Whereupon that impossible woman had looked around the table and nailed him with her eye. “Mr. Hoag can test me. I don’t know what he does. No one does.”
“Really, Julia.” Mrs. Pomeroy had tried hopelessly to intervene, then had turned to the man on her left with a smile. “Julia has been studying psychology this season.”
The man on her left, Sudkins, or Snuggins — Stubbins, that was his name. Stubbins had said, “What does Mr. Hoag do?”
“It’s a minor mystery. He never talks shop.”
“It’s not that,” Hoag had offered. “I do not consider — ”
“Don’t tell me!” that woman had commanded. “I’ll have it in a moment. Some profession. I can see you with a brief case.” He had not intended to tell her. Some subjects were dinner conversation; some were not. But she had gone on.
“You might be in finance. You might be an art dealer or a book fancier. Or you might be a writer. Let me see your hands.”
He was mildly put off by the demand, but he had placed his hands on the table without trepidation. That woman had pounced on him. “Got you! You are a chemist.”
Everyone looked where she pointed. Everyone saw the dark mourning under his nails. Her husband had broken the brief silence by saying, “Nonsense, Julia. There are dozens of things that will stain nails. Hoag may dabble in photography, or do a spot of engraving. Your inference wouldn’t stand up in court.”
“That’s a lawyer for you! I know I’m right. Aren’t I, Mr. Hoag?”
He himself had been staring unbrokenly at his hands. To be caught at a dinner party with untidy manicure would have been distressing enough — if he had been able to understand it.
But he had no slightest idea how his nails had become dirtied. At his work? Obviously — but what did he do in the daytime?
He did not know.
“Tell us, Mr. Hoag. I was right, was I not?”
He pulled his eyes away from those horrid fingernails and said faintly, “I must ask to be excused.” With that he had fled from the table. He had found his way to the lavatory where, conquering an irrational revulsion, he had cleaned out the gummy reddish-brown filth with the blade of his penknife. The stuff stuck to the blade; he wiped it on cleansing tissue, wadded it up, and stuck it into a pocket of his waistcoat. Then he had scrubbed his nails, over and over again.
He could not recall when he had become convinced that the stuff was blood, was human blood.
He had managed to find his bowler, his coat, gloves, and stick without recourse to the maid. He let himself out and got away from there as fast as he could.
Thinking it over in the quiet of the dingy hotel room he was convinced that his first fear had been instinctive revulsion at the sight of the dark-red under his nails. It was only on second thought that he had realized that he did not remember where he had dirtied his nails because he had no recollection of where he had been that day, nor the day before, nor any of the days before that. He did not know what his profession was.
It was preposterous, but it was terribly frightening.
He skipped dinner entirely rather than leave the dingy quiet of the hotel room; about ten o’clock he drew a tub of water just as hot as he could get it and let himself soak. It relaxed him somewhat and his twisted thoughts quieted down. In any case, he consoled himself, if he could not remember his occupation, then he certainly could not return to it. No chance again of finding that grisly horror under his fingernails.
He dried himself off and crawled under the covers. In spite of the strange bed he managed to get to sleep.
A nightmare jerked him awake, although he did not realize it at first, as the tawdry surroundings seemed to fit the nightmare. When he did recall where he was and why he was there the nightmare seemed preferable, but by that time it was gone, washed out of his mind. His watch told him that it was his usual getting-up time; he rang for the bellman and arranged for a breakfast tray to be fetched from around the corner.