The only burn that went deep was on the shoulder. Elsewhere I'd merely lost a little skin. The fact that it hurt like hell was, to a tough undercover operative of my courageous and stoical nature, irrelevant. At least it was supposed to be.
I took from my pocket the tube of ointment Catherine Smith had given me. I was sitting there reading the label and feeling sorry for myself when Sheila let herself back in quietly. She put the ice bucket on the dresser, came over to look, and snatched the tube from my hand.
"You're not going to use that?"
"Why not?"
"I wouldn't trust her to give me anything but syphilis!"
I said, "That's probably the one thing she can't give you, Skinny. At least I'm under the impression VD doesn't work like that."
"You know what I mean!"
"Sure," I said. "She's a terrible person. Okay? Now may
I have that drink?"
Sheila tossed the ointment on the bed and marched off across the room. She was still wearing the summery print dress with a good deal of skirt and not much bodice, but she'd exchanged her high-heeled shoes for a pair of white sneakers more suitable for playing detective. They made her look like a high-school girl. I watched her fix my drink and wondered why looking at her gave me a funny tight feeling in the throat that the sexy Miss Smith in her black lingerie hadn't elicited at all. Well, not much. I decided that I was getting old and paternal and protective-or real expert at kidding myself.
I spoke to her back. "I haven't thanked you for the timely help."
To my surprise, I saw her wince as if I'd said something harsh and cruel. She turned swiftly to look at me.
"Don't!" she breathed. "Don't make fun of me!"
"I wasn't-"
"I know I made a fool of myself!" Her voice was low. "Don't you think I know it? You'd have done better to pick a green kid to help you. He'd have remembered how to come through a door with a gun. That's what you're thinking, isn't it? I don't blame you! But you don't have to be sarcastic!"
I said, "No sarcasm was intended. As it happened, everything turned out for the best. There are no shots to explain, no dead bodies to dispose of. And you did turn up right on the dot. I was wondering how the hell to talk myself out of there, when you barged in." After a little pause, I said, "Of course, you're not supposed to shadow me without instructions, doll."
She came over with a glass and put it into my hand. "And you're not supposed to send me to bed like a child because you think I look tired. If I'd been a man, husky and healthy, you'd have had me covering you tonight, wouldn't you? It would have been routine. So I did." After a moment, she picked up the ointment tube, punched a hole in the end, squeezed out a little of the salve, and smelled it suspiciously. "I suppose this stuff really is all right to use.
How do you feel?"
"I'm all right," I said. "You can't hurt us seasoned veterans of the hush-hush service. We're all made of rhinoceros hide and old iron… Ouch!"
She'd started to apply the stuff to the burn on my shoulder just as if she were an ordinary girl instead of a mental case with a thing about being touched by, or touching, men. A little startled, I couldn't help stealing a look at her face. It looked kind of pink and white and determined. She was concentrating very hard on what she was doing and not meeting my eyes at all. The only trouble was, she wasn't very gentle.
I said, "Hey, take it easy."
"You!" she said softly. "You and that overdeveloped bitch in her little peekaboo foundation garment. Black! And stockings, sheer black nylon stockings, at this time of year! How obvious can you get?" She started on my chest. "Lean back a little."
"Why, Skinny," I said, "you're a peeping Tom, that's what you are."
"The window was open. Did you have to kiss her?"
I said, "It says on the label a light application, do1~. A vigorous massage is not indicated. This town seems to be just crawling with sadistic females." The pressure eased somewhat. 1 glanced at her again. "What was I supposed to do, carry on an intellectual conversation with the dame in her underwear while I waited for her partner to fight his way out of the bedroom and clobber me? And what's it to you, anyway?"
It was meant to be light and casual, but my casual touch didn't seem to be functioning tonight. Her hand stopped moving abruptly. After a moment she stepped back and stared at me oddly. Her eyes were wide and yellow. She looked down at the sticky fingers of her right hand, and at the tube in her left hand, also sticky. She looked around for something to wipe them on and didn't find anything. She dropped the tube, and whirled, and ran for the door.
I was on my feet by this time, but she'd have beat me out if the doorknob hadn't been reluctant and her hands hadn't been slippery; that gave me a chance to get across the room.
I caught her by the bare shoulders and shoved the door shut with my foot. She became perfectly still.
"Don't touch me!"
"Cut it out," I said. "We're all through with that don't-touch-me routine, remember? It's gone the way of the no-talk bit."
"Let me go," she whispered. "Please!"
I let her go. She turned to face me, holding her sticky hands away from her dress.
"I'm sorry," she breathed. "I was… just being silly and melodramatic. I'm all right now."
"Dr. Stern explained it to me," she said. "He called it a transference, I think. That's all it is. Just a transference."
"Sure," I said. "Just a transference."
"It's perfectly natural," she said. "I mean, it isn't your fault. After all, you saved my life."
"Me and twenty-three other people."
"They didn't all get blisters on their hands carrying me to safety. They didn't… didn't feed me milkshakes clear across the continent and talk to me as if I were a person and not a shattered wreck. They didn't get me out of that place where those ghouls were going to take my mind apart like a broken clock and put in all kinds of bright new springs and wheels I didn't want… Let me go to my room, Eric," she whispered. "Please."
"Sure," I said.
She didn't move. "Damn you," she whispered, "you're just an ordinary man, a little taller than average. You're not really very nice. I mean, you aren't even above arranging things so you can make a pass at a woman in the line of duty. Duty! I saw you! And you're not very brave, you wiggle and groan like anybody else when it hurts. I heard you. I don't know why I… I mean, there's nothing special about you. I don't know why any woman would want… Eric."
"Yes."
"Kick me out. Make me go. It's just a transference. A simple psychological phenomenon. It isn't fair to let me stand here making a spectacle of myself. It isn't fair to laugh."
"I'm not laughing," I said.
The room was suddenly very quiet. She shook her head minutely, looking up at me. Then she was coming forward, or I was, I forget how it happened. Then we stopped. There were the practical aspects to consider.
One of us laughed, maybe both, I forget; and Sheila turned quickly, presenting her back to me. "If you're not going to kick me out," she breathed, "if you're not, then I think you'd better help me off with my dress before… before we get that stuff all over it."
xv
I woke up SCARED. I couldn't at first remember what I'd done, only that it was unforgivable. Then I sat up quickly and looked around. I was alone in the room. There wasn't a sign of Sheila. She'd gone during the night, leaving none of her belongings behind.
I pulled on my pants and crossed the room and looked at myself in the mirror. The only satisfactory part of the image was the pattern of burns and blisters, which were all right as far as they went, but they didn't go half far enough. A heel like you, I told myself, should be trussed hand and foot and revolved slowly over a bed of glowing charcoal, like a roast pig. Any creep who'd take advantage of the irrational hero-worship and gratitude of a sick and confused little girl for whom he'd been made responsible.