Read Online Amazing Mrs. Pollifax by Dorothy Gilman - Free Book Online Page B

and he said peevishly, “Damn it, I absolutely loathe being pushed around.” He walked to her side and leaned over Henry. “He’s really dead?”
    “Yes.”
    “What are you going to do with him?”
    It was an interesting question, delivered with the detachment born of shock, but it served to bring Mrs. Pollifax to her senses, which had been badly jarred. “Why—I don’t know,” she said in astonishment, and at once understood that Henry dead could prove an almost insurmountable embarrassment, which was undoubtedly why Stefan had presented him to them. “Good heavens!” she gasped, and stood up.
    “We ought to have followed them,” Colin said. “There’s still the van in the other garage but now it’s too late. If they go far they’re bound to empty the tank, there was less thanfive miles’ worth left. We ought to have followed them. We can’t keep Henry here,” he added.
    “No, we can’t,” said Mrs. Pollifax.
    “Because you don’t have a passport,” he said, as if this explained everything.
    She nodded. “I realize that. But I believe I know what to do with Henry. It’s just struck me. I can take him to Dr. Belleaux.”
    “Who?”
    “I was given the name of a man—a retired professor—to contact in an emergency.”
    “But with a
body
?”
    Mrs. Pollifax thought about this. “I daresay it’s unorthodox,” she admitted, “but if he’s equipped to handle emergencies can you think of any graver emergency than being presented with the body of a man who’s been murdered? We have to consider your uncle, too; this is his garage.”
    “Yes,” Colin said, nodding solemnly.
    “Also,” continued Mrs. Pollifax feverishly, “what else can we do with Henry? Stefan need only make one anonymous phone call to the police and I shall never get my passport back. And I have Dr. Belleaux’s address right here in my purse. He’s highly respected by the Turkish government—”
    “Do you mean Dr. Guillaume Belleaux?” said Colin in surprise.
    “Yes, do you know him?”
    “I’ve heard of him. Everyone has.”
    “Well, I hadn’t. But don’t you see, he can vouch for me to the Turkish police! Of course we can’t tell the police about Magda, but this time there’s your jeep, with a registration number and a traceable license, and I can certainly describe to the police the two men who stole it. With this information the police may very well find both the jeep and the men by morning, and I shall have a clue as to where Magda may be!”
    “Let’s go then,” Colin said, nodding. “The van’s in the other garage. I’ll back it up and we can put—uh—Henry inside.” He disappeared through the door to the office and she heard an engine starting, garage doors open, and then a cumbersome van backed into the courtyard and Colin leaped out. “I think I’ll turn the lights out for this,” he said nervously and pulledthe switch, leaving moonlight their only illumination. “You take his feet, will you? I’ll take his shoulders.”
    Clumsily, slowly, they carried Henry to the van and inserted him into it. This proved extremely difficult because the van’s rear doors had been welded closed—to gain more space inside, Colin explained breathlessly—and Henry had to be lifted up to the high cab of the van. Then it proved impossible to lift him between the two seats and they were forced to let him remain sprawled between the seats in a rather abandoned, drunken pose.
    “I hope Henry doesn’t mind,” Mrs. Pollifax said breathlessly. “I mean his spirit, or whatever lingers behind.”
    “I suppose he’s a spy, too,” Colin said.
    “Probably,” said Mrs. Pollifax with a sigh, “although he was here only to keep an eye on me, to look after me, so to speak. Oh, if only I could have warned him!”
    The van was moving ponderously up the driveway and now turned down Zikzak alley. “You said you have Dr. Belleaux’s address?” asked Colin.
    She disentangled it from the other papers in her purse