Night Extra

“Why, of course,” the desk clerk said. “The inspector was in just the other day, as a matter of fact. No trouble, just a misunderstanding. A girl passed out in the bar, and somebody slapped her to bring her around — and it frightened her. As I say, it was a misunderstanding.” He smiled, displaying large, very white and false teeth. “There are people who judge a hotel by its location. It’s a form of snobbery, don’t you think?”

“You have a point,” Terrell said, looking at the register. Paddy Coglan had checked in the day before, at ten in the morning.

“The man in 103 — is he up there now?”

“Yes, nice, quiet fellow. Has his food sent up. Is anything wrong?”

“Nothing serious. But don’t bother to announce me.”

Terrell took the elevator to the third floor and walked down a wide gray hallway to Coglan’s room. A breakfast tray was beside the door, the napkin crumpled, the stub of a cigarette pressed into a mound of rubbery-looking scrambled eggs. Terrell studied the tray for a few seconds, then sighed and rapped lightly on the door.

Someone had been moving about inside the room, but now those small shuffling sounds faded into silence.

“Open up, Paddy,” he said. “This is Sam Terrell. I want to talk to you.”

The knob turned slowly, and the door swung back a few inches. Coglan stared up at him, his eyes shifting and his lips trying to work themselves into a smile. “Well, Sam boy,” he said, laughing a bit. “You could knock me over with a feather. I needed a rest, and I ducked over here all by myself.” He rubbed his mouth with the back of his hand. “That’s all I wanted, some place where I could have a drink in private without scandalizing the neighbors.” He smelled of whiskey, and he needed a shave.

“Can I come in?”

“Why sure, Sam.” Coglan moved away from the door and Terrell walked inside and took off his hat. The room was meanly furnished; a faded carpet, thin as paper, a bureau with half the drawer knobs missing, beige curtains shadowed in streaks with dust. It was a still life of small losses, of meagre defeats; a bitterly appropriate place for Coglan to run to ground, Terrell thought.

“You want a drink, Sam?”

“No, thanks.”

“Well, I’ll have just a touch.” Coglan moved over to the bureau where there was a half-full bottle of whiskey and. a blue plastic tooth-brush glass, its sides faintly streaked with a pink dentifrice. He poured himself a long drink and then sat down on the edge of the bed. “You take the chair,” he said. “I save it for guests.” He wasn’t wearing a shirt, and the skin of his shoulders was blotchy with freckles. He finished his drink in one swallow, and it reddened his cheeks and brought a film of moisture over his eyes. “Boy, that does it. I seem to need a drink today. Must be coming down with something.” He smiled at Terrell. “Well, how come you’re over this way?”

“You know why I’m here, Paddy. Me or somebody else — what difference does it make?”

“Yeah,” Coglan said, in a gentle, whispering voice. “Yeah.” He smiled again, blinking his eyes rapidly, and the liquor on his lower lip gleamed in the harsh light of the room. “Somebody had to come, I guess.”

“Because you lied, and an innocent man may die for it.” Terrell sat down and took out his cigarettes. “You can’t live with a thing like that. There’s not enough booze in the world to give you a night’s sleep.”

“They had too much on me,” Coglan said. He nodded wearily at the empty glass in his hands. “Too many times playing around with this stuff instead of minding my work. They’ve got reports, suspended verdicts — stacks of them. They could toss me out in less time than it would take to fill in the forms. And Stanko said he would if I didn’t—” Coglan sighed and looked into the bottom of his glass. “Unless I lied. Unless I said I didn’t see the man who ran out of Caldwell’s. He said it was hush-hush business — that I’d understand later and that sort of thing. I didn’t believe him. But I pretended I did. Even to myself.” Coglan wet his lips and walked over to the bureau. “Sure you won’t have a nip?”

“No thanks, Paddy. You go ahead.”