I am not weary, but sleep is, nevertheless, coming on. Tomorrow, more will occur.
I have this odd piece of paper in front of me. I read it, and I wonder if I have been made a fool of. I hope not. I think not. Unless something happens to change my mind, I will assume not.
When I left the house it was early in the evening, the full moon had not yet risen, and I was greeted by the aftermath of a freezing rain; one of those ambiguous signs that either says, “It will be colder soon,” or, “It will be warmer before too long.” For the time of year, it ought to be the latter, but I am not convinced. But it makes the streets and sidewalks just as slippery either way, and everywhere I saw the flashing lights of tow trucks doing their job and policemen too busy to look for the likes of me.
In spite of the fact that I walked all the way-tread-ing, as it were, on thin ice-it was still early when I found the hotel, every bit as ugly as I’d been told, with red brick and a cracked glass door next to a revolving door that bore an “out of order” sign that seemed very old. I looked at the other doors that were a part of the same structure, and one of them had, drawn in chalk, a circle with a dot in the middle of it. Inside the door, a public hallway, were three mailboxes. I recognized the name on number two.
There were three doors on the landing at the top of the long, narrow stairway. The one I wanted was not difficult to identify; it was in the middle and had a number on it, albeit hanging upside down from one nail. It also had her name above the door in glittering letters.
I knocked upon the door and waited.
There was the sound of shuffling feet, and the door was opened as far as the security chain would permit. I found myself regarding a pair of dark eyes cast into an old, weathered face poured from a mold I’d seen many times in many places. The eyes regarded me, widened, narrowed, then appeared to consider. I had the feeling that I’d been recognized.
After a moment the door closed, the chain slipped off, and the door opened again; apparently she realized that such devices are neither sufficient nor necessary. She supported herself with a wooden stick in one hand, the other gripping the door.
Her voice was sharp and brittle. She said. “You must be John Agyar.”
“Yes,” I said. “Good evening.”
She nodded, watching me carefully.
I said, “Are you going to invite me in?”
“No.”
“Ah. Then we must converse this way?”
“I have nothing to say to you. What have you to say to me? I’m too old for threats to mean anything.”
“I’ll bet you say that to all the guys.”
“Only for as long as it’s been true. What do you want?”
“I thought you could tell me my future.”
She snorted. “My crystal ball isn’t here. What do you want?”
I shrugged. “I dislike standing by the door. Can we meet somewhere?”
“Do you think I’m so foolish?”
“Au contraire, as my friend the ghost likes to say. I believe you are wise enough to take precautions, and intelligent enough to know what precautions to take. As it happens, I have no desire to harm you in any way; but I am wise enough not to expect you to believe me and intelligent enough to invite any reasonable alternative.”
She stared at me for a moment more, looking me dead in the eye as if to tell me I could do nothing to her, which may even have been true. Then she nodded. “There is a cafe in the hotel downstairs; I’ll meet you there.”
“I’ll wait for you outside.”
She snorted a little. “Very well. I will see you in a moment.”
I returned to the street and found a dark place to await the redoubtable lady and keep an eye out for the police, just in case she thought to call them on me. I decided that I liked her; I hoped I wouldn’t have to kill her.
Twenty minutes later she came out of the door, helped by two walking sticks. She was heavily muffled against the weather, wearing a dark wool coat and a matching hat and scarf, thick woolen mittens with little metal clasps attaching them to her coat sleeves, such as children wear so they don’t lose their mittens. I suspect that she had made most of the items herself.
She looked around for me and I stepped up next to her. She didn’t jump; she just scowled and said, “Come along.” She didn’t have much trouble walking in spite of the icy sidewalk, I suppose because of years of practice and the shortness of her steps. A boy of about eighteen was spreading salt on the sidewalk as we walked by, but it hadn’t started working yet.
I followed her into the cafe, which consisted of about ten green plastic booths and some stools arranged in a long rectangle. The interior decoration was chrome, except for additional aesthetic statements provided by the coats hanging on racks which were attached to the end of each booth; patrons sitting at the counter were, I suppose, expected to leave their coats on.
It was just past the dinner hour, so, while there was no one in line ahead of us, we had to wait almost five minutes for them to clean off a table; five minutes which my companion spent complaining loudly about being made to wait standing. A harried-looking but not unattractive middle-aged waitress offered her a seat at the counter while she waited, an offer that was declined with a sniff.
At last we were shown to a booth. I helped her with her coat, removed my own; I saw from the thin gold chains around her neck that my companion, who wore a severe black dress, had not neglected anything; we sat down. The silver was ugly, and set on a paper place mat full of pictures of covered bridges; it had been printed by the Lakota tourist bureau and should have been called, “What to avoid in Ashtabula County.”
My dinner partner propped her canes against the booth, and set her purse next to her. She picked up the one-page plastic menu from behind the napkin holder, glanced at it, and said, “Well? The beef stew is good. Or perhaps some chili since the day is so cold?”
“Funny,” I said. “Thanks just the same, I think I’ll pass this time.”
She sniffed, replaced the menu, and folded her hands in front of her. She said, “No doubt. Well, then, let’s get on with it. What do you want?”
“Coffee?” said the waitress, coming up behind me.
“Please,” I said. “Half a cup.”
“Tea,” said my companion. “With lemon.”
The waitress went away, and came back presently with a little tin of hot water and a bag of Lipton’s. She poured me half a cup of coffee, learned that I didn’t need cream, and was informed that we would not be ordering food, which didn’t seem to bother her. She went away.
The old woman put the tea bag in the thick ceramic cup and poured the water over it, scowling as if it had offended her in some way. “What do you want from me?” she said.
“As I said, I want to know my future.”
“You know your future as well as I do; the only question is when, and you are aware, I think, that I would not tell you that even if I could. What do you want?”
So much for polite conversation. I said, “You know who Jill Quarrier is.”
“Of course.”
“Then you ought to know that she failed.”
The old woman frowned. “Failed?”
“She didn’t have what it took.”
“She couldn’t have-”
“If I had left her alone, it might have been different. Then again, it might not have.”
She glared at me. “What have you done to her?”
“She lives.”
“How do you mean that?”
“As you do. She breathes, her heart beats, she eats and drinks and tells jokes.”
The old woman sniffed. “Well?”
“Well, I want to know how she did it.”
She scowled at me. After a moment, she said, “What’s the difference? It failed.”
“It failed because, as I said, she didn’t have what it took after I interrupted the proceedings. I do, no matter who interrupts me.”