I was striding by the front desk on my way to the elevators when I suddenly stopped and looked thoughtful, as if remembering something... just as the clerk held up a finger and opened his mouth. (I admit it. I was watching from the corner of my eye for just such a moment.) I hurried to the desk, taking out my wallet as I went. I let him see the stack of bills inside as I peeled off three large ones and placed them on the blotter.
"I believe this will cover any arrears, my good man," I said.
The clerk (not Mickey Rooney) gave me a sour look that told me he'd been anticipating my ouster with relish. But he took the money and turned to his computer. I dug in the pocket of my cape and removed Toby and set him on the counter. He sniffed at the inkwell, and promptly knocked over the "No Pets Allowed" sign. I told him to sit, which he did.
The clerk's already prunelike mouth wrinkled even further when he turned from his ledgers with my change.
"I'm afraid no pets are allowed in the guest rooms, sir," he said.
"Toby is not a pet. He is a performer." I put my palm flat on the blotter between us.
"Nevertheless, I'm afraid..." He had finally noticed the edge of the twenty sticking out from under my hand.
"Seems there's a lot you're afraid of," I said. "You'll have to stop going around in such a frightened state." I pushed the bill a little closer, and he took it, making no effort to be discreet. A bribe's a bribe, as far as he was concerned.
"No need for any change just now," I said, airily. "We shall be checking out tomorrow morning, and I may be charging some interplanetary calls to my room. Tomorrow I shall need my bags delivered to dockside, H.M.S. Britannic, in time for the afternoon sailing."
"Of course," he said, making a note. Then he looked up, sneering. "Shall I have them sent to the crew deck?"
"And have your mother drop them over the side? You should let that old woman retire. No, no, send them to my dressing room. It's the one with the star on it."
I picked up Toby while the clerk was still sputtering, and swept away to the elevators.
It's always a melancholy time when I must once more put Toby down. Melancholy for me, not him. He always knows it's coming because for the two days prior I stuff him with food. A full belly extends his downtime and makes him recover more rapidly from the effects of hibernation, but the real reason I do it is guilt. It's entirely self-induced. Toby never offers a word of reproach.
I'm sure dogs don't experience the passage of time in the same way we do. He's sharp enough, I think, to know a hibernation is not the same as a regular night's sleep. While there are no actual seasons in our modern environments, there are periodic daily, weekly, and quarterly changes in temperature, humidity, pressure, and so forth, because it's been found people do better that way. Toby surely noticed those when awakened. But I doubt he had any notion of how much time had passed. So it was no skin off his nose, right?
I just hated treating him like a little, warm machine. I'd never thought of him as property. A dog sticks to you out of loyalty. And, pragmatically, because you're his meal ticket.
I called him over and tossed the sleepy pill in his direction. He leaped into the air and caught it. I heaped praise on him, which he took as only his due, clever dog, smart dog. Then, old hand that he is, he sat down and waited. He used to stagger about, run into things. He didn't like to be held at such times, as he sometimes became delirious, hallucinated. Once he bit my hand, and felt rotten about it for days after I woke him up. So he just sits there, and pretty soon he begins to nod. Sometimes he growls at things I can't see. But in no time his heart rate is falling, along with all his other metabolic signs.
He fell over and I scooped him up.
When I bought him he came with a little hard-sided carrying case, about the size of a hatbox. It was a hideous aluminum color. I had it covered with the finest crocodile skin, replaced the plastic handle with leather. I put him in the case, curled into a fluffy ball, and pasted a sensor to his pink belly. Green lights came on in the lid, which I then snapped closed. If anything went wrong, alarms would sound, and if I was close enough to hear I could rush him to a vet. Nothing had ever gone wrong.
I packed him into the Pantechnicon, laid out my clothing for the next day, then showered, brushed my teeth, put on my nightgown and cap, said my prayers, and crawled into the narrow, lumpy bed provided by the Lambs.
I heard the door squeak open on rusty hinges.
"I don't want to talk now, Elwood," I said. I could see his shadow on the floor. He nodded, and closed the door quietly. He knows I'm moody when I've just packed Toby.
Soon I was asleep.
About an hour later I sat up, instantly awake. I had the terrible feeling I'd forgotten something important. Something impossibly important. I cast my mind back over the day, which had been a fairly eventful one. I could come up with only one thing, and it was silly.
Surely he had been kidding. Surely...
There was nothing for it but to call the union. I got a computer. Don't tell me PFPA never sleeps. I showed my union card to the screen, which agreed I was a member in good standing of the Pluto Federation of Performing Artists (luckily for me you can still be in good standing though in arrears on your dues), delivered a canned lecture concerning the matter of P$795.03 due and payable or we are entitled to deduct said sum from any residuals received by this office (don't hold your breath), and asked what it could do for me.
"Search announced productions. Stage. King Lear. Polichinelli."
There was a short pause, and the computer was sorry to inform me no such production had been billboarded. Not on Pluto, not on Charon—
"Not Pluto, you idiot. Polichinelli never travels. Check the Luna listings."
"Inner-planet bookings are not handled by this office, sir. Please call—" Which I did, only to be answered by an identical computer voice. After the same rigmarole (oddly, this office felt I owed them P$795.13), I asked the same question.
The pause was even shorter.
"General casting call, all parts, King Lear, by William NMI Shakespeare (b. 1564, d. 1616). Production announced E-day 1/1/38. Casting begins 10/1/38. Venue: Golden Globe Theater, 2001 The Alameda, King City, Luna. Director: Kaspara V. Polichinelli. Producer—"
"Lear! Lear!" I was shouting. "Has Lear been cast?"
There was that little gurgle a voice program sometimes makes when shifting protocols.
"Dramatis personae," it intoned. "Lear, King of Britain: TBA. Goneril, daughter to Lear: TBA. Cordelia—"
I broke the connection so hard I almost broke my finger as well. Then I was fumbling with the card by the room phone, trying to find out how to call Luna. I got the hotel computer—the same voice I'd just heard from the union; a very good program salesman had been through here at one time—which regretted to inform me that such calls must be paid in advance.
After a bit of shouting I figured it out. That goddamn clerk was trying to pocket the change from my payment!
I stormed into the lobby in my dressing gown and slippers. Naturally the blackguard was not on duty. The night clerk looked up, doe-eyed, from a large crossword she was working on. I throttled my anger; she looked like a sweet kid, probably a drama student. She had enough heartbreaks in her future without me adding mine.
"I would like to send a telegram to Luna," I said.
"A what?"