South Wind by Theodore A. Tinsley

Author:Theodore A. Tinsley [Tinsley, Theodore A.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 978-1-4804-9304-9
Publisher: MysteriousPress.com/Open Road

Mr. Beull Carfax was tall, handsome, with cold eyes and a small ashblond mustache. He bowed briefly to Tracy and shot a quick flicker at the stolid Butch. Tracy had forgotten to mention Butch over the wire.

“I hardly think, Mister Tracy,” said the courtly brother of Lola, “that Mis’ Carfax would care to be interviewed. Any news of plans, social engagements and so fo’th is, of co’se, sent to yo’ readers regularly by Mis’ Carfax’s secretary.”

Tracy said: “This is different.”

“If there is anything that I personally might—”

Tracy said, again: “This is different.”

The cold eyes focused on him. After a moment they blinked.

“Very well. This way, please.”

Nobody said anything to Butch. He trailed after Tracy. Lola Carfax was standing on the far side of the room, examining a small hunting print on the wall. She didn’t turn around.

Buell said, in his stately drawl: “Lola, honey, here’s that newspaperman.”

She paid no attention. Tracy walked swiftly across. His smile was as thin as a hacksaw blade. He stood and looked at her back for a moment. He caught her eye reflected in the glass of the picture frame.

He said, deliberately: “Turn around, you cheap little grifter!”

She whirled. Her beauty was like the flash of a blinding ray. Tense, wordless, carved in ice. Her red lips were parted slightly, she seemed scarcely to breathe. Her eyes had the cold, hard glaze of a cat’s.

Across the room, Buell Carfax gave a thick bellow of rage.

“Why, dam’ yo’ filthy Yankee—”

As he sprang forward his hand came away from his vest pocket. The light glinted on the muzzle of a tiny derringer. Butch’s hand thrust out with the speed of a striking snake. His hairy fingers closed around the slender wrist and bent arm and weapon upward.

There was a muffled report; a short, straining tussle; Carfax squealed shrilly as his pinioned arm snapped.

Butch’s left hand caught the slumping man by the throat and pinned him upright against the wall. He held him there almost casually. His attention was on the little derringer in his own right palm. Butch had never seen a toy like that before. He stared at it with the absorbed curiosity of a monkey.

Tracy smiled into the lovely eyes of Lola. She was lifeless, stiff, except for the candle-flame in her eyes. There was something eerie and horrible in the intensity of her fright. Her voice was barely audible.

“Is this a hold-up?”

“You’re damn’ right”

“What are you after?”

“Everything you got.”

They were like conspirators whispering together in a dark cave.

“You can’t get away with this. You must be insane. You’re a madman.”

He said to her: “No, I’m not—Mrs. Jeff Tayloe.”

The flame he was watching was quenched for an instant and then blazed up brighter than before.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Oh yes you do, baby.”

There was no humanity in Tracy, either. Two lumps of ice whispering together.

He paused a moment.

“Thunder Run,” he said. “It’s in North Carolina. No comment?”

She watched him with that horrible immobility.

“Just an old-fashioned story about an old-fashioned gal. Once upon a time there was a gal.

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