“Oh, we’re awfully sorry, Mr. Bicker. But your room has been reserved by another party. I'm afraid you’ll have to give it up."
“Look,” I said heatedly. “I can’t give it up if I’m not Mr. Bicker. And I’m not Mr. Bicker. So if you want his room, why don’t you wake him up so he can make his plane and let me go back to sleep?” I slammed the phone back on its cradle.
Twenty minutes later it rang and woke me again. “Hello, Mr. Victor, this is the manager. I understand from our operator that you’d like to extend your reservation. You should really have called me direct about that, you know.”
“I don’t want to extend my reservation!” I shouted.
“Oh, then you'll be leaving this morning?”
“No!” The shout became a scream. “I will not be leaving this morning!”
“No? But then you’ll miss your plane, won't you?”
What I said at this point is unprintable. Indeed, it wouldn’t be printable in the Longshoremans’ Profanity Gazette. Suffice it to say that it summed up my feelings to the manager that the Beverly Topless was an intrinsically hostile hostel and that I, for one, reciprocated the hostility in full.
If I seem to have gone into the hotel's hostility at some lengths, it’s because during many of the events which ensued after my visit to the barber shop, there was always the thought that the causes might have been typical hotel goof-ups, rather than the insidious ones to which my mind leaped. However, I’m getting ahead of myself. Right now, it was time to go and get my haircut.
The haircut was typical of the Beverly Topless. The barber nicked my neck-nape, dribbled hair down the inside of my shirt, and left me with lopsided sideburns. But his manner was lofty enough to intimidate me, and there was the distraction of the topless manicurist to placate me as well. The fact that she castrated my cuticles didn’t really detract from her bosomy charms, either. All in all, the pros and cons of a haircut at the Topless balanced out, with the fringe benefits offsetting the frayed results.
Also, there was a bonus. The barber patched up my bald spot with some of my very own excess hair. The only trouble was that when I got back to my room, I had to remove the patch again, because underneath it the barber had inserted a tiny slip of paper with a message on it. At least I deduced it was a message. It was Greek to me. It probably would have been Greek to a Greek, for that matter. Like the one I’d received in Washington, this gummy missive was indecipherable to me.
I put in a call to Putnam. Nothing could be done over the phone, he told me. So he arranged to have the message picked up by a courier who would fly it to Washington where it could be decoded. As soon as there were any results, Putnam promised to call me back.
The courier came and went within the hour. It Was getting late-ish by then, and I still hadn’t had any dinner. I was hungry, but not in the mood for a lavish meal. So I went into the hotel's Lancer Lounge—known familiarly among the guests as the “Cancer Lounge”--intending to have a drink and a sandwich.
As I entered, I spotted Misty Milo sitting alone in a dimly lit booth. She called out a greeting. I opened my mouth to answer and a large green olive bypassed my craw to lodge in my windpipe. The bartender had been struggling to open a bottle of them, and he'd succeeded.
I wasn’t the only victim. Various guests scattered around the room were pelted with olives and spattered with oil. For the most part they ignored the assault. Such incidents were quite simple a part of life at the Beverly Topless. While a few of the ladies plucked olives from their decolletage and some of the gents slyly dabbed at the oil spots on their partners’ bosoms, I stood rooted to the spot, choking and turning purple. A passing waiter pounded my back without breaking stride, baptized me with some particularly sticky anisette, and kept his nose pointed at the ceiling as he continued on his way. I swallowed the olive in one gulp, pit and all, not really properly grateful for the gratis sustenance, I suppose, and went to join Misty.
“My favorite bull, come home to graze,” she greeted me. She’d had a few, and was evidently past being subtle. “I feel more like a steer this morning -- I mean night," I told her. “That was a pretty wild scene up at Voluptua’s.”
“It could have been a lot, wilder." She managed a leer. “If we'd ditched those loonies it would have been.”
“Until I get some nourishment in me, I'm neuter,” I told her, removing her hot hand from my thigh. “I need libation and calories to renew my lust for life.”
“Mmm. Then let’s get you fed and whiskeyed. But don’t lose sight of the lust." Her long red fingernails plowed some furrows in the back of my neck.
“Waiter!” She grabbed the tail of the jacket of a passing waiter.
He swiveled around. The bottle of tonic on the tray he was carrying teetered and tipped over. Quinine water sloshed down my neck, mixing with the anisette. That’s no combination for a drinking man. “Club sandwich and Early Times on the rocks. Make it a double,” I instructed him, just to be sure there’d be something left for me after the inevitable spillage. “And do it again to the lady.”
“You too, darling,” Misty murmured, her fingers between the buttons of my shirt now and playing with the hair on my chest. “And make it a triple.”
“Behave!” I removed her hand and held onto it. “We're in a public place.”
“It’s dark enough to be public.”
“That's exterior,” I corrected her. “And never mind getting specific.”
“You’ve been giving me naughty dreams, Stevie.” She blew in my ear.
The waiter was back at my elbow with the Early Times. I rescued the bourbon before he could spill it all over Misty’s hand and my lap, which were just then enjoying an intimate proximity. I sipped it appreciatively, feeling the smooth, Kentucky-flavored warmth spreading through my body. I still wasn’t quite as warm as Misty, but I was getting there. “Well, maybe we can‘ make your dreams come true,” I found myself murmuring back.
“Ooh!” She reached over and took my hand and pressed it to her breast. She wasn't wearing anything under the silk cocktail dress. Her breast was warm and soft, and I could feel her quick heartbeat.
In order to maintain the contact, my arm was stretched none too subtly across the table. We were seated side by side, but Misty had chosen to honor the hand farthest from her. It figured that the waiter delivering my sandwich chose to put the plate down right on top of my arm. Naturally the sandwich rolled off the plate. A mixture of toast, bacon, lettuce, tomato, turkey and Russian dressing cascaded into Misty’s lap.
It made for an interesting cleanup job. I disdained the waiter’s help and took it on myself. Misty didn’t help. She just reacted.
“Just let me snag this piece of bacon,” I said, peering closely at the disaster area.
“Ahh, yes!” She wriggled and managed to trap my hand along with the elusive bacon.
“Now cut that out, Misty. People are looking at us!” I rubbed vigorously with my napkin at a splotch of Russian dressing.
“I can't help it!” Her voice was unexpectedly loud. “That’s the spot!”
“I'm trying to get it out!”
“That's not what I meant!” She was half rising from her seat.
“Excuse me, sir.” The waiter was bending over me and watching with great interest. “Would you and the lady be wanting another drink now?"
“Ready for another, Misty?”
“I’m ready! I'm ready! I've never been readier!”
“I mean a drink,” I explained desperately. “'I'he waiter wants to know if we want another round.”
She didn’t answer. Only her eyes were moving now, darting wildly toward the ceiling.
“Yes,” I told the waiter. “Bring us another round."