Counterfeit Wife Read Free

slightly out of place on her, as though the fabric itself dishearteningly realized that the most cunning tailoring could not hide the full, feminine convolutions of her body. She was bareheaded, with two heavy braids of honey-colored hair wound about her head. She wore no make-up except a great deal of freshly applied and very crimson lipstick. Her face glistened with perspiration.
    When she completed her slow survey of the room with big, wide-open eyes, her lashes came down to make narrow slits of them. Her mouth tightened and she turned purposefully to the nearest ticket counter and asked a question. The clerk’s reply sent her swinging toward the National Airlines counter with that steady and careful manner of placing each foot solidly before the other, a practice of experienced drinkers who are just sober enough to realize they are drunk.
    Men got out of her way and turned to look at her as she passed them by.
    She brushed a small man aside and took his place in front of the Immediate Departures window, planted both elbows on the counter, and thrust her face toward the smiling girl with the freckles on her nose. Her neck was a white column rising from solid shoulders. Wisps of honey-colored hair curled downward behind her ears and lay plastered against her moist skin. Her voice was warm and husky. Not loud, but it carried well, and Shayne heard her question clearly.
    “Has your plane for New Orleans left yet?”
    “Flight Sixty-two has just taken off.”
    The woman’s shoulders lifted slightly, swelling the tight fit of her tailored coat A pulse throbbed in the white flesh on the right side of her throat. She said, “I wonder if my husband managed to get a seat on that plane at the last minute?”
    The girl said, “If you’ll give me his name I’ll check the passenger list.”
    “Dawson,” the woman told her. “But that won’t cut much ice if he was sneaking out on me. He’d probably give another name. It would be in the last ten minutes,” she went on impatiently. “You’d remember him.”
    “The last ten minutes have been very busy,” said the girl. “Perhaps you could give me a description of him.”
    “He’s a little runt. Had on a gray suit. Not a drop of red blood in his body. He’s nobody you’d get excited about—sort of bald and stupid looking. Funny looking eyes on account of they’re brown, and his eyelashes and brows are pure white.”
    Shayne edged closer as he listened. He wondered how a man like Dough-face could be married to a woman like that. There was an impression of tremendous vitality about her. She wasn’t old, not past her middle thirties, yet she gave one the feeling that here was a woman who might have mothered a brood of Vikings, a maiden of Odin straight from the pages of Norse mythology.
    The freckle-nosed girl looked as though she were trying hard not to smile. “I do remember him now, Mrs. Dawson. He didn’t give me his name. He got here just before the take-off,” she went on, stroking her cheek with a forefinger. “He said it was terribly important that he get space on Sixty-two, but there simply wasn’t anything for him. We had no last-minute cancellations tonight.”
    Shayne was standing at the counter, not more than five feet away from the girl as she spoke. He turned slightly, instinctively tugging his hat lower over his face.
    Mrs. Dawson said, “They told me over at the Eastern counter that no other planes have left since then, and that none are due out until morning.” It was more a statement than a question.
    “That’s correct.”
    Mrs. Dawson straightened to her full height. She was at least ten inches over five feet tall, and her body tapered gracefully from heavy shoulders and big breasts to a neat waistline above the spread of wide hips. She turned slowly to study the interior of the waiting-room again with an intent gaze.
    Shayne lit a cigarette and met her eyes from beneath the brim of his hat as her gaze passed over him. Her eyes were blue. A