making corpses of you, ... being my first, and all, you know." She crossed to the door and locked it, keeping the key, then turned back to them apologetically. "I'm afraid I'll have to leave you for a while," she said. "I'll have to dream about this. I get all my best ideas in my dreams."

"I'll bet you do," Marc said flatly.

She regarded the crack in the wall for a moment. "The landlord's going to make an awful fuss about that. He's so narrow minded. What's a home, if you can't shoot it up a bit once in a while?" She turned to Toffee. "It's rude of me, I know, to leave you alone like this, but I simply have to get to sleep right away, to think of some way to rub you out, as they say. You won't mind?"

"Certainly not!" Toffee replied grandly. "Go right ahead!"

As the strange woman started in the direction of the bedroom, Marc turned amazedly to Toffee. "She's crazy as a loon," he whispered.

"Balmy as a night in June," Toffee hissed back.

Suddenly Miss Quirtt whirled about. "I heard that!" she shrieked. "I heard what you said!" She regarded Toffee regretfully. "And I thought you were such a nice, helpful girl, too. It makes me sad to know that you can't be trusted. Now I won't be able to enjoy having your corpse around, like I would have." She moved quickly to a closet, dragged out two straight jackets, and handed them to Marc and Toffee. "Put them on!" she commanded, brandishing her gun.

"They're perfectly lovely," Toffee said sarcastically, struggling into hers. "They remind me of nurse's uniforms. Where did you ever get them?"

"Oh, I have dozens of them," Miss Quirtt said proudly. "And they were all given to me. Every time I go for a vacation, when I leave, they give me one of those. I remember a lovely summer at Bellview. The one you have on reminds me of it."

A few minutes later, Miss Quirtt surveyed her trussed up guests from her bedroom door, and smiled with satisfaction. "I think the gags were a nice idea, too," she said. "You'll have to be quiet, anyway, if I'm to get any sleep." Then, closing the door, she sighed, "Oh, but you'll make such lovely corpses. And I can hardly wait to have some of my own."

Silently, Marc and Toffee, their mouths uncomfortably full of Miss Quirtt's more intimate garments, gazed at each other mournfully.

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