What You Do Not Know You Want

Friday morning exposed a chink in my week's armored bad luck. Werewolf was perched on a hillock of angling equipment in recep-tion, threading a fishing line. "Off fishing?" I asked, just as a galaxy-class SUV pulled up outside. Werewolf muttered, "No, it's my line-dancing morning," and left Wei at reception. Opportunity stuck its thumb up my ass. From a call box I got hold of Dwight Sil-verwind, telling him the hour of repayment was at hand, then sidled back to Hotel Aloha to watch where Wei put the key. When the call came her face went from complacency to worry in twenty seconds. Dwight can still work his magic, the fraudulent old prick. Pive minutes later Wei went rushing out, carrying a document wallet and leaving reception guarded by Barney the dinosaur whose Back at… toy clock promised me a whole hour. One retrieved key and one deep metaphorical breath later I was in the back office, stashed with clutter from more prosperous days for Hotel Aloha. Trespasser, fretted Fear, trespasser. trespasser. Strung beads clatted as I passed into a lounge and kitchenette maintained with the minimum effort. The furnishings were bargain bin circa 1975. Fire escapes zigzagged the walls of the inner concrete courtyard. This rectangle of concrete must be where you fell. Here. Right here. Someone stepped over my grave. On the wall, a framed photograph held a poodle-cuddling woman in long-faded Hawaiian sunshine, perhaps at Lahaina. Mrs. Werewolf, deceased, I presume. No evidence of children, past or present. The bedroom housed an unmade bed and a dressing table hidden under bales of Angler's Weekly and Playboy. Well, Vulture, I searched in a cupboard of hammers, saws, chisels, power tools and screws in labeled boxes but no seppuku dagger or flute case; a bestiary of purple teddies, lime rabbits and lovey-eyed dalmatians; an empty fish tank, under mattresses, between folded towels, amid dead shoes and albums of fishing trips, inside an umbrella stand and casserole dishes. Hurrry, nagged Fear, hurry, harry. Possible footsteps from reception kept worrying me. How long had Wei been gone.' How long before she smelled wild goose? Should I take every key I could find and search the entire hotel? Oh, impossible, a squad of spies would need a week. Then the reception bell chimed and a wheezy voice called through, "Frank? You at home?" I froze. The outer office door creaked. Dildo! shrieked Fear, You left it ajar!

"Frankie!"

I crouched down looking for a hiding place. "What you doing to yourself in there' It'll make you go blind. Ain't that why you bought Miss Slitty?" I scuttled under the table and beseeched the god of farce to do me this one favor but banged my head on a leg. "Frankie?" I heard heavy breathing. I saw his legs lumber by, close enough to touch. A bottle was opened, a glass filled. A magazine opened. A chuckle. "Thanks, Frankie, don't mind if I do." If he sat down now, he'd have a clear sight of me crouching here. My knee was killing me. Sixty seconds scraped by. Sixty more passed by before I suspected he might have gone.

Wei was in a royal bitch of a mood when I got back from lunch. "Those Immigration fatheads! Just after you left this morning, I get a call saying there's an inconsistency has been found with my green card extension, so present yourself immediately and ask for Oily Schmidt. No, no, it won't wait, immediately means now, so off I run and guess what happens when after fifty goddamn minutes my number finally flashes up' There is no Schmidt in Immigration! A Sampson, a Silvestri, a Stein, but no Schmidt. No one knows a thing about why I had to go there! Fatheads!" American bureaucracy for you, I sympathized, then steered the subject to the nocturnal disturbances on the fourth floor. Wei just frowned. "What shouting? I sleep like a baby in this place." Then what about her trip to the Coke machine the other night? Wei just gave me an Are you crazy? look. "I sleep like a baby in this place."