The Dishonest Murderer by Frances Lockridge Read Free Book Online Page B

threshold,” Pam said, sleepily. “Start the New Year—”
    Jerry lifted her in his arms. The cats looked at them in astonishment. Sherry, the blue-point, a creature of almost over-acute sensibility, bristled, cried in fright, and plunged under the sofa. Gin, sparked by Sherry’s excitement, growled questioningly, but stood her ground. Only Martini, their mother, wiser in the way of these troublesome charges of hers, sat unmoving, her enormous round eyes fixed, her whiskers slightly curled.
    Jerry kissed his wife, not casually, tightened his arms around her and then put her down.
    â€œYou know,” he said, “standing out there—there’s something wrong with that lock, incidentally—I almost had something—” He nodded to her. “Almost had it,” he said. “Now it’s gone.”
    â€œJerry,” Pam said. “Tomorrow? I want to go to bed.”
    â€œIt was about civilization,” Jerry said. “And—I don’t know. Keys and keyholes. Like the rats, you know? The ones that jumped at little doors and finally got confused and—”
    â€œListen, darling,” Pam said. “I’m terribly tired of those rats. All my life I’ve heard about those rats, jumping at doors.” She paused. “All my life,” she said, “I’ve wanted to go to bed. And you want to talk about rats.”
    Jerry North ran the fingers of his right hand through his hair. He said, “Oh.”
    â€œAll your life,” he said, “you’ve wanted—what did you say?”
    â€œI want to go to bed,” Pam said, and then stopped and looked at Martini, who had rolled over on her back, with her feet in the air, and was looking at them between her forelegs. “Wants to have her belly rubbed,” Pam said. She sat down on the floor and began to caress Martini. “Is the major cat,” Pam said. “Is the cat major. Is—”
    Then the telephone rang. It rang with horrible loudness, with a kind of anger. Martini swirled from under Pam’s hand, rolled to her feet, dashed into the hall, from whence the ringing came, and looked up at the box which held the doorbell.
    â€œConfused,” Pam said. “It’s the telephone, Martini. It’s—Jerry, it’s the telephone! ”
    Jerry had the telephone in his hand. He said “Yes?” to it.
    But the telephone continued to ring.
    â€œJerry,” Pam said. “The other telephone. The house telephone. Who on earth?”
    Pam North was on her feet. She was almost as quick as Martini had been. She was in the hall, at the house telephone on the wall. She said, “Yes?”
    â€œMrs. North?” a woman said. Her voice was young, now it was hurried, strained.
    â€œYes,” Pam said.
    â€œThis is Winifred Haven,” the woman in the lobby downstairs said, the words hurried. “May I come up?”
    â€œWhy,” Pam said. “Of—of course, Mrs. Haven.” But it was hard to take the request as a matter of course; hard to keep surprise out of her voice.
    â€œI know,” Freddie Haven said, answering the tone. “It’s—it’s impossible. But—” She seemed about to go on, to change her mind. “I’ll come up, then,” she said.
    Pam turned back to the living room. Jerry was still holding, still looking at the wrong telephone. His look was reproachful.
    â€œSimplification,” he said, in a grave, distant voice. He returned the wrong telephone to its receiver. “Too many everything. Keys. Telephones—”
    â€œJerry!” Pam said. “Mrs. Haven’s coming up. Your admiral’s daughter.”
    Gerald North came wide awake at once. He looked at his watch. He said, “What the hell?”
    â€œI don’t know,” Pam said. “She’s excited. Something’s happened.”
    â€œAt twenty-five minutes to four,” Jerry North said. “In