The Pink Hotel (26 page)

The Bar

“. . . Let nothing you dismay,” but Purcell was dismayed, nevertheless. He had a dull feeling of hopeless hangover. His mouth tasted like a dirty wool sock. He’d even gone back to the Baldwins’ last night after closing, like a damned fool, not that there had been anybody home.
Mary, baby. My lovely girl.
He shuddered briefly and entered the bar. Phil was piling dirty glasses onto a big room-service tray. “The usual, boss?” he asked. Purcell nodded.

The windows were open, but there was a stale reek of spirits and lemon peel, a heavy flavor of tobacco in the polished wood of the bar. A lone female figure draped over a bar stool resolved itself, after a bit, into Dukemer. “Good morning, Mr. Legree,” she said. “Do you want me to quit now, or would you rather fire me?”

His eyes focused painfully.
Mary, Mary, Mary.
“Aren’t you supposed to be on duty, kid?” he asked.

“That’s a very embarrassing question,” Dukemer said,

“She don’t feel so good,” Phil added apologetically.

My love is like a red, red rose.
I
mustn’t cry.
Antidisestablishmentarianism is the longest word in the English language. “I’m all right,” she said. “A Touch of Cashier’s Colic, maybe,”

“She works too hard. For a woman, it ain’t right.
People?”
Phil said darkly.

Dukemer looked into her glass. “I don’t do it for my mental health, exactly.”

“Never learned to like it myself,” Purcell admitted. “This working for a living is no good. What about you, Phil?”

“You kiddin, boss? Know what I’d like to do? Raise chickens. S-ay. You take a Black Minorkey. . .”

Dukemer lifted her hand to her nose and left abruptly for the Powder Room.

“A good kid,” Phil said. “Regular. She come in right after I open up. She has this nosebleed, see? Talks sort of funny, too,” Phil continued. “The Old Man, he’d fire her in a minute if he saw her. I can’t do nothing with her.”

“She’s a good kid, all right,” Purcell assented, “but that never got a dame anywhere.”

“Pardon my maiden vapors,” Dukemer said returning, wiping her nose and sliding her glass across the bar. “A little more simple syrup, please. I’m not having a very good time.”

Purcell laid a light hand on her shoulder. “Look, sweetheart, why don’t you go home like a good girl? The Old Man sees you, he’ll make me fire you. You know I don’t want to do that.”

“So he’ll fire me.” Dukemer shrugged a little. “I. . .” she began, and her voice broke and mended. “I can’t take the cage today.”

“Sure,” Purcell said earnestly. “Sure. I don’t blame you. Everybody’s entitled to a day off sometime. You don’t feel good. But choose up sides and go to bed or, you want to get
swacked, go do it someplace else. Anywhere else. It isn’t healthy. Try Boca Raton or Hollywood Beach. Don’t do it here, kid. The Little Father wouldn’t like it.”

Dukemer clasped and unclasped her hands nervously. Laughed.
I
mustn’t cry.
“Look who’s being a good guy,” she said at length. “That’s quite a Big Brother Act you’ve got there, Jack Dalton. What do you want that
I’ve
got?”

“We’re friends.” Purcell flushed uncomfortably. “You’re okay. Maybe I like you. Don’t put me in a spot,” he begged.

“A fine friend,” Dukemer said slowly. “A fine friend. I do not like you, Doctor Fell. Look at little Street—another friend of yours. You did the dirty on her,” she pointed out.

“Yes,” Purcell admitted. “I did. How do you know?” he asked abruptly. “Did she tell you?”

“I figured it,” Dukemer said. “You always get what you want, don’t you? It’s too bad Mary doesn’t have any money, you might even want to marry her, you being such good friends and all.”

“Friends, hell,” Purcell exploded. “Do you know where she is?”

Dukemer wiped her mouth, nodded and patted her purse. “You ought to be ashamed. Stick to Countess Alexandroff. She’ll make you a lovely friend.”

“Look,” Purcell said excitedly. “Look! Do you honestly know where she is? I’ve got to square myself. She—she means a lot to me. I’m a no-good bastard, just like you say, but I’m crazy about my Mary. She won’t have anything to do with me.”

