Day Three
July 23, 1952
Wednesday Afternoon
Waverly’s note was simple. “Your life is in danger. Meet me at the Flamingo Bar on Larimer Street at 10:00 p.m. tonight and I’ll explain. Do not tell Tom Bristol where you are going and be sure he doesn’t follow you. This is not a joke.” She folded the note, put it in the envelope, licked the glue and sealed it shut. Then she handed it to the Brown Palace receptionist-the cigar-smoking peach-together with a dollar bill.
“What I need you to do is slip this to the woman staying with Tom Bristol in room 414,” she said. “Don’t let Bristol see you. Tell the woman to read it in private, away from Bristol. Is that something you can do?”
He took the dollar and stuffed it in his pants pocket.
“Done,” he said.
Waverly kissed his cheek.
“Thanks.”
“It’s the least I can do, and that’s what I always do.”
Waverly smiled and left.
Now what?
From a phone booth down near Colfax she called Emmanuelle LeFavre’s hotel again only to find that the woman still wasn’t in.
Damn it.
She headed to her fleabag room, changed into her grungy clothes, laid the dress neatly on the bed and took the bus to her apartment, getting off a block after the fact and circling back on foot.
From across the street, everything looked normal.
No Tom Bristol’s or trolls were loitering around.
She wasn’t going to stay there, not tonight at any rate, but it wouldn’t hurt to check things out, just to be sure everything was all right. She trotted across the street, shot into the building and bounded up the stairway two steps at a time.
Her door was locked as it should be.
She opened it.
The place was trashed.
Someone had broken in and messed it up.
She pulled the door closed, relocked it and headed down the stairs with a thundering heart.
Halfway down she heard steps coming up.
They were heavy.
They were moving fast.
Turn around.
Turn around.
Turn around.
That’s what she told herself.
Turn around.
Do it.
Do it now.
Do it now, this second.
Her body didn’t respond though.
It didn’t turn around.
Instead it did the worst thing it could do.
It betrayed her.
It froze.