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My head was spinning like a revolving door and my stomach was reeling like a luggage cart. The Tipton itself looked pretty much the way I remembered it, but the people inside were a different story. All the dames were in furs and all the men were in fedoras. I followed the sound of a rhythm and blues melody to the Tipton showroom.
/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\
Carey was on stage, as usual, but the song was more old-fashioned, less contemporary than the popular numbers she usually performed. It was an old standard, a big band piece. She was wearing her already short black hair bobby style, and she looked like a million bucks in a sequined cocktail dress.
I drifted closer to the stage to hear her song. Then I spotted Mr. Candypants himself, Patrick the maitre d', with his usual carrot-colored goatee and upturned nose, in a waiting uniform, carrying a silver server.
"Something to drink, sir?" he asked me.
"Thanks," I said, "but shouldn't Rich or Gary be taking my order?"
He laughed an unusually throaty laugh.
"Rich and Gary are no longer employed here," he said. "The manager let them go due to their unsavory… eh… extracurricular activities."
"The manager? But…"
"Are we going to gab all day or are you going to have a drink?"
"Root beer."
He eyed me sternly.
"Root beer? You know it's illegal for us to serve that here! Unless... eh…"
He held out his hand and caressed his own palm with his thumb. I took out my billfold and greased it with a couple fivers.
"And make it on the rocks," I instructed.
He marched away with his silver tray and his candy pants, and I turned my attention back to the show. Carey was warbling a Cole Porter tune far removed from her usual repertoire.
Patrick returned with a glass on his silver tray. I took a swig and several pebbles hit my teeth. I backwashed into the glass.
"What's this?"
"You said you wanted your drink on the rocks."
"But that means on ice!"
"Well, excuse me! Would you like another?"
"Oh, never mind!" I said, and I set the glass back on the server. Carey was finishing her number. As Patrick walked away, Carey climbed down from the stage and stepped closer to me.
"Nice to see you again, detective."
"I beg your pardon?"
"I didn't think you were going to come back after last night."
"But of course I did! Why wouldn't I?"
"Those two gave you a pretty bad roughing last night."
I rubbed my head. I certainly felt like I'd had quite a roughing.
"Carey, what is going on here?" I demanded.
At that point, Patrick returned and asked Carey if she'd like a drink. She requested her usual, on the rocks.
"You might want to double think those rocks," I said. "Now, would someone please tell me what's going on here?"
"You tell me," Carey said. "You're the detective."
The whole hotel felt like it was spinning. I reached out my hand and felt a table top. I slowly lowered myself into a chair.
"You'd better make that two," Carey instructed Patrick, who floated off with his silver server while Carey turned the chair in front of me around and straddled it.
"What year is it?" I asked.
"What? Are you nuts?"
"I just get a little confused some times. What year?"
"1930, the dawn of a new decade."
I hoped Patrick would get back soon with whatever Carey's usual was. Had Arwin's ridiculous contraption actually… worked?
I reached for the glass on the table and brought it to my lips.
"Everything all right?" Carey asked.
"Of course it is," I said. My voice sounded distant, alien, as if I was removed from it by a hundred years. Or at least half that long. "Why wouldn't I be?"
"You're trying to drink a lit candle."
I panicked. I threw the glass to the table, breaking free the wax and wick inside of it. The table cloth caught fire. I tried to bat it out with my sleeves. That's when Patrick reappeared. He shrieked like a two-year old girl and tossed the drinks all over the table, as well as me. I wiped the beverage from my eyes and flashed Patrick my meanest look.
"Looks like drinks are on you tonight," Patrick said. And then he laughed at his own joke. I hate it when he does that.
I looked over to see that Carey was chuckling a little bit, too. She wiped the smile off her face and reached into her sequined purse.
"He left this for you."
She slid a small, rectangular piece of paper at me.
"Who's he?"
She didn't answer my question. When I looked up, she was gone.
I looked at the piece of paper she had given me. In a sloppy scrawl of red ink, I could make out the writing "Here. Thurs. 9."
I flipped the card over, and I could barely believe my eyes. It was a business card. Centered on the card was simple, neat typing. Typewriter typing, not computer typing. It read:"Moseby, P. I." And an address.
I rose from the table and headed for the lobby. On my way out the main exit of the Tipton, a hotel staff member stopped me.
"You almost forgot these, sir."
And he handed me a trench coat and fedora.
/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\
The address on the business card was for my apartment, but I barely recognized the apartment building. The halls were damp and dusky, and lined with ugly, peeling wallpaper. My apartment was marked by a smoked glass window, the lettering on it matching that on the business card. I heard the bells and keys of an old-fashioned typewriter clattering inside.
When I opened the door, the room was lit only by slits of sunlight slipping through Venetian blinds. I could make out a shadowy figure in the corner. I opened the shades.
It was Maddie Fitzpatrick. She was wearing a billowy white blouse and a pleated skirt, and her hair was tied into tight pigtails with two brown ribbons. She wore a tiny pair of glasses and was making more noise chewing gum than she was punching keys on the typewriter.
"Hey, chief," she said, obnoxiously around the piece of gum. "I didn't hear you come in."
"So I take it you're my girl Friday?"
"But it's only Wednesday, boss," she said.
"Never mind."
And I took a seat behind the large wooden desk by the wall. My popsickle-stick replica of the Tipton was on top. At least that provided some comfort.
"So," said Maddie, "any leads on the case?"
I propped my feet up on the desk, careful to place them safely next to the miniature Tipton hotel.
"Maddie, refresh my memory," I said. "What is… the case?"
"Oh, you remember, boss," she said. "That Tipton guy came to see you."
"Tipton guy? What Tipton guy?"
"The one that owns the big hotel. You know. The one right across from the place where the cops just found the big Root Beer distillery."
"Yeah. I know it."
"Well, anyway, that Tipton guy came and asked you to find his daughter, the one what's disappeared."
"Disappeared? What did he say happened to her?"
Maddie looked concerned. She stood up from her fancy typewriter and placed a small hand on my forehead.
"Are you okay, chief? It sounds like those guys gave you a harder beating than I thought last night. Beat the memory out of you."
I pushed the hand away.
"I'm fine, Maddie," I said. "I just… haven't been myself lately. Just refresh my memory, okay?"
"He said she'd been hanging out at… that one place. You know, the other hotel. The one where they found the distillery…"
'The St. Mark," I said, not without a fair amount of loathing.
"That's the one. Anyway, he said she… I mean the dame what's his daughter…"
"London," I said.
"No. I'm Maddie."
"No. That's her name."
"Her name's Maddie?"
"No. London."
"I told you, my name's not…"
"Never mind, angel. Just finish telling me what he said."
"Oh. Well, he said that she'd been seen at that one place and then just… Whoosh!... disappeared into thin air."
"And what did I say?" I asked.
"You said you'd take the case," Maddie said. "And then you told me you thought you had a pretty good idea who to talk to about everything."
"And who was that?"
"Hot Peppers."
"Hot Peppers? You mean the famous Boston mobster Hot Peppers?"
"That's right. Hot Peppers Julio Ricardo Montoya De La Rosa Ramírez. So my question to you is… did you find him?"
I turned the business card over and over in my hand.
"Yeah," I said. "I think I did."