“Now, he’s crazy about her!” Dukemer said bitterly. “Another drink and he’ll want to settle down and raise a family.”

“How can I marry her when I don’t even know where she is?” Purcell asked reasonably. “Stop talking like Beatrice Fairfax. I don’t like myself very well either. You know so much, where is she? I’ve been going nuts trying to find her.” Purcell pursed his mouth with hungry abstraction.

“A-ahh,” Dukemer said with a curled lip.
“A-ahh.
Is that the way it is? Why didn’t you say so? You want to know? You
really
want to know? Right about now, our little Mary is probably at, let’s see, she said producing an envelope. “Two-four-one-three Pleasant Heights Place, Centralia, Illinois, that’s where.”

Purcell’s face fell.
2413 Llama Place, Tibet, Tibet,
“That’s one hell of a long way from here.”

“Alexander Graham Bell invented the telephone,” she pointed out, “and ten to one, the Centralia operator has a crisscross. But you don’t really care. You’re all alike.”

“Say, I could call her at that. Phil!” he shouted suddenly. “Give me a dollar’s worth of silver.”

“You crazy or somethin?” Phil asked. “That thing
eats
quarters, boss. You got a finnif?” He put his hand in his pocket. “If you’re a little short, I—”

Purcell grabbed his change and pounded to the pay station.

Phone Booth

“Hello
, operator. Give me long distance. . . . Long Distance? I want to call Centralia, Illinois. Yes, Centralia. C-e-n-t-r-a-l-i-a. See if you have a phone listed for 2413 Pleasant Heights Place Street,” he said. “The
name
is
Street.
No, not Pleasant Heights Street. Pleasant Heights
Place. Street
is their
name.
They live there.”

The connection wasn’t very good. Purcell could just hear a dim, distant conversation overflowing with the banalities of the long-distance holiday call. Someone was asking how someone named Hortense was and then someone else said that Hortense was great, just great, but that little Ella got whooping cough for Christmas. It sounded like a queer present, Purcell thought foolishly. Then the operator said, “I’m ringuingggggg,” and ring she did.

“H-hello?” Mary’s voice came faintly to him.

“Mary? Mary, baby, it’s Dave.”

“Dave!” she said. And then she said, “I’m sorry but I don’t want to—”

“Mary, baby, why did you
do
this to me?”

“W-why did I do
what
to you?” she said with a tinge of bitterness.

“Go away without a word. You didn’t even answer my note. I don’t write notes like that every day. In fact, it was my first.”

“Note?”

“The note I left on your desk, the day you went to Palm Beach. My God, do you realize I haven’t seen you since?”

“What note are you talking about, David? I didn’t get any—”

“The note I left on your typewriter. It was before you came in. Only the Old Man was. . . Why, that dirty, lowdown—”

“David! David, are you still there? Are you drunk?”

“No. But I wish I were.”

“I don’t know anything about a note. I only know that Mr. Wenton said that you were all set to marry that horrid Countess Alexandroff and I—”

“That son-of-a-bitch,” Purcell said quietly. “Listen, Mary, I’ve been going out of my mind on account of you. I—”

“I—I’ve been having a pretty bad time of it, too, David. I came home because—”

“Mary, listen to me baby, I want you to marry me. Now. Right away. I even gave it to you in writing. I—”

“David,” she said, “are you sure you’re not—that you haven’t been drinking?”

“I never meant anything more in my life. I want to marry you. Right away, if you’ll have me.”

“Oh, David! I will! Of course. Yes. I—”

“Listen, baby, I don’t believe in long engagements. You scared me too much this time. I’m coming up there today. I’ll
take the next plane out. Meet me at the Midway Airport in Chicago. We’ll get married right away.”

“B-but will Mr. Wenton l-let you just take off like—”

“Mr. Wenton isn’t going to have anything to say about this. In fact I’m going to have some things to say to Mr. Wenton. I’m going up there and—”

“Oh, David!”

“Hey, don’t start crying, baby. Please don’t cry. This is it. This is the happy ending. You meet me in Chicago, we get
married just as fast as we can. We live happily ever after, Repeat after me: Meet in Chicago. Midway Airport. Get Married. Merry Christmas.”

