Homako Tani had been a shrewd hotelier.
La-La Land scuttlebutt had it that the Neo Edo's builder had liberated the original during the 1657 conflagration which had destroyed Edo Castle; but Kit had never found any trace of it, not even in Homako's private safe. Of course, scuttlebutt also had it that Homako Tani had been murdered by the irascible Musashi, himself, during a down-time visit to feudal Japan, for some minor insult the ronin samurai hadn't been willing to overlook. Other rumors had him last seen stepping through an unstable gate into Tang Dynasty China; and others that he'd gone into permanent retirement in Tibet as the Dalai Lama.
The point was, nobody knew what had become of Homako, not even the named partners in the law firm of Chase, Carstedt, and Syvertsen, who had delivered the impressive envelope deeding him ownership of the Neo Edo for "payment of debts.' The only debt Homako Tani had ever owed Kit Carson was having his backside hauled out of that incendiary fiasco in Silver Plume, Colorado. So far as Kit knew, Homako never had gone back to the Old West: The stink of burnt saloons, banks, and cathouses had lingered in Kit's lungs for weeks afterward. He still mourned that sweet little four-inch "Wesson Favorite" he'd lost during the confusion. Only a thousand of the S&W Model .44 cal. DA revolvers were ever made, and his had gone up in smoke.
Kit sighed. Whatever the true fate of Homako Tani, the "inheritance" had come just as Kit was being forced into retirement. He'd needed a job, more to justify hanging around La-La Land than anything, since he didn't really need money. The Neo Edo had seemed a gift from the gods. After three years of managing the hotel, Kit had begun to suspect Homako Tani had simply come to hate government paperwork and tourists so desperately he'd bailed out before his sanity snapped.
Kit shouldered his way politely past incoming arrivals from Primary, nodding and smiling to customers whose loud voices grated on his nerves, and headed past the pebble-lined fish pond just outside his lobby. He glanced both ways down the Commons, but saw nothing out of the ordinary. Just the usual batch of new tourists gawking and lugging heavy suitcases while trying to decide which hotel they could best afford.
Kit wandered over toward a free-standing souvenir-and-information stall with a nonchalance born of long practice and pretended to study the trinkets. The stall's owner, Nyoko Aoki, raised a brow, but she said nothing, tending her genuine customers with studied diligence. Nyoko's stand provided a perfect view of the Neo Edo's main lobby. The hotel's graceful facade towered three stories above the Commons floor, rising to a peak two stories below the ceiling. The name was painted tastefully in gilt English script and Japanese characters. The tourists provided perfect cover as they busily bought up station maps, guide books, and T-shirts or wandered into the hotel lobby to admire Musashi's mural.
Kit didn't have to wait long, although the visitor's appearance startled him considerably. The minute Kit spotted her, he knew that this was the up-timer Malcolm had called about. She was young, redheaded, and apparently operated on full throttle as her natural mode.
Unlike any normal tourist, she was not gawking, window-shopping, or looking for a station guidebook. The way she was dressed-and the way she moved inside all that black lace and leather-got attention from ninety percent of the men on the Commons and not a few of the women.
Kit found it suddenly difficult to control his breathing properly. Good God, she's easy on the eyes. Hard on the pulse, though .... A man could get himself into serious trouble with that girl, just by smiling at her. She charged into the Neo Edo like a runaway bullet train and cornered poor Jimmy behind the desk. His eyes had bugged. Kit couldn't quite hear what was being said over the tourist babble, but he could see her impatient frown and Jimmy's shrug and uplifted hands. He could also read Jimmys lips: "Try the Time Tripper."
Good. Wild-goose-chase time. She shot out of the Neo Edo's lobby at full tilt. Who in God's name was this kid? He'd expected ...Well, Kit wasn't sure who, or what, he'd actually expected. But it wasn't a redheaded speed demon with an Irish wildcat manner and motives as inscrutable as a mandarin's. Malcolm, drat the man, hadn't given him even a hint. Of course, with Sven offering to buy drinks in exchange for information, maybe no one else really knew, either.
Kit followed her thoughtfully He was certain he'd never run across her down time. Her, he'd have remembered. Vividly. He was equally certain he'd never met her up time, either. Hell, he hadn't been up time in years, probably not since that sexy little kitten had been wrapped in diapers. If that girl was past eighteen, it wasn't by more than a few days.
So who was she and why was she looking for him?
Probably a journalist, he thought gloomily, trying to make a name for herself. She had that supercharged "I'm going to get this story if it kills you" look of someone out for a first Pulitzer.
God...
Her skin was delightfully flushed, either from carrying that suitcase-which looked heavy-or from sheer pique.
Kit grinned. Good. If she were sufficiently off -balance when they finally met, so much the better for him.
Kit bought a tourist map for camouflage and followed her at a respectable distance. She certainly didn't dawdle. Whoever she was, she headed straight for the Time Tripper, a modestly priced hostelry catering to families on tight budgets. Middle-aged fathers, respectable in their Hawaiian shirts and jeans, ogled her from over their wives' heads and ignored whining kids.
She cornered the hapless desk clerk, who shrugged, looked thoroughly irritated, and gestured vaguely toward the next hotel. When she stooped to retrieve her suitcase, Kit's viscera reacted mindlessly. The man standing next to him groaned, "Oh, yes, there is a God ...." Kit grinned. The guy pulled himself out of a trance when the woman next to him hit him on the shoulder.
"Hey! Quit drooling!"
Another man said, "Five minutes with her would probably kill a horse."
"Yeah," his companion moaned, "but what a way to go ....
They were undoubtedly right on all counts. That girl spelled T R-O-U-B-L-E-and her trouble had his name all over it. He sighed. When the redheaded whirlwind headed for the Tempus Fugit, Kit decided to let her continue the hunt alone. If Jimmy had laid his groundwork properly, she'd spend the next several minutes going from hotel to hotel. That would give Kit time to dig up what he could on her. He watched her eye-catching retreat toward the Fugit, then hastily backtracked toward the Down Time.
Margo rapidly received the impression that people were jerking her around, apparently for the fun of it.
None of the desk clerks had seen Kit Carson, despite what that grinning idiot at the Neo Edo had told her. If Kit Carson had "stepped out for a meeting with the other hotel managers, sorry, I'm not sure which hotel," Margo would eat her luggage, suitcase and all.
"This is ridiculous!" she fumed, heading for yet another hotel. "He's got to be here somewhere!"
The desk clerk at the Hotel Acropolis looked at her like she'd taken leave of her senses. "Meeting? What meeting? I am the manager." The middle-aged woman patted the back of Margo's hand "Honey, Jimmy probably called Kit, wherever he was, and warned him you were coming. Kit doesn't much care for unannounced visitors. If I were you, I'd settle into a room someplace, call for an appointment, and meet him at his office."
Margo thanked her for the advice and left in a hurry, more determined than ever to track him down. If she simply called for an appointment, he'd find some excuse or other to delay meeting her, probably permanently. Margo might be a nobody, but she wasn't going to remain one and she wasn't going to let a little thing like impossible-to-get appointments stand in her way. Working as she was against a ticking clock-with a six-month countdown not even God could delay, she simply didn't have time for failure.