Seven Kinds of Death Read Online Free PDF Page A

it, for Christ’s sake!” Since the piece was five feet tall and massive at the base, with shiny metal here and there, and several kinds of wood here and there, it was unlikely that anyone would trip over it.
    Toni and Janet Cuprillo had entered the house in time to hear this exchange. Janet had been Toni’s roommate in the beginning. She was very pretty, with short black hair shingled in the back; her brown eyes were almond shaped and beautiful, with long, long lashes. She was extremely talented, everyone agreed, but within days Toni had come to realize that words were not the same for Janet as for other people. She liked some more than others for the way they sounded, or the way they looked, and she rarely gave a lot of thought to what they meant.
    She had summed up John Buell for Toni during her first week here. Johnny took the world seriously. Living was a serious matter with him. Like a saint with arrows sticking out all over, he bled a lot. Toni had looked at her with incomprehension. “You know,” Janet said, “he has a mission and if he has to suffer for it, that’s fine with him. That’s what a serious person does, suffers and bleeds if he has to, but he gets his mission done.”
    “A mission?” Toni had echoed.
    “Like missionary? A message to give. In his case buildings to build.”
    This was the day that Toni had come to realize that Janet took a lot of interpreting. Mission, message? Buildings as message? She wasn’t sure what Janet had meant, but the gist of her comments was clear enough. Johnny was a serious young man with an important job. He took work seriously, took Marion seriously. The Max Buell Company was building a multimillion-dollar condominium complex a mile away from Marion’s house, and Johnny took that most seriously of all. Then, Janet had added dreamily, if he weren’t already engaged, she’d go for him. But as it was she was indivisible, and so was Toni.
    Invisible, Toni decided, and that was fine with her. As far as she was concerned, Johnny’s attitude was no more false and unreal than his father’s: Max Buell seemed to find everything amusing, and took nothing seriously; Johnny found nothing amusing and everything was serious. He was unreal, and Janet, who was only twenty-one, was almost as unreal as Johnny.
    Toni and Janet had stayed back out of the way while the movers strained getting Seven Kinds of Death in place; both young women were grimy with sweat and caked dust from the work in the barn, Janet nursing a splinter in her finger, and anxious to go give it a soak. After the movers left, they started up the stairs, but stepped aside once more as Max Buell came down. Unlike his son, he not only saw them but everything about them, every smudge, every scrape, every speck of dirt. He grinned as he passed them on his way to the living room.
    “Message for you,” he said to Marion. “Your friend Paul Volte is bringing a lady friend with him.” Max was as tall as his son, and heavier, thicker in the shoulders and chest. His face was weathered dark brown, and there were crinkly lines at his eyes. He walked to the piece in the center of the room and whistled. “Hey, that looks like hot shit there! Marion, I think it’s just dandy!”
    “He’s bringing someone,” Marion said in a grating voice. “I don’t suppose we know if the lady friend will want a separate bedroom, do we? My God, I’m going mad! I’ve rearranged sleeping accommodations a dozen times already! Why didn’t he tell me weeks ago? That bastard! He didn’t even tell me he was coming. What does he think, I’m running a goddam hotel or something?”
    Max chuckled. “I don’t think you need worry about it. It’s that lady editor, and from what little I know about things like that, I think you could call them real friendly.”
    At the doorway Toni gasped and clutched the framework to steady herself. Not Victoria! He wouldn’t! She was aware that they were all watching her as she turned and fled