style="font-size:15px;"> ‘Mr Morton?’ the man says, ‘I’m so sorry. I thought someone was at the desk.’
‘Not to worry.’
‘I do apologise.’
‘Only this instant arrived.’
‘It’s remiss of us. I didn’t hear the taxi.’
‘He left me at the gate.’
‘Really? That’s –’
‘At my request.’
‘Ah,’ says the man, and from the dragging of the vowel it is clear that he has scrutinised him and understood. A large sheet of paper is turned, and another. ‘Good journey?’
‘Not bad. On time, more or less.’
‘Good, good,’ he says, writing with a harsh nib. ‘And no problem getting a taxi?’
‘None at all.’ High up behind him, near where the woman’s voice came from, an aerosol gushes.
‘Now, we have a single room reserved for you, on the second floor. But if you’d prefer there’s a double on the first floor. A very nice room, large. I can offer it to you at no extra charge.’
‘That’s kind of you, but I don’t need a lot of space. Just a bed and a bath and a table for my laptop,’ he says, hoisting the bag in which he carries it.
‘Well, there’s a small table in the single, a bureau in the double. I would recommend the double, Mr Morton. It’s an extremely comfortable room and very quiet. I’m afraid we don’t have air-conditioning. You knew that? With this weather we could do with it, but we just have the breeze.’
‘I prefer the breeze.’
‘Good, good. So the double it is?’
‘Thank you, Mr –?’
‘Forgive me. Caldecott, Malcolm Caldecott. The manager. Pleased to meet you.’
‘Likewise.’ He holds out his hand and Mr Caldecott takes it, giving a grip that is firm and brisk. Someone wearing steel-tipped shoes approaches and halts at the desk, brushing his sleeves with gloved hands. ‘One other thing, Mr Caldecott. Is it possible to send e-mail from my room?’
‘It is, yes. David here will show you.’ A key clinks, being detached from its hook. ‘David will take your bags up. The lift is very close.’
‘I’d rather take the stairs. You know where you are with a staircase, if you see what I mean.’
Ascending the staircase behind the porter, he slides a palm on the curving handrail, which has the coolness and smoothness of naked metal and is interrupted by a stout column of glossy stone, marble probably, and resumes with a tight angle that steers him round to a landing, where they pass through a fume of furniture polish. ‘This way,’ says David, turning left into a corridor where the air is considerably warmer than in the hall and has a dusty tang. ‘Here we are,’ he announces.
A lock grinds and snaps, and a freshening waft of rose scent arrives. He rests his hand on wallpaper that is embossed with a florid pattern and slightly greasy. A hand gently hooks his other cuff to draw him forward.
‘OK,’ says David, uncertainly. ‘Well, what you have here, sir, basically, is the bed over here, in the middle of the room, against the wall.’ David pats a quilt three times and moves further away. ‘Over here is the bathroom.’ Another door opens, making a soft boom, and now there is cooler air, which has a weak glassy smell in which there is an element of bleach. ‘Right. OK. Well, basically what you’ve got, sir,’ he continues, his voice amplified by the bare room, ‘is the basin on your left. It comes out quite a way, and the bath on your right, yes, a bit more, that’s it. And then there’s quite a gap, a bin there, careful sir, yes, and right down the end here, towel rail there, and down the end here there’s the toilet,’ and as if to prove its existence he flushes it, with a clank like an ancient water pump.
When the presentation of the room has been completed and the computer plugged in, he unpacks his clothes and eats half of one of the sandwiches he made this morning. He switches the laptop on and immediately switches it off again. Still wearing his jacket, he lies on the bed. His outstretched hands do not reach the edge of the mattress, nor do his feet. The smooth fat pillow subsides slowly under his head, exhaling a fragrance of pristine linen. He flips the face of his watch: it is not yet six o’clock. He is unaccountably tired, but he should at least attempt to work. ‘Garzoncello scherzoso’, the phrase that pestered him intermittently all morning, appears in his mind again, pursued by the English words: playful boy; playful lad; larking lad; lively lad. He drowses in the humid air, while the words circle ceaselessly, like flies: lively boy; scamp; lively lad; boy.
Cleaning the mirrors on the balcony, Eloni wonders if the man who has just arrived is somebody important, because there was something important about the way he held his head, in the manner of someone who is used to being treated respectfully. The dark glasses made him look frightening, and it seemed from his expression that he was still annoyed that there was nobody at the desk to greet him, or perhaps David had annoyed him in some way. His slow, stiff-backed walk was like a soldier’s walk, but his hair was longer than a soldier’s would be, and the soft bulge of his belly above his belt wasn’t like a soldier, and his clothes were too messy for a soldier. His shoes were covered in dust, and his denim shirt was black with sweat around the collar. And would a soldier wear a crumpled jacket or have a big brown stain on his sleeve? He is interesting but perhaps not nice, she concludes, whisking the duster once more over the head of Prince Albert, then she hears the double peep of the butcher’s van.
The driver’s surly face, when he sees her hurrying towards him, does not change at all. Reluctantly he climbs down to open the back doors. The hinges crack when he pulls at the handles, making him scowl more sourly. Without a word he hands her the parcels of meat, piling them into her arms without once looking her in the eye. In all the time she has been here, he has spoken not a single complete sentence to her; he has never asked her name, and she does not know his. He pokes a crumpled invoice under the string of the top parcel and turns his back, which has a stripe of sweat right down it.
‘Thank you,’ she says to the stripe.
The driver pushes the doors shut with a slap of both hands. He gives one of them a shove with a shoulder to be sure, and a sound is knocked out of him by the effort: ‘Yup.’
‘Goodbye,’ she says, as the driver gives the door another bang with his shoulder. Clamping her chin on the invoice, she turns round slowly and almost walks into Mr Caldecott, who takes half the packets from her and comes with her to the kitchen.
When she has finished putting the meat into the refrigerator he looks at her directly and tells her again that he is asking about work. ‘But you understand, I can’t promise anything. It’s –’
‘I understand,’ she tells him.
‘I’ll do what I can, Eloni,’ he says. He gives her today’s thin envelope of money.
‘Yes,’ she replies, looking at her watch. She will be late if she doesn’t leave now. Over Mr Caldecott’s shoulder a long string of cobweb hangs from the underside of a rack of pans, with a blue-grey clot of web dangling at its end. ‘Thank you,’ she says.
