A. Fair - Up for Grabs

I danced with Dolores.

She had a very intimate, seductive way of dancing without appearing to be too close.

“Been making any passes at Bruno?” I asked.

She said “The man’s an iceberg. He’s really injured, Donald. This is a new angle. I never expected to encounter one like this.

“They told me they wouldn’t send anyone out here unless they were sure he was faking. I don’t know how they could have felt sure about this fellow.”

“Perhaps they aren’t,” I said. “They may have taken a chance and got the wrong answer.”

“Are you going to be around, Donald?”

“I don’t know. Why?”

“I’d hate to have you go back just when we’re getting acquainted.”

I said, “Anyone would think I was the one who was malingering the way you’re putting it up to me.”

Her eyes came up to mine. “I’m putting it up to you, as you expressed it, because I like you,” she said.

The music ended at that moment, and Dolores emphasized her remarks by pressing her hips close to mine for just the fraction of a second and making a little twisting motion. Then she was smiling up into my face and one of the other guests was bearing down on her for a dance.

“How do you keep from antagonizing all the wives?” I asked.

“It’s an art,” she told me, and turned to the approaching guest with a smile that was completely impersonal.

I watched the next dance. She was properly demure, smiling from time to time at her partner, then letting her eyes look over the other guests, sizing them up, making certain they were having a good time.

Any married woman would have caught that look and appreciated it. It showed Dolores was doing her duty.

I couldn’t be sure about Bruno, but there was one thing I could say for certain, Dolores was a remarkably clever young woman.

Activities at the guest ranch were timed so that guests could retire at an early hour.

On two nights a week they had dancing, but the dancing was limited to an hour, then the music was turned off and the guests were encouraged to get into bed early.

On two nights a week they had a campfire out in a second patio where they had chairs in a circle around the campfire. Mesquite logs gave forth flames and then burned down to coals. Cowboy entertainers played guitars and sang Western songs. These entertainers were usually a group who went from ranch to ranch entertaining the various guests.

Then occasionally they would have group evenings where two or three of the guest ranches would get together for a joint entertainment. These entertainments would be more elaborate, would include both dancing and campfire gatherings with cowboy singing.

The idea was to have enough variety so that the guests were kept entertained but to see that they got plenty of sleep.

I retired to my cabin early because Melita Doon had plead a headache and turned in, and Helmann Bruno had utilized his injuries as an excuse to be taken down to his cabin.

Someone had dug up a wheelchair for him and he was taking to this wheelchair like a duck to water.

Dolores Ferrol was frustrated but concealing her frustration amid the myriad activities of a good hostess on a social night. She was determined to get Bruno to open up.

She saw that everyone met everyone else, saw that the groups were shifted from time to time so that the guests didn’t get into groups that would in time develop into partisan cliques.

In short, Dolores was thoroughly competent and was doing a great job, but she wanted very much to talk with me, and I could see that after the formal entertainment broke up she intended to discuss the case in great detail.

As far as I was concerned, there was no case to discuss — not yet, anyway, and before I became involved with Dolores I wanted to be definitely certain about Melita Doon. There was something about that girl that bothered me.

I started toward the cabin, yawning ostentatiously.

Dolores was at my side almost instantly.

“You’re leaving, Donald?”

“It’s been a hard day.”

She laughed. “Don’t kid me, you’re one of these wiry guys who could take a dozen days like that — or are you afraid of the night?”

I shifted the subject back to business. “What about Melita Doon?” I said. “She isn’t the usual type who’s looking for adventure and romance. She isn’t a girl who’s nuts about horses and wants to ride, nor is she a shutterbug who wants to come out in the desert to get a collection of colored pictures.

“Why is she here?”

“I’ll be darned if I know,” Dolores said. “I’ve seen them all, all the different types, but this girl has me stopped.

“You’ve classified the three types who come here, all right. When they’re on the make, they’re very much on the make. The first people they meet are the cowpunchers and these gals literally throw themselves at the wranglers. The wranglers get so terribly bored with it that a woman can virtually peel off her clothes, and they’ll yawn, turn their backs and go to saddling the horses.

“Then there’s the horsey type. The wranglers get along fine with those if they don’t think they know more than they do. If they genuinely love the horses and love to ride, we see that they get good mounts and have a good time.

“Then, of course, there are the shutterbugs, the artists and the people who love the solitude and vast spaces of the desert. They can’t get out by themselves, but this is the next thing to it. They come here and they keep to themselves.”

“Well,” I said, “Melita Doon came here and she’s keeping to herself. How about the latter type? Do you think she’s one who loves the solitude and takes this because it’s the nearest approach to it?”

Dolores shook her head. “Not that girl. There’s something on her mind. She’s here for— Somehow, Donald, I feel she’s here for a purpose.”

“I get the same impression,” I said.

“Well,” she said, “she’s in the cabin next to you and this is the third time you’ve yawned prodigiously in the past fifteen minutes. I thought perhaps the expectation of... well...”

She smiled enticingly.

I said, “Somebody must have doped the coffee. I’m dead on my feet. See you tomorrow, Dolores.”

“Tomorrow?” she asked.

I faced her. “This is a pretty good job you have here, Dolores.”

“I make it a good job.”

“Does it pay well?”

“I make it pay well,” she said. “I know what I’m doing, I’m doing a darned good job. Because of me the guests leave with a lot better impression of the place than they would if I weren’t here. I charge money for that, and I get money for it.”

“And,” I said, “no one knows about this other job that you’re holding down, the one for the insurance company?”

Her eyes suddenly became quizzical. “What are you doing, Donald, leading up to a species of blackmail?”

“I just don’t like to be in the dark,” I said.

“You can have lots of fun in the dark... Go on,” she said, “what are you getting at?”

“How did you get this second job?” I asked.

“That was an idea that the Claims Department had.”

“Homer Breckinridge?”

“If you want to know, yes.”

“Then he’s been here at the ranch?”

“Yes.”

“When was he here?”

“Last year.”

“And he saw you working and got the idea for this setup, having people come down here ostensibly as contest winners?”

“Yes.”

“How many have you had?”

“I don’t think Mr. Breckinridge would like to have me tell you that.”

“Look, Dolores,” I told her, “we’re both of us working for Breckinridge. Now, this conversation is designed to keep relations harmonious and happy.”