Part 14 (2/2)
_Steve_, I told myself, _this time you're in for it!_
”All right,” I said as apologetically as I knew how, ”so I've made a bad mistake. I apologize. I'll also admit that you could wipe up the hotel with me. But do you have to prove it?”
Mr. Horace Westfield's mental processes were not slow, c.u.mbersome, and crude. He was as fast and hard on his mental feet as he was on his physical feet. He made some remarks about my intelligence, my upbringing, my parentage and its legal status, and my unwillingness to face a superior enemy. During this catalog of my virtueless existence, he gandy-walked me to the door and opened it. He concluded his lecture by suggesting that in the future I accept anything that any registration clerk said as G.o.d-Stated Truth, and if I then held any doubts I should take them to the police. Then he hurled me out of the room by just sort of shoving me away. I sailed across the hall on my toes, backward, and slapped my frame flat again, and once more I hung against the wall until the kinetic energy had spent itself. Then I landed on wobbly ankles as the door to Room 913 came closed with a violent slam.
I cursed the habit of building hotels in dead areas, although I admitted that I'd steer clear of any hotel in a clear area myself. But I didn't need a clear area nor a sense of perception to inform me that Room 913 was absolutely and totally devoid of any remote sign of female habitation. In fact, I gathered the impression that for all of his brute strength and virile masculinity, Mr. Horace Westfield hadn't entertained a woman in that room since he'd been there.
There was one other certainty: It was impossible for any agency short of sheer fairyland magic to have produced overnight a room that displayed its long-term occupancy by a not-too-immaculate character. That distinctive sour smell takes a long time to permeate the furnis.h.i.+ngs of any decent hotel; I wondered why a joint as well kept as this one would put up with a bird as careless of his person as Mr. Horace Westfield.
So I came to the reluctant conclusion that Room 913 was not occupied by Nurse Farrow, but I was not yet convinced that she was totally missing from the premises.
Instead of taking the elevator, I took to the stairs and tried the eighth. My perception was not too good for much in this murk, but I was mentally sensitive to Nurse Farrow and if I could get close enough to her, I might be able to perceive some trace of her even through the deadness. I put my forehead against the door of Room 813 and drew a blank. I could dig no farther than the inside of the door. If Farrow were in 813, I couldn't dig a trace of her. So I went to 713 and tried there.
I was determined to try every -13th room on every floor, but as I was standing with my forehead against the door to Room 413, someone came up behind me quietly and asked in a rough voice: ”Just what do you think you're doing, Mister?”
His dress indicated housed.i.c.k, but of course I couldn't dig the license in his wallet any more than he could read my mental, #None of your business, flatfoot!# I said, ”I'm looking for a friend.”
”You'd better come with me,” he said flatly. ”There's been complaints.”
”Yeah?” I growled. ”Maybe I made one of them myself.”
”Want to start something?” he snapped.
I shrugged and he smiled. It was a stony smile, humorless as a creva.s.se in a rock-face. He kept that professional-type smile on his face until we reached the manager's office. The manager was out, but one of the a.s.sistant managers was in his desk. The little sign on the desk said ”Henry Walton. a.s.sistant Manager.”
Mr. Walton said, coldly, ”What seems to be the trouble, Mr. Cornell?”
I decided to play it just as though I were back at the beginning again.
”Last night,” I explained very carefully, ”I checked into this hotel. I was accompanied by a woman companion. A registered nurse. Miss Gloria Farrow. She registered first, and we were taken by one of your bellboys to Rooms 913 and 1224 respectively. I went with Miss Farrow to 913 and saw her enter. Then the bellhop escorted me to 1224 and left me for the night. This morning I can find no trace of Miss Farrow anywhere in this fleabag.”
He bristled at the derogatory t.i.tle but he covered it quickly. ”Please be a.s.sured that no one connected with this hotel has any intention of confusing you, Mr. Cornell.”
”I'm tired of playing games,” I snapped. ”I'll accept your statement so far as the management goes, but someone is guilty of fouling up your registration lists.”
”That's rather harsh,” he replied coldly. ”Falsifying or tampering with hotel registration lists is illegal. What you've just said amounts to libel or slander, you know.”
”Not if it's true.”
I half expected Henry Walton to backwater fast, but instead, he merely eyed me with the same expression of distaste that he might have used upon finding half of a fuzzy caterpillar in his green salad. As cold as a cake of carbon dioxide snow, he said, ”Can you prove this, Mr.
Cornell?”
”Your night crew--”
”You've given us a bit of trouble this morning,” he informed me. ”So I've taken the liberty of calling in the night crew for you.” He pressed a b.u.t.ton and a bunch came in and lined up as if for formal inspection.
”Boys,” said Walton quietly, ”suppose you tell us what you know about Mr. Cornell's arrival here last night.”
They nodded their heads in unison.
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