Sammy Keyes and the Hotel Thief (6 page)

ELEVEN

In the morning, Marissa offered me a ride on her handlebars, but I figured out a long time ago that Marissa McKenze is not someone you should accept a ride from. The one time I did she about killed me, wobbling all over the place, telling me to duck so she could see where she was going, putting on the brakes so fast that I fell off and almost cracked my skull. No, it's much safer to walk, even with the world's biggest blister telling you to ride.

So off she went, racing down East Jasmine, waving and wobbling, calling over her shoulder, “Wish
I'd
been suspended!” and off I went, wishing I'd drained my blister.

When I finally got home, I let myself in, and what I'm expecting to see is Grams on the couch reading the paper or doing a crossword puzzle or watching the morning news. But what do I see? Nobody. I call out, “Grams, I'm home!” and what do I hear? Nothing. So I peek into her bedroom and say, “Grams...?” and then check the bathroom. “Grams?” Finally it dawns on me: Grams is not home.

Now this had never happened before, and it struck me how
quiet
it was. And then I started to worry. I moved around the apartment from place to place, not really going anywhere. First I sat on one side of the couch; then I sat on the other. Then I moved across to a chair and just sat there with Dorito in my lap, staring off into space. I wondered where in the world Grams could be. I mean, what if something had happened to her? Maybe she was in the hospital. Maybe Mrs. Graybill had come after her with a curtain rod or something. Maybe…maybe she hadn't answered the phone when I'd called last night because she was in trouble.

Then I had a terrible thought: maybe the hotel thief had come back looking for me and wound up tying Grams up and stuffing her in the closet.

Now I tell myself that's stupid; it couldn't have happened. But the more I think about it, the more I can just see her, tied up with duct tape, her glasses all crooked, shoved in the back of the closet.

So I get up. And very slowly I move to Grams' closet. And I'm standing in front of it, feeling like I've got X-ray vision because I can just see her in there, and I take a deep breath, yank open the door, and...there's nobody there.

Well, I feel pretty stupid, and before you know it I'm back in Grams' favorite chair, worrying. And when I'd had just about as much worrying as I could take, I got up and started vacuuming. I vacuumed the whole apartment. Even the baseboards. All that noise helped me think. And what I decided was that if Grams was home in the morning, then she was probably all right. If she hadn't been home all night, then there really was something to worry about.

I shut off the vacuum cleaner and headed for the kitchen. I checked out the sink, which was empty; then I looked inside the dishwasher. The bowl on the top rack had been rinsed, but when I looked at it real closely I could see some oatmeal stuck to one side. I checked the glasses and there was a spot of pink on the side of one of them. Grams' grapefruit juice.

So I closed the dishwasher and went into the bathroom. Sure enough, Grams' toothbrush was wet. So was the bottom of the bar of soap. Well, I felt a lot better. Grams was fine, no doubt about it. And I was just about to leave the bathroom when I noticed something in the wastepaper basket. I bent down and picked it up, and sure enough, it was what I thought it was—tissue paper with lipstick dabbed on it.

Now I've only seen Grams wear lipstick for real special occasions, so it was strange, finding the shape of her lips on that piece of tissue paper. And I couldn't help thinking I missed something. I mean, what was the special occasion? Where had she gone?

So I started sweeping up the kitchen, scrubbing down the sink, cleaning out Dorito's litter box, just keeping busy while I was trying to figure it out. But after all that cleaning I still didn't have an answer, so I sat down and had a big glass of milk and waited. And waited. And waited some more. And pretty soon I'm sick to death of waiting and I'm thinking about what in the world I can go do. Going to the mall doesn't sound like any fun. The Pup Parlor would be all right, but I don't really feel like it. Then I remember how I really should get some gum to replace the masking tape on the fourth floor, so I head to Maynard's.

Nobody's in the market but T.J. And since he's on the phone with his back turned, I decide to check out the comic books. And I'm back by the magazines when I hear him say, “What do you mean the crop froze? How can the crop freeze? It's always ninety degrees in Florida!” He listens for a second, then says, “Hugh! Buddy! You told me it was a sure thing! ‘Double your money overnight,' that's what you said....I know there are risks, I know you can't guarantee...but you said it was a sure thing! No no no,
you
don't understand. I borrowed it from my old man. I've got to make it back by the end of the week or I'm out of a job, out of a home, out of...” He listens for a long time, then shakes his head. “Man, you said that last week about coffee beans. You said that Friday about oranges! Now you're talking pork bellies? Give me a break.” He listens for a long time. Finally he sighs. “You better turn this thing around, Hugh....Yeah, go ahead. I'm in for the pork bellies.”