“M-meet in Chicago. Midway Airport. Get Married. Merry Christmas. Sincerely, Art Wenton. Oh, David, yes!”

“Your thu-ree min-nits are up. Kindly insert—”

“No use wasting time on idle chit-chat, darling. I’ll see you in Chicago and I love you.”

“Oh, David, and I love you, too.”

“You’re so sweet, baby. My little wife.”

“David.”

“If you wish to continue your conversayshin kinely insert—”

“Bye, baby. I’ll see you in Chicago.”

Phil and Dukemer exchanged raised eyebrows. With his hand over his mouth Phil made convulsive motions indicative of nausea. “Ain’t he a kick?”

“I’m not laughing,” Dukemer answered. She coughed.

“Hod’ja catch such a cold, Tootsie?”

“Just lucky, I guess.” Dukemer shrugged.

Purcell bounded into the bar. “I’ve done it,” he crowed. “Release the doves, scatter the petals. David Underdown Purcell is off to wife it pronto in Centralia!”

Dukemer took off her black glasses, stared bluely at him and then put the glasses back on. “I’ll believe it when I see it.”

“You won’t see it, Dukemer. A simple ceremony in the Chicago City Hall, the Centralia Odd Fellows Lodge. I don’t know when or where, but as soon as possible. Mary said Yes!”

“Gee, that’s nice,” Dukemer said, draining her drink.
I
mustn’t cry. I mustn’t cry.
“I hope you’ll stop being such a bastard. Little Street deserves something better.”

“I’ll try, Dukemer. Scout’s Honor I’ll try. Goodbye, kid,” he said, planting a big smooch on Dukemer’s cheek.

“Sure you will,” Dukemer said and she had a hunch he’d
succeed. “Good luck,” she quavered after him. “You’ll probably need it.” Dukemer blew her nose. “Well, I guess
somebody’s
got to be happy.”

Cruel physalia lashing the water, Portuguese Men of War
inflated their blue pneumatophores. Chiang vaulted an area-way silently, and, as silently, L. Harvey Crull, Jr. prowled halls and service stairways. Are you ready?
Scorpionida Arachnida,
that excellent parent, fixed five moist eyes on the shrimp-pink sole of Mrs. E. J. Westbury’s foot and adjusted his telson.

Gracia Mellott swallowed with dry distaste and scratched her stomach petulantly. “He!” she called hopefully. “He! Come to he mudder,” she said.

Dawn Tribbie had a new, well, bump on her chin and T. J. Sturt, III shuddered in the grip of Korsakoff’s Psychosis. Furman exposed all of her splendid teeth and wished late-risers a cute, little old “Merry Christmas, you y-hear?”

“He’s a nice kid, that Roger,” Bill McCannon admitted, “but hell, why didn’t you wait for me?” “You talk too much,” Ann said lazily, and shut his mouth pleasantly with hers.

The crumpled paper towels and waste cotton in the trash barrel ignited easily. There was a flare of old newspapers and cardboard boxes.

Executive Suite

Purcell stopped off at the Hall Porter’s desk, tossed the man a five. “Get me a seat on the next plane to Chicago. It’s urgent. I don’t care if they throw the President’s golf bag off. It’s urgent.”

“Easy, Mr. Purcell. Christmas Day an’ all that. There’s the noon plane from Miami or the—”

“That’s it. Noon. Noon, moon, June, spoon and take it out of my severance pay.”

Purcell got into the elevator and said “Two.”

Purcell was still grinning as he rode up in the elevator. Happy days. Happy days and ah, the nights. What I’ll do to her, he told himself. There was a girl who’d always come down smiling to breakfast. But Phil was right; the Old Man wasn’t going to like hearing about the birds and bees and
flowers. The Old Man preferred something a little more complicated. His own awkward vice, and Von Krafft-Ebing for light reading.

Oh well. He knocked on the white paneled door of the Executive Suite. A scrap of nursery rhyme floated foolishly through his head. “Over the hills and a long way off—And the wind will blow my topknot off.”

