Strangers on a Train

Six

That evening, Charles Anthony Bruno was lying on his back in an El Paso hotel room, trying to balance a gold fountain pen across his rather delicate, dished-in nose. He was too restless to go to bed, not energetic enough to go down to one of the bars in the neighborhood and look things over. He had looked things over all afternoon, and he did not think much of them in El Paso. He did not think much of the Grand Canyon either. He thought more of the idea that had come to him night before last on the train. A pity Guy hadn’t awakened him that morning. Not that Guy was the kind of fellow to plan a murder with, but he liked him, as a person. Guy was somebody worth knowing. Besides, Guy had left his book, and he could have given it back.

The ceiling fan made a wuz-wuz-wuz sound because one of its four blades was missing. If the fourth had been there, he would have been just a little cooler, he thought. One of the taps in the John leaked, the clamp on the reading light over the bed was broken so it hung down, and there were fingerprints all over the closet door. And the best hotel in town, they told him! Why was there always something wrong, maybe only one thing, with every hotel room he had ever been in? Some day he was going to find the perfect hotel room and buy it, even if it was in South Africa.

He sat up on the edge of the bed and reached for the telephone. “Gimme long-distance.” He looked blankly at a smudge of red dirt his shoe had put on the white counterpane. “Great Neck 166]… Great Neck, yeah.” He waited. “Long Island… In New York, lunk, ever hear of it?”

In less than a minute, he had his mother.

“Yeah, I’m here. You still leaving Sunday? You better… . Well, I took that muleback trip. Just about pooped me, too…. Yeah, I seen the canyon…. Okay, but the colors are kind of corny…. Anyhow, how’s things with you?”

He began to laugh. He pushed off his shoes and rolled back on the bed with the telephone, laughing. She was telling him about coming home to find the Captain entertaining two of her friends—two men she had met the night before—who had dropped in, thought the Captain was her father, and proceeded to say all the wrong things.