He gets off the phone, mumbling, “Pork bellies...” and then he notices me. “Hey, you're not supposed to read those here! You're supposed to buy 'em and read 'em at home.” He goes to the freezer and takes out a Double Dynamo. “What are you doing here anyway? I thought school started yesterday.”

I check out the freezer, which is chock-f of Double Dynamos, then count the money in my pocket. Not enough. I look at T.J. chomping away on his and say, “I got suspended.”

His eyebrows shoot up. “Suspended? On the first day of school?”

I pick out some gum and pop it on the counter. “That's right.”

He stares at me and I just stare back. Finally he rings me up and says, “Get out of here, would you? I don't need juvenile delinquents hanging around my store.”

So I stand on the corner of Broadway and Main awhile, watching cars do-si-do around each other, and all of a sudden I get a very bad idea. And the more I think about it the more I talk myself into believing it's a good idea, and off I go down Main Street, straight to Madame Nashira's House of Astrology.

I wasn't really expecting her to be there. I tried peeking around the old velvet curtains, but I couldn't see much, so finally I pushed on the door. A bell jingled as it opened, and a voice called, “Not open, sorry!”

I stood there blinking for a minute, trying to get used to the darkness. The walls and the ceiling were painted black, with little silver stars everywhere. There was an old velvet love seat, and in front of it was a coffee table with unlit candles and a big deck of cards. Across the room was an ancient-looking telescope on a brass stand, and sitting at a table next to it, punching numbers into a calculator, was Gina.

The table had a thick green skirt around it, and behind it was a white curtain, coming down from the ceiling like a slice of the Milky Way.

I watched her for a minute as she went back and forth between a book and the calculator. Finally I said, “Hi.”

Well, she about jumps into outer space. And when she comes back down she's clutching her heart. “Don't
do
that to me! I was concentrating!”

“Sorry...”

She looks at me a little closer. “Oh, it's you!”

“Hi.”

“What are you doing out so late?” She gropes for her watch and curses.

“What's the matter?”

“That creep took my watch, too. Like he's gonna be able to get anything for it. It's just silver plate, but I really liked it. It had moons on one side of the band and suns on the other and...Doesn't matter. It's gone.” She eyes me. “The point is, what are you doing out so late? Does your mama know where you are?”

I laugh. “It's ten in the morning!”

“No kidding?”

I pull back the window curtain. “See?”

She shields her eyes like I'm torturing her. “Put it down!”

I drop the curtain and laugh. “Sorry!”

“So why
are
you here?”

“Um...I don't know...I guess I was hoping that maybe they'd found out something more about...”

“The jerk who stole my money? No chance. Not with that buffoon in charge.” She squints at me. “Why are you so interested, anyway?”

I just shrug and stand there in front of her desk, toeing the carpet with my high-top.

She studies me a minute. “You're not just interested—you're worried!”

I keep digging at the carpet. “No I'm...”

“Yes you are! What's the matter? You worried that maybe the guy saw you, too?”

I look up at her. “I know he did.”

“Seriously?” She gives me a doubtful look. “How do you know that?”

I go back to destroying the carpet and mumble, “Because I waved at him.”

Her face twitches a minute, and then she busts up. “Oh, you're priceless!”

“More like stupid.”

She laughs a little more, then makes herself stop. “Look, honey, you're probably worried about nothing. Maybe he saw you, but he can't know who you are. It's too far away.”

“I keep trying to tell myself that, but...”

“So what you've got to do is get your mind off of it. Forget about him. Make yourself think about something else.” She taps the paper on her desk. “Ever had your birth chart done?”

“I don't even know what a birth chart is.”

“You don't? Well, sit down and let me show you!”

She's looking at me so excited, I can't exactly say, No thanks, I really shouldn't even
be
here, so down I sit, right across the table from her.

She shoves this drawing at me that looks like a cross between a clock and a wagon wheel. “
This
is a birth chart. It plots out the exact position of the planets at the time of someone's birth.” She points to the wedges. “These are houses. That's the way we divide up the space surrounding Earth. There are twelve houses, and each one represents a sphere of human life.

“For instance, the first one is the house of Aries and Mars. It reveals personality and psychological motivation, whereas, say, the sixth house—Virgo and Mercury—is related to health, diet, and exercise.”

