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easier?”
“Those are good reasons,” Peter said.
Warren Trent slammed down his hand hard upon the chair arm. “Never mind the reasons! What matters is, you're being damn fools, both of you.”
It was a recurring question. In Louisiana, most hotel chains had nominally complied with the Civil Rights Act, but then, quietly went back to their long-established segregation policies. As for the St. Gregory, it simply resisted change.
“No!” Viciously, Warren Trent stubbed out his cigar. “Whatever's happening anywhere else, I say we're not ready for it here. So we've lost the union conventions. All right, it's time we got off our backsides[73] and tried for something else.”
It was quiet in the big living-room, with only a whisper from the air conditioning, and occasional sounds from the city below. Warren Trent could feel his heart pounding heavily – an effect of the anger. It was a warning, he supposed, which he should heed more often. Yet nowadays so many things upset him, making emotions hard to control and to remain silent. It was because he sensed so much was disappearing beyond his control. Besides, anger had always come easily – except for those few brief years when Hester had taught him to use patience and a sense of humor, and for a while he had. How long ago it seemed! – more than thirty years since he had carried her, as a young bride, across the threshold of this very room. And how short a time they had had: those few brief years, joyous beyond measure, until the paralytic polio struck without warning. It had killed Hester in twenty-four hours, leaving Warren Trent, mourning and alone, and the St. Gregory.
He rose awkwardly from the deep chair and moved to the window, looking across the rooftops of the French Quarter. Was the hotel worth fighting for? Why not give up, sell out and let time and change take them both? Curtis O'Keefe would make a fair deal[74]. There would be enough money left on which he could live, at whatever standard he chose, for the remainder of his life.
Surrender: perhaps that was the answer. Surrender to changing times. After all, what was a hotel except so much brick and mortar?[75] He had tried to make it more, but in the end he had failed. Let it go!
And yet… if he did, what else was left?
Nothing. For himself there would be nothing left. He waited, wondering, his eyes looking at the city spread before him. It too had seen change, had been French, Spanish, and American, yet had somehow survived as itself.
No! He would not sell out. Not yet. While there was still hope, he would hold on. There were still four days in which to raise the mortgage money[76] somehow, and beyond that the present losses were a temporary thing. Soon the tide would turn[77], leaving the St. Gregory solvent and independent.
He walked stiffly across the room to an opposite window. His eyes caught the gleam of an airplane high to the north. It was a jet, losing height and preparing to land at the Airport. He wondered if Curtis O'Keefe was aboard.
When Christine Francis found him, Sam Jakubiec, the stocky, balding credit manager, was standing at the Reception, making his daily check. Most hotels cared nothing about the morals of those who stayed within their walls. Their concern was a single basic question: Could a guest pay?
With a swift movement Sam Jakubiec put the ledger cards back in place and closed the file drawer containing them. “Now,” he said, “what can I do?”
“We've hired a private duty nurse for 1410.” Briefly Christine reported the previous night's crisis concerning Albert Wells. “I'm a little worried whether Mr. Wells can afford it, and I'm not sure he realizes how much it will cost.” She might have added, but didn't, that she was more concerned for the little man himself than for the hotel.
Jakubiec nodded. “That private nursing can run into big money.” Walking together, they moved away from Reception to the credit manager's office.
“Madge,” Sam Jakubiec said, “see what we have on Wells, Albert.”
Without answering, the secretary opened a drawer. Jakubiec took the card the secretary offered him. Scanning it, he observed, “He looks all right. Stayed with us six times. Paid cash. One small problem which seems to have been settled.”
“I know about that,” Christine said. “It was our fault.”
The credit man nodded. “I'd say there's nothing to worry about. I'll look into it, though; find out what the charge is going to be, then have a talk with Mr. Wells. If he has a cash problem we could maybe help out, give him a little time to pay.”
“Thanks, Sam.” Christine felt relieved, knowing that Jakubiec could be helpful and sympathetic. She recrossed the main lobby, acknowledging “good mornings” from bellboys, the florist, and one of the assistant managers. Then, bypassing the elevators, she ran lightly up the central stairway to the main mezzanine.
Since last night Christine had found herself thinking about Peter a good deal. She wondered if the time they had spent together had produced the same effect in him. At several moments she caught herself wishing that this was true. Over the years in which she had learned to live alone there had been men in Christine's life, but none she had taken seriously. At times, it seemed as if instinct were protecting her from renewing the kind of close relationship which five years ago had been broken so savagely. All the same, at this moment she wondered where Peter was and what he was doing. Well, she decided practically, sooner or later in the course of the day their ways would cross.
Back in her own office in the executive suite, Christine looked briefly into Warren Trent's, but the proprietor had not yet come down from his fifteenth-floor apartment. The morning mail was stacked on her own desk, and several telephone messages required attention soon. She decided first to complete the matter which had taken her downstairs. Lifting the telephone, she asked for room 1410. A woman's voice answered – presumably the private duty nurse. Christine identified herself and inquired politely after the patient's health.
“Mr. Wells passed a comfortable night,” the voice informed her, “and his condition is improved.”
Wondering why some nurses felt they had to sound like official bulletins, Christine replied, “In that case, perhaps I can drop in.”
“Not for some time, I'm afraid. Dr. Aarons will be seeing the patient this morning, and I wish to be ready for him.”
It sounded, Christine thought, like a state visit. The idea of the pompous Dr. Aarons being attended by an equally pompous nurse amused her. Aloud she said, “In that case, please tell Mr. Wells I called and that I'll see him this afternoon.”
The conference in the owner's suite left Peter McDermott in a mood of frustration. Striding away down the fifteenth-floor corridor he reflected that his meetings with Warren Trent always went the same way. As he had on other occasions, he wished that he could have six months and a free hand to manage the hotel himself.
Near the elevators he stopped to use a house phone, asking Reception what accommodation had been reserved for Mr. Curtis O'Keefe's party. There were two adjoining suites on the twelfth floor, and Peter used the service stairway to descend the two flights. Like all big hotels, the St. Gregory pretended not to have a thirteenth floor, naming it the fourteenth instead.
All four doors to the two reserved suites were open and, from within, the noise of a vacuum cleaner was heard. Inside, two maids were working under the critical eye of Mrs. Blanche du Quesnay, the St. Gregory's sharp-tongued but highly competent housekeeper. She turned as Peter came in, her bright eyes flashing.
“I might have known that one of you men would be checking up to see if I'm capable of doing my own job.”
Peter grinned. “Relax, Mrs. Q. Mr. Trent asked me to drop in.” He liked the middle-aged red-haired woman, one of the most reliable department heads. The two maids were smiling. He winked at them, adding for Mrs. du Quesnay, “If Mr. Trent had known you were giving this your personal attention he'd have wiped the whole thing from
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