"Oh, damn, damn damn!" She jerked angrily at the zipper. "Just when my professor was warming to his subject."
I grinned and the laughter spread through me, silent, exhilarating. Fear and danger seemed very remote.
"I'll tell the man to go away," I said.
I was still grinning broadly when I pulled open the door. Two uniformed policemen confronted me, their faces hard and unsmiling.
8
"I don't understand," I said.
"It's a simple question," Sgt. Bullock said, shifting his broad and solid buttocks on the small pedestal chair in front of the desk. "Do you know a girl named Lois Worthington?"
"I don't know. I know a girl named Lois, a waitress at a little restaurant near the university. But—"
"That's the one." The sergeant glanced meaningfully at his partner, who abruptly tore his gaze away from Laurie. She sat on the couch under the window, her legs drawn up under her, her face extraordinarily cool and composed under the flaming hair.
"I don't really know her," I said. "I mean, I've just met her in the Dugout."