Эллери Куин - The Killer Touch

He retraced his steps around the cistern to where she waited. Like a passenger whose bus has just arrived, she pushed herself away from the wall and threw her cigarette to the ground. As she came toward him, Burt saw that her long legs were bare beneath the beach coat.

“I was beginning to get cold,” she said, locking her hands behind his head and looking up with a teasing smile. “I wondered if you’d have the guts to come.”

Burt spread his hands across her back and felt the muscle-taut flesh beneath it. She was not as calm as she appeared.

“Where’d you leave Rolf?” he asked.

“In the cabin, reading. He thinks I’m taking a walk.” She rocked against him, an undulating warmth pressing him from chest to knee. “We don’t have much time. Will you kiss me?”

“No biting?”

“Maybe that comes later.”

He felt the surprising coolness of her lips and the curiously facile, impersonal probing of her tongue. He tasted wine and braised pigeon, and decided that this girl knew all the right moves at the right time, but that skill could never take the place of natural passion.

Then suddenly all her weight hung from his neck. She fell backward onto the ground, pulling him off-balance so that he had to put out both hands to avoid crushing her with his weight. The sandy soil scraped his elbows as he tried to break her grip around his neck, and Burt discovered that somewhere in midfall she had managed to unfasten the robe. He made three more discoveries in rapid succession: She wore nothing beneath the robe, she had a wiry masculine strength, and whatever her ulterior purpose in arranging the meeting, the seduction was in deadly earnest.

He jerked free and sat back on his haunches. “Cool it a minute. What’s all the rush?”

She put her hands behind her head and began laughing softly.

“Did him want to chat? Did him want to be a big strong man and just overwhelm poor little me?”

Her mock babytalk curdled his stomach. “I think I get it. Rolf was supposed to catch me in the act and shoot me, right?”

She raised her head and frowned at him. “Huh?”

Burt rose to his feet. “Get up. I’ll show you something.”

“Oh, now wait—”

Burt seized her arm and jerked her up. “Come on.”

Rolf was stirring when they rounded the corner. The woman tore free and ran toward him. “Rolf, what happened?” She knelt beside him an instant, then whirled and leaped at Burt, her teeth bared, her white robe flying out like the wings of a silver moth on both sides of her nude body. Her nails raked his cheek once, then again, while Burt wrestled with an untimely question: Where does a gentleman seize a naked woman he doesn’t want to hurt? He felt he was being smothered in satin-firm flesh, she seemed to have a dozen arms, breasts, stomachs all heavy with an exciting smell of sweat and perfume. Her teeth were seeking a purchase somewhere in the region of his jugular vein when he found her shoulders and pushed with all his strength. She sprawled backward on the ground, but she was game; she bounced up and was about to charge again when Rolf’s voice cracked like a pistol shot:

“Drop it, Bunny!”

She stopped as though on a short leash, her robe hanging open. Rolf sat up, drew his legs under him, and spoke in a tired voice:

“Wrap up the package, baby. It didn’t sell.”

She drew her robe together and tied it slowly, like a child putting away a doll which she’d been forbidden to play with until Christmas. Burt watched the pair, feeling like a stranger at a family dinner.

“It wasn’t my fault,” she said with petulance.

“Mine. Totally mine.” Rolf touched the back of his head. “Sergeant March used an old trick. I was expecting something more original.” He pressed his hand to the bulge of his jacket, sighed, and looked up at Burt. “Did you borrow my gun, old man?”

“I’ll keep it for a while.”

Rolf smiled. “With my compliments. I don’t like guns. That one shoots slightly to the left, anyway.” He fumbled beneath his jacket and drew out a cigarette. “Will you ask your question here, Sergeant, or—” he paused to ignite the cigarette “—shall we go to my cabin and have a drink?”

“This is fine.” Burt pulled out the gun and squatted with his back against the wall. To the woman he said, “Get over beside him.”

She obeyed, leaning against Rolf and delving into his jacket for a cigarette. She lit it from Rolf’s and giggled softly. “Maybe he handles a gun better than he does a woman.”

“Keep quiet,” said Rolf absently. “Permit me to observe, March, that any restriction of an individual’s freedom of movement is technically kidnapping. Since you’re off-duty and outside the United States, you have no authority whatever.”

“Let’s all go together and complain to the authorities.”

Rolf chuckled. “You win. First question.”

“Where’s your wife?”

“Sitting beside me.”

“You called her Bunny.”

“A term of endearment, just between us.”

Burt decided it felt good to have the intellectual jump on Rolf. He smiled. “The island seems to have agreed with her. She’s grown three-and-a-half inches since she arrived.”

Rolf stiffened and looked sharply at the woman.

“Rolf, I didn’t—”

“No, I understand it now.” He turned back to Burt. “I assumed you’d be too chivalrous to search the purse. I was wrong.” He pressed a shaky hand to the back of his neck. “Do me, Bunny. I’ve got a headache.” She rose to her knees behind him and began kneading his neck. Rolf looked at Burt. “She’s Bunny DeVore, specialty dancer, late of Miami Beach. She starts her dance in a cowboy suit and winds up wearing only a gun. Clever act, particularly when she demonstrates the symbolism of the gun—”

“You didn’t bring her here to dance,” said Burt.

“No, she goes with me on all my trips to South America. Sort of a traveling secretary, except that she can’t type and can’t take shorthand.” He chuckled. “Pity you struck so soon, March; you’d have learned what makes her so valuable in my business.”

“I know,” said Burt, “But I can’t say I dig the professional touch.”

“Oh, you lousy fink—”

“Go to the cabin, Bunny,” said Rolf. Your ego’s getting noisy.”

“Stay there,” said Burt.

“Burt’s afraid you’d bring back a sawed-off shotgun, I suppose.” To Burt he said: “I’m your hostage, so why worry? I can speak more freely when she’s gone.”

Burt hesitated a moment, then nodded. Bunny rose and disappeared into the darkness, her back stiff.

“She minds well,” observed Burt.

The secret,” said Rolf, “is to give no commands she’s not already half-inclined to follow. She usually enjoys the tasks I give her. This one tonight — I must say she was particularly eager, but now — you know what they say about a woman spurned. I’d watch my back if I were you.”

“What was the purpose of this business tonight?”

“I have a theory that people act because of pressure on them. When I want somebody to do something, I find out what pressures prevent them from doing it. Then I set up a counterpressure in my favor, stronger than the one against.”

“And Bunny supplied the pressure.”

“There are less pleasant pressures, March.”

Burt narrowed his eyes; Rolf didn’t seem to be threatening, only stating a fact. “I had a feeling last night you wanted something from me. Why not just tell me what it is?”

“Not until you put the gun away.”

“All right. Then it can wait. Tell me why you pulled the switch.”

“That was a challenging problem. My wife and Bunny are almost polar opposites. My wife is small, as you know, with a triangular face, brown eyes, blue-black hair and a faintly olive complexion. Bunny is a type particularly favored by South Americans, an ash blonde with green eyes—”