Rex Stout by Red Threads Page A

Hell, you’re just a kid.”
    “My God, I’m thirty-one years old. I’m not letting any one feed me rabbit stew. I’ve dealt with Indian agents and concession hounds and cattlemen who don’t like any fences except their own—and anyway, he was my father.”
    The old Indian, his head tilted back a little to peer at the taller men from under the brim of his Panama, grunted. “That girl,” he said. “What did she feed you? You’re not a kid. You’re a man.”
    “She didn’t feed me anything. What do you mean, Wilson?”
    The Indian grunted again. “You saw me feel it.”
    “I know I did. What do you know about it?”
    “Me? Nothing.”
    “The devil—” Guy Carew shrugged. “I can’t get it out of you here. But I will.” He shifted to Buysse. “And you too. I’m damn tired of all this silent paddle stuff. Of course you know the police are following all of us everywhere we go. I’ll see you to-night, you and Wilson both….”
    Buysse and the Indian, both motionless, stood and listened.
       Leo Kranz, toward the end of his conversation with Portia Tritt, employed a phrase nearly identical with one Guy had used to Buysse. He said, “I can’t finish it here. I think Ella Desher is headed for you now. But it won’t do, Portia.” His voice was tense, his eyes level into hers. “I tell you it won’t do.”
    “I don’t say it will.” Her smile proclaimed no amusement. “But who says it won’t?”
    “I do. I’ve been patient; I always am. No one knowsthat better than you. But your bringing him here today—under all the circumstances—”
    “My dear Leo!” She laughed with light assurance. “I told you long ago I won’t stand for a bridle, let alone spurs. And you know very well I have never given you the slightest—Oh, hello, Ella! No, really, I was just telling Mr. Kranz that I hoped you wouldn’t be completely overwhelmed—”
    It was after eight o’clock when Jean Farris finally escaped from the admiring clutches of a pair of persistent ladies who wanted to write her up for a magazine still in the period of gestation which was to be called
The Covered Woman.
They were the last of the cocktail guests to go. The dinner guests were scattered around the grounds, or in the house; on that portion of the lawn Jean was alone except for two men in white jackets who were stacking folding chairs in piles and raking up rubbish. She stood with her back pressed against the trunk of a maple tree, with her arms up for her hands to clasp on top of her head, and her eyes closed. She felt tired and not at all gay, and was wishing that she had either drunk more cocktails or had refused the two she had taken.
    “Oh, there you are!”
    Jean gave a little start and opened her eyes. She didn’t feel like smiling at the man who was striding towards her, so she didn’t try to.
    She said, “You walk differently, you really do. As if your toes had more to do with it—but still not exactly like the Indians I’ve seen in New Mexico.”
    “Well, I’m not from New Mexico.” Guy Carew stood and looked down at her. “You look different too, the way you were standing against that tree. Who were you posing for?”
    She shook her head. “I was just resting. A tree doesrest me that way. Maybe I’m a half-breed dryad. What are you wandering around for?”
    “I was looking for you.”
    “Here I am.”
    “So I see.” He came a step closer. “I want to ask you something. As you observed the other day, I don’t know how to use finesse. I’m too direct, but I can’t help it. Will you give me that—those things you’re wearing? That skirt and jacket?”
    “Give you—” She stared. “You mean
give
them to you?”
    “Yes. I can’t say lend, because I don’t know … You can imagine how I hate to ask you, but that’s what I mean. Give them to me. And I can’t explain, at least not satisfactorily. I can only say that something has happened which makes it very desirable that I have them.”
    Jean looked