She smiled. "'The maid who laughs is half taken.'"
"Fifteenth century, I believe."
"Something like that. But it's true. I like your jokes on the set. Everybody else is so concerned about the show. But you-"
She touched her mouth to his again.
He felt transported back to 1958 and the St. Michael's gym. He was moving as one about the floor with Mary Sue O'Hallahan. He knew she knew he had an erection that threatened to cause him a heart attack. He wondered if she minded. That had always been the big mystery in those days-did girls actually want you to get erections or did they just sort of put up with it when you did?
All these long years later, he was getting his answer.
"My cabin or yours?" she said easily.
And then he happened to glance over her shoulder-actually through her armpit, his level of vision not reaching her shoulder-and saw Todd Ames in his Robin Hood getup start to leave the celebrity dais.
Tobin assumed he was going one of two places. To the biffy or to Tobin's cabin.
Tobin would lay even money on the latter.
"Could we," he said miserably, "meet a little later?"
Pressed against him, and breathless as he, she said, "Later? Tobin, are you crazy?"
"I know. And I'm sorry. But…"
She stared at him with her overly made-up eyes (wasn't there a hooker someplace on God's own planet who didn't wear any makeup at all). With a quiet air of disbelief in her voice, she said, "You having some problems?"
"No."
"I mean, we don't have to jump on top of each other. Sometimes men your age-well, I love necking myself. It's like high school again."
Wretchedly, he watched Todd Ames leave the restaurant.
And all he could do was break and run.
"Tobin!" she shouted. "Tobin! You get back here!"
But by now Ames had vanished and Tobin was worried that he wouldn't be able to beat him back to his cabin.
He had to climb three flights of stairs and run down what seemed endless miles of corridor. He was sweating and panting and just about ready to barf when he reached his cabin door.
He pushed his ear to the wood and listened.
Party sounds floated up from below; a sky gorgeous with summer stars spread with radiant beauty round the entire world.
From inside, nothing.
Quickly, he inserted his key and ducked into his cabin.
29
Todd Ames had apparently gone to the John because twenty minutes after entering his cabin Tobin had neither heard from nor seen the man.
Which caused a certain degree of resentment in Tobin. Standing up in a corner of the dark closet was not fun. At least it was big and mostly empty but still it was dull, particularly given the fact that Tobin had abandoned the chance to have some sort of tryst with Susan Richards to be here.
All he could do now, unfortunately, was wait. The large dusty closet was lit only by corridor light spilling into the louvered door.
Ten minutes later he had to risk going to the bathroom. He just couldn't hold it anymore.
He ran in and did the deed and ran back.
He'd just gotten the closet door closed when he heard footsteps coming down the corridor.
Tobin had made it easy for whoever might want to claim the personal effects of Iris Graves and Everett Sanderson.
He'd put everything right in the middle of the bed.
All the thief had to do was rummage through it, take what he or she wanted, and then Tobin would spring from the closet and trap the person.
It sure sounded simple enough…
The cabin doorknob rattled as it was turned first rightward and then leftward.
Tobin's heart began pounding so loudly he wondered if the intruder could hear it. Sweat started collecting under his arms and down his back and in his shoes. Flop sweat.
The door creaked open.
Either the intruder possessed burglary tools or knew how to use a credit card. The door creaked shut.
A dark form stood in the center of the cabin, looking around, as if he suspected that he was indeed being spied upon.
No problem identifying the person. There'd been only one cowboy at the costume party tonight. Jere Farris.
The cowboy outfit had included a pair of spurs, which did not exactly lend themselves to stealth. As Farris crossed the room to the bed, thumbing on a flashlight whose beam was yellow and lurid in the gloom, his spurs began to jangle.
Farris set to work.
He went through the box belonging to Sanderson first. He picked up a variety of items, examined each, and then put them back.
Next he went through Iris Graves's material and it was here that he paused at great length, especially when he came to the notebook Tobin had so thoughtfully set out.
He thumbed through the pages to the middle section where she'd done most of her writing on the "Celebrity Circle" show. Then he said, "Sonofabitch."
Obviously Farris knew that Iris Graves had known something about the "Circle" crew.
The next set of footsteps were lighter than Farris's had been.
Both Tobin and Farris froze and stared at the cabin door, the knob of which was being shaken in a hopeless attempt to rattle it open.
Tobin watched Farris panic-whip his head around, his white Stetson nearly falling off, searching desperately for a place to hide.
Where else in a cabin like this could you hide?
The person at the cabin door now applied a credit card, just as Farris himself had done.
Farris stuffed the book inside his vest and started for the closet.
Wanting to see who else was coming to steal something from his cabin, Tobin obligingly opened the closet door and then put a finger to his lips and made a big sssshing! sound.
Farris, startled, almost yelled out something in surprise but Tobin gave him a double sssh! and that took care of him.
Tobin grabbed Farris by the wrist, yanked him inside, and then waited to see who came in next.
She had some kind of lantern, one of those bulky jobs you take camping to Montana. It looked all wrong with her Bo Peep getup. You would have thought that Cassie McDowell would have elected something more graceful and feminine.
Like Farris, she stood in the dark, orienting herself first. But it didn't take long for her to find the things piled on the bed. Tobin had put everything but a STEAL ME QUICK sign on the stuff.
Several times Farris in his goofy cowboy clothes leaned toward Tobin as if he wanted to whisper something but Tobin pointed a finger at him, implying that he'd punch Farris for making any sound at all.
Cassie went through the material in much the same order Farris had. Something seemed to interest her in Sanderson's belongings, though from the angle of the closet, Tobin could not see what. Then she began to work through Iris Graves's things.
Or started to, anyway.
She'd no more than lifted Iris's reporter's pad when somebody could be heard moving down the corridor.
Cassie stopped, killed the lantern.
In the shadows Tobin could hear all three of them breathing. They sounded as if they'd been running up and down stairs.
A hand wrenched the cabin doorknob.
"Oh, shit," Cassie said, though not loudly enough to be heard in the corridor.
Her eyes searched frantically about the cabin and came to rest, of course, on the louvered closet door.
Tobin opened it up, stuck out his head, grabbed her elbow, and jerked her in, clamping a hand over her mouth for good measure.
He got the closet door closed and then the three of them-Tobin, Cassie, and Farris (who'd moved down one, the way used-up guests did on the Carson show)-watched as Tarzan came into the room.
Kevin Anderson, macho guy that he was, had not brought a light along. Presumably this was because of his X-ray vision.