The bellman nodded. “Is it okay to tell him what you look like?”
“You’ll have to, but if he’s got the room staked out he’s probably made us already. Now listen, he’ll take you over everything three or four times if he’s a good cop. Keep it simple and remember to forget anything you could possibly forget. He didn’t give you his name, did he?”
“No.”
“He didn’t say, ‘I’m detective so-and-so?’ Anything like that?”
“No. I would have remembered.”
“You said he showed you his badge. What was the number?”
The bellman hesitated, then said, “I guess I didn’t notice.”
“Okay, when you go back, don’t knock like he told you. Go straight past. He’ll stop you again. Tell him you’re not sure about him, and say you want to see his badge again. Take a good look—make him let you see it in a good light—and remember the number. When you get back downstairs again, phone this room and tell me what it was. What did he look like?”
The bellman thought for a moment. “Not as big as most of them. I’d say maybe just over middle size. Big nose. He had a bandage around his head.”
“Forget the badge number,” Stubb told him. “I know who he is.”
“So do the rest of us,” Candy said when the bellman was gone.
“Except her.” Stubb nodded toward Sandy Duck.
“You’re right,” Sandy said. “I certainly don’t know. I also don’t know why the police should want to watch Madame Serpentina. Of course they always view major psychics with distrust except when they beg them to solve their cases for them without a fee.”
The witch smiled. “I believe you yourself wanted a certain prediction. I did not hear any mention of payment, but then perhaps I was inattentive.”
“I wish I could,” Sandy said frankly. “I can’t. Our magazines don’t have the money. I’ll tell you what we’ll do, though. Any time you want, we’ll run a one-page ad for free.”
The witch laughed.
Stubb said, “Don’t knock it. Sandy, I’ll send you Madame Serpentina’s copy tomorrow. To run as soon as possible, either magazine. How do you want it?”
“If there are pictures, we’ll need camera-ready copy. If it’s just text, you can tell us what you want to say and we’ll lay it out and spec the type.”
“But now,” the witch said, “I must earn this advertisement with my prediction. First, however, I will answer several more questions, questions you would ask if I permitted them. Yes, I did indeed see something in the mirror. No, you would not have seen what I saw, had you looked—you would merely have ruined the operation. And lastly, what I have done is the verso of necromancy; I summoned the spirits of the unborn to reveal the future.
“You desired to know of a great event—one affecting the entire nation—that will occur within a decade. Is that correct?”
Pencil poised, Sandy nodded.
“Very well. The greatest event of the coming decade will be the quadrumvirate. Four leaders, unknown today, shall unite to take political, financial, artistic, and judicial power. They shall create a revolution of thought. Many who are now rulers shall be imprisoned or exiled. Many who are now powerless shall rise to places of great authority. The rich shall be made poor, and the poor rich. Old crimes, long concealed, shall be made public, and their perpetrators given to the people as to a pride of lions. The four shall be hated and idolized, but their rule will not end within the period specified by my prediction. That is all I was told.”
The pencil flew. “You don’t know the names of these men?”
“No. That information would be very difficult to obtain. The spirits, as you should know, have great difficulty providing answers in terms of specific words. It is somewhat as though you—who we shall say speak Chinese— were to ask a woman who knew no other tongue the name of an American she met last year. If you were most fortunate, you might hear ‘Beloved Disciple of the Iron-Smiter,’ if the name was John Smith.”
“They will come to power in ten years?”
“Much sooner, I think.”
Sandy rose. “I realize I’ve asked more questions than the three we agreed on, and I don’t want to wear out my welcome. Mr. Barnes, Ms. Garth, I want to thank you for bringing me up here. I know as well as you do that I couldn’t have gotten into this room if it hadn’t been for you. Mr. Stubb, you’ve come to my rescue more than once, and I appreciate it. Madame Serpentina, I know you never grant interviews, but you’ve given me one tonight and let me take a picture and everything, and I appreciate it more than I can say.”
The witch inclined her head graciously. Candy looked embarrassed, Barnes grinned, and Stubb snorted.
“I’ll go now, but I want you to know that nothing I’ve heard in here—I mean, nothing beyond what I myself was told—will go into my article.”
Stubb said, “I’m a good deal more worried about what you’re going to tell the cop. Do you want to talk to him?”
Sandy shook her head. “Not if I can help it.”
“Swell. According to what the bellhop said, he’s between us and the elevators; but this hotel’s built in a hollow square, if you know what I mean. Turn right instead of left when you go out the door, and you should be able to walk around the long way and get to them without passing his room. Will you do that?”
