All Heads Turn When the Hunt Goes By Read Online Free PDF Page B

to do. Bull Pete, will you listen to me?"
    He sobbed once more, and was done with it, although I doubted the misery would ever leave his eyes. He hadn't been there. No thought that he was needed, not on Clipper's wedding day. Still, he would blame himself.
    I ordered Jenner to back up to the private car. "Find something I can use for a crutch," I said to Jenner.
    Brakestone helped me aboard. It was dim and cool in Boss's car. The butler's pantry was empty. I knocked and waited and knocked again, banging the door with my fist. No one answered. I had Brakestone wait and let myself in.
    The long railroad car was divided, half parlor, half bedroom. The parlor, Boss's domain, was unoccupied. Fine paintings and books and gaming tables for the serious cardplayers Boss liked to have with him on a trip. The odors of humidors. I made my way from one piece of Victorian furniture to another, my left leg all but useless. The slightest pressure created extravagant pains. And my face hurt from the plaster dust.
    I leaned against the bedroom door and pounded. "Nhora," I said, "it's Champ. Please let me in."
    Again there was no answer.
    Fumbling with the gold knob, I found the door unlocked. I went into the Venetian baroque bedroom. No tobacco allowed here. The air was cool but somewhat stale. Conflicting odors: woodsmoke, Ivory soap, a mild antiseptic, a sachet sweetness, the tantalizing cologne Nhora wore infrequently. In the gray, artificial twilight of this traveling palace, painted cherubs lolled on the ceiling. I saw silk sheets lying in a tangle on the carpet outside the absurd tented bower where Nhora and Boss made their bed, and a set of discarded ice bags. A lax bare leg protruded through the layers of diaphanous curtain. I was startled and felt ill, imagining for the moment some further disaster had occurred. She seemed so lifeless.
    Then without warning Nhora sat up in alarm. "What is it? Who is that?"
    "Champ," I said, my voice a croak. I cleared my throat. "Nhora, I have to tell you—there's been—" I was trying to move toward her, but I miscalculated the strength of a brocaded armchair and in leaning on it broke its back. I fell. Nhora gasped and scrambled from the bed and kneeled beside me. I put a hand on her and discovered she was completely naked. At my touch I felt a faint velvety tremor, but she didn't shy away.
    "Champ, are you hurt?"
    "No. Clumsy. I'm all right."
    "Champ—I don't have anything on. Wait—"
    Nhora left me sitting there and walked quickly to the other end of the bedroom; I glimpsed her putting on her robe. Then she reached up and turned on a hanging crystal lamp. Even barefoot she was a very tall woman, only a fraction under six feet.
    She turned and looked at me and was horrified. She clutched her abdomen and I remembered the appendicitis attack, which perhaps had saved her life today. I could well imagine how I appeared to Nhora as I grimly pulled myself to my feet.
    "What—what—there's blood—my God, have you had an accident?"
    I made her sit down, in a boudoir rocker that was too small for her. Then I told her the full, appalling story. There was no way to spare either of us, but for Nhora it was like surgery without anesthetic. I suppose I had expected a different reaction, given her size and proportions—Amazonian stoicism. Possibly I had always underestimated the depth of her feeling for Boss. But she cried like a child. She rocked and groaned and finally screamed for me to stop. But she couldn't stop rocking, although she was nearly doubled over in the chair.
    There was a decanter half-full of Irish whiskey on the marble pedestal table I was using for support. I was awkward, I spilled it all over both of us, but I got her to drink some of it. It may not have been the best thing for someone with a problem appendix, but the whiskey that went down soon had a restorative effect. She gulped hard a couple of times, looked vaporous, mumbled an apology and hurried into the