The guy on the stool next to me hit me with an elbow, apologized, and went back to his business.
Then the raspy voice came behind me over the charter and the radio which Manny had turned on to the news.
"Hand."
"Juanita, I don't…"
Juanita reached over Shelly and took my hand, spinning me around on the stool.
You couldn't miss Juanita. Orange-and-gold billowing dress, colored beads around her neck, jangling bracelets and silver earrings the size of a burrito. Juanita's hair was dark and wild, her weight was her own business, and her age was somewhere over the rainbow. Juanita had an office in the Farraday. Juanita was a seer. Don't make the mistake of calling her a fortune teller. Many had slipped. All had regretted it.
"Nothing new here," she said, running a red fingernail across my palm. "But you're givin' off something. Like my second husband Ivan just before he went north, never to be heard from again."
The news blared, customers babbled, dishes clanked, and Juanita said, "You got his game wrong, Toby."
"Who?"
"Who?" she repeated sarcastically. "Whoever's giving you a hard time. Whoever's playin' a game with you. He's got his finger up your you-know-what and he's spinnin' you around, pointing your head the wrong places."
"Thanks," I said.
"The stars," she said, looking into my eyes. "All the stars will be in one place as you stand in the grove. Someone wants you to go to the grove. He wants you watching stars in the grove."
"The grove?" Shelly asked as Manny plopped the tacos and drinks on the counter.
"The grove," she repeated.
"Orange grove?" I tried.
"A grove where the fruit is hard as a turtle shell," she said. "Don't go to this grove, Toby. Juanita is tellin' you straight from the heart. Don't go. Finish your tacos and I'll read the crumbs. Maybe there's more."
"Another time, Juanita," I said.
"Suit yourself," she said with a jangling shrug.
"How's your sister?"
"Okay," she said. "Arthritis. Bad season. Watch yourself, Toby."
"I will, Juanita," I said.
She bustled out of Manny's, humming something I didn't recognize. Juanita had a way of being right about things, but I'd never been able to make sense of anything she told me till it was too late. It's like being told the winner of the Kentucky Derby in a code you know you can't break.
"You believe in that stuff?" Shelly asked.
I swiveled back around and reached for my first taco.
"Wipe your face, Shel. You got sour cream on your chins."
Chapter 9
Victor Spelling was, according to the desk clerk, a resident of the Carlton Arms. It took another five bucks of Clark Gable's money for me to find out that his room number was 342, that he had been at the Carlton Arms since January second. Spelling paid on time, said little, and often walked out in a tux and tie.
"Think he's a waiter at some big restaurant," the clerk said, trying to earn his bribe or urge me into an even bigger one. "Don't know which one, Toby."
It was late in the morning on Monday and business was slow. Only one person, an old man in a shaggy brown suit, was sitting in the lobby. The old man was sitting in a red-leather chair, his chin forward against his chest, his eyes closed.
The furniture was all red leather in the Carlton Arms lobby. A trio of ceiling fans ground around, redistributing the muggy air. The clerk dabbed daintily at his brow with a handkerchief.
The clerk was named Sandy Mixon. He had a round, red face, a thick neck, very little hair, oversized teeth, and a great desire to please. We had never, as far as either of us knew, met before this morning, yet I was his old pal Toby, and he was…
"Sandy, what if I told you Vic and I were old friends, high school…"
"He's about ten years younger than you, Toby."
"I was slow in high school, Sandy. Math is my nemesis."
The old man asleep in the red-leather chair snorted. Both Mixon and I looked at him. The old man's eyes opened wide. He looked around, confused, saw us, blinked, and went back to sleep.
"Can you add five more to what you've already put in the pot?"
"What'll it buy me?" I asked.
"A bellboy who'll open room 342, a Band-aid for that little cut on your forehead, and my further assurance that you are not deficient in your math skills," said Mixon. "I taught arithmetic to third-graders in Fresno. That was three months in '37. Worst winter of my life, and you're talking to a man who grew up and grew cold in Hibbing, Minnesota."
"Keep the Band-aid," I said, peeling off another five and handing it to him. "It gives me character."
Mixon examined the bill, flattened it with the side of his hand, folded it, and wedged it into his jacket pocket with the other bills.
"For free," Mixon said, leaning forward and dabbing his neck with his handkerchief. "Another guy was looking for Spelling today. Short, big arms, white hair, bad skin, worse attitude."
"Tools Nathanson," I said.
"Name rings no bells," said Mixon, standing erect. "Slow man with a dollar. Said he'd be back. Said I should say nothing to Spelling about his having been around. He slipped me three Washingtons. I said I'd shut up. Truth to tell, I don't talk to Mr. Spelling either way."
"Key," I said.
Mixon pulled a set of keys from his pocket and said, "I assume you're simply going to surprise your old friend and talk to him."
"I like that assumption," I said.
"And I like my job," said Mixon. "I don't want to go back to the multiplication tables in Fresno, if they'd even take me back."
"Key," I said.
"This is a decent hotel," Mixon said, looking around as if he'd never seen the lobby of the Carlton Arms before. "You can get a clean room for a buck a night, no questions asked."
"It's the Plaza of Los Angeles," I said. "Key."
Mixon nodded knowingly and hit the bell hi front of him. A girl with freckles and a maroon uniform with polished-brass buttons appeared and looked for my luggage.
"Connie," Mixon said. "Please let Mr. Peters into room 342. He's an old friend of Mr. Spelling's."
Connie smiled, showing large dazzling-white teeth, and took the offered passkey from Mixon. I nodded to Mixon and followed the bouncing Connie, who hurried across the lobby. The sleeping old man in the rumpled brown suit seemed to sense us coming, opened his eyes again, gave me a look of disgust, and tried to lift himself from the chair.
"Noise," he grumbled. "How can a man rest with…"
He waved his arms around and sank back, staring across the lobby at a painting on the wall of a young woman filling a pitcher with water at an outdoor fountain.
"Mr. Walters," Connie said, nodding at the old man. "Used to be a movie writer. Bronco Billy Anderson, even Chaplin. Long before my time. Talks a lot about somebody named John Bunny. Elevator or stairs?"
"Up to you," I said.
She nodded brightly and started up the carpeted stairs, bounding with energy. I wanted her to slow down, but I didn't want to tell her. So I did my best to bound.
She waved and said hello to a naval officer and a woman with him old enough to be his wife. She greeted an overly made-up old woman dressed in a draping gossamer which was more appropriate for Cairo in 1914 than Los Angeles in 1943.
"Mrs. Forbes-Hughes," said Connie over her shoulder, bounding ever upward. "You look great today."
"Thank you," Mrs. Forbes-Hughes of ancient Egypt said to Connie.
"Third floor," Connie announced as I came up the last four steps and stood at her side, trying not to breathe heavily.
"Are you always like this?" I asked, panting and trying not to show it, which is not easy.
"Like what?" she said, striding down the hall.
"Like one of those birds in Snow White. Katharine Hepburn in Bringing Up Baby."
"Movies," she said, nodding in understanding as she strode on. "My mom told me when I was four to keep positive, keep moving, keep my eyes open, and always, always smile in public and have a good word for everyone."