The boss had made reservations at the downtown hotel. He emphasized the article to indicate it wasn’t the only, but the best among many. Said he couldn’t miss it. Just ask anyone. Well, if I can’t miss it, why will I have to ask? No matter. He’d find it. A real hotel: nice change from the motels with the creaky beds and hard water and rust-stains in the sink, the bulb over the bed with a pull-chain that clanks against the bedframe if the folks next door starting feeling their oats. Get a place with character, history. Where getting a drink means going downstairs to the bar like a civilized guy, not sitting in the room with your feet up on the bed drinking beer. Where you could sit in the lobby and get your shoes shined, smoking a fat fine cheroot, glancing up from your newspaper to note the passing parade. A hotel. He liked this trip already.

Joe swung home to throw clothes in a suitcase and turn the thermostat down. He considered calling his mother, but she’d be out. Call her from the road. He unplugged the TV and the radio – stuff shorts out, sparks, you never know – and then he gave the living room a brief salute. See you later. Behave. He ran his cigarette under the tap in the kitchen, held it in his hand to make sure it was out, put it in the garbage – then sighed and decided he wouldn’t sleep if he didn’t take out the garbage now, just in case. This is what owning a house had done to him. He was surprised it was still there every day when he came home, frankly. Imagine what it would be like with a wife. Imagine with kids. You could go nuts, the thoughts you’d have.

He was on the road by four. Traffic; Highway two bunched up around Euclid, and he spent the dinner hour waiting for an accident to clear. He had a burger in his car in Mentor and pulled in around six. The Ashtabula was obviously the hotel, but that said less about the hotel and more about Ashtabula. He slowed as he passed, making sure he had the right place, somehow disappointed they didn’t have a doorman. He’d never stayed in a place with a doorman. Did you tip the guy? For what? Opening the door? Like that’s such an accomplishment. Like paying a guy to turn on the water taps in the restroom. But no, that’s how it is with hotels. You grease them in advance. Lay four bits on him on the way in, he helps you on the way out, when you roll through the revolving door and face the great unknown of nocturnal Ashtabula. Where’s the action, friend? Doormen knew these things. They saw all.

Or maybe they were hired because the house could count on them to see nothing. What’s to see, anyway? Drive a man nuts, standing there all day.

He parked a block away, got out his suitcase and grip, looked up and down the street: empty. A sign for a TV repair shop, Chow Mein – who ate that crap? - a department store marquee down the block. Woolworth’s. Always Woolworth’s. He snapped up his collar and pulled his hat down: the wind made no friends here.

There was a doorman in front of the hotel. Guess he’d been on a leak break. Joe nodded, turned into the door.

“Good evening sir,” the doorman said. He leaned over and gave the revolving door a sharp shove.

“Thanks for the head start,” Joe said. He unbuttoned his coat to get a quarter. The door spun down and slowed, stopped. The doorman looked at him without expression. Joe found a quarter and handed it to the doorman; he tipped his cap and smiled.

“Have a good night sir.” He leaned over and pushed the door again.

“Do my best,” Joe said, thinking: now I owe him for two pushes. Well, get him on the way out. He’d better remember.

Joe rode the door inside, taking half-steps to keep the door from striking his suitcase and grip. A man could not go through a revolving door with a suitcase and keep his dignity intact. Wasn’t that what doormen were for? Take your stuff and let you stride inside, man of the world, a train of vassals behind you? Make that a dime on the way out. Make that a nod and a smile.

The lobby was warm and dim and worn and yellow. It smelled of old cigars, fried food, a faint high note of bleach. There was a sitting room off to the right, an expanse of faded carpet with a few chairs marooned in random positions, as though there had just been a gay party here a few minutes ago before everyone left for another venue. More likely this was how the chairs got pushed around by the charwoman who vacuumed up, Joe thought. There was a small TV in the corner to indicate the presence of the modern world; otherwise, everything looked like it looked when he was a kid. When his dad took him on that trip to Chicago, to the hotel where he said Goodbye To Your Mother Once. The Palmer? Yeah, that. But the Palmer for Munchkins. Drunk ones. Joe approached the desk.

The clerk looked up.

“Evening,” Joe said. “I believe I have a reservation.”

“Or course,” the clerk said. He was a fellow in his forties, squat nose and fleshy lips, big dark eyes with luxurious eyebrows. His aftershave and hair tonic were engaged in a shouting match. He turned the ledger around and pointed to a line with a pen on a chain. “Sign here, please, and if I could see your driver’s license.” He turned around, consulted the row of boxes, and took a key. “Third floor. It’s reasonably quiet.”

“Yeah, I’ve heard tales about Thursday night in Ashtabula,” Joe said. “Like the Chinese New Year.” He pocketed the key, took out his wallet, pulled out the license and handed it to the clerk. What to have? Beer? Something harder and browner? The night was young.

“Cleveland,” the clerk said. He was staring at the license with pursed lips.

“Yeah. Big city? To the south?”

“Of course.” The clerk smiled. “I was just – sorry sir, my error.”

“What? You do have a room? The boss made a reservation.”

The man seemed to turn slightly pale; he smiled again. “No error. Let me do something about that room, however? If I may.” He held his hand out. Joe fished in his pocket and produced a quarter. “Oh no - if I may? The key?” Oh. The clerk put the key back in its cubbyhole and withdrew another from the top row.

“I hope this is satisfactory. Boy!” The clerk struck the bell with such force the sound seemed to hang in the empty lobby for the entire time it took for the bellboy to push through the door and reach the desk. “Six-twelve.” To Joe: “Thank you, sir, and if there’s anything at all, anything, please don’t hesitate.”

