Free The Corpse Without a Country by Louis Trimble Page B

indignation, I laughed. “So you can maul me some more? No thanks.”
    She dipped her head, snapping at the tip of my nose with her teeth. I pulled back just in time or I might have lost a fair-sized piece of my anatomy. And when she did that, something left me. Whatever inhibitions I might have had regarding Ilona went off into limbo. There was just nothing fragile about this lady.
    I said, “When you’re angry like this, you’re more beautiful than ever.”
    I released her right wrist, got my hand on the back of her neck and pulled. Her entire weight came down on me and her face was pressed to mine. This time I was the one who started a kiss. And I finished it.
    She got her hand in my hair and started to pull herself free. But I was stronger. After a minute I could feel her starting to relax. Her lips softened up. The rigidity of resistance left her body. Then she stopped relaxing, but there was a different kind of tension in her now. Her breath quickened, catching up with mine.
    She put her whole self into the matter at hand.
    The gun lay forgotten. When Ilona lifted her lips off mine, her eyes were soft and dreamy, showing nothing but interest in our present procedures.
    She rolled to a sitting position. She murmured, “Help me up, Peter. The floor is much too hard.”
    What it was too hard for, I didn’t ask. I got to my feet and held out my hands. She took them, lifted both feet and planted them in my middle, pulled on my hands, and rolled.
    I did a beautiful imitation of a broken-winged swan ballet and landed on my back on the bed. The frame gave way, dropping me with the springs. By the time I was on my feet, Ilona had the gun again.
    She said, “You will now give me your clothing, please.”
    “I was about to when you got rough,” I said.
    “I am no longer in the mood for play,” she informed me.
    I agreed. The gun looked ugly and it was aimed at me in very definite fashion. I looked around for the bath, found it, went in, and peeled. I tossed my clothes out to her. She kept them all except for my shorts and socks which came back almost at once.
    I sat on the edge of the tub and waited for her next move. Then minutes later, it occurred to me to wonder just what she might be doing. I listened. No sound from the room. I opened the door carefully. Not only was there no sound, there was no Ilona.
    But there were my clothes. They lay in a pile on the bed. A pile of strips and tatters. Every seam had been slit away. My shoes had been literally taken apart. My wallet and silver lay on the bed, but my keys were gone.
    About all I had left to wear outside my shorts and socks was Ilona’s lipstick. That she had left, generously smeared over my mouth.

XII
    S OMEONE WAS LAUGHING AT ME . I turned toward the door to the living room and there was Maslin staring in.
    I said, “Did you get them?”
    “I just got here,” Maslin said. “Miss Rasmussen said they left about five minutes ago.”
    “Then go get them,” I yelled. “Go down to the Pad. I’ll bet you’ll find them there with Trillian.”
    “I just came from the Pad,” Maslin said. He sucked noisily on an empty pipe. “And Trillian isn’t there. Neither is this Emily Calvin dame.” He had stopped laughing and now he was giving me a fishy eye.
    “In fact, the dame that runs the place said they haven’t been there for some time.” He blew through the pipe. It gurgled. “But she said you’ve been there.”
    “Jodi and I were there earlier this evening,” I said. “And Emily and Trillian were sitting at the next table.
    “The one you busted up?” Maslin asked innocently.
    “I didn’t break up any table. What is this?”
    “That Willie dame says you did. She says you came in looking for Emily and when you couldn’t find her, you tried to take the place apart.”
    “She’s crazy!” I yelled. I wasn’t in any condition or I would have expected what came next.
    I was caught flat-footed when he said, “And she’s preferred charges against