Room Seven was occupied, and so was the room beside it. The interconnecting door was wide, and fluorescent lights burned in both. The occupancy was not a problem. Sadie had long become used to the ethereal state; to wandering unseen among the living. In such a condition she had attended her niece’s wedding, and later on her father’s funeral, standing beside the grave with the dead old man and gossiping about the mourners. Buck however-never an agile individual-was more prone to carelessness. She hoped he would be careful tonight. After all, he wanted to see the experiment through as much as she did.
As they stood on the threshold and cast their eyes around the room in which their fatal farce had been played out, she wondered if the shot had hurt him very much. She must ask him tonight, she thought, should the opportunity arise.
THERE had been a young woman with a plain but pleasant face in the manager’s office when Earl had gone in to book the rooms. She had now disappeared to be replaced by a man of sixty or so, wearing half a week’s growth of mottled beard and a sweat-stained shirt. He looked up from a nose-close perusal of yesterday’s Pampa Daily News when Earl entered.
“Yeah?”
“Is it possible to get some ice water?” Earl inquired. The man threw a hoarse yell over his shoulder. “Laura May? You in there?”
Through the doorway behind came the din of the late-night movie-shots, screams, the roar of an escaped beast-and then Laura May’s response.
“What do you want, Pa?”
“There’s a man wants room service,” Laura May’s father yelled back, not without a trace of irony in his voice. “Will you get out here and serve him?”
No reply came; just more screams. They set Earl’s teeth on edge. The manager glanced up at him. One of his eyes was clouded by a cataract.
“You with the evangelist?” he said.
“Yes… how did you know it was-?”
“Laura May recognized him. Seen his picture in the paper.
“That so?”
“Don’t miss a trick, my baby.”
As if on cue Laura May emerged from the room behind the office. When her brown eyes fell on Earl she visibly brightened.
“Oh…” she said, a smile quickening her features, “what can I do for you, mister?” The line, coupled with her smile, seemed to signal more than polite interest in Earl; or was that just his wishful thinking? Except for a lady of the night he’d met in Pomca City, Oklahoma, his sex life had been nonexistent in the last three months. Taking a chance, he returned Laura May’s smile. Though she was at least thirty-five, her manner was curiously girlish; the look she was giving him almost intimidating direct. Meeting her eyes, Earl began to think that his first estimation had not been far off.
“Ice water,” he said. “I wondered if you had any? Mrs. Gyer isn’t feeling so well.”
Laura May nodded. “I’ll get some,” she said, dallying for a moment in the door before returning into the television room. The din of the movie had abated-a scene of calm, perhaps, before the beast emerged again-and in the hush Earl could hear the rain beating down outside, turning the earth to mud.
“Quite a gully washer tonight, eh?” the manager observed. “This keeps up, you’ll be rained out tomorrow.”
“People come out in all kinds of weather, ” Earl said. “John Gyer’s a big draw.”
The man pulled a face. “Wouldn’t rule out a tornado,” he said, clearly reveling in the role of doomsayer. “We’re just about due for one.”
“Really?”
“Year before last, wind took the roof off the school. Just lifted it right off.”
Laura May reappeared in the doorway with a tray on which a jug and four glasses were placed. Ice clinked against the jug’s sides.
“What’s that you say, Pa?” she asked.
“Tornado.”
“Isn’t hot enough,” she announced with casual authority. Her father grunted his disagreement but made no argument in return. Laura May crossed toward Earl with the tray, but when he made a move to take it from her she said, “I’ll take it myself You lead on.” He didn’t object. It would give them a little while to exchange pleasantries as they walked to the Gyers’ room; perhaps the same thought was in her mind. Either that, or she wanted a closer view of the evangelist.