by Gene Wolfe
The telephone rang.
Barnes sat up in the gray dimness. His arms were cold and stiff, and he rubbed them. As if he were still dreaming (and for a moment, he believed he was) the bathroom door swung open, releasing a flood of light. A switch clicked and the light went out. The telephone rang again.
“Hello,” Candy said. There was a pause. “Yes, it’s me … . I’m staying with her … . Okay. It was real nice hearing from you, you know? We thought something might have happened to you.” She hung up.
From the other end of the room, Stubb’s voice asked, “What was that?”
“Never mind.”
“You didn’t tell somebody from the hotel you were staying with Madame S.”
“Huh uh. It wasn’t from the hotel.”
“Who was it?” Stubb’s voice was sharper now.
“I said never mind. It was for me, all right? I answered it. I got the message. It was my business.”
The witch asked, “How would someone know that you were to be reached in my room?”
“I don’t know. I didn’t ask him, and he didn’t tell me.”
“It was a guy then.”
“Jim, shut the hell up.” Trailing a corner of blanket, the fat girl stepped over Barnes. There was a grunt and a thump as she lowered herself. “Dammit, I’m not made for sleeping on floors. I don’t think I ever even passed out on a floor, for Christ’s sake. I usually find a couch or something.” A scuffing noise was followed by the flapping of the blanket.
No one else spoke. Barnes stared at the dim ceiling for a time, then allowed his eyes to close. The fat girl was near enough for him to hear faintly the sighing of her breath. He could even imagine the sensation of her body heat on the bare skin of his left arm. He was chilled, and she seemed to radiate warmth like a stove.
He tried to call back the great house in the mountains, but it was lost somehow, speeding away from the speeding car, always vanishing around the next turn in the road until they no longer saw it at all, were no longer sure it had even passed that way. Then something happened, somehow the car would no longer run, and Little Ozzie was wandering the windy mountain roads on foot, alone in the dark and looking for him.
Something touched his hand. Automatically, he drew it away; the touch came again, and after a moment he realized it was another hand, very soft, small and warm.
“Ozzie.” It was the faintest of whispers.
“Yes,” he said, glad to be taken away from the nightshrouded mountain roads where his son could not find him, where he could not even find himself.
“You awake?”
Outside, the doorman’s whistle blew.
“Yes,” he said again.
“Jim’s asleep. I can hear him and I think she’s asleep too.”
Barnes did not reply. He had opened his eyes, but they had closed themselves again. He lay in the dark, listening to her as he might have listened to some night-calling bird, innocent of the need for any reply.
“I feel like a hog, keeping this whole blanket to myself. Are you cold, Ozzie?”
“Little.”
“There’s plenty for both of us. It’s for a double bed.”
There was a flapping as of wide wings, and the blanket settled over him. Her breasts nuzzled at his shoulders, and the soft, warm bulge of her belly lay against his side. Two arms that were like two pillows embraced him. He rolled over and kissed her.
Her lips were moist, soft and warm as every part of her seemed to be soft and warm. She did not bite, though he for some reason had feared she would; her tongue touched his, then drew away just before they parted. She nibbled gently at his lower lip, so that he had the illusion (taken perhaps, as such things often are, from some forgotten book he had been read as a child—or perhaps only borrowed from the blond girl who had once in better days brought him a drink in the Kansas City Playboy Club) that Candy was a very large white rabbit who had somehow been transformed into a woman. So that if someone had flicked on the lights, he would not have been surprised to find she had pink eyes and a wiggling pink nose; not a carrot-chewing, wisecracking Bugs Bunny, but something like one of Peter Rabbit’s sisters, caged and fed on Caesar salads and grown huge. “Nothing tricky,” she whispered. “Not tonight.”
“All right,” he said.
“Not that I mind usually, but it’s late and I’m tired. Besides, it’s like …you know.”
“All right,” he said again. He did not know. He kissed her again.
She laughed softly. “You’ve got a nice mustache. It looks like it’s going to be bristly, but it’s sort of silky. Anybody ever tell you?”
