Death Before Bedtime Read Online Free Page A

mechanical, a part of the paraphernalia of public office rather than sincere good spirits. He eyed Ellen and myself suspiciously all evening and I began to wonder just how long my job was going to last. I cursed Ellen to myself, fervently, furiously … her announcement that we were engaged had messed up everything.
    The other guests seemed uneasy, except for Verbena Pruitt who matched the Senator laugh for laugh, joke for joke in a booming political voice.
    Brandy was served with coffee and Senator Rhodes, turning to Roger Pomeroy whom he had ignored most of the evening, said, “Got some good cigars in the study. Want one?”
    “No thank you, Lee,” said the other. “I’ve had to give up the habit … heart.”
    “None of us are getting any younger!” snorted Miss Pruitt over her brandy, a hairpin falling softly to the carpet.… His eye is on the hairpin, I thought irreverently.
    “I’m sound as a bell,” said the Senator striking his chest a careful blow. He did not look very sound, though. I noticed how pale he was, how one eyelid twitched, how his hands shook as he lighted a cigar for himself. He was an old man.
    “The Senator has the stamina of ten men,” said little Sir Echo, Rufus Hollister, smugly.
    “He’ll need it, too, if he’s going after that nomination,” said Miss Pruitt with a wink. “Won’t you, Lee?”
    “Now who told you I was interested in the nomination?” said Senator Rhodes with an attempt at roguishness, not much of an attempt at that; he was obviously paying very little attention to us. He seemed preoccupied with some perplexing problem. His gray eyes looked unfocused.
    While Verbena Pruitt and the Senator sparred, I talked toMrs. Pomeroy who sat beside me on the couch. “Such a marvelous man, the Senator,” she said, her eyes glowing. “Have you known him long?” I shook my head, explaining my presence in the house.
    “We’ve known the Rhodeses for just years, back in Talisman City. Were you ever there? No? It’s a wonderful
residential
town, almost Southern in a way, if you know what I mean. Except we’re getting quite a bit of industry there … my
husband
is in industry.”
    “That’s very nice,” I said.
    “We have a
government
contract,” said Mrs. Pomeroy importantly. She chattered on about herself, about their hometown, about the gunpowder business, about the latest developments in gunpowder: the new process Pomeroy Inc. had developed. While she talked I watched Ellen making time with lovely boy Langford on the couch opposite us. She was talking to him in a low voice and I could tell by the gleam in her eyes and the flush of confusion on his youthful puppydog face that before this night was over he would be forced to revise his estimate of the Rhodes family since, I was quite confident, long before Aurora showed her rosy head in the east, he would be engaged to the daughter of the house. He was a gone goose … for a few weeks anyway. I wondered if Mrs. Rhodes was on to her daughter. If she was she hardly showed it. She completely ignored her, speaking for the most part to Mr. Pomeroy and Rufus Hollister who sat on either side of her, their voices pitched a register below those of Senator Rhodes and Miss Pruitt who were now speaking of various scandals attendant upon the Denver Convention of 1908.
    Just before midnight, Mrs. Rhodes stood up and announced that she was going to bed but that the others should take no notice of her if they wanted to remain up. “Good nights”were said and the hour for breakfast set. I was wondering whether I should go straight up to bed or wait for some sign from Ellen, when the Senator beckoned to me. “Like to have a little chat with you,” he said. “We can go up to my study.” I said good night to everyone. Ellen hardly noticed us go; she was already beginning to unravel poor Langdon, right there on the couch … all very ladylike, though: only an experienced eye like mine could tell what she was up to.
    The