Twinkle, Twinkle, "Killer" Kane Read Online Free PDF Page A

followed Fell. Kane strode behind him, averting his gaze from the inmates.
    “‘Ten— hut! ” commanded Groper, saluting as Kane walked by the formation. Kane heard the men, in chorus, crying: “Hail! Hail, Caesar!”
    Kane stopped. He turned and looked. The inmates’ arms were stiffly upraised in their wonted form of salute. Groper stood rigid, cheeks turned carmine. Kane did not move; not at all. But his eyes brushed over the men, brushed over each of them in series; and abruptly held fast on Cutshaw; on his blue, unblinking eyes staring intently into his own. Each man felt a current leaping out at him from the other; each man sensed some mystery, challenging and perilous.
    Kane turned to Groper, returned his salute. “Carry on,” he said flatly. Then walked slowly into the mansion. But at the door he paused and turned. And even at that distance, Captain Cutshaw’s eyes found him. He was watching him; still watching. Kane’s large and sinewy fingers gently brushed along his face, tracing a memory, an ugliness, that a Korean plastic surgeon had effaced for him years ago: a scar that had jagged like lightning from his eye to the base of his jaw.

Chapter 4
    Mary Jo Mawr knew the value of time; but she spent it in the belief that someday time would return the favor. Thirty and attractive, she was a warm beach, waiting—waiting for some promise calling her name across endless hope. She knew that he would come. Although there were days when she had her doubts; days when she hated her work, hated the sun-browned laughing girls who were always young while they were with her and usually married when they left. She was resident dean of women at the Consuelo Endicott College for Girls. Now she walked along its corridors whiffing chalk and perfumed cashmere.
    “Oh, Miss Mawr?”
    Mawr eyed the senior who had fallen in step with her, a honey-haired lisper named Sloop. Clydene Sloop. She wore braces on her teeth and clearly needed them for her head, which was largely stuffed with the lurid contents of unexpurgated editions. She slunk.
    “May I be excused from gym?” wheedled Sloop.
    “No,” drawled Mawr in her laconic Vassar pucker. “You may not. You need to lose weight.” It was one of those days when she hated sunsets.
    “My, I think I’m rather svelte,” gritted Sloop.
    “I think you are rather fat, Miss Sloop, and I’ll not endure any insolence.”
    “ In solence?”
    “Insolence. An inevitable derivative of overweening pride.” Clydene was the daughter of the Secretary of Defense. And she damn well knows it, thought Miss Mawr with a splash of venom. She halted abruptly, putting her hand on the knob of a door that was marked “Founder.” “Onward to gym, Miss Sloop,” she ordered, adding, “Fight Fiercely, Endicott!” Then pushing open the door, she glided into the Founder’s office.
    “Snot!” breathed Clydene. Then jiggled down the corridor with yards of slink to spare.
    “Miss Mawr, Miss Mawr, what now, what now? What are we at, eh? What? What’s the game, what’s the—? Whoop! Here, now, where are my glasses? Where, where, where? Where have I put them?” Miss Consuelo Endicott sent fumbling pink fingers crackling through papers on her desk while Miss Mawr eased into a chair, flipping her hair back from her eyes. Mawr’s nostrils twitched inquiringly as the Founder recovered her glasses, putting them on with delicate care. Mawr had her suspicions but had never been quite sure: Scotch or bourbon, she couldn’t tell which; breath is such a personal thing.
    “Now, then, Miss Mawr.” The Founder’s hands were clasped studiously under a still beautiful face; still beautiful at fifty, even with dissipation. She dyed her hair, Mawr knew well; but, why not, she thought, why not? Maybe she was waiting, too. “Precisely what is it you wished to see me about?”
    “I believe you sent for me. The inmates?”
    “Inmates?” The Founder’s eyes glazed over, gave her the look of a cocker spaniel