"killerinthehouse" - читать интересную книгу автора (Blackmon Robert C)

We reached the seventh and top floor, and he asked if he should wait. I shook my head,
because I wanted this solo until I found out about the groaning.

Johnny went down. I went to Room 712.

It was down the main hallway, near the service elevator. Being a front room, its windows
faced the long balcony overlooking the beach and the ocean. Sea View had the same arrangement
on all floors, with two side halls leading from the main hallway to the balcony on each floor.
Room 712 was just beyond the second hall on the seventh floor.

I rapped on the door and waited about a minute. There was no answer. My passkey sprang
the lock, and I went into the room, the short hair tingling along the back of my neck.

No lights were on in the room, but a sort of gray half-light came in through the two
windows that opened out on the balcony. That was enough to show me the white shape of the
bed and the figure of the man Iying on it. He wasn't moving or making a sound. I stood
just inside the doorway, looking at him for a couple of minutes.

Then I remembered I'd seen two or three men drinking a bit heavily down in the bar,
earlier in the evening. I didn't remember how any of them looked. Hammond was probably
one of them, drunk. I was practically certain of that, but I had to be absolutely certain.
Sea View couldn't stand any trouble, right at the start of the season.

Pawing around, I found the switch and the overhead light went on. Every single hair
on my head stood up by itself as I looked at the man on the bed.


David Hammond was about forty, and he was short and fat. He was wearing blue-and-white
striped pajamas and was Iying on his back. His left arm was flung out, his right hand up
near his head, and near the pudgy fingers of the right hand was the handset of the tele-
phone. The rest of the instrument was on the bedside table. Hammond's eyes were wide open,
staring fixedly at the ceiling. His mouth was open, the lips sagging. There was a brownish-
red stain on the front of his pajamas. It covered a space about as big as two hands. Even
as I looked, I could see the stain spread slowly, crawling. It made cold prickles run up
and down my spine.

A brassy taste started in my mouth, and I could feel cold sweat popping out on my face.
I couldn't do anything for a long time but stand and stare at the man on the bed.

The stain on the front of the pajamas was blood. I could see a small slit in the cloth,
about in the middle of the stain, and I knew it had been made by the blade of a knife. The
slit was about where Hammond's heart should be.

Stiffly, I made it to the bed and stood beside it, looking down at Hammond.

The knife that had killed him wasn't anywhere on the bed, and it was a cinch he hadn't
hidden it after sticking himself. Somebody else had stabbed him, and he'd lived long enough
to grab the telephone handset and groan into the transmitter. The groan Myrtle had heard was
David Hammond dying.