The Great Game by Michael Kurland Read Free Book Online Page B

they were seeing to their baggage. The baggage car is at the rear."
     
                  "Perhaps," Cecily agreed, coldly.
     
                  "Listen, Dove, I don't want to fight with you. Honestly I don't," Barnett said, dropping his voice to a whisper. "But you surely wouldn't want me to say I agree with you when I don't. Would you?"
     
                  "If you knew how many times I had done just that for you," Cecily told him, "you would hesitate to ask. It seems that there is one law for the Medes, and another for the Persians." She pushed her plate of veal aside and stood up. "I am no longer hungry. I will meet you back in our compartment."
     
                  Barnett also stood, out of automatic politeness to his angry wife. There are times when anything you can do is wrong, and this, Barnett perceived, was one of them. Whether he exhorted Cecily to stay, returned with her to the compartment, or let her go by herself, she would not be pleased.
     
                  The cursed unreasonableness of women! Here he was, a reasonable man, behaving in a reasonable manner, being put constantly, and unfairly, in the wrong by his wife, who was usually the most rational, sensible of God's creatures. It was infuriating!
     
                  "I must apologize for this interruption." An oily, slightly shrill voice sounded in Barnett's ears as he stood there.
     
                  "You are, perhaps, the Barnetts? Mister and Mrs. Is that so?"
     
                  "Why?" Barnett asked, turning. It was the fat man, risen from his seat and hovering unctuously by Barnett's side. This was too much. Had the man been eavesdropping? Even so, what on earth could he want? Whatever it might be, Barnett was in no mood to deal with it.
     
                  "I do really apologize for this unseemly interruption," the fat man said. For a second his lips formed into a smile, which promptly disappeared. "The conduttore mentioned to me of your presence on this train. I was overjoyed at the coincidence. A fortuitous happening, surely, you will admit."
     
                  "Will I?" Barnett was conscious of the three of them frozen there by the fat man's rudeness; Cecily poised for flight, and he undecided whether or not to follow, and the fat man talking. And talking. And talking.
     
                  "But yes." The fat man paused, one hand on his cheek, and grimaced as though just stricken with a horrible possibility. "You are, are you not, the Barnetts of the American News Service?"
     
                  "That's correct," Barnett said, grudgingly. How could this man possibly know that? And why should he care? Perhaps there was, after all, something to Cecily's apprehension. On the other hand, if the man wanted to do anything besides merely speaking to them, he didn't have to follow them around until they were in the carrozza ristorante to do it.
     
                  "Good. Good," the fat man said. "It is as I thought. You will pardon the intrusion, but, with the most honorable of intentions, I must seize this moment to speak with you. It is a matter of some urgency and some—delicacy." He whipped a hand into his jacket pocket, and it came out again clutching a white pasteboard. "My card, if you would be so good."
     
                  Barnett took the card, glanced at it, and passed it to Cecily. Gottfried Kasper, it said in firm but delicate brown lettering, scrittore e giornalista, Milano.
     
                  "What can we do for you, Signor Kasper?" Cecily asked the fat man sweetly. "Please, sit down."
     
                  Barnett looked at her in amazement. "Yes," he said, choking back a comment, "please do." Cecily surely must have some reason for asking the fat man to sit—unless it was merely to show Barnett that she would prefer anyone's company to his right now. Or