The Dark and Deadly Pool by Joan Lowery Nixon Read Free Book Online Page B

from someone like Art? Not much. “I’m with it,” I told him. “On duty. Bright and cheerful.”
    He actually growled at me, snatched his car keys out of the desk, and said, “I’m off. Got stuff to do.”
    “Are you going to be back?”
    “Maybe yes, maybe no.”
    “But you said the club would be really busy.”
    “So what? I hired you because I thought you could do the job. How smart do you have to be to pick up dirty towels? If you don’t think you can handle it, just say so.”
    It would have given me a great deal of pleasure to tell him what I was thinking about him, but I wanted to hang on to my job. So I quietly said, “I can handle it.”
    Without another word he strode out of the office.
    I completed my check of the women’s dressing room and sauna, but there were guests in the men’s section.Art was right. The club was getting busy in a hurry. I toured the pool area, stopping to say hello to Mrs. Bandini and Mrs. Larabee, and passed Mr. Jones, who was leaving the club. “Good-bye,” I said cheerfully, but he didn’t seem to hear me. He pushed through the door, head down, muttering to himself.
    Just as I sat at the desk Tina popped into the office. “Hi,” she said. “Ready?”
    “For what?”
    “Card file.” She handed me a stack of cards an inch thick. “Here are the new ones, and while you’re busy filing them, let’s see if we can’t find that good-looking guy’s card.”
    “What’s his name?”
    “I don’t know, but he’s out there right now, sunning himself. He’s already got a great tan.”
    I pulled the file from the side drawer and handed it to her. “Here. While I study the new ones, you can look through the file and find his name.”
    While Tina was busy with the file, I checked in four guests, mentally matched their faces to their cards, handed them towels, and smilingly said that I hoped they enjoyed their stay in the Ridley health club.
    As I went back to the desk, Tina snapped shut the lid of the file and looked puzzled. “So where is he?”
    “Who?”
    “The guy with the brown hair. His card isn’t in here.”
    “Maybe he checked out.”
    “No. I told you. He’s out there sunning himself.”
    “Maybe the card was misfiled.”
    “I went through the whole thing.”
    “Do you suppose he’s not really a guest here? We could ask security to check.”
    Tina stood up and smiled. “I’m security. Remember?And what a good excuse to start a conversation. See you later.”
    She zipped out the doorway, heading for the outside pool—just as a small body dashed past her and cannonballed into the pool, sending up a sheet of water.
    Tina jumped back, glaring and muttering, and snatched up a towel. As she blotted the spots on her uniform she said, “This is your department. Yell at him. Kick him out. Have him arrested for impersonating a human being.”
    I had seen who it was. Pauly Canelli. “I’ll be stern,” I said, and marched to the side of the pool. Pauly had surfaced and was grinning at me.
    “I told you not to do that,” I said.
    “I forgot.”
    “No, you didn’t.”
    “What are you gonna do about it?”
    I put my fists on my hips and tried to look tough and mean. “Out of the pool!”
    “I’ll tell my grandma.”
    “Out!”
    He swam to the shallow end, near to the chair in which his grandmother was enthroned. I walked around the edge of the pool to meet him. I noticed two men in business suits standing by the door to the hotel. Perhaps they were new guests. I should find out, but I had to take care of Pauly first.
    Mrs. Bandini was all smiles as Pauly ran to her. She enfolded him in a large beach towel and beamed at me. “Isn’t he a lovely boy? Both of my grandchildren are such a joy to me.”
    “She made me get out of the pool,” Pauly whined.
    Mrs. Bandini’s eyes grew wide. “Why?”
    “He was cannonballing people,” I said. “I told him not to.”
    Mrs. Bandini chuckled. “I thought it was something important. Well, Pauly won’t do