“I can pay for this room, Mr. Stubb.”
“Sure, but you don’t want to. And whatever it is you’re going to try here isn’t going to work if I tell them—they’ll be watching every move you make. You want to phone?”
The witch shrugged. “You are an old friend. Besides, I am curious.”
“Yeah, you and me both.”
“How did you get here, Mr. Stubb? You know nothing of magic, but that was like magic.”
“No trick at all.” Stubb sat on the bed. “When we dumped your luggage outside the hotel—you didn’t give us any hundred, but maybe we were lucky at that—you expected us to split. I didn’t. I waited and followed you in. You were at the desk, and I got on the other side of the big guy next to you. The clerk said your room number when he shoved the key at the bellhop. I got an elevator while he and his buddies were rounding up your computer and the bags you’d brought here earlier. That was bullshit, when you asked us about the closest hotel; you’d already picked this place and got most of your stuff here, but you didn’t want us to know you’d carried it yourself.
“Anyhow, the elevator got me here maybe two minutes before you came. It took me about fifteen seconds to open the spring lock with plastic slip. Your window there is recessed behind the curtain, so that’s where I stood, with my ass pushed up to the glass. I’m a little guy, as you’ve probably noticed, and sometimes that’s handy. Now, how about you?”
“What do you mean?”
“Tell me about the hundred.”
“I have already told you, and when you hid behind my drapes you must have heard. I gave them a one hundred dollar bill. They were to take ten dollars each and bring seventy to me. It was my emergency reserve.”
“And you trusted a bellhop with it and gave thirty bucks in tips? Sure you did. Was it queer?”
“I wish this hotel to believe I have a great deal of money. Thus I can stay a long time.”
“Sure.” Stubb patted his pocket. “I’m out of smokes. You got any?”
“I do not smoke.”
“You smoke; I’ve seen you. What you mean is, you don’t smoke much in public. Give me a cigarette, please.”
The witch said nothing, staring at Stubb.
“Okay, forget it—it’d probably be poisoned anyhow. When I jumped out of your curtains, you had your hand in your bag. Want to tell me what it was doing there?”
“Certainly. You are correct. I was reaching for a cigarette.” The witch picked up her purse and took out an oddly shaped box covered with Arabic script. “They are Turkish.” She extended the package to Stubb.
He selected one and lit it with a paper match. “A little dry,” he said, emitting a puff of smoke. “Maybe they were too long on the boat.”
“I am most terribly sorry. You may give it back to me if you do not like it.”
He chuckled. “That’s better. For a minute I was afraid you were going to go ladylike on me. You’re cute, aren’t you? You’re a cigarette psychologist.”
“I fear I do not know what you mean.”
“When I asked you for a cigarette, you said you didn’t have any, because you figured sooner or later I’d go out after some, and you could lock the door. Then when I started on the handbag, the cigarettes came out to take my mind off it. It won’t work, Madame S. If I ever wanted to smoke that bad, I’d quit.”
“So I was condemned for not giving you a cigarette, and now for giving you one. Such condemnations come cheaply. Very well, you wished for a cigarette and you have one, though you do not like it. What else do you wish?”
“I’ve already told you. I want to know your gimmick with the hundred.”
“And I have told you. I gave the porter one hundred dollars—a hundred dollar bill, not counterfeit as you seem to think. He is to return seventy to me.”
“Okay, I’ll guess. Will you let me see that handbag?”
“Certainly not!”
“Any way you want it. It would be better to have some verification, but here’s my guess. When I got my mug out of the curtains, you were at the bag. You might have been going for your lipstick, but if you had been you wouldn’t be so up-tight about it. So I say you were putting the hundred away for next time. Want to comment?”
“I say only that I am going to have you put out of this room.”
“Either you never really gave the bellhop the hundred—just let him see it and switched it at the last minute—or you got it back somehow. If I had to bet, that would be the way I’d go, because you keep insisting you gave it to him. Want to tell me what he did with it? No? When I’m flush, I usually tip bellhops about a dollar, and I’ve never yet seen one get out his wallet and put my buck in there—they don’t want you to see how much they’ve got. What most of them do is stick it in their front pants pocket. For somebody with magician’s fingers, it wouldn’t be much of a trick to get it out of there.”
The witch spit like a cat. “I do not do tricks!”
“Sure you do. We all do. What you mean is you don’t do them on stage or at parties to impress your friends, if you have any friends.”
“Not like you. You, I am certain, have many, many friends.”
Stubb pointed a finger. “Don’t sneer at me. I warn you, it’s the only thing I can’t take. You sneer at me, and sooner or later I’ll get you.”
“Yes, so many good friends, little man!”
He raised his fist, then let it drop. “You know, I’m glad you said that. It reminded me of something. Want to pass me that phone?”
“Hardly.”
“I think you’d better—”
The telephone rang. Stubb reached for it, but the witch was nearer and quicker. “Yes, this is she … . How did you discover … No, do not come; you will not be admitted.”
Stubb leaned toward the receiver and said loudly, “Come on up. I’ll let you in.”
“You fool! You damnable fool!”
“Don’t you think you should hang up before you call me names?”
The handset slammed down. “You are unendurable!”
“Sure. It’s part of my shtick to be unendurable when I want to be. I do bill collecting when I can’t get anything else. On the other hand, I can be as nice as pie when I’m on your side. Wasn’t I nice when I damn near broke my arm carrying your suitcase? Candy helped too. What’d you carry?”
The witch was calm again, but there was no blood in her dark face. “Are you such a fool as to think I cannot curse? I can, and though in the ordinary course of life I would not waste my efforts on such small prey, for you I will make an exception. Wait and see what I shall do!”
Stubb chuckled. “Going to curdle my milk? Madame S., I’m flat broke. I’m nearsighted, and there’s newspaper in these shoes, and I think I’m getting an ulcer. Anything you could do now would just put me in jail or the hospital, and either one would be a hell of a relief. Curse away, and meantime I’ll be cursing you, in my own inimitable fashion. Or would you rather have me working for you?”
In The Lobby
“I lost it,” Majewski declared.
Fuentes looked daggers at him as the house telephone rang.
The mystery fan said, “I’m not calling you a liar—there’s no evidence of that. Did I call you a liar?”
Majewski shook his head as the house telephone rang again.
“All I’m saying is seventy dollars of that money belongs to the woman in seven seventy-seven. You lost seventy dollars of her money. You’re going to have to make that up. Ten belongs to ’Cisco and ten to me. You’re going to have to make that up too.”
The house telephone rang yet again, rather pettishly.
“Damn right,” Fuentes said.
A sub-assistant manager called, “Joe, will you please get that phone?”
“Yes, sir!” Majewski answered with unaccustomed smartness, and picked up the handset, happy to escape.
“This the bell captain?”
“Yes, sir,” said Majewski, who was not.
“Captain, I want you to do me a favor. Somewhere around there’s a young lady in a white raincoat. Garth. Gee, ay, are, tee, aich. Garth. Stout. Blond. Look around. You see her?”