The Seventh Sinner - Elizabeth Peters [49]
“You think too much,” she said flippantly. “Such men are dangerous.”
“I’ve been thinking about sevens. We all have; we’re hung up on numbers. What is that woman up to, Jean?”
“What do you mean?”
“Two weeks ago you’d never heard of her. Now she’s practically adopted you. What does she want? Are you sure she isn’t queer?”
Jean didn’t know whether to laugh or be angry. Anger won; her nerves weren’t at their best. And in her anger she broke the rule she and Jacqueline had been observing from the first—never to express their suspicions openly.
“Yes, she’s queer! It’s queer, these days, to put yourself out for another human being. Just because she’s trying to keep me from getting killed—”
Michael’s eyes shifted, and Jean turned. Jacqueline had arrived. She was wearing sunglasses: with the inquisitive green eyes hidden, she looked remote and unfamiliar. Her short, sleeveless dress was golden yellow. The purse was held tightly in the curve of her arm.
“Sorry I’m late,” she began. “I couldn’t get—what’s wrong with you two?”
“So that’s it,” Michael said softly. “They weren’t accidents. You believe that too.”
“I didn’t mean to say that,” Jean babbled. “I wasn’t thinking. I mean—”
“Wait a minute.” Jacqueline put a hand on her arm. “Did you say ‘too,’ Michael?”
“What do you think I’ve been following her around for?” Michael made a violent gesture. “I don’t stick around where I’m not wanted unless I’ve got a reason. Why do you think I’ve been prowling around your apartment half the night?”
“You’ve been what?”
“Be quiet, Jean,” Jacqueline interrupted. “I knew he was there. Giorgio told me.”
“Why, that fat pirate!” Michael exploded. “After all the glasses of bianco I’ve bought him, and the sad stories I told him about unrequited love and a rival—”
“He thinks you are a very simpatico young romantic,” Jacqueline said. “But I paid him. Grow up, Michael…. Are you trying to tell us that you’ve been watching Jean in order to protect her? That you are also suspicious of her so-called accidents?”
“Right on.”
“Why?”
“Why was I suspicious? Why were you?”
“All right,” Jacqueline said, with a sigh. “What else strikes you about the situation?”
“That it’s tied in with Albert’s death,” Michael said promptly. “Hell, it’s obvious, isn’t it? You think it was murder, not suicide.”
“What do you think?”
“No reason why not. If I ever met a cat who was asking to be murdered, it was Albert.”
Jean was still speechless. Jacqueline said calmly,
“That’s an interesting contribution. Our problem has been that we couldn’t figure out why anybody would want to kill him.”
“Good Lord, there are fifty reasons.”
“Such as?”
“Ah, hell,” Michael said. “You’re probably being too logical. There never is a good reason for murder, is there? According to your ethos, anyhow. Except maybe to save a crippled child from an ax murderer, and like that. But murders are committed every second of the day, for all kinds of lousy reasons. Albert was a born victim. He was nosy, rude, and insensitive; sooner or later he was bound to stick his nose into something that was none of his business.”
“You’re suggesting that he was killed because he had stumbled on someone’s secret? You know who the suspects are, don’t you?”
Michael’s eyes flickered.
“Sure. That’s obvious. The Seven—your mystic number.”
“Which implies,” said Jacqueline patiently, “that one of you nice young intelligent kids has a guilty secret. It’s hard to believe, Michael.”
“Nice young intelligent kids,” Michael repeated, with a note of wry amusement. “Lady, you are really out of it. We are all cruddy with guilty secrets.”
He looked from one of them to the other, and suddenly anger seized him.
“You think I’m kidding? All right, I’ll show you. What time is it? If we hurry, maybe we can catch him.”
“Who? What are you talking about?”
Michael was already moving, pulling Jean by the hand. She held back, but he was too strong for her. Jacqueline followed, demanding explanations.