The Four Johns Read Online Free PDF

bright red heads. They remind me of something, I can’t think what. My mother? That can’t be.…”
    Harriet Brill asked cautiously from behind, “Did your mother have red hair?”
    â€œIt’s hard to remember. She died when I was sixteen.”
    â€œOh,” said Harriet.
    â€œIgnore him,” Susie said shortly.
    At Boce’s direction Mervyn turned up Panoramic Way, a narrow and wickedly winding road that led up into the sky, with the reach of the bay spread out far below, and San Francisco a stipple of miniature towers in the hazy west.
    Oleg and Olga Malinski lived in a house of glass and redwood perched incredibly over a cliff. A dozen cars were already parked along the street, and Boce sat on the edge of his seat while Mervyn backed into a parking place.
    Harriet suddenly exclaimed, “John, I’ve been meaning to ask. Did Mary call you yesterday before she left?”
    There was an instant of startled silence. Susie and Mervyn looked at John Boce, whose neck had turned red. “Why should she telephone me?”
    â€œShe spoke to a John and asked him to please be on time. I know it wasn’t you, of course—”
    â€œThen why’d you ask?” growled Boce.
    â€œMary knows lots of Johns,” said Susie indifferently. “Also Petes, Wilburs, Dicks.…”
    â€œAny time you stable this goat I’ll get out,” the bulky accountant snapped at Mervyn.
    Mervyn set the hand brake. “Lead the way.”
    Malinski’s house was essentially one vast living room, with the incidental addition of two or three cubicles for bathing and sleeping. A deck across the entire width of the house hung out over what seemed miles of empty air. Below and beyond spread the gray cities, the leaden bay, the sky, where sunset colors were gathering.
    The cars parked along Panoramic had given John Boce an unjustified fright; only eight or ten guests were in evidence. They had gathered at one end of the deck, where a whole lamb turned over glowing coals. Here stood Oleg Malinski, a small, agile man with a large, excessive head. A bushy mustache covered his wistful pink mouth; his gestures were extravagant. He drank red wine from a beaker of blue Mexican glass, he basted the lamb, he discoursed with emotion and conviction to the captive audience gathered around the spit. Boce hurried to join the group. “Oleg,” he said, “I’ve arrived. What a magnificent sheep!”
    â€œGad!” said someone. “You’ve ruined everything. I can’t stand the idea of eating sheep.”
    â€œSo much more for the rest of us,” said Boce with a pudgy bow. “Anyone else I can bug?”
    Mervyn and Susie and Harriet came out on the deck, and Boce introduced Mervyn. Oleg absently extended the hand that held the basting brush. “Harriet I know. And Susie, of course. Where is your effervescent sister?”
    Susie gave the slightest of shrugs; Harriet spoke in a voice quivering with excitement. “Can you guess? Mary has eloped.”
    Oleg Malinski swung the brush dramatically high. “No! I cannot believe my ears! Who could succeed where I failed?”
    â€œHis name is John,” Harriet said.
    â€œJohn? John who?”
    â€œNot me,” said John Boce. “I plan to drown my sorrows in that sheep.”
    â€œ Please don’t call it sheep!” cried the same someone.
    Mervyn went to the kitchen area to deposit the gallon of red wine he had brought; from a jug already open he filled three glasses, served Susie and Harriet. Oleg Malinski was still dwelling upon Mary’s elopement. “It must be someone we know. Ha there, John Lloyd, are you the guilty one?”
    John Lloyd, a man of forty, thin and brittle as a stick-insect, smiled knowingly. “Would I admit it in the presence of my wife?” His wife, buxom, flat-footed, square-faced, gave him a look of scornful malevolence.
    â€œI think we can consider