Murder Queen High by Bob Wade Read Free Book Online Page A

It curved a little more and said, “You’re trying to scare me. Somebody told you I like to be scared.”
    The Conovers looked at each other. Nobody was making faces or anything. John Henry said, “Well, that doesn’t answer much of my question, Miss — ”
    The girl kept smiling, half-veiling the bright eyes. Her voice came caressingly from way down in her throat. “I’m so glad you came to call. I need building up.”
    Sin said flatly, “We live here.”
    The girl answered, “I live here.”
    “That’s not true.”
    The girl shook her sleek black head slowly.
    “Now, look here,” John Henry began, then stopped. He pushed around Sin to the porch and looked at the cottage number. Yes, it was 15, all right. His lips clamped in determined lines and he marched back into the house, shutting the door firmly behind him. “Now, look here,” he began again.
    “Tell her, Johnny.” Sin nudged him. “Tell her that we’re registered here.”
    “That’s right. We’re registered here, Miss — ” The girl stopped rubbing her chin. With the ball of her thumb, she polished at one long fingernail, and her face saddened. “I’m sorry this is all a mistake. It started out like such fun. I was registered for this cottage less than an hour ago. Mr. Gayner was quite definite about the number.”
    John Henry regarded her with grim disbelief. The brunette uncoiled her legs lazily and stretched, her open-toed sandals kicking playfully at the crease of his trousers. Sin whispered, “Johnny, don’t just stand there! “John Henry took recourse in reason.
    “Yes, I guess a mistake has been made, all right. They’ve accidentally put you into the wrong cottage. We’ve been living here ever since early this evening, Miss — ” He rammed a fist into his palm. “I’ll show you!”
    This could be proved easily. He strode into the bedroom. Their clothes, which he had unpacked himself, were in the closet. That should convince the girl that she was in the wrong place. The girl had unfolded her graceful body — she wore lounging pajamas of some dark fuzzy material — and followed him into the bedroom. Sin brought up the rear. “Now, take a look at this!” John Henry threw open the closet door.
    “Do you think they suit me?” the girl asked him seriously.
    Sin said, “Oh, honey …” John Henry got confused. The closet was stuffed with clothes, but they were the wrong clothes — slinky dresses, evening gowns, dressing gowns, everything feminine. Nothing was Sin’s, much less her husband’s.
    The girl leaned near him, looking at the negligees, and he breathed in her musky perfume. She pulled out a hanger with a black robe which, except for collar and cuffs of jaguar fur, was completely transparent. She held it up and looked at John Henry through it with purple eyes frank enough to make him glance hastily at Sin. “I found this in Mexico City. Would you say it was too extreme? I can take awfully extreme things.”
    Confounded, John Henry backed up and sat down abruptly on the bed. “I can’t understand it,” he said heavily. “This is our cottage. I know it is.”
    “We were registered for this one. We dressed here. Johnny took a bath in that bathroom,” Sin stated, pointing the way with a dramatic forefinger.
    “So did I.” John Henry wished the girl hadn’t said it just like that. Then she smiled demurely at his wife. “You must have mistaken the number this evening. It’s easy to do when you can’t see in the dark.”
    Sin folded her arms. John Henry recognized the battle flags going up and he got off the bed. “I,” she announced, “am going to stay right here. This is our cottage.”
    “Well, there’s no use being unreasonable about it — any of us,” John Henry interposed. “Obviously, somebody — ” he glanced at the girl, who was holding the robe to her shoulders “ — has made a big mistake. Suppose I get Mr. Gayner. He ought to be able to straighten the whole thing out in a