“No,” he said. He tried to kiss her as he had before, but she had turned her head to one side, and it was her ear he kissed. He kissed his way down to her neck, thick, soft and warm, like all the rest of her.
“Stop,” she said. “You’ll make me laugh and that’ll wake them up for sure.”
He did not stop.
She pushed him gently away and reaching down took hold of him. “Do you like that?”
“Yes,” he said. “I like that very much.” He wanted to kiss her breasts, but he could not reach them. He stroked them instead.
“I have big ones, but nobody ever notices,” she said.
“I noticed.”
“Forty-six D’s. How about this? Do you like this too?”
“Yes,” he said. “I like that a lot.”
“Only when I take off weight—when I used to—that’s where it would come off first. It never would come off my hips. Nothing but surgery or a hydrogen bomb will ever take one ounce off my hips.”
“I like your hips too.”
“Not me. The movies won’t let me in any more.” She kissed his chest and shoulders.
He visualized a rude ticket-taker who barred her from some palace of dreams with a flaming sword.
“Those damned narrow seats. Don’t pinch hard.”
He kissed her again, pushing close, and she tucked the blanket around them.
“I used to love to go. You remind me of that one with the mustache—I can’t think of his name.”
“Peter Sellers. Richard Pryor.”
“No.” She giggled. “I can’t think of it. He’s handsomer, but you’re handsome too.”
“That’s right.”
“Can you reach? I’m sorry, but you can’t lie on top. I don’t like that any more.”
“All right.” He moved until their faces were no longer together, their bodies forming an X. Afterwards, he got up first and went into the bathroom to wash. Candy went in when he left, and he lay on the floor listening to her, hearing the toilet flush, then flush again.
He hoped she would lie down with him instead of asking for the blanket back, and she did. “Everything okay?” she said. “Copacetic?”
He had been wondering if he had caught a disease, syph or maybe herpes. She’s probably thinking maybe she’s pregnant, he thought. No, she isn’t. He said, “Not while you were gone. I missed you.”
“Uh huh. You were cold.”
“Right.” He chuckled.
“Me too. My feet are cold from that damn cold floor in there. Can I put them against your legs?”
“Okay.”
She lay with her back to him, the soles of her feet against his calves. He made sure they were covered by his topcoat, tucking it in, then pulled up the blanket. Old Mr. Free was standing there in the dark, ready to light the hot water heater for Candy’s bath. Barnes thought: That’s who called. She must have told him to come up.
* * *
“I’ll be gone before sundown, so what do I care?” Free said. “You like women, don’t you, Mr. Barnes?”
“Yes,” Barnes admitted, “yes, I do.”
“You’re a bigger man on the inside than on the outside, Mr. Barnes.”
“Thank you,” Barnes said, “but I’d rather be bigger on the outside too.”
“Don’t be any bigger fool than you can help, Mr. Barnes. You said you wasn’t widely respected. I said
I respect you, and I do. Only you’ve got hold of a few things you don’t understand hardly at all. Right now you’re trying to figure out how you can ask me about that treasure—some way that will get me to tell you what I don’t know myself about something you’re not even close to understanding.” Old Mr. Free pointed to the wall. There was a sign on it, a white sign of painted boards with black lettering that said something.
Barnes went to it and pushed it aside and looked through the hole in the wall behind it. It was Madame Serpentina’s room, but Candy Garth sat there naked on Madame Serpentina’s bed smoking one of Madame Serpentina’s cigarettes. After a moment Barnes saw that the rumpled sheets of the bed were not rumpled sheets at all, but heaps of rings and diamond bracelets. The key to the room lay on the dresser near the hole, beside Madame Serpentina’s hairbrush, and he knew that if only he could seize it he could open the door and go in—although it would not be necessary for him to walk down the hall and turn the key in the lock, because the wall itself would melt away, the whole house be transformed. He thrust his arm through the hole, feeling a deep pleasure.
