‘Thank you for everything you did,’ he said in a placating voice. ‘You were wonderful.’

But he backed away as he spoke, reading murder in her eyes.

‘If,’ she said, breathing hard, ‘you don’t get out of this room this instant, I shall scream the place down, call back the policeman and tell everyone the truth about you.’

‘Not that,’ he begged. ‘Anything but the truth.’

‘Oh, but this truth is very interesting. You are an unspeakable scoundrel-’

‘No doubt about it.’

‘A crook-’

‘Guilty.’

‘A ham actor-’

‘That’s going too far.’

‘A fraud, a man without scruple-’

He’d reached the door now, opened it, paused in the gap.

‘I just want to say that you were brilliant,’ he said quickly.

‘Go!’

‘And thank you.’

‘If you don’t get out of here-’

He paused just long enough to blow her a kiss. Then he was gone.

Mandy stood, torn between exasperation and laughter. He was everything she’d called him and worse, but she felt mysteriously invigorated as never before in her life.

Swiftly she put out the lights, tossed aside the robe and jumped into bed, mulling him over.

Where did he come from? She’d heard him mutter to himself in Italian, and he spoke in a Continental accent.

What had possessed him to make those crazy jumps? Fear of an enraged husband? No way. He was a lithe and powerful athlete who could have handled any number of husbands. Yet he’d chosen to run for it, risking his life in the process.

A man without fear, then, but also a man with some very kooky values. The way he’d said, ‘She swore she was divorced, and how’s a man to know?’ implied many other similar incidents.