the irresolution and exhaustion could not conceal the intelligence in those eyes. That head went up now, and the woman moved like a sleepwalker across the lobby until she came to Mrs. Pollifax. “Your book,” she said in a low voice, only lightly accented. “You are—?”
    “Sit down,” Mrs. Pollifax said quickly. “You’ll be less conspicuous and you do look exhausted.”
    The woman sank down beside her on the couch. “Who are you?”
    “Emily Pollifax. Are you being followed?” Beyond the woman, on the other side of the window, Mrs. Pollifax saw Colin Ramsey sitting in his jeep. He had found his parking space and was patiently waiting for dinner companions. She felt that she had met and talked to him in another world, a world of innocence that had abruptly vanished at sight of this poor creature.
    “I don’t know, but—it is possible,” whispered Ferenci-Sabo. “I should never have chosen this place—so far, so public, so open.” She looked utterly wrung out, drained.
    Mrs. Pollifax said crisply, “I’ve brought you money and a passport but obviously you need rest and food before you can use either. There’s a rear exit on my left, do you see it? There are also stairs going up to the second floor. My room number is—” She broke off, startled. The woman beside her on the couch was staring across the lobby in horror. At once she jumped to her feet. “Oh please,” she gasped.
    Automatically Mrs. Pollifax glanced at the entrance to see what had frightened her; when her glance returned to the couch the woman was gone. She had vanished completely.
    Two men in the uniform of the Turkish police were crossing the lobby, and one of them suddenly increased his pace, heading for the rear exit. His companion continued inexorably toward Mrs. Pollifax, and as he loomed above her—he looked surprisingly high—she doubtfully rose to meet him.
    “Pasaport, luften,”
he said, holding out a hand.
    “Passport?” faltered Mrs. Pollifax. “But what has happened? Do you speak English?”
    “You are American? English?”
    “American.” She opened her purse, careful not to touch the second passport.
    He opened and scanned the passport, glancing from face to photograph and back again. “You arrived here only this afternoon, I see.” He frowned. “Your business in Istanbul?”
    “Why—tourist,” she faltered.
    “The woman to whom you spoke—the one who fled—” He broke off as his comrade entered the lobby through theside door. His friend shook his head, pointed to the ceiling and disappeared again, presumably to search the hotel. Mrs. Pollifax’s inquisitor nodded.