the few minutes help he needed to complete the transcript. Then, with the task completed, he had pretended that the lock to the cashier's cage was jammed. Anyway, Dusty was convinced that it was a pretence. Bascom wouldn't let him try to work the key. He couldn't climb out of the enclosure, as he might have in any of the other front offices, because of the heavy steel netting across the top.
Finally, after almost twenty minutes had passed, the room clerk's phone rang, and, lo and behold, the lock suddenly became unjammed. Bascom gave him a shrewish, over-the-shoulder grin as he sauntered out of the cage. Dusty shoved past him roughly as the clerk began relocking the door.
It was in his mind to tell Trowbridge what had happened. But he wasn't quite angry enough for that, and, as it turned out, there was neither opportunity nor necessity to do so.
Tug and the other two men were lounging in the parlor of his suite, their coats off, brimming glasses in their hands. They were obviously unaware that Dusty was more than thirty minutes late.
'Here already, huh?' Tug beamed. 'Now, that's what I call service. Sit down and have a drink with us.'
'Thanks very much,' said Dusty. 'I don't drink, Mr. Trowbridge.'
'Sure, you don't; keep forgetting,' the big man nodded. 'Well, have a smoke then. Shake hands with my friends. Don't believe you've met these gents.'
Dusty shook hands with them, and sat down. He'd never seen them before, but he felt that he had. There was something in the manner of Tug's friends that made them all look a little alike.
'Dusty's the lad I started to tell you about,' Trowbridge continued. 'Ain't that hell, though? Here's a plenty smart kid, got almost four years of college under his belt, and he winds up hopping bells. Nice, huh? Some future for a guy that figured on being a doctor.'
The two men looked sympathetic. Or, rather, they tried to. Tug wagged his head regretfully.
'That's about the way it stacks up, eh, Dusty? Your old man doesn't stand a chance of getting things straightened out?'
'It wouldn't do much good if he could,' Dusty shrugged. 'He'll never be well enough to go back to work.'
'A hell of a note,' mused Trowbridge. 'I remember readin' about it at the time. I said to myself right then, Now, why the hell does a man want to do a thing like that? A man with a good job and a family to take care of. What's he figure it's going to get him to mix himself up with a bunch of Reds?'
'He didn't mix with any Reds,' Dusty said quickly, almost sharply. 'I know they tried to make it look that way, but it wasn't anything like that. You see there was this group – the Free Speech Committee – who wanted to hold a meeting in the school auditorium, and all Dad did was sign a petition to-'
'Sure' – Tug stifled a yawn. 'Well, it was a lousy break, anyway. Lousy for you. Of course, it was hard on your old man, too, but he'd already lived most of his life. The way I see it, he stuck his neck out and yours got stepped on.'
'Well…' Dusty murmured. There was a casual bluntness about Trowbridge which precluded argument. For that matter, he didn't entirely disagree with the ex-racketeer.
Trowbridge got the bag of laundry from the bedroom, and gave him a dollar tip. He.returned to the lobby, heartened by his talk with Tug yet vaguely ashamed of himself. His father hadn't done anything wrong. In any event, it wasn't up to Tug Trowbridge to pass judgment on him. Still, it was nice to have someone see your side of things, to realize that you were making a hell of a sacrifice and getting nothing for it. Everyone else – the doctor and the lawyers and his farther, and his mother, up until the time of her death – had taken what he had done for granted.
Dusty couldn't remember just how he'd happened to tell Tug about the matter. It had just slipped out somehow, he guessed, a natural consequence of the big man's friendliness and interest. Trowbridge was a far cry from the Manton's average guest. He treated you like a friend, introduced you to the people he had with him. When he said, 'How's it going?' or 'What's on your mind, Dusty?' he really wanted to know. Or he certainly made it sound like he did.
Bascom was waiting for him when he got downstairs, frowning and tapping impatiently on the counter. 'Finally got back, did you?' he said grimly. 'How long does it take you to pick up a bag of laundry?'
'Not too long.' Dusty looked at him coolly. 'About as long as it takes you to unlock a door.'
