“We wait five minutes. Then I check in, drop my suitcase, and look for a car to rent.”
He said that was easy. In Esmeralda there were three places that rented cars, time and mileage, any make you wanted.
We waited the five minutes. It was now just past three o’clock. I was empty enough to steal the dog’s dinner.
I paid my driver off, watched him leave, and went across the highway and into the office.
3
I leaned a polite elbow on the counter and looked across at the happy-faced young guy in the polka dotted bow tie. I looked from him to the girl at the small PBX against the sidewall. She was an outdoorsy type with shiny make-up and a horsetail of medium blond hair sticking out at the back of her noodle. But she had nice large soft eyes and when they looked at the clerk they glistened. I looked back at him and choked back a snarl. The girl at the PBX swung her horsetail in an arc and put the eye on me also.
“I’d be glad to show you what we have vacant, Mr. Marlowe,” the young guy said politely. “You can register later, if you decide to stay here. About how long would you be likely to want accommodations?”
“Only as long as she does,” I said. “The girl in the blue suit. She just registered. Using what name I wouldn’t know.”
He and the PBX girl stared at me. Both their faces had the same expression of distrust mixed with curiosity. There are a hundred ways of playing this scene. But this was a new one for me. In no city hotel in the world would it work. It might work here. Mostly because I didn’t give a damn.
“You don’t like that, do you?” I said.
He shook his head slightly. “At least you’re frank about it.”
“I’m tired of being cagey. I’m worn out with it. Did you notice her ring finger?”
“Why no, I didn’t.” He looked at the PBX girl. She shook her head and kept her eyes on my face.
“No wedding ring,” I said. “Not any more. All gone. All broken up. All the years—ah, the hell with it. I’ve followed her all the way from—well, never mind where. She won’t even speak to me. What am I doing here? Making a damn fool of myself.” I turned away quickly and blew my nose. I had their attention. “I’d better go somewhere else,” I said, turning back.
“You want to make it up and she won’t,” the PBX girl said quietly.
“Yes.”
“I’m sympathetic,” the young guy said. “But you know how it is, Mr. Marlowe. A hotel has to be very careful. These situations can lead to anything—even shootings.”
“Shootings?” I looked at him with wonder. “Good God, what sort of people do that?”
He leaned both arms on the desk. “Just what would you like to do, Mr. Marlowe?”
“I’d like to be near her—in case she needs me. I wouldn’t speak to her. I wouldn’t even knock at her door. But she would know I was there and she’d know why. I’d be waiting. I’ll always be waiting.”
The girl loved it now. I was up to my neck in the soft corn. I took a deep slow breath and shot for the grand prize. “And I don’t somehow like the look of the guy who brought her here,” I said.
“Nobody brought her here—except a cabdriver,” the clerk said.
But he knew what I meant all right.
The PBX girl half smiled. “He doesn’t mean that, Jack. He means the reservation.”
Jack said, “I kind of gathered as much, Lucille. I’m not so dumb.” Suddenly he brought a card out from the desk and put it down in front of me. A registration card. Across the corner diagonally was written the name Larry Mitchell. In a very different writing in the proper places: (Miss) Betty Mayfield, West Chatham, New York. Then in the top left-hand corner in the same writing as Larry Mitchell a date, a time, a price, a number.
“You’re very kind,” I said. “So she’s gone back to her maiden name. It’s legal, of course.”
“Any name is legal, if there’s no intent to defraud. You would like to be next door to her?”
I widened my eyes. Maybe they glistened a little. Nobody ever tried harder to make them glisten.
“Look,” I said, “it’s damn nice of you. But you can’t do it. I’m not going to make any trouble, but you can’t be sure. It’s your job if I pulled anything.”
“Okay,” he said. “I’ve got to learn some day. You look all right to me. Just don’t tell anybody.” He took the pen from its cup and held it out. I signed my name with an address on East Sixty-first Street, New York City.
Jack looked at it. “That’s near Central Park, isn’t it?” he asked idly.
“Three blocks and a bit,” I said. “Between Lexington and Third Avenue.”
He nodded. He knew where it was. I was in. He reached for a key.
“I’d like to leave my suitcase here,” I said, “and go get something to eat and maybe rent a car, if I can. You could have it put in the room for me?”
Sure. He could do that for me easy. He took me outside and pointed up through a grove of saplings. The cottages were all-over shingled, white with green roofs. They had porches with railings. He showed me mine through the trees. I thanked him. He started back in and I said, “Look, there’s one thing. She may check out when she knows.”
He smiled. “Of course. Nothing we can do about that, Mr. Marlowe. Lots of guests only stay a night or two— except in summer. We don’t expect to be filled up this time of year.”