The Executive Suite was dark and cool. “Merry Christmas,” Purcell said. “The head better today?”
I
wish you were in hell.

“Same to you,” the Old Man answered languidly from the depths of his chaise longue. Good-looking chap, Dave. Fine nose. Good shoulders. He adjusted a dashing black patch over his bad eye and was lost in Executive Thought. “How’s the house count?” he asked automatically.

“The house count’s down, the season’s off and the weather’s unusual,” Purcell said. “It always is.”

“Been doing a little thinking about our new policy. The Personal Touch,” J. Arthur said softly. “Our Keynote for the Future. Find out their birthdays. Take five minutes,” he told Purcell. “Send a card. In exceptional cases, I’d say a box of citrus jellies,” he pronounced judicially. “Takes a little thought, that’s all. Eight by ten postcard every three months. Very unusual. Big rotating file. ‘Sincerely, Art Wenton.’ Signature cut, of course. Blue ink. Let them know we appreciate their business. Someone is thinking of you. Take five minutes. Am I right?”

Someone is thinking of you. I love you with a fishbone in your throat.
“You probably are, at that,” Purcell said uncomfortably,

“Looking very spruce, Dave. New suit?”

Purcell shook his head. “I took a bath for Christmas.” The Old Man laughed unreasonably. Purcell plunged. “I’m thinking of getting married,” he announced without preamble, and rubbed one foot against the other. “Wish me luck,” he said.

J. Arthur swelled in his corner like a sea urchin.
“Hau-g-h,”
he said and spat into his handkerchief. “ ‘He travels fastest who travels alone.’ Kipling. Very true too. Compensations, of
course. Married myself. My wife is a sow but she is,
hau-g-h,
well-born. Who’s the lucky ugh, girl?”

“Why, don’t you know?” Purcell said meaningfully. “I thought you’d have known before she did herself. What with one thing and another.”

“It’s not—not Maggie Alexandroff? You could do a lot worse, you know.”

“Nothing that expensive,” Purcell said. “I’m afraid she’ll be an income tax deduction. It’s your Mammalia Centralia. Little Mary Street.”

“No!” The Old Man jumped to his feet. “Not Miss Mucus! Surely you’re not serious, Dave. You can’t be. Nonsense. Vicious nonsense. Dave, dear boy. I sensed that something like this was happening but—”

“Practically clairvoyant, aren’t you?”

“Oh, I knew that you were going around with her. Sleeping with—”

“Take it easy, please,” Purcell said levelly.

“But, Dave, dear boy. A flirtation, an affair is one thing. Marriage is another. A man assumes his wife’s social position . . .”

“My social position isn’t all that exalted. It’s just about what yours is.”

“Marry the right woman, Dave, and you’re accepted anywhere. But marry the wrong one—some little nobody of a typist—and,” he dropped his hands in an eloquent gesture, thumbs down, “you’re done for.”

“What if you happen to be in love with some little nobody of a typist? What if you happen to think she’s somebody?”

“Love! Faugh! You sound like a schoolboy, Dave. Come, now. We’re men of the world, you and I. Do you think that I love that superannuated sow
I
married? That I
ever
did? I’m able to have marriage and find love.”

“You seem to have had a little trouble finding it in the Christmas rush,” Purcell said, staring pointedly at the Old Man’s big eye.

Flushing, the Old Man raced on. “I’ve got plans for you, Dave. Big plans. You can go far. You’re worth a lot more than you’ve been getting—oh, a lot more. You’re popular with the guests, especially the—
hau-g-h—
ladies.”

“Sorry,” Purcell said with a set mouth.
You sugary sod!
“My mind’s pretty well made up.”

“Ah, ‘pretty well made up,’ eh?” J. Arthur pounced, clutching at a straw. “But it isn’t definite yet? Good. I have plans for you, Dave, just as I told you. Big plans. There’s this hotel. You could take over the management almost—
hau-g-h—
almost completely. And if this isn’t enough challenge for you, I’ve got other ideas. There’s a house up in Aiken, beautiful place but run-down, badly mismanaged. Going begging on the market. I could pick it up for a song. Give you an absolutely free hand—a partnership, perhaps. You could turn it into the most exclusive place in the South. Aiken. What does that remind you of? Horses! Am I right? You know those little bars of soap in the bathrooms?
We’ll
give ‘em saddle soap. The best English make. How’s that?”

