The Vampire Files 08 by The Dark Sleep

Author:The Dark Sleep
Language: eng
Format: mobi, pdf
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

9

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When I got up Tuesday night Escott had left the papers, undipped and open to the right sections, on the kitchen table.

They all had pictures—above the fold—of Bobbi and Grant dancing, smiling, and otherwise looking like they were having a terrific time with each other. The fruitier captions suggested that a new romance was brewing between Chicago’s own radio celebrity Archy Grant and beautiful, talented club singer Bobbi Smythe. They even spelled her name right.

“Perhaps,” said Escott, who stood in the hall doorway, “this fellow is operating under the belief that if one says an untruth often enough it will be believed, even by those who know better. From the evidence presented here I’ve assumed your evening out with Miss Smythe did not go as planned.”

“You could say that. He bushwhacked us for a publicity stunt and Bobbi had to play along with it or look bad.”

“How unfortunate.”

“She’s gonna kill him for this,” I said, skimming a caption festooned with exclamation points and question marks.

“What about your own reaction?”

“I should have taken care of him last night.”

“If I may ask, what were you planning to do?”

“Just a little mind changing. I wasn’t going to punch him out; now I’m not so sure. On the other hand, Bobbi will probably beat me to it.”

“Would you bring me up to date on this business? If she’s going to assault the man, I’d like some background to enhance my appreciation of the event.”

“The business will be all over after tonight.”

“Then I should like to know what I’ve missed.”

I brought him up to date.

He shook his head and tsked when I finished. “I must commend you for your singular show of restraint.”

“Yeah, well, you won’t be seeing much more of it. Publicity for his damned show is one thing, but this gossip about a romance is over the limit. Bobbi threw a conniption when he made his pitch to her; she’s gonna boil right over for this.”

“Which has likely already occurred since these editions have been out all day.”

“Jeez, I better call her.”

He went upstairs to give me privacy while I attacked the kitchen phone. I dialed the right number, but it just kept ringing unanswered. Bobbi must have been getting a lot of calls on this. Next time I dialed I let it ring once, then hung up and dialed again. It was a code we’d worked out long ago for those times when she wanted to be unavailable to the general populace.

“Hello? Jack?” She sounded both anxious and hopeful.

“Right here, angel. I just woke up and saw. You all right?”

She let out a long sigh. “Yes, I’m fine, but the phone’s been going off since this morning. I never knew I had so many friends and that there were so many other people pretending to be my friends. There’s also been reporters from every rag you can think of, a woman from Radioplay magazine came by the hotel trying to get an interview, and some cigarette company wants me to do an ad for them.

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