Стюарт Стерлинг - Collection of Stories

Wayner’s lips trembled, he stared blankly at the carpet, his head rocking from side to side in misery. “All right. She was fooling around with the manager here and—”

“Broodman?”

“Arnie Broodman, yuh. Doris—” tears began to stream down his face — “she was in love with the crumb. He tells her he’s going to marry her — all the time he’s got a wife an’ a couple of kids out on Long Island. He keeps sayin’ he’s going to get a divorce so he can marry Doris but I know better. He don’t intend to do nothing of the kind. I been trying to get her to break it up, quit her job, move out of the hotel. She tells me to keep out of it, she’s old enough to know her own mind. Maybe she is, but she don’t know Arnie’s... and now—” he closed his eyes and lifted his face toward the ceiling.

“Was your sister drinking heavily tonight?” Pedley didn’t ease the pressure.

“Some. Arnie’d been up to see her around eleven an’ he brought her up a fifth of brandy. To celebrate the good news, he says. He was feeding her a lot of yatadada about the hotel closing down for six months — repairs or something — an’ him going down to Miami to run another place so that’s when he’ll split up from Mrs. Broodman an’ marry Doris. I tell her she’s feeble-minded if she falls for an old line like that but she laughs me off. Finally I ask her how long she’s going to stand for the runaround an’ she says if Arnie doesn’t file suit or whatever as soon as the hotel closes here an’ he goes to Florida, then she’ll know he isn’t on the level and she’ll raise plenty of hell with him.” He opened his eyes, staring fiercely at Pedley. “Y’know what I think? I think she told Arnie that, too — an’ he hadn’t any idea of bustin’ up his home, so he was afraid of what Doris might do and he beat her to it, tonight. That’s what I think!”

“You didn’t see him go up to the fourth again — after you left?”

“I didn’t see the crumb at all!”

“Not after the alarm went in?”

“No. Soon’s I heard those sirens I grab one of the service elevators and run it up to take people off the eighth — that’s where Harris says the fire is...”

“You don’t know where Broodman was, from the time you left your sister’s room until the apparatus began to come in?”

“No.” Wayner’s mouth hardened. “But I know where he’ll be when I get my mitts on him! I’m going to—”

“—go out in the lobby and sit down and keep your mouth shut. Understand me?”

“You said you’d let me go to see my sister.”

“I’ll tell you when you can go.” Pedley rolled down his sleeves, put on his coat, opened the door.

“Ed...?”

“Yeah, Ben?”

“Keep an eye on this kid. Send Broodman in.”

Arnold Broodman was a tall, gaunt, sandy-haired individual with deep frown-creases slashing the bridge of his nose; he had a golf-course tan and a slightly disheveled look about him, as if he had dressed hurriedly.

Pedley didn’t ask him to sit down. “A week ago,” the Marshal read from a tissue carbon, “the Bureau of Fire Prevention wrote you as follows:

ARNOLD J. BROODMAN

RESIDENT MANAGER, HOTEL GROLIER—

You were directed by the Fire Commissioner on... March 7, 1947... to:

1. Equip with steel doors all exits from all floors

2. Install acceptable fire breaks on floors 2 to 10, inclusive

3. Satisfactorily enclose two elevator shafts

4. Erect an additional fire escape on the Forty-fifth Street side of the building

5. Provide for an automatic smoke alarm system

within... 60 days... at the premises occupied by... the Grolier Operating Corporation (leased) by you, said premises being considered dangerous to life and property and in its present condition a violation of law.

Having failed to cause the ordered reequipping to be done within the... 60 day... period, I am required by law to notify you that the said premises are hereby ordered to be... vacated.

“That notice was signed by John M. Bresnahan, Deputy Fire Commissioner, City of New York.”

Broodman laced and unlaced his fingers wretchedly but said nothing.

“Three days after you received that notice, your lawyers obtained a two-week stay of ejection from Judge Potter. In your application for this deferral, you promised to cease operating this building as a hotel within ten days; you pleaded inability to get labor and materials with which to make the required alterations to date.”

The manager sweat it out in silence.

“A couple of days ago you attempted to obtain an additional policy of fire insurance to the tune of forty thousand dollars—”

“To cover the improvements on the property,” the hotel man interrupted.

“The companies turned you down. After checking with us. Anyhow, failing to get your additional coverage, today you began to give your employees their week’s notice. And tonight you have a fire.”

“Nobody can feel worse about this than I do.” Broodman combed his hair nervously with his fingers.

“A hell of a lot of people feel a hell of a lot worse!”

“The corporation won’t attempt to deny its responsibility.”

“You won’t, either.”

“You’re not suggesting—?”

“I’m making a flat statement, Broodman. This blaze was incendiary. You... and your other stockholders... are the only persons who could profit from it.”

The manager’s tan became a muddy gray. “As far as profit is concerned, every cent I have was in this hotel. The insurance won’t cover sixty percent of the loss. I’m wiped out... even if the corporation wasn’t liable for damage suits. Don’t talk to me about profiting from a ghastly business like arson. I’ll sue you for defamation of...”

“After I get through with you, you won’t have any character that could be defamed, mister. The fire started in Mrs. Munson’s room. You were up in her room tonight. She was liquored up. You supplied the liquor. You were in a jam with her. Now she’s going to die; you think you’re out of that jam. Well, you’re in another and it’s a lot worse. They electrocute people for first degree arson in this state, in case you didn’t know.”

Broodman scowled. “You sure the fire started in Doris’ room?”

“I can make it stand up in court.”

The manager sat down suddenly in the straight-backed chair, buried his face in his hands. After a minute he groaned:

“I guess you’re right, saying I’m responsible. But not for arson. Only because of Doris.”

“Trying to say the girl deliberately burned herself.”

“That’s what she would do, Marshal — what she must have done. She threatened as much, though she didn’t say anything about... setting a fire.”

“When was this?”

“Tonight. Half-past eleven or so. We’d been threshing the thing out — apparently you know about it...?”

“Only what I got out of Harris and Wayner.”

“Well... I told her I had to shut the place up... was going south to run a hotel there. It would take a while for me to get a divorce and so on. She wanted to know how she was going to live in the meantime. Couldn’t she go with me and so on. Finally I got sore. Told her if she wasn’t satisfied to play it my way, we’d call the whole thing off.”

“And then...?”

“She bawled and got hysterical, the whole damn rigamarole women put on. But I’d had enough of it by then — I suppose worrying about the shutdown made me kind of jumpy — and I told her we were all washed up. Finally she said she’d kill herself; she’d make me sorry for treating her that way if it was the last thing she ever did.” Broodman chewed at his lower lip. “That’s the kind of break I get — for her to be so badly burned she can’t tell you the truth of it. You could ask her...”