healed.
At least my hat fitted me now, and didn’t bother me.
Ahead I could see the waterfront and the harbour, the shops and cafe and saloons.
As I walked along the congested sidewalk I kept my eyes open for a patrolman, but I
needn’t have bothered. No patrolman could have spotted me in that teeming crowd.
A few minutes’ walking brought me to an hotel. It seemed the kind of place I was looking
for. It was dingy and quiet, and looking through the double swing-doors I saw the lounge was
deserted.
I pushed open the doors and walked in.
Ahead of me was the reception desk. A little guy in a black alpaca coat was propping
himself up against the desk. He was bald and wrinkled, and his deep-set eyes were bored. “I’d
like a room,” I said.
“Ten bucks deposit,” he said briefly, “For how long?”
“A couple of days, if I like it, maybe a week.” He scratched the top of his head with one
finger. “Don’t see your baggage.”
“It’s at the station.”
“We like baggage, mister. We could collect it for you.”
I fished out two tens and dropped them on the desk.
“I’ll get it in the morning. Let’s have a room.”
He reached for a key from the rack behind him, shoved the register at me and a pen.
I wrote John Crosby on the line he indicated with a dirty finger. My slight hesitation didn’t
fool him.
“Any relation to Bing?” he asked with a small sneer.
“Why, yes,” I said. “I’m his sister. Where do I find the room?”
69
He gave me a cold, hostile look, stuck his thumb into a bell-push and turned his back on
me.
After a while a middle-aged bell-hop materialized and took the key. He was a rat-faced guy
with close-set eyes and a thin, hard mouth. His blue uniform and pill-box hat shone like a
nickel plate.
“Second floor,” he said. “No baggage?”
“No baggage,” I said.
I tramped up the stairs after him. Eventually we came to a door which he unlocked and
pushed open. He reached inside and turned on the light.
“The bathroom’s at the end of the corridor. Don’t use the shower. It don’t work.”
I went past him into a box of a room with a bed, a table, a chest of drawers and a strip of
worn carpet.
“Just like Buckingham Palace,” I said.
“A little more roomy, if anything.”
He put the key on the chest of drawers and looked me over expectantly. I gave him a dollar.
He nearly dropped in his tracks.
“Anything you want mister?” he said eagerly. “How about a little company? I have a list of
telephone numbers as long as my arm.”
“Dust,” I said.
“If you change your mind, call the desk and ask for me. My name’s Maddux.”
“Beat it!”
When he had gone I sat on the bed and took off my hat. I was so tired I could scarcely keep
my eyes open. The bed felt as if it had been stuffed with golf-balls, but that didn’t worry me.
I could have slept right then on a bed of nails.