Now when Gina started talking about the birth chart it's like she became a different person. She still looked like a Gypsy who'd dunked her head in a bucket of shellac, but all of a sudden she sounded different. She sounded really smart.

She sees me staring. “Why're you looking at me like that?”

I blink. “Sorry.”

“Okay. Like I was saying, these are the houses and this”—she points to a green line going through the middle of the chart—“is the horizon.”

“The horizon?”

“Yeah. The horizon at the time of birth. You need to know that so you can position the cusp of the first house. That's called the ascendant.”

“The ascen-what? What's a cusp?”

She laughs. “Here. This line is a cusp. It separates one astrological sign from another. The ascendant is the degree of the zodiac rising over the eastern horizon at the moment of birth. Each degree takes about four minutes to rise.”

“Wait a minute. How do you know the moment of birth?”

“You need a birth certificate. Gotta have it. You can't just guess 'cause even if you're only a few minutes off, by the time you're done making all the conversions into sidereal time your whole chart'll be off. Same with the place of birth. If the latitude and longitude are off, well, forget it.”

“Seems pretty complicated to me.” I look at her chart for a minute. “So what do you
do
with it?”

“I'm not anywhere near done yet! I've got to finish writing in the glyphs, draw in the midheaven, position the sun and the moon and the planets. Then I've got to draw in the aspects, progress it, and interpret it.”

I shake my head. “Wow.”

She studies me a minute. “You're an Aries.”

It's not a question, but I nod anyway.

She laughs. “Who but an Aries would wave at a man stealing money?” She collects her papers and says, “What I want to know is, what else have you seen through those binoculars? You some kind of Peeping Tomasina?”

I can feel my cheeks turning red. “No! I just...well, sometimes I get bored.”

Gina nods like she understands. “Ever try looking at the stars through binoculars? It's pretty cool.”

“Really? They're so far away I wouldn't think you could see them any better.”

She slides her papers into a drawer and straightens out the books. “Try it sometime. You'll be surprised.” She points to the telescope across the room. “Last year around Christmas I hauled that thing to the roof of the mall. It was spectacular!”

My mouth drops open. “The roof of the mall? How do you get up there?”

“Haven't you ever gone behind one of those ‘Employees Only' doors?”

“No...”

“They'll take you straight to the roof.” Gina laughs. “And here I thought you were an anarchist.” She picks up her keys and says, “Bedtime for Madame Nashira.”

I watch her lock up and go, and the minute there's a break in traffic I jaywalk across the street so I don't have to walk through the guys already hanging around the Red Coach. And before I even reach the far side of the street I've got a whole new plan for how I'm going to spend my day.

TWELVE

Mrs. Graybill's nose wasn't in the hallway, and Grams' binoculars
were
under the bed—right where I'd left them. I cleaned the lenses, scrawled Grams a note, then headed for the mall.

When I got there, I tried to act real casual riding up the escalator, but since the only people at the mall in the middle of a school day are adults and babies, it felt like everyone was staring at me. Like any minute someone was going to come right out and say, “What are
you
doing here? And, hey...what's with those binoculars?”

The second I got to the top floor I found an “Employees Only” door and ducked behind it. I stood there for a minute, just glad to be away from all those adults and babies and eyes staring at me. Then I started walking.

I'd always thought there were just bathrooms behind those “Employees Only” doors. I didn't know there was a whole maze of corridors! And I'm cruising along, feeling like a hamster in a new cage, when a door swings open and practically knocks me over. It's not an adult, and it's sure not a baby—it's Brandon.

He flips back that shiny hair of his and says, “Sammy! Sorry.”

I said, “What are
you
doing here?” because everyone knows Brandon's supposed to be at school.

“I had a dentist appointment. I just stopped by to pick up my paycheck.” He looks me up and down. “I might ask you the same question...”

I blush and mumble, “I got suspended.”

“Suspended—
you?
”

I check out my high-tops, feeling pretty stupid. “Yeah. For punching someone in the nose.”

He laughs. “Well, I'm sure they deserved it.” Can you believe that? I tell you, Brandon's all right. Anyhow, he looks at his watch and says, “I've got to run. I'll talk to you later.”

I stop him. “Hey, Brandon? Do you know how to get up to the roof?”

“The roof? Why do you want to get on the roof?”

“I don't know, I just do.”

