Where Is Bianca? Read Online Free

puff he said in a flat voice, “All right, fire away.”
    â€œLet’s go back to the last time you saw your wife. That was a week ago tonight, wasn’t it?”
    â€œYes.”
    â€œHow heated was the argument?”
    â€œHot enough.”
    â€œHow hot? Did it come to blows?”
    Lessard choked over the cigarette. “Blows! Certainly not . I don’t hit women. And even if I did, you don’t hit a woman like Bianca.”
    â€œWhy not?” Corrigan asked curiously, as if woman-hitting were the most natural sport in the world.
    â€œYou just don’t. She’s so—so ethereal. I mean, she’s like a butterfly. I know that sounds corny, but it’s the only comparison I can think of. Who’d swat a butterfly?”
    â€œYou ought to sit behind this desk,” said Corrigan. “So it was a hot argument that didn’t come to blows. The subject was Frances Weatherly?”
    â€œYes. I tried to explain to Bianca that a man sometimes gets involved with a woman before he really knows what’s happening. With a certain sort of woman.”
    â€œWhat sort is that?”
    â€œFrances Weatherly. No … no sense of moral values. And she doesn’t give a—she doesn’t care whom she hurts. I said it wasn’t my fault, just a combination of circumstances that I was helpless to stand up against.”
    â€œYour wife,” said Corrigan dryly, “didn’t buy it?”
    â€œShe wouldn’t listen . It’s the first time I wasn’t able to reason with Bianca. She was all emotion .”
    Brother, thought Corrigan, you have just described the différence that the Frenchmen vive .
    â€œHow,” he asked, “did Mrs. Lessard find out about you and Miss Weatherly? It is Miss Weatherly, by the way, not Mrs.?”
    â€œMiss. How did Bianca find out? I don’t know—gossip, I suppose.” Lessard suddenly seemed conscious of his hairline. He took a handkerchief from his pocket and blotted the sweat away, then sat holding the handkerchief tightly. “How does any wife find out? Anyway, she followed me—it was on the night before our row. She saw Frances and me in a cocktail lounge together, saw us go up to Fran’s place afterward. Waited for me to come out. I still can’t understand it. It’s so unlike Bianca. I was flabbergasted.”
    â€œLet’s stick to the night she followed you. She waited for you to come out. How long did she have to wait?”
    â€œWell,” said Lessard, “a pretty long time.”
    â€œAnd the next night, when you got home, you had your quarrel, and Mrs. Lessard walked out on you?”
    â€œThat’s correct, Captain.”
    â€œAnd you haven’t seen or heard anything from her from that moment to this?”
    â€œYes. I mean, no!”
    â€œDoes your wife have any distinguishing marks? Scars? Birthmarks?”
    â€œNo.”
    â€œBridgework?”
    â€œNo, no.”
    â€œHow about dental work generally? Who is her dentist?”
    â€œHer teeth were taken care of in Europe, I don’t know by whom. She hasn’t had time—I mean she hasn’t needed—to see an American dentist since she got back.”
    And that, Corrigan thought, is a really tough break.
    â€œHow about a ring? An unusual ring, I mean—not an engagement or wedding ring.”
    â€œOh. Yes,” said Lessard. “She has a Mayan ring—of silver—I mean of Mayan design; it’s a copy in sterling silver of what’s supposed to be a very old one. It was given to Bianca by a close friend, a Mexican girl, daughter of a diplomat, who attended finishing school with Bianca in Switzerland.”
    â€œWas Mrs. Lessard wearing this ring the night she walked out on you?”
    â€œShe always wore the ring.” Lessard suddenly sat up straight. He had become very pale. “Are you telling me that you’ve found the ring,