John said, ‘All right. I think you’re very attractive. Is that a crime? And besides, it’s “Dauphin”, like the eldest son of the King of France, not “Dolphin” like in Flipper.’
‘Pity. “Dolphin” kind of suits you.’
They reached Room 309. John put down Rhodajane’s suitcase and opened the door for her. Then he switched on the lights and hefted her suitcase on to the linen chest in the corner. ‘Nice room,’ he said, looking around. It was decorated in turquoise and gold with brocade drapes and a bedspread to match. He went to the window and peered out. ‘You got a great view of the university, too.’
‘Really?’
‘Don’t knock it. I hear they have a first-rate department of anthropology.’
‘That’s a relief. Switch on the TV for me, would you?’
John switched on the television while Rhodajane sat on the bed and took off her shoes. ‘God, my feet. I mean, I really love these shoes, but…’
John handed her the remote control. ‘You’ll have to work this out for yourself. I’m not too good when it comes to technology.’
Rhodajane flapped one hand. ‘Anything will do, so long as they’re speaking English. I really have to go to the little girls’ room.’
When she stood up without her shoes on, she was at least three inches shorter than she had been before. She padded off to the bathroom and closed the door while John flicked through the TV channels. As far as he could he see it was the usual daytime diet: As The World Turns and The Electric Company for kids, followed by General Hospital, American Justice and The Tyra Show.
Tyra was talking to a plump young woman who wanted to swallow a tapeworm so that she could lose weight. John wondered if he ought to do the same, but apart from the very idea of it making his mouth feel all greasy and his throat close up, he doubted if any tapeworm could keep up with him. He could finish a whole muffuletta sandwich in less than a minute, complete with extra provolone.
‘Hey, you want to come see this!’ he called out. An entrepreneur who sold tapeworms on the Internet had joined Tyra and her guest, and was lifting one of them out of a jar, all four feet of it, pale and slippery, with four suckers around its head.
John turned around. Rhodajane was still in the bathroom with the door closed, but he could see himself in the mirror over the dressing table. He could see the reflection of the TV screen, too, but inexplicably the reflected TV screen wasn’t showing Tyra Banks and her two guests. Instead, it was showing an indistinct image of a darkened room, as if it was being filmed by a closed-circuit camera. A woman in a stained white nightgown was lying on a bed, and a man was repeatedly walking backward and forward in front of the camera, although John couldn’t see who he was, because his head was cut off by the top of the screen.
Baffled, John looked back at the real TV. The tapeworm entrepreneur was lowering the worm back into the jar, along with several other coiled-up companions, and Tyra was screaming and laughing in disgust. John looked back at the TV in the mirror. The man was bending over the woman on the bed and although John couldn’t hear what she was saying, it looked from the expression on her face as if she were crying and begging.
‘Ma’am!’ John called out. He heard the toilet flush, and the faucets in the bathroom basin splashing. The man who was bending over the woman on the bed moved slightly to his right, so that he obscured the woman’s face. He appeared to be jerking his left elbow backward and forward, in a strange repetitive way. John could only see the woman’s bare legs, but they were covered in huge maroon bruises and they were twitching and convulsing as the man continued to jerk his elbow.
‘Ma’am!’ John repeated. He wanted Rhodajane to see this — partly because he couldn’t believe what he was seeing with his own eyes, and partly because he was worried that this might be an example of what Detective Wisocky had called ‘anything out of the ordinary.’
‘OK, OK! Keep your toupee on!’ The bathroom door opened, and Rhodajane stepped out, still brushing her hair. ‘Sorry if I kept you waiting but I was busting.’ She walked across the room and opened her pocketbook. ‘How much do I owe you?’
John said, ‘The TV, ma’am. Take a look at the TV.’
‘Hold up. Let me get my glasses. I can’t see a goddamned thing without my glasses.’
As she was rummaging in her pocketbook for her purse and her spectacles, John saw a dark red stain spreading quickly across the sheet on which the woman was lying. The man stood up straight, and for a split second John could see the woman’s face again. She seemed to be staring directly at him, her eyes bulging in pain, her mouth dragged downward in a silent howl. Then the TV screen flickered and jumped, and the image of the darkened room vanished, and was instantly replaced by a commercial for HeadOn headache cure, (or nOdaeH as it appeared in the mirror.)
Rhodajane came up behind him wearing her glasses and laid a surprisingly familiar hand on his shoulder. ‘So what did you want me to see? Not this goddamned HeadOn commercial? It must be the worst commercial ever! “HeadOn — apply directly to the forehead! HeadOn — apply directly to the forehead!” Jesus, I can hear it in my sleep!’
‘No, no, not that,’ John told her. ‘There was something on The Tyra Show, that’s all. It doesn’t matter.’
‘The Tyra Show? That crap? You have very strange tastes, Mr Eldest-Son-Of-The-King-Of-France. How much do I owe you?’
‘Forty-four bucks, but let’s call it forty. The traffic wasn’t your fault.’
Rhodajane gave him a fifty-dollar bill and said, ‘Keep the change my good man. But don’t spend it all on bacon fries.’
John headed for the door and opened it. Before he left, though, he turned around and said, ‘Here — let me give you my cellphone number.’
‘What for? I’m still not going out with you.’
‘I know that. I’m not asking you to. But just in case.’
‘Just in case of what, for instance?’
‘Just in case something weird happens. Weird things do happen. I’ve had some pretty weird things happen to me, in my time.’
‘You and that detective, you’re both as screwy as each other if you ask me. Tweedle-de-dum and Tweedle-de-dee.’
John took a catsup-spotted business card out of his breast pocket and offered it to her. ‘More than likely, ma’am, everything’s going to be fine. But if you get spooked or anything, and you feel too reticent to phone the cops, give me a call and I can be round here in five minutes flat. I only live in Glenville.’
Rhodajane hesitated for a moment, but then she took his card and tucked it into her cleavage. ‘OK, big boy, whatever you say. But I don’t believe for one single second that my room is going to change into the chamber of horrors or that I’m going to hear screaming in the middle of the night. And nobody else is getting in here once I’ve locked this door behind you, and you can be one hundred and eleven percent sure of that.’
‘Sure,’ said John. He could have tried to explain to her what he had seen on the reflected TV screen, but she would probably think that he was deliberately trying to frighten her so that she would ask him to come around and protect her. Either that, or she would think that he was mentally challenged, or that he had been smoking something more exotic than Marlboro Lights.
‘Goodbye, then, Mr Dauphin,’ she told him. ‘And thank you. You’re a gentleman.’
‘Well, I was the last time I looked. But don’t forget, will you? Anything outré occurs, anything at all, anything eldritch, you pick up your phone and it’ll be John Dauphin to the rescue. I mean that.’