I did a couple of dives from the springboard, went out on one of the fiber mats and let the sun soak into my skin, then I went in, took a shower, came out and sat at one of the tables.
Dolores came over and said, “Melita Doon will be here for lunch. She came in on the morning plane. Buck’s gone to pick her up.”
“Know anything about her?” I asked.
“Only that she’s a nurse, in her late twenties. She should be okay.”
A man’s voice said, “Hey, Dolores, show my wife how to do that backstroke, will you?”
“I certainly will,” she said and leaned intimately forward to hold my eyes for a minute. “See you later, Donald,” she said, and was gone.
After that, she was a perfect swimming instructor, then she supervised exercises with some of the women who wanted to take off a few pounds where it counted, and then the guests straggled away to the showers to get ready for lunch.
Melita Doon arrived about twelve-thirty. Dolores Ferrol went out to meet her while Buck Kramer took her things into her cabin. She had Cabin number 2, right next to mine.
As they walked past where I was sitting, Dolores gave me a purposeful glance, then looked back to Melita Doon and let her eyes run up and down Melita’s figure, the way one woman will when she’s sizing up another.
Melita was a blonde, about twenty-six or — seven, not over five feet two or three, and perfectly proportioned. There wasn’t an ounce of weight on her that didn’t belong, but she had all the things that did belong, although on a small scale. She walked with an easy grace, her legs slender and aristocratic.
The thing that caught my eye was her eyes.
She flashed me one swift look then glanced away, but I could see that her eyes were hazel and uneasy. She looked frightened.
Then the girls went on past me toward the cabin.
Dolores knew that I would be watching them from the rear and exaggerated the swing of her hips just slightly so that I’d know she knew I was watching.
They were still in Cabin number 2 when the luncheon bell rang.
Lunch was out by the pool. It was fruit salad, consomme, with hot biscuit and chipped beef in creamed gravy.
Buck Kramer sauntered over while I was eating. “All alone?” he asked.
I nodded.
Kramer sank into the chair on the opposite side of the table.
This wasn’t what I had in mind. I was hoping that Dolores would bring Melita out and we’d have a chance to get acquainted, but there was no way I could turn Buck down without being rude him.
“Lunch?” I asked.
“Not this stuff,” Buck said, waving his hand in an inclusive gesture. “I eat in the kitchen. I like a little more meat and a little less fruit. How did you like that horse?”
“Fine.”
“He’s a nice horse. We don’t let everybody ride him.”
“Thanks.”
“Don’t thank me. He needs the exercise; but you know how it is, you let a good horse out to a poor rider and in no time at all the rider is just as bad as he ever was and the horse is just as bad as the rider.
“People don’t realize it, but horses are very sensitive to a rider. They know people. The minute you put your foot in a stirrup and pick up the reins, the horse knows just about all you know about riding. By the time you’ve settled yourself in the saddle and give him the first turn signal, he can tell all about you, whether you take your coffee black or with cream and sugar.”
Kramer grinned.
“You seem to be a pretty good judge of riders,” I said.
“You have to be in this business... Take the guy that comes out with a new pair of cowboy boots, a tailor-made Pendleton out: fit, a five-gallon hat and a silk scarf around his neck. He swaggers over and says he’d like to have a horse that is a little better than the average dude horse. He hates to be at the tail end of the procession.
“You look the guy over and if he’s wearing spurs the first thing you do is to tell him that it’s one of the regulations of the ranch that guests can’t wear spurs. Then you watch how he takes the spurs off, and by that time you know enough about him to give him one of the oldest, safest plugs on the place.
“That day he’ll give you a ten-dollar tip and tell you he’d like a better horse for the next day. He has a girl friend that he wants to impress. He tells you about the riding he’s done in Montana, Idaho, Wyoming and Texas.”
“What do you do?” I asked.
“Take the ten bucks and give him another plug the next day. If you gave the guy a real horse, he’d have a runaway and wind up either falling off or getting bucked off.”
“Doesn’t he resent getting a plug after he’s given you ten bucks?”
“In a way,” Kramer said, “but you have a line that goes with It. You tell him he’ll have to be alert; that that horse is usually very demure but if he could take advantage of a rider he would. You say that he spilled a couple of people last year and since that time you’ve never dared to put anyone on him except an expert rider.
“The guy goes and tells his girl all about that, gives you ten bucks more, and tells you it’s a good horse and he wants to have him all the time he’s here.”
Kramer yawned.
Dolores came out of Cabin number 2, stood in the door waiting, caught my eye, saw Buck sitting there and went back into the cabin.
“You’ve eaten already?” I asked Buck.
“No, I’m going to eat now.”
He scraped back his chair, looked down at me and said, “You know, Lam, if you don’t mind my saying so, there’s something a little peculiar about you.”
“How come?”
He said, “You’re not talking.”
“Am I supposed to talk?”
“Hell,” he said, “people come out here and spill their guts, particularly the people who can ride. They tell me about the dude ranches they’ve been at, the camping trips they’ve been on, the hours they’ve spent in the saddle... Where the hell did you learn to ride?”
“I don’t ride,” I said. “I just sit on the horse.”
He snorted and walked away.
No sooner had he left than Dolores came out of the cabin bringing Melita Doon with her. They walked over toward the main house, then abruptly Dolores swung over my way and said, “Miss Doon, let me present my friend, Donald Lam.”
I rose and bowed. “Pleased to meet you,” I said.
Hazel eyes surveyed me with a frankness that I found embarrassing.
“Hello,” she said, and gave me her hand.
It was a cool hand with slender but strong fingers.
She had changed to riding clothes now, a tailored outfit showed her slender figure to advantage.
“It’s just at the lunch hour,” Dolores said to Melita Doon, “and I’m famished... Look, Donald, why don’t we sit here with you? You seem to be all alone.”
“That,” I said, “would be wonderful.”
Dolores caught the eye of one of the waiters and beckoned him. I drew up some chairs for the two girls. They seated themselves.
Dolores said, “Donald and I are buddies... He’s nice.”
Melita smiled at me.
A waiter came and took orders.
Melita studied me with a certain frank curiosity that was far from the casual scrutiny a girl on vacation would give a stranger.
I had a sudden flash of panic as I wondered if Dolores had been a little too obvious in plugging me to Melita. Dolores was a girl who didn’t waste time, and Melita was a girl who didn’t overlook the obvious — and there were times when Dolores could be pretty darned obvious.
We were halfway through the meal when Buck Kramer came over with a telephone message for Dolores. “Helmann Bruno is going to be in on the three-thirty plane,” he said.