Miss Wonderly drew in a shuddering breath and screamed again.
I crossed the room and slapped her face. Her eyes rolled back until only the whites showed and she slid down the wall to the floor. She left two damp marks from her shoulders and hips on the egg-blue paint.
The door flew open and half the world burst in.
I faced them. They came so far and then stopped. They looked at me, they looked at Miss Wonderly and they looked at John Herrick. I looked at them.
There was the reception clerk, the house dick, a bell-hop, two ritzy-looking women, three men in white flannels and a fat man in a lounge suit. Right in front of them all was the evil-faced guy in the green gaberdine suit I’d noticed watching me at the Casino.
The two ritzy dames started screaming as soon as they saw Herrick. I didn’t blame them. I felt like screaming myself. But it made the man in the gaberdine suit mad.
“Get those bitches outa here!” he snarled. “Go on, get out, all of you.”
The reception clerk and the house dick stayed, but the rest of them were shoved out.
When the door closed, the man in the gaberdine suit turned to me.
“What’s going on?” he demanded, clenching his fists and shoving out his jaw.