He pulls on the back of his hair, studying me a minute. Finally he says, “Go down this way and turn left at the next T. It's the first door on the right.” He turns to go, then stops and says, “You didn't hear that from me, right?”

I laugh. “Right!”

I ran down the corridor and turned left, then opened the first door on the right. It led to some cement steps, and up to another door.

I went up the steps and through the door, and all of a sudden there I was, on the roof of the mall. And it felt like I was on top of the world. I ran around a bit, peeking over the edge of the roof wall; then I cut through a bunch of fans that looked like the top of some Saudi sheik's palace and went over to the other side. I could see the tops of trees and power lines and the roofs of houses. And then people—lots of people—just kind of hurrying along the sidewalk.

After I'd looked around with my eyes, I started using the binoculars. First I checked out the Salvation Army. There are always people hanging around at the Salvation Army. They kind of spend the day sharing cigarettes and lying back on their sleeping bags, watching people go back and forth to the courthouse, waiting for someone to come out of the soup kitchen with some food.

I spent a little while watching them watching people, and then I decided to watch the people they were watching. Lawyers mostly. They were hanging around outside the courthouse, sharing cigarettes and talking, looking quite a lot like the people at the Salvation Army, only dressed up. It didn't take long to get tired of watching them, so I moved on over to the police station.

The police station is right next to the fire station, so you'd think there'd be a lot going on, but there wasn't. I watched the front door of the police station for a long time and it only opened once. Same at the fire station. I could see a couple of guys cleaning the fire trucks, but it all seemed like it was in slow motion.

So I cruised along the wall for a while, watching some bulldozers level dirt for a new mall parking lot, and then I thought to look for William Rose Junior High School. Maybe I could even spot Heather Acosta picking her nose or something.

I found the school all right, but all I could really see were the basketball hoops, so I gave up and went over to the other side of the roof. There were people sitting on benches in the little grassy area around the mall—mostly in the shade, because it was pretty hot out. There was a lady with her baby, sitting under a tree playing peek- aboo. There were a couple of guys drinking out of Styrofoam cups, playing checkers. There was a man in a three-piece suit, and with his briefcase and perfect hair I would've been sure he was a lawyer, except he was doing something you never catch lawyers doing: he was eating an ice cream cone. A Double Dynamo.

Well, I looked down the street a little farther and sure enough, there's Oscar, sitting on a planter by himself in the shade of a big tree, cleaning his glasses with a hanky, enjoying a rest from pushing that cart of his around. And all of a sudden I realize that the roof of the mall is the hottest place in town and I'm dying for an ice cream—or at least a drink of water.

So I start for the door, telling myself I'll come back when it isn't so hot—maybe at night, to check out the stars—when I get the idea to look for Hudson's house.

So I run across to the far side of the roof, then find Hudson's house with just my eyeballs. I put the binoculars up, adjust the focus, and sure enough there's Hudson, sitting on the porch, beating the heat with a tall glass of iced tea, laughing.

And sitting right next to him, beating the heat with a tall glass of iced tea, laughing, is my grandmother.

*                  *                  *

I felt like going down to Hudson's but I didn't. I went home. And the longer I waited for Grams, the madder I got. What was she doing? Trying to teach me a lesson? What if I hadn't seen her through the binoculars? And why was she spending the whole day with someone she thought
I
spent too much time with?

When she finally came through the door, she was hauling a bunch of plastic shopping bags, humming. She put them down on the kitchen counter and smiled at me. “Did you have a nice day?”

I crossed my arms. “I was
suspended
, remember?”

She starts taking cans out of a bag and putting them away. “Oh, I remember all right.”

I watched her for a minute. “This was just your idea of teaching me a lesson, wasn't it?”

She keeps humming away, putting up the groceries. Finally she turns to me and says, “I'm sorry, Samantha. Really. I didn't mean to be gone so long.”

Huh. I'm quiet for a while, then I heave a sigh. “Worrying's the pits.”

Grams throws her head back and laughs. “You can say that again!”

And she's on her way over to give me a hug when I say, real quietly, “At least when you worry about me it's because of emergencies—not because I decide to spend the day sipping tea on someone's porch.”

That stops her cold. “What?”

“Have a nice time with Hudson today?”

She takes her glasses off and starts buffing them, holding them up to the light, then buffing them some more. “I only went there because I thought it was high time I knew a little bit more about the man.”

“Because of me?”

“Yes, of course, because of you.”

“So...? I'm right, huh?”

