He shook his head wisely. "They always pretend they're going to, but actually they just want to snag skirts. I've picked up rippers with as many as fifty skirt-snags tacked up in their rooms. Of course, sometimes they come a little too close."
I explained that if I hadn't yanked her out of the way, she'd have been hit by more than hooks. But he interrupted, "If she'd thought it was a real murder attempt, she'd have stayed here."
I looked around. It was true. She was gone.
"She was fearfully frightened," I told him.
"Who wouldn't be? Those kids would have scared old Stalin himself."
"I mean frightened of more than 'kids.' They didn't look like 'kids.'"
"What did they look like?"
I tried without much success to describe the three faces. A vague impression of viciousness and effeminacy doesn't mean much.
"Well, I could be wrong," he said finally. "Do you know the girl? Where she lives?"
"No," I half lied.