The Homeless Millionaire

Monday started badly. I stubbed my little toe on the door jamb when entering the bathroom, and it hurt like hell. A moment later, I cut myself while shaving. It wasn't a deep cut, but it kept bleeding and I had to stick a bit of toilet paper on it. It quickly turned red.

It also provided Roch with inspiration for a series of stupid jokes about people who stuck their faces where they didn't belong. He suggested that I should paint a self-portrait, and entitle it The Cunt That Bit Me.

I hit back when he asked me later if I'd put in a few hours at the house before going off to the Montrose. I told him no: I had to pay a visit to the laundromat, and practice frying the perfect egg; I explained my night receptionist duties involved serving breakfast to early risers. He looked so hurt that I relented, and told him I might be able to help for a few hours another day.

Roch left the house around ten still looking hurt, and I put the dirty laundry in a garbage bag, then changed my mind and put it in my traveling bag. This involved moving the Rembrandt back under the pillow.

I didn't want to carry my laundry in a garbage bag because it made me look like a total loser. Hiding the Rembrandt under my pillow made me feel like moron. It wasn't a great trade.

I read the day's paper in the laundromat. The museum robbery had been degraded to Page Five. There was no hint of negotiations between the robbers and the museum. The author of that article sneered at the cops: they were victimizing art students because they had no clue who robbed the museum. It had to be a team of top professionals! Only a criminal mastermind could have pulled it off.

I did some sneering of my own and took the clean laundry home. I wanted to leave for work around six: although my shift started at ten, His Excellency Houghton-Briggs had asked me to come in early on my first day. I was to become acquainted with the guy working afternoons, who would help me settle into my new job.

That left me with plenty of time to press the laundry that needed pressing as well as practice frying eggs. Roch kept the ironing board and the iron in his bedroom. He basically used the board as a clothes horse, I never saw him iron anything.

The first thing I saw upon entering Roch's bedroom was the fucking shotgun. He'd left it lying on the bed! I tried to be cool about it—Roch had a licence for that gun—his old man had bought it in a fucking store, it had all the legal paperwork. But seeing that gun really threw me off balance, and I came close to burning the cuff of my best shirt with the iron.

I'd thought about taking a nap before I left for work; I was going to be up all night. But I was too tense to sleep, and I spent almost an hour standing at the kitchen window and smoking cigarettes and staring at the backyard with unseeing eyes as I imagined all kinds of unpleasant things happening to me in the near future.

I also thought about Tracy. I'd been trying hard not to think about Tracy at all, and I'd succeeded because I was busy robbing a museum in the meantime. But now it all came back, and made me feel the way jilted lovers usually do.

I took a long bath and washed my hair and saw that had been a small positive development: my cut had stopped bleeding. I'd been planning to fry up some eggs for an early dinner, but I just couldn't face fucking around with a frying pan.

I got dressed for work— shirt, tie, jacket, dark grey flannels and dress shoes—and left the house around half past five in the afternoon. It was a nice day and I intended to walk to the Montrose, and stop at a cheap restaurant along the way.

The Chinese restaurant I chose was called Fortune Garden, and the fortune cookie I got with my meal warned me about hidden enemies. It made me look out for cops all the way to the Montrose.

I arrived there a little after seven: it was beginning to get dark. The front door was locked; it seemed to be the standard at the Montrose, and a little odd for a place that called itself a hotel. I rang the bell and waited and waited and finally the door opened, and I found myself looking at the face of a fish.

The guy that answered the door was about my height, but that was where any resemblance ended. He had pale skin and greenish, protuberant eyes and next to no chin. Lanky, dirty blond hair snaked down his forehead in greasy curves; he resembled a halibut peeking out at the world from under a clump of seaweed. His grey suit had seen better times, most likely when it was still being worn by his father. He said:

"You must be Michael. Michael Ryman?" He had an unexpectedly deep, low voice, quite a nice voice actually.

"Yeah," I said. The sound of my last name made me flinch: I was reminded of my fucking family.

He noticed that. There was an amused glint in those bulging eyes when he held the door open and stepped to the side and said:

"I'm Larry. Come in. I'll show you around." He didn't offer me his hand.

I went in and followed him to the reception counter and he laid out the procedure for booking guests. They were to write down their names in the register and pay ten bucks up front for a room—no documents needed and I should never ask for any, even when I was sure the name they'd given me was false.

Larry grinned when he told me that, revealing long yellow teeth. He added:

"After they've signed in, you take their key and go upstairs and show them to their room. Remember, when they leave you instantly go to their room again and change the sheets and put in fresh towels. You know how to make a bed? Great. Spare sheets and towels are in that big closet to the left of the stairs, you saw it on the way up. I nearly forgot, make sure the ashtrays are clean too."

"No maid?"

"Nights you're the maid, pal. She comes in at eight, and goes home at four. You're responsible for the rooms while you're here. When there's stuff lying around like empty cigarette packs or bottles or whatever you clean that up, too. Occasionally you might have to pick up a used condom from the floor, use a tissue when you do. You make sure the room looks good, okay? Now, when you show new people in, always smile and say enjoy your stay like you mean it before you give them the room key. Sometimes they'll tip you a quarter, occasionally you'll see a half dollar or even a dollar when they're feeling jolly. You might get another tip when they check out if they've enjoyed the fuck."

"The what?"

"The fuck. You know, fucking. The thing people mean when they talk about making love. But people don't come here to make love. They come to fuck. Hey. Something wrong?"

