Free A Tan & Sandy Silence by John D. MacDonald

with the funny games, coming here with your funny card and your funny check? If you knew we're close friends, why not start honest?"
    "I have not seen her or talked to her in over three years, Holly. And don't jump on my knowing your first name and try to make anything out of it. The woman next door clued me."
    "Hitting the whole neighborhood?"
    "One at a time. Mary is ... low-key intense. She hides a lot of herself. She doesn't make friends easily. But she needs people, so I thought she'd have to have a friend in the neighborhood. A friend, not an acquaintance. Right?"
    "So right, McGee. Coffee and tears. Most women bug me. Mary doesn't. I ... still don't feel right Page 28

    about you. About taking you for granted. It could be some kind of a trick. I want to ask you things, but I can't think of anything to ask that you couldn't have gotten from Harry."
    "He's trying to find her."
    "You know it! I thought the silly son of a bitch was going to try to shake it out of me."
    "When was this?"
    "A couple of weeks ago. He'd had a couple. He got all weepy. He insisted I had to know where Mary is."
    "Do you know where she is?"
    "McGee, I know why Harry wants to find her. He wants her to come back to him and sign something and live happily ever after."
    "It might be an ugly shock if she did come back."
    "How?"
    "She'd find the house empty, and she'd go look for Harry at the Casa de Playa, where he just so happens to be shacked with a divorcing blonde named Betsy Booker. In apartment 61."
    I couldn't read her expression. "So?"
    "So isn't that where Mary found him with the Canadian?"
    "Only two people could have told you that. Or three. Harry, Mary, or Lisa-the Canadian quiff."
    "Wrong."
    "The hell you say."
    "I got it out of Betsy Booker's best friend, Jeannie Dolan, also from Columbus, who got part of it from Betsy and part of it from the housekeeper. Jeannie and Betsy take turns manning the sales desk at the Casa de Playa."
    I saw her buy it and give a small nod. "So help me. That rotten Harry. Jesus! The way I read it, Lisa was not the first. Just the first she caught him with. He really is one sorry bastard."
    "How did she find out?"
    "She thinks it was one of the girls in his office or a girl he'd fired, trying to make things rough for him. She got a phone call. The person on the other end whispered. Mary said it was spooky.
    Something very much to the point. 'Mrs. Broll, your husband has loaned apartment 61 in his new building to Lisa Dissat, and he'll be taking another long lunch hour today so he can drive out there and screw her.' So she drove out and hid somewhere until he arrived and went upstairs.
    Then she went up to the sixth floor and waited around until the door opened and he started to come out. She took a quick run at the door and knocked it open and charged past him and found the bareass Canadian getting ready to take a nice nap. I take it there was a certain amount of screaming going on for a while."
    "Then Harry got rid of the girlfriend?"
    "She was packed and out of there the next day. Back to Canada, Harry told Mary. He confessed his sad story. He had gone to Quebec for business conferences with his Canadian partners. He had to dictate new agreements. They sent the secretary to the hotel. They worked very late. He was too tired to think clearly. She was pretty and available. It went on for the three days he was up there. He came back. Two days after he was back, she phoned him at his office from Miami.
    She had quit her job and followed him back to Florida. So he told Mary that while he was trying to talk Lisa into going back, he put her up at the apartment. I guess he was having a hard time convincing her. He talked from the end of November till two days before Christmas. That's a lot of long lunches and a lot of evening conferences."
    "But Mary didn't leave him until January fifth."
    "Harry told you that?"
    I laughed. "I thought the silly son of a bitch was going to try to shake it out of me, too. This was just