Reno Rendezvous by Leslie Ford & Zenith Brown

Author:Leslie Ford & Zenith Brown
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Wildside Press LLC
Published: 2018-01-24T16:00:00+00:00

14

I nodded to the detective who looked out of the linen room as I went by, and opened my door. I wasn’t tired as much as I was deflated. I didn’t want to go to bed. It occurred to me that that was probably why the River House was still crowded and hectic. People didn’t want to go to bed and be alone with the sense of defeat and unrest, and the excitement of dashing about and drinking and gambling, even if it was just pulling the lever of a slot machine, kept them from it.

I opened Judy’s door very quietly, and glanced in. She had put the Do Not Disturb sign on her door—I’d noticed it as I came in. The room was dark. I listened. I couldn’t hear her breathing. I waited a minute, listening, a little chill gathering on my heart, and then threw open the door and turned on her light.

Her bed was pulled down from behind its door, but Judy wasn’t in it. The long windows were open. For one terrible moment I stood there, the horrible thought of that river three stories below the balcony burning in my mind. Then, as I stood absolutely petrified, my eyes fell on a sheet of paper on the table in the middle of the rose-and-gray room. My knees felt like water as I crossed over to it, and steadied myself as I looked down and read.

“Dear Grace,—Don’t be alarmed. I’ve had to go out a minute. Leave the window open. I’ll be back.—J.”

I sank down in a chair, shaking like a leaf. The phone jangling suddenly nearly scared me out of my wits. My hand shook as I lifted the receiver, and my heart stood still at the sound of a familiar voice.

“Mrs. Latham,” it said, “—this is John Primrose. I’ve been trying to get you. Mrs. Bonner is up at Lake Tahoe. And I’m sorry to have to tell you, but I think you ought to know it—Hogan has put her under formal arrest.—Martin will call for you shortly.”

I had a curious sense of running the gauntlet of a pack of jackals as I went downstairs, some minutes later, through the lobby and out into the street. Whitey and Kaye Gorman and Joe were there, standing at the bar. I saw them glance at me and at each other. Why Judy had let herself get mixed up with such people was beyond me, I thought suddenly. Why she couldn’t have gone to a quiet civilized ranch out in the hills, the way her friend Polly Wagner had, and waited discreetly and patiently for her six weeks, I couldn’t think. But of course I did know, really. She was upset and alone, and Dexter Cromwell had been her guide. Tomorrow she would go, bag and baggage, I thought . . . if by tomorrow she wasn’t in the city jail.

Mr. Martin held the door of his car open for me, and closed it. “It was most imprudent of her, leaving the hotel at all,” he said.

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