Frankly My Dear, I'm Dead. Livia J Washburn

Чтение книги онлайн.

СКАЧАТЬ

      And my hopes for a perfect tour were disappearing with every yell.

      CHAPTER 3

      The lights were still down, the newsreel playing on the big screen that had rows of seats curving in front of it. The glare from the screen was enough for me to see what was going on. A couple of men must have started fighting, and others had stepped in to pull them apart. Luke, in fact, had hold of a man I recognized as one half of the couple that had come all the way from Germany to visit the Southern states.

      One of the security guards was hanging on to the other combatant—who was none other than the amorous Elliott Riley, definitely wearing a rug. I could tell that because it was skewed sideways a little on his head from the tussle.

      “He is a thief!” the German shouted as he glared at Riley. “A thief, I tell you! He tried to steal my camera!”

      “I never touched his blasted camera,” Riley insisted. “Let go of me, damn it.”

      The other members of the group who were in the room, including Amelia and Augusta, were watching the confrontation like it was more interesting than what was on the screen. I suppose it was. It’s not often you see two grown men throwing punches at each other in public.

      But all I felt at the moment was anger that something had gone wrong with my tour. My first tour. The one that was supposed to be perfect.

      This was one instance when having a temper and a loud voice came in handy. I stepped closer and said, “Settle down, both of you. This isn’t a bar or a boxing ring.”

      “He stole—” the German tourist began.

      “I never—” Riley began.

      “Hush!”

      They all looked at me, including Luke and the security guard, and I realized that my voice had been really loud that time.

      Amelia and Augusta said in unison, “Whoa.”

      I tried to tone it down some as I went on. “Look, you’re ruining the tour for everybody else. Why don’t we step out of the screening room and try to settle this somewhere else, where we won’t be disturbing folks?”

      “We can go in the security office,” the guard suggested.

      I nodded. “That’s just what I’m talking about. Luke, you take over the tour for a few minutes.”

      “Hadn’t I better go with you?” he asked with a frown.

      “No, I want you looking after the clients. I’m sure I’ll be fine with—” I looked at the guard.

      He supplied his name. “Dave.”

      “I’m sure I’ll be fine with Dave,” I went on, “and anyway, Mr. Riley and”—I searched my memory for the German’s name and came up with it—“Mr. Riley and Mr. Mueller are going to settle down and behave themselves. Aren’t you, boys?”

      Both of them looked sullen. Mueller said, “I believe the police should be summoned.”

      “Fine with me,” Riley said. “They can arrest this Kraut for attacking me and making wild accusations.”

      Mueller’s face started to turn red again. “Kraut? Kraut?”

      I took hold of Riley’s arm and hustled him out of there while Dave followed with Mueller.

      I felt a sense of relief when the door of the security office closed behind us. At least this commotion wouldn’t be distracting my other clients from the tour anymore. But I still had to deal with Riley and Mueller and try to make peace between them. They glared at each other from opposite sides of the room. I wished the office was a little bigger so they wouldn’t be within fist-swinging distance of each other.

      “Now,” I said, “what happened out there?” They both opened their mouths to yap at me, so I pointed to the German and added, “You first, Mr. Mueller.”

      “Why does he get to go first?” Riley asked before Mueller could say anything, reminding me of the argument between my nieces a few days earlier. Riley sounded just about as mature as they had.

      “Because he’s a guest in our country and we’re going to be polite.”

      Riley gave a surly shrug and didn’t say anything else.

      “This man was sitting behind me and my wife,” Mueller said. “I felt my camera move and looked down to see his hand on the case. He was trying to steal it.”

      “That’s not true and you know it,” Riley said.

      The benches that formed the rows of seating in the screening room had no backs to them, so it would have been easy enough to reach forward and try to sneak something away from whoever was sitting in front of you, I supposed. But Mueller had the strap attached to his camera case looped over his shoulder, so I didn’t see how anyone, even the slickest thief in the world, could have hoped to slip it away from him without being noticed.

      On the other hand, maybe Riley had intended to open the case and take the camera out of it, leaving the case where it was. That might have worked, although he would have to be pretty daring to attempt that in the middle of a crowd. Some thieves are downright brazen, though.

      “Is your camera worth a lot of money, Mr. Mueller?” I asked.

      “It is a fine camera. I paid”—he paused to do the math in his head—“what would amount to four hundred of your American dollars for it.”

      A four-hundred-dollar camera was pretty expensive, all right, but not something that was fabulously valuable. I had no idea how much a thief could have gotten for it, but surely quite a bit less than its retail value. Steal enough stuff, though, and I supposed it would be a living, despite getting only pennies on the dollar for it.

      “Did anybody else see Mr. Riley try to take your camera?” I asked.

      “Of course not,” Riley said, “because I didn’t do it.”

      I shushed him and turned back to Mueller. He frowned and asked, “How would I know what the others saw?”

      “Nobody spoke up to say you were right,” I pointed out.

      “Naturally, they would take the side of a fellow countryman over a foreigner.”

      I wasn’t sure that was true; most folks were still pretty honest, or so I liked to think.

      “Look, you’ve still got your camera, so no harm was done,” I said. I took a deep breath, hating to do what came next, but I didn’t see any other option. “If you want your money back, I’ll be glad to refund it.”

      Now that was a bald-faced lie. I wouldn’t be glad to refund what he had paid for the tour at all. But I knew from my years working at one of Atlanta’s largest travel agencies that you’ve got to have a reputation for being honest and trustworthy if you want to succeed in business. I would give Mueller his money back if I had to—but I wouldn’t like it.

      Mueller sniffed. “My wife is СКАЧАТЬ