* * *
Outside, the doorman’s whistle blew thinly and shrilly. He opened his eyes, uncertain for a moment where he was. Gray light shone through the drapes. The whistle blew again. Going to catch an early flight, Barnes thought. He remembered the year he had covered the whole East Coast for Continental Compactors, Inc. The whole damned East Coast. Boston to Miami by plane a couple of times. Philly to New York on the train, riding the ferry from Long Island to Connecticut.
Candy had rolled away, taking the blanket with her—that was surely for the best. One arm was thrust out from under his topcoat, and his feet were cold. The towel lay in a crumpled heap to one side. He stood up, wrapping the towel around him. Candy looked like a bear lying there in her brown blanket, her back to him. The bed that could not be mussed was still unmussed, pristine. The witch slept like an actress in a movie, her profile, almost but not quite too strong to be lovely, outlined against the white sheet, her enormous eyes closed in sleep. Stubb lay on his back, his mouth open, his face strange without its glasses.
Barnes went into the bathroom and switched on the lights. His cheeks were blue with stubble; he rubbed it with both hands, wishing that he, or someone, had a razor; there was none in the litter of cosmetics the two women had spread over the basin table. He examined himself again, combing back his hair as well as he could with his fingers. “Oh, I’m strong at the finish/’cause I likes me spinach … .” His eye was in the pocket of his topcoat. He wondered if Candy had realized it was missing. She’s probably wondering if I noticed how fat she is, he thought, if she’s still awake.
He laughed softly to himself.
His underwear was dry; he put it on. His shirt was still a little damp at the collar, but he put that on too. All the crease was out of his trousers, but otherwise they didn’t look too bad. Perhaps when evening came he would still be here, and perhaps Stubb and Candy would be gone. He would press them under the mattress then.
He made sure his empty wallet was still in the pocket, put on his trousers, switched off the light, and left. The other three were asleep. He put on his tie, his somewhat rumpled suitcoat, and his eye. For a moment he was afraid Stubb was going to wake up when he stepped out into the hall, but he never stirred.
Three doors down, that was what the bellboy had said. The latch was taped back. The room might be rented by now, but if it were, it would be locked. If anyone came to the door, he could pretend he had come to the wrong one. Or try to sell them something—they would get rid of him fast enough. He pushed gently against the door, and it swung back.
Stakeout
The room was quiet and dark. Barnes stepped inside and closed the door silently behind him, then stood listening. Over the sighing of the vent in the wall came the heavy breathing of sleep.
Most of the bed was concealed by the jutting enclosure of closet and bathroom, but as his eyes grew accustomed to the dimness he saw a foot—black shoe, white sock, dark trousers cuff above—that extended beyond it. He walked forward softly.
Sergeant Proudy lay on the bed fully dressed, his head still swathed in bandages. A notebook and a pencil, a small camera, and a revolver were neatly arranged on the bedside table by the telephone. For a moment, Barnes wondered if he should not empty the revolver—it seemed to be the sort of thing they did on TV—then decided not to. It was probably against the law, and he did not know how to open the mechanism anyway.
A black attache case stood open on the desk, and an electric razor nestled there among a clutter of other objects. Barnes reached for it, drew back his hand, then imagined himself making calls with a day’s growth of beard. The temptation was too great; he carried the razor into the bathroom and locked the door.
Proudy’s knuckles slammed against it as he was finishing up his right cheek. “Just a minute,” Barnes called. “I’m almost through.” A fusillade of violent rapping startled him. “Please, Sergeant, it’s early. You’ll wake up the guests, and they’ll complain. I’ll be out in a minute.”
“You better be. Who are you? What the hell is that noise?”
“Just a minute.”
“I’ll shoot through the door!”
There had been no hint of humor in the policeman’s voice. Barnes said, “It’s only your electric razor. I thought I’d shave while you were sleeping. I’ll be out in a minute.”
“You got a gun?”
“I’m not armed,” Barnes said. “You can’t even trim your corns with an electric razor.”
