Upside Down

48

John Adams pulled up to the curb near the Monteleone Hotel, just inside the French Quarter.

“I'll be back with the radios in two minutes. Think you can keep the car from being stolen?” he said to Nicky before he climbed out.

“I reckon I can manage it,” he replied. “If you get lost in there, just fire that Glock three times in the air and I'll come get you.”

Nicky Green watched the FBI agent worm his way through the weekenders cluttering the sidewalk and vanish through the doors. The agent moved with a fluidity that added to Nicky's doubts that Adams was what he claimed to be. Nicky was sure that whatever Adams's purpose was, it wasn't what he had claimed. Adams had the eyes of a predator, not a cop. If Massey was as good as Nicky thought he was, he didn't believe Adams's story either. How had Adams gotten to town so fast, located them, and bugged the car?

Nicky decided that he needed to learn more about the man. After Adams had been gone for thirty seconds, Nicky climbed out, made his way into the hotel, and strolled to the bell captain's kiosk. The bell captain was middle-aged, dressed in a navy sport jacket with the hotel's logo over the pocket, starched white shirt, and striped tie. Telephone to his ear, he was jotting down notes. Nicky placed his hand on the desk and parted his fingers to reveal a one-hundred-dollar bill. The bell captain saw the bill but didn't acknowledge its presence.

“How may I help you, sir?” he said, hanging up the phone.

“A minute ago, a man named John Everett Adams came in here. You might have seen him. Gray suit. Five-ten, one-sixty-five. Crew cut.”

“I don't know the gentleman by sight, sir,” the bell captain said.

“Well, see, I'm hoping he's registered under John E. Adams.”

“He might be. And?”

A couple approached.

Nicky stepped aside.

The bell captain listened to their question about jazz clubs on Bourbon Street, which he answered by scribbling down the names of three he told them had good Dixieland. They left five dollars lighter.

Nicky returned to front and center. “Adams isn't exactly what he seems,” Nicky said.

“Is that so?”

“He is a married NASCAR driver. He is meeting with an actress whose name is a household word. I just need to know what room he's in so I can see if it is possible to set up a camera to see in the window.”

The bell captain inhaled deeply. Then he turned his sad gray eyes on Nicky. “You want to give me a hundred dollars for the room number of a guest so you can photograph him from a nearby rooftop while he's in bed with an actress?”

“That's about the size of it,” Nicky said, holding the man's gaze. “A tasteful picture of her at the window with him would do.”

“Private investigator?”

“Did I say that?”

“I should ask you to leave the hotel.” He cut his eyes at the front desk, sniffed, put his fingers between Nicky's, and slid the bill out. Sighing, he flipped open a book and at the same time slipped the bill into his pocket. He ran a finger down a list, then snapped the book closed.

“I would be fired if I gave you information on this John Everett Adams. It's against hotel policy. At any rate I cannot help you because, even if I told you he was in room four-sixteen, there is no place from which you could see into that room unless you get on our window-washing platform, which isn't available for that sort of tomfoolery.”

“Damn it!” Nicky frowned like he was disappointed, then turned and walked away. Greed was so predictable. Nicky crossed the lobby to the front doors, passing by a ten-foot-tall grandfather clock as he went.

He got back to the car less than a minute before Adams appeared carrying a small leather satchel.

Nicky pulled down the bill of his cap to make it appear that he had been napping. Adams opened the driver's door and, tossing the case into the backseat, climbed in behind the wheel, cranked the car, and swung it easily into a gap in the traffic.

Nicky lifted the cap. “I see you didn't lose your way.”

“Breadcrumbs,” Adams replied,