Creepers

12

They stood in the shadows of a vast lobby. The ceiling was so high that their lights barely reached it. The floor was grimy marble. At several pillars, there were tangles of battered furniture: cracked chairs, tables, and sofas, once-plush upholstery moldering.

"A clean-up crew that was told to stop is still the logical explanation," Conklin said.

Some pillars were surrounded by rotting velvet divans. Elaborate crystal chandeliers drooped. Balenger kept a distance, concerned that they would fall.

Vinnie took a photograph of a chandelier, but its crystals didn't reflect the camera's flash. Everything in the lobby was dull and smelled of dust, while another acrid hard-to-identify smell hovered. Cobwebs hung like ragged curtains. A mouse scurried from a settee. Suddenly, a panicked bird catapulted from one of the chandeliers. Balenger flinched.

"How did that get in here?" Vinnie said.

A cricket screeched.

Rick coughed. "Welcome to Wild Kingdom."

"Or Miss Havisham's memorial chamber in Great Expectations. Stay away from animal nests," Conklin warned.

"Believe me, I intend to," Balenger said.

"What I'm concerned about is the urine smell."

Now Balenger recognized the odor. Again he wiped his face, trying to lose the feeling that something mushy and fetid still pressed against his mouth.

"If you get too strong a whiff of the urine, there's a risk of hantavirus." Balenger knew the professor referred to a recently identified flu-like virus sometimes found in rodents' nests. Harmless to its animal hosts, the disease was potentially fatal to humans. "Not that you need to be paranoid about it. From time to time, cases turn up in the American West, but it's rare around here."

"That certainly relieves my mind."

Conklin chuckled. "Perhaps I should change the subject and talk about the lobby. As I mentioned, Morgan Carlisle took pains to update the infrastructure of the hotel." The professor's voice sounded hollow in the huge area. "But he never changed the design of the interior. Apart from the damage, this is the way the lobby appeared when it was first constructed in 1901. Periodically, the furniture wore out and needed to be replaced, of course. But the look of it never varied."

"Schizoid," Rick said. "The exterior anticipates art deco of the 1920s. But the furnishings are turn of the century. Victorian."

"Queen Victoria died in 1901 as the Paragon was being built," the professor explained. "Although Carlisle was American, he felt that the world had changed and not for the better. This was the style of the New York mansion in which he was raised. The exterior symbolized where his parents went and he was not allowed. The interior represented the place in which he felt safest."

"Yeah, schizoid. No wonder the hotel had trouble making a profit. It must have seemed old-fashioned even when it was built."

"Actually, it achieved the status of a theme hotel." Conklin gestured toward their surroundings. "Because the interior remained firmly entrenched in 1901, over the years 'old-fashioned' became viewed as 'historical' and then a kind of 'trip back into time.' The staff wore uniforms in the style of the turn of the century. The porcelain dishes and gold-plated eating utensils remained the same, as did the menu. The music in the ballroom was from that era, and the musicians wore period costumes. Everything was from another time."

Balenger studied the shadows. "Must have been a hell of a shock when a guest went upstairs, turned on the TV, and saw Jack Ruby shoot Lee Harvey Oswald. Or firefights in Vietnam. Or the riots at the Democratic convention in Chicago. But maybe Carlisle didn't allow televisions in the rooms."

"Reluctantly, he did. Guests didn't want to go that far back in time. But by then Asbury Park was in decline, and people had pretty much stopped coming."

"Yeah, a damned sad story," Balenger said. "Are all the sites you explore this well preserved?"

"Don't I wish. Salvagers and vandals often violate buildings before I get to them. The chandelier and the marble plant stands at the entrance, for example. Drug addicts would usually have stolen them long ago. The walls would be covered with obscene graffiti. It's a tribute to Carlisle's precautions that the hotel survived as completely as it has. Look at these photographs."

The group turned toward a wall of framed black-and-white images. Each had a tarnished copper plaque under it: 1910, 1920, 1930, all the way to 1960. Each depicted the lobby and showed festive guests. But although the lobby remained the same in every image, the style and placement of the furniture never varying, the clothing styles changed abruptly, lapels wider or narrower, dresses higher or lower, hair longer or shorter.

"Like time-lapse photography." Cora wandered across the lobby, turning her light this way and that. "But there's no photograph of the guests in the lobby in 1901 when the Paragon was built. I can imagine them around me. Moving calmly, speaking softly. Dresses rustle. The women carry gloves and parasols. The men wouldn't dream of going anywhere without ties and jackets. They have pocket watches on chains attached to their vests. Some have canes. Others have spats over their shoes to protect them from the sand on the boardwalk. As they enter the lobby from outside, they take off their Homburg hats, or maybe they've allowed themselves to be slightly casual at the seashore and their hats are straw. They approach the check-in desk."

Cora did the same.

Meanwhile, Rick went to the double doors at the entrance, inspecting them. "As you said, Professor, the interior doors are metal." He tried to open them, without effect. Proceeding to a window on the right, he pushed away rotted curtains, only to jerk back when another bird erupted, this one from the top of the curtains.

"Damned floor's covered with bird shit," Rick grumbled. He examined a shutter behind the curtain. "Metal." With effort, he freed a bolt. The shutter was mounted on a rail. He tried to push it but wasn't successful. "You mentioned that vandals smashed the windows. Rain and snow must have come in through the holes and rusted the rollers in place. The good thing is, nobody can see our lights."

"And if a security guard happens to pass, he won't hear us, either," Conklin said.

Rick pressed an ear against the shutter. "I can't hear the waves on the beach or the sheet metal clanging in that condo building. We've got the place to ourselves. But how on earth did the birds get in?"

A bell rang.