"MacDonald, John - Travis McGee 06 - Bright Orange for the Shroud" - читать интересную книгу автора (MacDonald John D)

"I guess because he kept dropping in." I sensed reservations.

"There must have been something else."

"I'd rather not say."

"Any little thing might help."

"It... it isn't a decent kind of talk, and I don't want you thinking the wrong thing of me for staying on where that kind

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of thing was going on. It's not I'm an old maid. I was married twelve years to Mr. Mooney, God rest his soul, and had three dear babies who died, every one of them, breaking my heart every time, and breaking it for good when Mr. Mooney passed away in such terrible pain it was a blessing when it ended. What happened, it was an afternoon not long before they had to give up the house, and Mrs. Wilkinson and that Boo fellow were out by the pool, side by side in those tip back chairs, her keeping her face turned up to the sunshine. The mister had gone into town for some reason, and I just happened to look out the utility room window where I was sorting laundry. I was looking at them sideways, sort of, her in a naked little white suit, the bottom part like a little narrow band with fringe on it. And I just happened to see him reach over slow and put... put his hand down into her lap. It came into my mind that she was sleeping and she'd wake up fighting mad. But she didn't move. You know how you want to stop looking at something and you're kind of froze? When she did move... it was just to make things a little bit easier for him, her face still turned up for the sun and her eyes closed. When she did that, I stopped looking, and I worked like a crazy woman, throwing those clothes around, getting them all mixed up, so I had to sort them all out again, spilling soap all over when I got them in the machine. When I heard them sploshing around I looked out and by then they were in the pool, laughing around. I knew then and there that the mister had a wicked wife, and I made my plans to give notice the end of the month, but before I could tell them, they told me they were giving up the beach house. That Boo man was around there a lot, and by then, those last weeks, Mr. Stebber and the sick one had gone away, back to Tampa I guess."

"Tampa?" I said it so loudly I startled her.

"Well, of course, it being where he lives."

"How are you sure of that?"

"Because I'm a real good cook. Mr. Mooney, God rest him, said I was the best he ever knew of. And that man loved to eat. I don't measure things. I just put things together the way they seem right. I did restaurant work once, but I hated it. There you have to measure everything because you have to make so much. I'm not lying when I say there've been visitors down here of-

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I

fered me more money than I'd care to mention to go back north with them. Mr. Stebber is one of those who lives for eating. You can tell it. Mostly it's fat happy men like him. They shut their eyes when they take the first taste, and they make a little moan and smile all over themselves. He came out there to the kitchen at that beach house and said it was just between the two of us, and when the Wilkinsons didn't need me any more, I should come to Tampa to cook for him. He said I'd have no heavy housework, and my own room and bath with color television. He said he was away a lot and when he was away it would be like a vacation for me. He said that I'd never have to cook for more than seven or eight at the most, and that wouldn't be often. He said he had a great big apartment in one of those cooperative places, looking out over Tampa Bay, with a colored woman that came in by the day to do the heavy housework.

"Well, I told him that I just couldn't bring myself to move that far away from Mr. Mooney's grave. The three babies lived a little while, every one, long enough to have their names given to them, Mary Alice and Mary Catherine and Michael Francis, marked on the stones. There isn't a Sunday no matter how I might feel or how the weather is, I don't go out and neaten up the plot and set there and feel close to the only family I ever had.

"He said again that it was just between us, and if I changed my mind later on, then I could call him up, but the number' wasn't in the book, and he gave it to me and told me not to lose it. But on that very next Sunday out there it seemed to me that Mr. Mooney somehow knew I was carrying that number in my pocketbook, so I took it out then and there and tore it up and let the wind blow it away. Are you sure it wasn't just maybe the missus and that Boo fellow cheated the mister?" "They were all in on it, Mrs. Mooney." "I do declare. You never can tell, can you? And they cheated that Mr. Watts too?"

"I think that's a very accurate statement." "I can't think of anything else that would help." "Do you know a redheaded girl named Dilly Starr?" "I can't say as I do. I guess a person would remember a name like that."

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"Or a Miss Brown, possibly Mr. Stebber's secretary?"

"Her neither," she said. "Is Mr. Wilkinson all right?"

"He's fine."

"Kindly give him my regards when you see him. He's a nice person. I suppose she ran off. Well, that's good riddance. I guess he couldn't help himself with her. When she was mad at him, she'd treat him like she treated me all the time, like a piece of furniture, wouldn't let him anywheres near her, and when he did exactly like she wanted, then she was... after him all the time. A woman shouldn't use that to break a man's spirit. That part of it is a wife's duty." She shook her head and clucked. "That little woman had him so he didn't know what end was up or what time of day it was. It makes a man a living fool."

When I thanked her for giving me the time, she said, "I'm glad you came by, Mr. McGee. It took my mind off the way I feel, and maybe I can drop off to sleep now. I hope the mister gets his money back."

At ten thirty I stopped at a gas station and picked up a road map to refresh my memory about distances in that sparsely settled area. I was wondering about taking the thirty or forty minute drive to Marco Island and seeing if I could locate Waxwell, but I didn't have any sound ideas about the approach. The radio news, announcing thunderstorms moving in from the Gulf, estimated to hit the area about midnight, made up my mind for me. I went to the marina, parked and locked the green Chev, and took a cautious fifty minutes driving the Ratfink home through unfamiliar waters.

The lovers had the lights out and the Flush buttoned up. I unlocked the after door to the lounge and went in and put some lights on. In a few minutes Chook came aft, into the lounge, black hair a-tangle, pulling and settling a flowered shift down on her hearty hips, squinting through the light at me.