Hotel

Keycase went in. He slipped on gloves, then closed and latched the outside door behind him.

He moved warily, yet wasting no time. Broadloom in the hallway and living room muffled his footsteps. He crossed the living room to a farther door which was ajar. As Keycase expected, it led to two spacious bedrooms, each with a bathroom, and a dressing room between. In the bedrooms, as elsewhere, lights were on. There was no mistaking which room was the Duchess's.

Its furnishings included a tallboy, two dressing tables and a walk-in closet. Keycase began, systematically, to search all four. A jewelbox, such as he sought, was in neither the tallboy nor the first dressing table. There were a number of items - gold evening purses, cigarette cases and expensive - looking compacts - which, with more time and in other circumstances, he would have garnered gladly. But now he was racing, seeking a major prize and discarding all else.

At the second dressing table he opened the first drawer. It contained nothing worth while. The second drawer yielded no better result. In the third, on top, was an array of negligees. Beneath them was a deep, oblong box of hand-tooled leather. It was locked.

Leaving the box in the drawer, Keycase worked with a knife and screwdriver to break the lock. The box was stoutly made and resisted opening. Several minutes passed. Conscious of fleeting time, he began to perspire.

At length the lock gave, the lid flew back. Beneath, in scintillating, breathtaking array were two tiers of jewelsrings, brooches, necklets, clips, tiaras; all of precious metal, and most were gem-encrusted. At the sight, Keycase drew in breath. So, after all, a portion of the Duchess's fabled collection had not been consigned to the hotel vault. Once more a hunch, an omen, had proved right. With both hands he reached out to seize the spoils. At the same instant a key turned in the lock of the outer door.

His reflex was instantaneous. Keycase slammed down the jewelbox lid and slid the drawer closed. On the way in, he had left the bedroom door slightly ajar; now he flew to it. Through an inch-wide gap he could see into the living room. A hotel maid was entering. She had towels on her arm and was headed for the Duchess's bedroom. The maid was elderly, and waddled. Her slowness offered a single slim chance.

Swinging around, Keycase lunged for a bedside lamp. He found its cord and yanked. The light went out. Now he needed something in his hand to indicate activity. Something! Anything!

Against the wall was a small attache case. He seized it and stalked toward the door.

As Keycase swung the door wide, the maid recoiled. "Oh!" A hand went over her heart.

Keycase frowned. "Where have you been? You should have come here earlier."

The shock, followed by the accusation, made her flustered. He had intended that it should.

"I'm sorry, sir. I saw there were people in, and . .

He cut her short. "It doesn't matter now. Do what you have to, and there's a lamp needs fixing." He gestured into the bedroom. "The Duchess wants it working tonight." He kept his voice low, remembering the secretary.

"Oh, I'll see that it is, sir."

"Very well." Keycase nodded coolly, and went out.

In the corridor he tried not to think. He succeeded until he was in his own room, 830. Then, in bafflement and despair, he flung himself across the bed and buried his face in a pillow.

It was more than an hour before he bothered forcing the lock of the attache-case he had brought away.

Inside was pile upon pile of United States currency. All used bills, of small denominations.

With trembling hands he counted fifteen thousand dollars.

22

Peter McDermott accompanied the two detectives from the incinerator in the hotel basement to the St. Charles Street door.

"For the time being," Captain Yolles cautioned, "I'd like to keep what's happened tonight as quiet as possible. There'll be questions enough when we charge your man Ogilvie, whatever it's with. No sense in bringing the press around our necks until we have to."

Peter assured him, "If the hotel had any choice, we'd prefer no publicity at all."

Yolles grunted. "Don't count on it."

Peter returned to the main dining room to discover, not surprisingly, that Christine and Albert Wells had gone.

In the lobby he was intercepted by the night manager. "Mr. McDermott, here's a note Miss Francis left for you."

It was in a sealed envelope and read simply:

I've gone home. Come if you can.

- Christine.

He would go, he decided. He suspected that Christine was eager to talk over the events of the day, including this evening's astounding disclosure by Albert Wells.

Nothing else to do tonight at the hotel. Or was there? Abruptly, Peter remembered the promise he had made to Marsha Preyscott on leaving her at the cemetery so unceremoniously this afternoon. He had said he would telephone later, but he had forgotten until now. The crisis of the afternoon was only hours away. It seemed like days, and Marsha somehow remote. But he supposed he should call her, late as it was.

Once more he used the credit manager's office on the main floor and dialed the Preyscott number. Marsha answered on the first ring.

"Oh, Peter," she said, "I've been sitting by the telephone. I waited and waited, then called twice and left my name."

He remembered guiltily the pile of unacknowledged messages on his office desk.

"I'm genuinely sorry, and I can't explain, at least not yet. Except that all kinds of things have been happening."

"Tell me tomorrow."

"Marsha, I'm afraid tomorrow will be a very full day . . .

"At breakfast," Marsha said. "If it's going to be that kind of day, you need a New Orleans breakfast. They're famous. Have you ever had one?"

"I don't usually eat breakfast."

"Tomorrow you will. And Anna's are special. A lot better, I'll bet, than at your old hotel."