I’ll take an elephant carved in butter. Joe thanked him. The doorman – now the bellhop, apparently – picked up his suitcase and samples grip and headed around the corner. Joe followed, and saw there was a narrow bar by the elevator. That’s for me. Maybe a shoe shine too.

“So where you in from?” the bellhop asked. He set down the bags and pushed the call button. The doors rattled open.

“Cleveland,” Joe said.

“Golly.”

“As I live and breathe.”

“I’d like to go there some day.”

“The road’s almost finished, I hear.” They got in the elevator. “Trains go there too.”

“I know. It’s just I don’t know anyone and it’s a big place, y’know? My mom would worry.”

“My mom worries, and she lives there. But I know what you mean. Things happen. Even if they don’t happen to you, you hear about them. Changes your way of looking at everything, you hear enough. That’s the most dangerous part of living in a big city. It’s not what you say that works on you, you know? It’s what you hear.” He gave the kid a knowing look: have some big city wisdom on me, pal.

The bellboy suddenly looked at Joe as though he’d remembered something; he stood up a little straighter. “Of course, sir,” he said. “I don’t hear anything.” He nodded gravely.

By the time they got to the room the belllboy was sweating slightly. Odd. The bags weren’t that heavy and the hallway was rather cold. The bellboy opened the door, clicked on a light – weak yellow bulb - waved Joe in, brought the bags and showed him where everything was.

“I can figure it out,” Joe said. “Took a while, but I don’t use in the flowerpots anymore. Now I look for the room with the big white things.” There was a bulb over the bed, he noticed. A bulb with a chain. Ah well. He dug in his pocket for another quarter, but the bellboy waved him off.
“My pleasure,” he said. “If you put your shoes out before 2 AM we’ll shine them up nice. I’ll see to that myself. Well, okay, good night, sir.” He grinned weakly, backed out of the room and closed the door with exaggerated slowness until the latch closed without a click. Joe watched the knob turn, then heard the bellhop retreat. Creak. Creak. Sounded like he was auditioning for a job testing mine fields. What a peculiar place: Had he interrupted something? Was this actually a hotel, or some sort of secret Nazi spy nest? Hard to think that just being from Cleveland was enough to get red-carpeted, but if that’s how it was, fine. Didn’t get you much respect elsewhere. Not even in Cleveland. Especially not in Cleveland.

Joe washed up – hard water, rust stains in the sink and the tub and the toilet. He wiped his face with a towel that was not entirely indistinguishable from sandpaper. He took a pack of smokes out of his jacket, patted his pocket for the room key, and headed down to the bar.

No name. Just BAR in a sign over the door. Dim and cloudy. Four stools on the side, two booths in the back. The bartender looked about ninety; he stood by the cash register reading a magazine with a Charles Atlas ad on the back. Well, never too late. A big guy in a small suit sat at the bar sipping something brown. Joe nodded to both, sat down. The bartender hobbled over and put down a coaster as though it was the last thing he owned in the world, and looked at Joe.

“Scotch,” Joe said. “Light ice.”

“We got Old Grand-Dad and we got Four Roses.”

Blend ‘em all together, pops. See what happens. Texas and Blue Streak. “Grand-Dad’s fine.”

Joe sipped his drink, planned tomorrow. Up and out by nine. Call mom. Ask her to drop by the house and see if it burned down.

The best part of a hotel scotch was the first sip; after that it was watered down. It’s like they invented ice that melted the moment booze hit it. Maybe they warmed the bottles. He drained the drink and held up the glass, waiting for the bartender to look his way.

The big man was staring at him.

“Do I know you?” Joe said.

“’S thinkin’ maybe so. In a way.”

Joe turned to face him. “Here. Profile doesn’t do it, try the marquee view.”

The man pursed his lips, nodded. “You’re Cleveland, right? Maybe we know the same people. You know. Friends of ours.” He made an indistinct gesture with his right hand, fingers trilling to suggest all the possible possibilities.

“No I don’t know. Did we go to school together? Fourth grade? The teacher we all called Miss Pineapple? After that it’s a blur.”

The bartender set down Joe’s drink; he toasted the big guy and went back to staring at himself in the mirror. Bar light was good. The world should be lit like a bar. How much more easy it would be. For everyone. Guys could relax. Women? They’d still doll up. Aces all around.

He saw the big guy watching him, frowning.

In the bar mirror Joe saw the desk clerk enter. He walked over to the big man, palms together. He pointed out the door and said something Joe didn’t hear; the man nodded, shot Joe a hard look and went back to stirring his drink.

A few minutes later another man entered the bar; he paused at the door. Letting his eyes adjust, maybe. Joe turned and took a look – dark suit like his. Red tie like his. Thin, twitchy like a pony. The man at the bar looked up. Cocked his head. The new guy wandered over; they said a few hushed words, shook hands. They both looked at Joe for a second.

“Stupid Al, shoulda said about the moustache,” the big man grinned, pointing to Pony’s face. “Sciocco anziano, eh? C’mon. Over here.” He stood and pointed his drink at a booth in the corner. He held up the glass, said “two times,” and they walked away. Beef had his arm around Pony’s shoulder.

Joe finished his drink, went upstairs, put his shoes out in the hallway and look a long final leak. He turned off the light and closed his eyes.

Jesus Christ: gangsters.

That was it. And they thought he was one of them. The front desk clerk after he saw the Cleveland license, after Joe mentioned “the boss.” The bellboy, nervous about everything. Beef, acting like they had something in common. Everyone knew but him.

Ahhh, nonsense.

He woke at seven, showered and shaved, and dressed. Where the hell are my shoes? Oh. Yeah. He opened the door, and there they were.

Just as dull as when he’d put them out the night before.