“You’d better not be. I’m going to frisk you when you come out. You can forget about wrapping it in plastic and dropping it in the toilet tank, too. I’m on to that.”
Barnes looked. “This toilet doesn’t have one.”
“Don’t get smart with me.”
There was a silicone-impregnated strip of paper for shining shoes. Barnes put one foot on the basin, then the other.
“Come out!”
Something in the policeman’s tone gave Barnes the impression that the revolver he had seen was pointed at the bathroom door. Under his breath he said, “Everything is bathroom doors lately,” and opened the door, still muttering. It was a shock to see he had been correct.
“What’d you say?”
“‘Well, blow me down.’ It’s just an expression.”
“I’ll blow you away if you stay cute. You know who I am?”
“Of course,” Barnes said. “I let you in yesterday.”
“That’s right. That’s exactly right. You know who I am and where I am, and why I’m here. Ain’t that right?”
Barnes shook his head. “How about putting away the gun, Sergeant? I’m not going to do anything.”
“I’ll say you’re not. Turn around and put your hands against that wall. Lean on’em. I’m going to shake you down, and if you so much as wiggle your ass I’ll blow you in two.”
Barnes did as he was told and felt the rapid patting of the policeman’s hands—inside thighs, outside thighs, under arms. His order book was deftly extracted from the breast pocket of his suit coat. He heard the pages riffled, then the slap as the book was tossed on the bed.
“Okay, turn around.”
He turned as instructed. “I just wanted to talk to you for a minute. Put away your gun and let’s sit down.”
“You said you had an electric razor. Where is it?”
“I left it in the bathroom.”
“Switch those lights on again and point to it. All right, go over to it slow.” Sergeant Proudy followed him into the bathroom, the muzzle of his revolver jammed against Barnes’s spine. “Unplug it and drop it in the crapper.” Barnes started to protest, and the revolver made an ominous click. “You do what I tell you. Do it now.”
The razor sank with a soft splash, trailing a column of tiny bubbles. Barnes left the wire hanging out of the bowl. “Is that all right? If it is, how about putting your gun away? You’ve seen I haven’t got one. I’d like
to sit down and talk.”
The revolver no longer jabbed his spine, and he heard the shuffle of the policeman’s feet as he backed out of the bathroom. “You’d like to jump me. That’s what you’d like to do.”
“I could have jumped you while you were asleep,” Barnes protested.
“Yeah, but you didn’t. Lost your nerve. You sit down; sit on the bed.”
Barnes seated himself gingerly, wondering what the maid would say, how she would report it to the management when she found the bed of an unoccupied room so rumpled and creased.
“I’m putting my gun back in this shoulder rig,” Proudy announced. “You see it? I can get it a hell of a lot quicker than you can get your hanky, and I’m hoping, yeah, hoping you’ll try something. Because you’re going to be dead before you ever get your ass off that mattress.”
“I won’t try anything,” Barnes said.
“God damn you, you’d better not.”
“I just came here to talk to you. You’re watching Madame Serpentina and Stubb and—ah—the rest of us? Isn’t that true?”
“You’ve got this all wrong, bud. I don’t answer questions. I ask them.”
“All I want,” Barnes said carefully, “is a little advice. You see, Sergeant, I’ve been offered a business proposition—by Stubb and Madame Serpentina specincally—and it occurred to me that if they were suspected of something, maybe I ought to find out about it before I give them my decision.”
“What you’re telling me is you’re not working with them already.”
“I’m not. We’re friends, that’s all.”
Sergeant Proudy had begun to pace the room. Barnes watched him, trying to recall him as he had been the day before, when he knocked at the door. A harsh band of daylight had penetrated the drapes; when Proudy entered it, he seemed haggard, as though he were a creature of the night who lost all life and color there, as sea creatures do, taken from the water.
“I know about you,” Proudy said after he had paced the room a dozen times. “You don’t think I do, but I do. You don’t think anyone knows, do you. Well, I do. I’m the only son of a bitch that does, but I know more about you than you do about yourselves.”