Отель / Hotel

“Excuse me, Mr. McDermott, can I have a word with you?”

McDermott recognized Sol Natchez, one of the elderly room-service waiters.

“I expect you’ve come about the complaint – the complaint about me.”

McDermott glanced at the double doors to the suite. They had not yet opened, only the dogs were barking. He said, “Tell me what happened.”

Sol swallowed twice, “If I lose this job, Mr. McDermott, it’s hard at my age to find another. The Duke and the Duchess are not the hardest people to serve… except for tonight. They expect a lot, but I’ve never minded, even though there’s never a tip.”

Peter smiled involuntarily. British nobility seldom tipped, thinking, perhaps, that the privilege of waiting on them was a reward in itself.

“It was about half an hour ago. They’d ordered a late supper, the Duke and Duchess – oysters, champagne, shrimp Creole.”

“What happened?”

“When I was serving the shrimp Creole, well… the Duchess got up from the table. As she came back she jogged my arm. If I didn’t know better I’d have said it was deliberate.”

“That’s ridiculous!”

“I know, sir, I know. After that there was a small spot on the Duke’s trousers.”

Peter said doubtfully, “Is that all this is about?”

“Mr. McDermott, I swear to you that’s all. I apologized, I got a clean napkin and water to get the spot off, but it wouldn’t do. She insisted on sending for Mr. Trent… ”

“Mr. Trent is not in the hotel.”

He would hear the other side of the story, Peter decided. Meanwhile he instructed, “If you’re all through for tonight you’d better go home.”

As the waiter disappeared, the door was opened by a moon-faced, youngish man with pince-nez. It was the Croydons’ secretary.

He introduced himself to the secretary.

The secretary said, “We were expecting Mr. Trent.”

“Mr. Trent is away from the hotel for the evening.”

“Why can’t he be sent for?” the Duchess of Croydon appeared, three of the terriers at her heels. She silenced the dogs and turned her eyes on Peter. He was aware of the handsome face, familiar through a thousand photographs.

“To be perfectly honest, Your Grace, I was not aware that you required Mr. Trent personally.”

“Even in Mr. Trent’s absence I expected one of the senior executives.”

Peter flushed. He had an impression, at this moment, of being on foot while the Duchess was mounted.

“I’m assistant general manager. That’s why I came personally.”

“Aren’t you young for that?”

“Nowadays a good many young men are in hotel management.”

“How old are you?”

“Thirty-two.”

The Duchess smiled. She was five or six years older than himself, he calculated, though younger than the Duke who was in his late forties. Now she asked, “Do you take a course or something?”

“I have a degree from Cornell University – the School of Hotel Administration. Before coming here I was an assistant manager at the Waldorf.” He was tempted to add: from where I was fired and black-listed by the chain hotels, so that I am lucky to be here, in an independent hotel. He would not say it, of course, because a private hell was something you lived with alone.

“The Waldorf would never have tolerated an incident like tonight’s.”

“I assure you, ma’am, the St. Gregory will not tolerate it either.”

The conversation was like a game of tennis. He waited for the ball to come back.

“Your waiter poured shrimp Creole over my husband.”

It was obviously an exaggeration. He wondered what had caused it.

“I’m here to apologize for the hotel.”

“My husband and I decided to enjoy a quiet evening in our suite here, by ourselves. We were out for a short walk, then we returned to supper – and this!”

He was about to leave when the door to the living room opened fully. The Duke of Croydon came in. He was untidily dressed, in a white shirt and the trousers of a tuxedo. Instinctively Peter McDermott’s eyes sought the spot where Natchez had “poured shrimp Creole.” He found it, though it was barely visible.

“Oh, beg pardon.” Then, to the Duchess: “I say, old girl. I must have left my cigarettes in the car.”

“I’ll bring some.” With a nod the Duke turned back into the living room. It was an uncomfortable scene that had for some reason heightened the Duchess’s anger.

Turning to Peter, she snapped, “I insist on a full report and a personal apology.”

Still perplexed, Peter left the suite. The bellboy who had accompanied Christine was waiting for him. “Miss Francis wants you in 1439, please, hurry!”

4

When the elevator stopped at the fourteenth floor, Christine thought that if five years ago someone at the University of Wisconsin had asked what twenty-year-old Chris Francis would do a couple of years later, she would have never guessed she would work in a New Orleans hotel.

After the accident in Wisconsin, she had sought a place, where she could be unknown and which was unfamiliar to herself. Familiar things had become an ache of heart. Strangely there were never nightmares after that day at Madison airport.

She had been there to see her family leave for Europe. Her mother, her father, her elder sister, embraced Christine; and even Tony, two years younger and hating public affection, consented to be kissed. They all promised to write, even though she would join them in Paris two weeks later when term ended.

And a few minutes later the big jet took off with a roar. It barely cleared the runway before it fell back, one wing low, becoming a whirling Catherine wheel, for a moment a dust cloud, and then a torch. Finally, it turned into a silent pile of machinery fragments and what was left of human flesh.

It was five years ago. A few weeks after, she left Wisconsin and never returned.

Jimmy Duckworth, the bellboy accompanying her, noticed, “Room 1439 – that’s the old gent, Mr. Wells. We moved him from a corner room a couple of days ago.”