“It’s great,” Purcell said dully, “but what do they wash with?”

“Mere detail. Worry about that later. Prefer a single man, of course, but still, a wellborn wife—the right kind of woman with the right kind of money.”

“Someone along the lines of Maggie Alexandroff?”

“Exactly. Now you’re beginning to use the old brain, Dave. Maggie would be ideal. She’s a widow. Attractive. Well-bred. Has millions. And she likes you, Dave. I could tell that a mile off.” He moved toward the gold telephone on his desk. “We could call the Penthouse right now. It’s almost eleven. She must be—”

“She checked out yesterday,” Purcell said.

“But she’s not far from here,” J. Arthur went on desperately. “Look. There’s her yacht right out there in the basin. We could—”

“What are you planning to do? Swim out with a wedding ring between your teeth?”

“No, dear boy—heheheheheheh—course not. But we could
send a note out by launch. Take five minutes. Ask her to dinner, tell her—”

“Speaking of notes,” Purcell said. “I believe that you have a communication addressed to Mary Street. Something I left here the day—”

“Dave, what are you talking about?”

“You know damned well what I’m talking about, you old bag of guts.”

The Old Man paused. His face went white and then red. And then an unholy gleam came into his one visible eye. “Dave,” he said piously, “I can’t deceive you. I did open that note. Oh, quite by mistake,” he added quickly. “But when I read it. When I saw the dreadful mistake you were about to make—”

“Just what’s so dreadful about falling in love and wanting to get married?”

“Oh, nothing, dear boy, nothing. Most, um,
natural
thing in the world, I suppose. But you’re a young man, Dave. You didn’t know what you were getting in for. I’m much too fond of you to stand by and let you marry a bit of, um, damaged goods like Mary Street.” The pink and white hands began to caress Purcell’s shoulders, the voice sank to intimacy. “I’m amazed that a bright youngster like you didn’t know about her.” The hands groped, unsatisfied.

“Didn’t know
what
about her?” Purcell asked through clenched teeth.

“Ah, dear Dave,” the Old man purred and his arms, with the groping pink and white hands, tightened around Purcell. “Love
is
blind. Why, Dave, those innocent-seeming ones are always the worst. Little Mary Street was notorious. Wanton. There wasn’t a bellboy or lifeguard or guest in the hotel who couldn’t have her. She was even after me.”

Purcell wheeled on J. Arthur.
“What did you say?”

“You heard me. I could hardly keep her off me and even now I happen to know for a fact that she’s shacked up with this man Baldwin. She’s been living with him ever since—”

“You’re a liar,” Purcell said. “The most pernicious old bitch I—”

“Dave, I swear to you, that that little slut Street has been to bed with—”

“You need evening up,” Purcell said. And he let the Old Man have it in his good eye. “The personal touch. Sincerely. Dave Purcell.”

The Old Man was still stretched out on the golden Aubusson carpet when Purcell slammed the door of the Executive Suite.

Check Out

The charred boards of the barrel fell inward upon themselves, and flame spread to a pile of oily dustcloths, a battalion of oily dustmops in a corner, hesitated, flared over some open paint cans and plunged down an empty elevator shaft.

A soup cook and a fry cook argued Existentialism. Dr. Pomery considered her neighbors in the Pleasaunce and the use of super sound as a treatment for bursitis.

A nervous bus boy dropped a tray of dirty dishes and collapsed helplessly into another with a resounding crash and tinkle.

Fire roared now up the empty elevator shaft and arrested L. Harvey Crull, Jr., on his solitary rounds.
Are you ready?
The pamphlets of L. Harvey Crull, Jr. became a flaming sword against the unrighteous.
Vengeance is mine.
A frightened upstairs maid heard his low, bubbling laugh and bolted herself, quaking, into a linen closet.

Mrs. Browne-Smythe wrinkled her querulous nose and sniffed oracularly. “I smell smoke,” she said.