“I'll agree he's a very knowledgeable man, but frankly I find him to be an insufferable flirt.”

“An insufferable flirt?
Hudson?
”

She pops her glasses back on her nose. “That's right. But if you think for one minute you can make me forget your recent behavior by talking about Mr. Graham, you are sorely mistaken.” She points to the couch. “Sit. Right now. Sit and talk. You've got a lot of explaining to do.”

So I sit. And I talk. And I tell her right off that I didn't leave Mrs. Graybill that note—that I think somebody who knows I saw him steal something left it. Then I back up and tell her about the burglary at the Heavenly Hotel, and when it comes out that the binoculars were involved in the trouble I'm in, Grams is just dying to say, I told you so! but she doesn't. She just sits there, real quiet, looking paler and paler. And when she finally can't stand it anymore, she says, “Why in heaven's name did you
wave?
”

I shrug. “Grams, I don't know—I just did, okay?”

She looks at me through her glasses like Mikey looks at some new fish in an aquarium. “And next I suppose you're going to tell me you didn't call the police because you didn't want to worry me?”

My face crinkles up—part smile, part cringe. Then I add really fast, “But I
have
talked to the police. There's this guy named Officer Borsch—I told him the whole story that night at the Heavenly Hotel and—”

“At the Heavenly Hotel? You mean to tell me you went
inside?
”

My face crinkles up again. “Well, there were police cars parked out front, and I wanted to find out what was going on, so I—”

“You are
never
to set foot in that hotel again! Do you hear me? Never!”

“But Grams...it's not seedy, it's really kind of neat. It's got—”

“I don't care what it's got! It is no place for a girl your age, do you hear me?”

Just then the doorbell rings. Grams puts a finger to her lips and I do a quick check for anything of mine lying around; then I duck into the closet. Two seconds later Grams calls, “Who is it?”

Normally I shut Grams' bedroom door when I dive into the closet, but this time I didn't. I just dived in, made myself some room in the middle of Grams' shoes, and got ready to wait for whoever rang the bell to go away.

Then I heard something I couldn't believe.

I opened the closet door just a crack and sure enough, it was the voice of Officer Borsch. He was saying, “Yes, ma'am, I'm aware of that, but your neighbor insists that she's the one who left the note and it's my duty to follow up. It
is
a threat, you know.”

Grams says, “Of course it's a threat! And if you'd catch that fella my granddaughter saw across the way, you'd have the person who left the note!”

“Ah, so
you're
the grandmother.” It's dead quiet for a minute, then he says, “And I suppose it's your granddaughter who told you the note under your neighbor's door was left by the hotel thief?”

“That's right, and—”

He snorts. “With all due respect, ma'am, maybe this is just her way of getting some attention?”

By now I've pushed the closet door open a little more so I can hear better. And I'm dying to jump out and tell Officer Borsch a thing or two, but I can't. I have to just sit there, getting madder and madder, listening to him make fun of me. Then all of a sudden his voice starts to get louder and I can hear him creaking and jingling my way. He says, “Would you mind if I took a look out the window? I'd like to see if it's even possible to see the hotel room from here.”

Now I can tell that the last thing in the world Grams wants is for Officer Borsch to go nosing through her apartment, but what can she do? He's already nosing.

His feet walk right past the closet, so I scrunch back as far as I can and hold my breath. I hear him mumble, “Mm-hm...” like he just doesn't believe it. Finally he says, “Where is your granddaughter, ma'am?”

“Home from school, I suppose.”

“Ah, yes. She does have a very nice home, doesn't she?”

I can tell Grams doesn't quite know what to say to
that
. “Uh…yes, yes she does.”

“So why does she come here so much? Your neighbor seems to think
this
is her home.”

Uh-oh is what I'm thinking. Uh-
oh
. And I just know that Grams is out there sweating, but what she says is, “Oh, Daisy. She's...lonesome, if you know what I mean?”

Officer Borsch is quiet for a minute. Finally he says, “What's the name of the street your granddaughter lives on again?”

Well, my heart's going full speed ahead. I can see the Big Lie just crumbling away in front of me. Then, very quietly, out of Grams' mouth comes “East Jasmine.”

Let me tell you, I felt like whooping. There's nobody in this world like my grandmother. Nobody.

And I'm sitting there, with my hands in fists, going, Yes! Yes! Yes! as loud as my brain can shout, when something brushes against my shoulder. Not Grams' coat. Not one of her dresses.

Something alive.