“Yes, that’s me. But I’m afraid the VACANCY sign’s on by mistake. The motel’s closed down.”
“Sure, sure. We’re from Mr. Sanguinetti. From his insurance company. Come to make a quick inventory before things get taken away tomorrow. Can we come in out of the rain, miss? Show you our credentials inside. Sure is a terrible night.”
I looked doubtfully from one to the other, but I could see little of the faces under the oilskin hoods. It sounded all right, but I didn’t like it. I said nervously, “But the Phanceys, the managers, they didn’t say anything about you coming.”
“Well, they should of, miss. I’ll havta report that back to Mr. Sanguinetti.” He turned to the man behind him. “That right, Mr. Jones?”
The other man stifled a giggle. Why did he giggle? “Sure, that’s right, Mr. Thomson.” He giggled again.
“Okay then, miss. Can we come inside, please? It sure is wetter’n hell out here.”
“Well, I don’t know. I was told not to let anyone in. But as it’s from Mr. Sanguinetti…” I nervously undid the chain and opened the door.
They pushed in, shouldering roughly past me, and stood side by side, looking the big room over. The man who had been addressed as “Mr. Thomson” sniffed. Black eyes looked at me out of a cold gray face. “You smoke?”
“Yes, a little. Why?”
“Reckoned you could have company.” He took the door handle from me, slammed the door, locked it, and put up the chain. The two men stripped off their dripping oilskins and threw them messily down on the floor and, now that I could see them both, I felt in extreme danger.
“Mr. Thomson,” obviously the leader, was tall and thin, almost skeletal, and his skin had this gray, drowned look as if he always lived indoors. The black eyes were slow-moving, incurious, and the lips thin and purplish like an unstitched wound. When he spoke there was a glint of gray silvery metal from his front teeth, and I supposed they had been cheaply capped with steel, as I had heard was done in Russia and Japan. The ears lay very flat and close to the bony, rather box-shaped head and the stiff grayish-black hair was cut so close to the skull that the skin showed whitely through it. He was wearing a black, sharp-looking single-breasted coat with shoulders padded square, stovepipe trousers so narrow that the bones of his knees bulged through the material, and a gray shirt buttoned up to the throat with no tie. His shoes were pointed in the Italian style and of gray suede. They and the clothes looked new. He was a frightening lizard of a man, and my skin crawled with fear of him.
Where this man was deadly the other was merely unpleasant—a short, moon-faced youth with wet, very pale blue eyes and fat wet lips. His skin was very white and he had that hideous disease of no hair—no eyebrows and no eyelashes, and none on a head that was as polished as a billiard ball. I would have felt sorry for him if I hadn’t been so frightened, particularly as he seemed to have a bad cold and began blowing his nose as soon as he got his oilskins off. Under them he wore a black leather windcheater, grubby trousers, and those Mexican saddle-leather boots with straps that they wear in Texas. He looked a young monster, the sort that pulls wings off flies, and I desperately wished that I had dressed in clothes that didn’t make me seem so terribly naked.
Sure enough, he now finished blowing his nose and seemed to take me in for the first time. He looked me over grinning delightedly. Then he walked all round me and came back and gave a long, low whistle. “Say, Horror.” He winked at the other man. “This is some bimbo! Git an eyeful of those knockers! And a rear-end to match! Geez, what a dish!”
“Not now, Sluggsy. Later. Git goin’ and look those cabins over. Meantime, the lady’s goin’ to fix us some chow. How you want your eggs?”
The man called Sluggsy grinned at me. “Scramble em’, baby. And nice and wet. Like mother makes. Otherwise poppa spank. Right across that sweet little biscuit of yours. Oh boy, oh boy!” He did some little dancing, boxing steps toward me, and I backed away to the door. I pretended to be even more frightened than I was, and when he got within range I slapped him as hard as I could across the face and, before he could recover from his surprise, I had darted sideways behind a table and picked up one of the little metal chairs and held it with the feet pointing at him.