“Oh pshaw, Daisy, you’ve been smelling smoke for thirty-five years. When you don’t smell smoke, you hear a funny noise. A funny noise like somebody opening a window, eh Daisy? I smell smoke,” her lord said bitterly. “I hear a funny noise.” He returned to his water. Heat ran along steam-pipes set in concrete to a linen cupboard. Hot gases swept, by convection, up an enclosed metal stairway.

At the Colony in Palm Beach, Mr. Mather yearned for Dukemer’s full, soft mouth, the blue candor of her eyes, for all of her profane, yet sedate, enchantments.

Violet patted her diaphragm (fish was apt to come up on her) and complacently surveyed the thick legs which were the monstrous flowering of her heavy thighs, her thin face, her lean breast. “You know that navy blue ah-sheer I got at Anton’s, with diagonal tucks
here;
those little mother-of-pearl buttons,” Violet said painfully, seeing the minute seams, counting the buttons, for Violet suffered from total recall.

“I really
don’t
believe. . .” Mr. Mather began politely, although he knew better.

“Don’t talk to
me
about
little cottons,”
Violet said dangerously.

Mr. Mather compressed his lips. He did not mention little cottons. His vagus nerve signaled frantically.

“Dark blue, with a ah-bolero it could be a suit.” Violet’s voice beat Mr. Mather’s ulcer with little whips, echoed hollowly through his umbilicus. “With a ah-kick pleat.”

Mr. Mather’s ulcer drew up in tardy defiance. He rubbed the back of his neck and whistled under his breath.

“What?” Violet asked suspiciously.

“Ah-nothing,” Mr. Mather assured her. His ulcer considered thesis, antithesis and synthesis; rejected them in favor of a stinger. Mr. Mather sighed. Violet sighed too and regarded Mr. Mather almost fondly. He reminded himself that everything only
is
and took a bismuth tablet.

“Of course Nelly’s gone. Simply left us and got married. All those new uniforms. Naturally I asked her to wait until I could find another size twelve. No point in buying all
new
uniforms. ‘Which is more important,’ I asked her, ‘Miss Violetta’s recital with Rembski or your big ah-truck driver? You won’t be wearing a size twelve long, missy,’ I told her. She
did
have the grace to sniffle.”

Mr. Mather’s monad pulled down his sense-windows. His ulcer ground out a bile-green roundelay.

“. . . peanut butter and crab meat. Now about binding those
National ah-Geographics,
Will. . .”

Hydrochloric acid swirled evilly through Mr. Mather’s interior. Savage gastric juices attacked his mucous membrane. Stomach walls blanched furiously and blushed.

Dukemer left the bar. She was hot and unhappy. She walked to the sour reek of the service stairway, through a lower hall and out into a little areaway devoted to garbage cans and wet bathing suits.

The pulse continued to beat in Dukemer’s head. Thirty-
one.
Bury-your-
dead.
Thirty-
one
. All
alike.
Thirty-
one
. Die-
alone.
Thirty-
one
. Dearest-
love
. Vio-
let.

The areaway was fresh and cool, with a clean, salt breeze from the ocean, and a deep, blue dome of sky overhead. Heavy white blankets of cloud drifted aimlessly. “Merry Christmas,” Dukemer said aloud. “A
very
Merry Christmas.”

A tired bellman approached, walking a nervous wire-haired terrier. The Boy was fifty, fifty-five, she supposed. “Afternoon, miss,” he said. The terrier, clipped and chalked, circled the garbage cans, sniffing judiciously, was alerted with a deep-throated snarl for no reason, bolted as far as the leash, barked to save his dignity, scratched in untenable positions, preened himself delicately in a fish head. “Nice day,” the Boy said.

Die
-alone.
Thirty-
one
. Dearest-
love
. All
-alike.
Thirty-
one
, the clock in Dukemer’s head ticked. Chiang hissed from the service stairway, and the terrier was towed to barking, reluctant safety. Mewing and spitting, Chiang circled the areaway. He arched his back raspingly against Dukemer’s foreleg and she kicked at him absently. Dukemer’s head ached more fiercely in the blue brilliance of the day. She was hot, and her stomach itched, and she was very low in her mind.