Seven Kinds of Death by Kate Wilhelm Read Free Book Online Page B

clothes or anything.”
    Constance and Toni looked through the upstairs bedrooms and closets, the three bathrooms. When they returned to the first floor, Paul was entering from the back of the house. Toni’s fingers dug into Constance’s arm. The young woman was staring at Paul, her expression a mixture of anguish and fear; she was ashen. She turned and ran.
    “Would she have walked to town, to take a taxi back to Washington, perhaps?” Constance asked Paul.
    He shook his head. “I called the two taxi companies and asked. I called the train station and the bus depot. No sign of her.” He glanced beyond Constance; a few guests were still partying, no more than five or six. “We need to organize a real search,” he said. “Why don’t they clear out?”
    Spence joined them. “She’s not on this side of the property, I’d swear to it. Did she even know there was the rest of it across the road?” His voice was gravelly; a frown etched deeply into his forehead.
    “She never came out here before, but someone could have told her. Let’s start over there.” Paul Volte was nearly as pale as Toni.
    Constance saw again the look of terror that had come to Toni’s face, and although she had no idea of why these people were all assuming the worst, their fear became her fear. She said slowly, “Paul, perhaps we should call the sheriff’s office. Two or three people can’t really search the woods thoroughly.” It was fifteen minutes before eight.
    Later, when Charlie asked Constance exactly how she got rid of the lingering guests, she said simply, “I told them to go away.” It wasn’t quite that abrupt, but very nearly. Max called the sheriff, and Spence and Paul left to search the woods across the road.
    Ba Ba came up to Constance to complain about the summary dismissal of guests and Constance didn’t really tell her to shut up, just something like that, and then Tootles appeared again, coming from across the road. She had found time to change into her black pants and shirt.
    “What’s happening?” she demanded. “I met Paul and Spence and they practically ordered me to get my butt over here.”
    “And she’s ordering everyone in sight,” Ba Ba said aggrievedly, glowering at Constance. “All I said was that I was still having a conversation with Susan Walters, and here she comes and—”
    “Ba Ba, shut up,” Tootles said and asked Max, “What’s wrong?”
    “It seems that Victoria Leeds is missing,” he said with a shrug. “Personally, I think she must have decided to take a powder and just forgot to mention it to anyone. I called the sheriff.”
    Tootles’s eyes widened, then narrowed to slits. “Good Christ! Not Paul!”
    The sheriff’s deputy arrived a minute or two after that, and he called back to his office for help for a real search of the woods before it got too dark. It was nearly eight thirty.
    Dinner was a buffet; since the cook had no clear idea of how many people she would be feeding that night, it had seemed the simplest way to go, Ba Ba explained, and then started to explain again. This time Max told her to shut up. They picked at food that was very good. Paul and Spence had returned, and Paul didn’t even attempt to eat. He sat in the living room with his eyes closed and started at every sound from outside the house.
    The deputy returned at nine thirty. It was still day-bright outside; he was sweating heavily. He was a florid-faced man in his twenties, blond, blue-eyed; his shape was somehow not right, too narrow in the shoulders and chest, too wide in the hips. “What’s in the big boxes in the barn, Mr. Buell?” the deputy asked, standing in the doorway to the living room.
    “Artwork, pieces going on tour,” Max said.
    Everyone had stood up, and as if managed by a choreographer, they all began to move toward the door. The deputy looked surprised, but did not object, and the group went outside, across the porch, through the front yard that was several hundred feet deep,