It was impossible not to be charmed by Marsha's enthusiasms. And he had, after all, deserted her this afternoon.

"It will have to be early."

"As early as you Re."

They agreed on 7:30 a.m.

A few minutes later he was in a taxi on his way to Christine's apartment in Gentilly.

He rang from downstairs. Christine was waiting with the apartment door open.

"Not a word," she said, "until after the second drink. I just can't take it all in."

"You'd better," he told her. "You haven't heard the half of it."

She had mixed daiquiris, which were chilling in the refrigerator. There was a heaped plate of chicken and ham sandwiches. The fragrance of freshly brewed coffee wafted through the apartment.

Peter remembered suddenly that despite his sojourn in the hotel kitchens, and the talk of breakfast tomorrow, he had eaten nothing since lunch.

"That's what I imagined," Christine said when he told her. "Fall to!"

Obeying, he watched as she moved efficiently around the tiny kitchen. He had a feeling, sitting here, of being at ease and shielded from whatever might be happening outside. He thought: Christine had cared about him enough to do what she had done. More important, there was an empathy between them in which even their silences, as now, seemed shared and understood.

He pushed away the daiquiri glass and reached for a coffee cup which Christine had filled. "All right," he said, "where do we start?"

They talked continuously for almost two hours, all the time their closeness growing. At the end, all they could decide on definitely was that tomorrow would be an interesting day.

"I won't sleep," Christine said. "I couldn't possibly. I know I won't."

"I couldn't either," Peter said. "But not for the reason you mean."

He had no doubts; only a conviction that he wanted this moment to go on and on. He took her in his arms and kissed her.

Later, it seemed the most natural thing in the world that they should make love.

FRIDAY

1

It was understandable, Peter McDermott thought, that the Duke and Duchess of Croydon should be rolling the chief house officer, Ogilvie - trussed securely into a ball - toward the edge of the St. Gregory roof while, far below, a sea of faces stared fixedly upward. But it was strange, and somehow shocking, that a few yards farther on, Curtis O'Keefe and Warren Trent were exchanging savage cuts with bloodstained dueling swords. Why, Peter wondered, had Captain Yolles, standing by a stairway door, failed to intervene? Then Peter realized that the policeman was watching a giant bird's nest in which a single egg was cracking open. A moment later, from the egg's interior, emerged an outsize sparrow with the cheery face of Albert Wells. But now Peter's attention was diverted to the roofedge where a desperately struggling Christine had become entangled with Ogilvie, and Marsha Preyscott was helping the Croydons push the double burden nearer and nearer to the awful gulf below. The crowds continued to gape as Captain Yolles leaned against a doorpost, yawning.

If he hoped to save Christine, Peter realized, he must act himself. But when he attempted to move, his feet dragged heavily as if encased in glue, and while his body urged forward, his legs refused to follow. He tried to cry out, but his throat was blocked. His eyes met Christine's in dumb despair.

Suddenly, the Croydons, Marsha, O'Keefe, Warren Trent stopped and were listening. The sparrow that was Albert Wells cocked an ear. Now Ogilvie, Yolles, and Christine were doing the same. Listening to what?

Then Peter heard: a cacophony as if all the telephones on earth were ringing together. The sound came closer, swelled, until it seemed that it would engulf them all. Peter put his hands over his ears. The dissonance grew. He closed his eyes, then opened them.

He was in his apartment. His bedside alarm showed 6:30 a.m.

He lay for a few minutes, shaking his head free from the wild, hodge-podge dream. Then he padded to the bathroom for a shower, steeling himself to remain under the spray with the cold tap "on" for a final minute. He emerged from the shower fully awake. Slipping on a towel robe, he started coffee brewing in the kitchenette, then went to the telephone and dialed the hotel number.

He was connected with the night manager who assured Peter that there had been no message during the night concerning anything found in the incinerator. No, the night manager said with a trace of tiredness, he had not checked personally. Yes, if Mr. McDermott wished, he would go down immediately and telephone the result, though Peter sensed a mild resentment at the unlikely errand so near the end of a long, firing shift. The incinerator was somewhere in the lower basement, wasn't it?

Peter was shaving when the return call came. The night manager reported that he had spoken with the incinerator employee, Graham, who was sorry, but the paper Mr. McDermott wanted had not turned up. Now, it didn't look as if it would. The manager added the information that Graham's night shift - as well as his own - was almost ended.

Later, Peter decided, he would pass the news, or rather the lack of it, to Captain Yolles. He remembered his opinion last night, which still held good, that the hotel had done all it could in the matter of public duty.

Anything else must be the business of the police.

Between sips of coffee, and while dressing, Peter considered the two subjects uppermost in his mind. One was Christine; the other, his own future, if any, at the St. Gregory Hotel.

After last night, he realized that whatever might be ahead, more than anything else he wished Christine to be a part of it. The conviction had been growing on him; now it was clear and definite. He supposed it might be said that he was in love, but he was guarded in attempting to define his deeper feelings, even to himself. Once before, what he had believed was love had turned to ashes. Perhaps it was better to begin with hope, and grope uncertainly toward an unknown end.