I looked at him and the room and at him again and I must have looked really stupid, because he grinned from ear to ear and said:

"I get it. You thought this was a regular guesthouse. It's not. Well, you might get a regular guest once in a while. But nine out of ten you get people who need a bed to fuck. They come here, rent a room, stay for half an hour or half the night, and leave. You're gonna change a lot of bed sheets, pal, and sometimes they'll be really scummy. Just last week I had to deal with a bed on which a chick started to menstruate after a screw. It looked as if there'd been a fucking murder, blood everywhere, even on the pillow case. If you're squeamish about stuff like that, you'd better quit right now."

"Blood doesn't scare me," I said, doing my best to sound confident. I wasn't. What Larry was telling me had shocked me. I was sure he'd noticed that, he was doing a lot of grinning. He said:

"Good. Get the gloves from the kitchen if things are really nasty. And that reminds me: you have to cook breakfast for people who want some in the morning. It costs extra, prices are on the menus on the tables, check them out and make sure you collect the money when you serve the food. Otherwise some will leave without paying, especially if they're drunk. But you don't have to worry too much about all that, few people want breakfast, happens once in a blue moon. I started out here by working nights for five months, you can trust me on that."

"Mister Houghton-Briggs told me about the breakfast."

"Yeah. Houghton-Briggs. Isn't that a scream, old boy? That guy just kills me. But he's okay. He's actually nice. You have to be nice to other people in this business. Hey. Do you know how to smile?"

"What? Yes. Sure I do."

"Show me."

I realized that I'd assumed my habitual scowl while Larry was telling me about the mysteries of the Montrose. I smiled at him, putting a lot of heart into it. It made his eyes bulge even more.

"Wow," he said. "You look like a different guy. You actually look like you're a nice guy. Keep smiling while you're here, bud, it'll make you a lot of tips. Okay. I guess that's it, we're done. One more thing: mister HB will relieve you at six. He'll go and check on the empty rooms, so make sure they're tidy. Like I told you, best thing is go and do that right after people leave. Last week HB almost gave me a raise because if I hadn't changed those bloody sheets right away the mattress would've been ruined."

We went back downstairs and Larry gave me more info while we waited for his shift to end, and mine to begin. Mondays were always very quiet, he said. Tuesdays and Wednesdays were marginally better, real traffic started on Thursdays and got really intense on Friday nights. Saturdays were like Thursdays, except most people came in at least mildly drunk.

"Mister HB handles Sundays exclusively by himself," Larry told me. "My take is, there a little gambling being done. I came in one Sunday morning last winter 'cause I'd forgotten my scarf. They were all watching the game on the TV in the dining room and some were playing cards and there was cash on the tables. HB didn't like my coming round, he practically pushed me outta the door. So make sure you got all your things when you split Sunday morning, clear? Hey. Don't look so sad, pal. It's actually a good job, I've seen worse. HB is basically a nice guy who wants people to be happy."

"I'm not worried about HB," I said. "I'm worried about the guests."

"No need to. People come here to make love not war, know what I mean? Some are pretty nice. Especially some of the dames. Be nice to them and who knows, you might score a blowjob, you never know. I'm not in the market, I'm married with a kid and I got morals. But you're a single guy, right? You could find you really enjoy working here, you know? Even though you'll have to deal with scummy bed sheets. Just remember to always grab them by the corners when you're folding them up, the corners are always clean. It ain't so bad."

Larry had a wife and a kid! It was mind-blowing. I tried to imagine what they could look like, and failed. I didn't get the chance to find out more because just then the front door bell chimed.

"Watch me," Larry said. So I obediently followed him to the door and he let in a couple of guests. The guy looked like a salesman, he had the bulging briefcase and a brown suit that could be worn for months without appearing to be dirty. He was a pretty average-looking guy.

The woman with him wasn't attractive, either. If I'd met her on the street, I would have thought she was a secretary or a filing clerk or something along those lines. I watched Larry take them to the counter and make them sign their names in the register and collect the money for the room. Then he got the room key—the keys were kept in a box on a shelf behind the counter. He went upstairs with the couple, telling me to wait.

He returned looking slightly disgusted, and said:

"Those two aren't here to fuck. They're here to conduct one of those serious where-are-we-going relationship talks. Who knows, maybe she's pregnant. It might end with a row, we get that sometimes. By the way, anyone gets rowdy, you just go and knock on the door and tell them to pipe down, or you'll call the cops. You don't ever call the cops, you understand? You just say you will. It always works, they go quiet right away."

"What if they don't?"

Larry shrugged.

"Call old HB and tell him what's going on and ask for instructions. I've been here for a while and haven't had to do it once but hey, you never know. The number's on the inside cover of the register, here, let me show you."

Henry Houghton-Briggs showed up soon after that. He was wearing a three-piece pinstripe suit, rather like a banker's: delicate white piping on very dark blue. He had a white display hankie tucked into the front pocket, and he was smoking a cigarette in a black holder that was almost a foot long. He looked like a rich gambler on vacation. He said:

"Michael! So nice to see you, my dear fellow. How is he?" The question was directed at Larry. Larry grinned, and said:

"Pretty good. I think he'll do just fine."

"Jolly good! Jolly good. Michael, I'll come in a little early tomorrow morning, let's say at quarter to six, so you can tell me how everything went and ask anything you want to ask. But Larry has told you everything, I'm sure. Chaps?"

We looked at him. He beamed at us and inserted the holder in his mouth and pulled on his cigarette. Then, blowing little puffs of smoke, he said:

"Toodle-oo."

He turned and practically danced to the front door, throwing one last beaming glance our way before he left. Larry snickered.

"What a clown," he said. "He's a nice clown though. But don't upset him. He can be nasty when he's upset."

"I'll do my best," I said.

"I'm sure you will. So, you all set? It's quarter to, but I'll knock off now, okay? Be on time for the family dinner, for a change."

"Sure, go ahead."

He left, and I was on my own at the Montrose.