Bascom's eyes flashed. He flipped a slip of paper across the counter. 'College boys,' he jeered. 'There's some calls for you, college boy. See if you can take care of them between now and daylight.'
'Look, Mr. Bascom' – Dusty picked up the call slip. 'What's… well, what's wrong, anyway? What are you sore at me about? We used to get along so well together, but every time I turn around now you-'
'Yes?' said Bascom. 'If you don't like it, why don't you quit?'
'But I don't understand. If I've done or said anything-'
'Get moving,' said Bascom crisply. 'Step on it, or you won't get a chance to quit.'
Dusty made the two calls – ice to one room, a telegram pick-up from another. This was another thing he couldn't remember: just how his quarreling with Bascom had started. It had begun only recently, he knew that. They'd gotten along swell for months, and then, apparently for no reason at all, Bascom had changed. And since then he could do nothing but scold and snarl and ridicule. Make things tougher than they were already.
Dusty had been pretty hurt at first. He still was. But the hurt was giving way to anger, a stubborn determination to stand up against the clerk's injustice. He didn't know what it was all about – and he was ceasing to care – but he knew that Bascom couldn't get him fired. Not, anyway, without digging up much more serious charges than he could make now. Dusty had broken various of the hotel's innumerable rules, as in the instances, for example, of smoking behind the key rack and working without his collar. But Bascom was guilty of some rule- breaking himself. Bascom wasn't supposed to slip up to an empty room for a quick shower. He wasn't supposed to trot down the street to an all-night lunch room instead of having his food sent in. Dusty always knew where he was, of course, and could get him back to the desk with a phone call within the space of two or three minutes. But that could make no difference to the hotel. Bascom was supposed to remain behind the counter throughout his shift. That was the rule, period. If the management ever found out –
Dusty completed the two calls, and returned to the desk. He and Bascom resumed the night's chores, interrupted now and then when Dusty had to leave on a room call or one of the telephones rang. They checked off the day's charge slips against the guests' bills. They checked the room rack against the information racks. The work went rapidly, Dusty calling out the data, Bascom checking it. In the predawn stillness, the bellboy's clear steady monotone echoed through the desk area:
'Haines, eight fourteen, one at twelve dollars… Haley, nine twelve, Mr. and Mrs., two at fifteen… Heller, six fifty and fifty-two, one at eighteen… Hillis, Dallas, Tex.-'
'Wait a minute!' Bascom flung down his pencil. 'What kind of a room number is Dallas, Tex.? If you can't do any better than that, I'll-'
'Sorry,' Dusty said quickly. 'Hillis, ten oh four, one at ten.'
Bascom picked up the pencil. Then, suddenly, he laughed. Softly, amusedly. Suddenly – for the moment, at least – he was the old Bascom again.
'Out of this world, wasn't she?' he said. 'I don't think I've ever seen a woman who could come up to her.'
'I know I haven't,' said Dusty.
'Yes, sir, a lovely woman,' mused Bascom. 'Everything a woman should be. You know, Bill' – -he turned on his stool and faced Dusty- 'have you any idea how it feels, to be my age, in the job I'm in, and to see someone like her? I've used up my chances. I'm not an old man, but I'll never amount to anything more than I do now. And that isn't enough by a million miles for a woman like that… It's not a nice-feeling, Bill. Take my word for it.'
Dusty nodded, slowly, still taken aback by the clerk's sudden change in manner. He could see what Bascom was driving at, but –
You've been here about a year,' Bascom went on. 'How long do you intend to stay?'
'Well' – Dusty hesitated- 'I don't know. I can't say, exactly. It depends on my father, how my expenses run and-'
'Does it? I've seen you on the street, Bill, the way you dress, your car. I've got a pretty good idea of what you make here – around a hundred and fifty a week, isn't it? That's what's actually keeping you here, the money. Plenty of money with no real work or responsibilities attached to it. A nice soft job with a lot of so-called big shots calling you by your first name. You don't want to give it up. If you did, you'd have gone back to school long
