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."Listen to that.I'm glad I'm here, and not out in it.""I'm glad you're here, too." She paused at one of the doors."I'm in the next one along, so you may as well take this room.I checked it out earlier.The water's off, but the toilet will work—once.""It will be fresh water in the tank.I don't want to waste it.""That's your option.I'm going to use mine in the usual way.I'm not ready to give up completely on civilization.You say you have candles and matches?""Yes.""Do you want to light one before I go?""No.It's all right.I'll manage.""All right.Good night, then."She continued to the next door, entered, and closed it.Art stood hesitating in the dark corridor for a few seconds.Finally he went and knocked on her door."Dana?""What?""Do you have a gun?"The door opened.She raised the lamp and stared at him."I do not.I never learned how to use one.I'd be more danger to myself than anyone else.""Well, I have one.Knock on the wall or come into my room if there's any trouble.""I don't think there will be.But thanks." She closed the door again.Art headed into his own room, lit a candle, and stared around him.A bed with a mattress, but no pillow, sheets, or blankets.He had real trouble sleeping without a pillow.If he took off his thick sweater, he could fold it up and put it under his head.But it was going to be a cold night, he'd need all the warm clothing he could get.So he'd manage without a pillow.What did he expect, room service?Art placed his gun carefully down by the side of the bed, where he could reach it in one movement.He blew out the candle, stretched himself on the bed, and pillowed his head on his hands.He was still trying to make himself comfortable when he heard a knock on the door."Yes?""Are you decent? I'm coming in." Dana entered.She was in a thin white slip, and with the oil lamp held high she was a vision from another century.She carried a pillow under her arm, which she held out to Art."Here.I found three of these in the back of the closet.""Thanks." Art admired her dancer's legs and curved hips, wondered at the way she was dressed, and said, "Pillows.That's just what I was wishing I had.Are you going to sleep in that outfit? You'll freeze.""I brought flannel pajamas and a few sweaters.""Good."She stood for a moment as though waiting for him to do or say something more.At last she nodded and said, "Good night, then."She left.Art heard her door close, and the click as she locked it—something he hadn't bothered to do to his.He got up again, made his way to the door, and turned the lock.As he fumbled his way back to the bed he realized what all this reminded him of: one of the old farces, set in a hotel or a country house, knocking on bedroom doors, full of confusion and mistaken identities.Except that he, Dana, and Seth Parsigian—if he returned—were the only people staying at the Treasure Inn.There would be no middle-of-the-night shenanigans.It was time to go to sleep, if he was to be good for anything in the morning.He settled into bed again, much more comfortable with the pillow against his cheek.And he wondered.Was he the world's most stupid man? Dana had been wearing pants when he arrived at the Treasure Inn.You don't wear a slip underneath pants.And you don't put flannel pajamas and multiple sweaters on over a thin slip.Which meant she must have put the slip on in the past few minutes, before she came into his room, and she would take it off again before she went to bed.Or was there a completely different explanation, which he was just too tired to see? Art gazed at the invisible ceiling, tried to think, and at once drifted off.As always in the past ten years, he was a light sleeper.Sometime in the middle of the night he came awake, abruptly and uneasily.While he stared up into total darkness, the sound came again.It was the scream of something or someone in terrible pain.Should he go and make sure that Dana was all right? But the sound was far away, nowhere inside the hotel.He could not even place a direction.Without a watch he had little idea of the time.He lay and listened.The scream did not come again.The drum of rain on the roof had ended, and now the night was totally and unnaturally silent.At last, waiting for a dawn that never seemed to arrive, he fell into the unsatisfying half sleep of present nightmares and old, happier memories.7Art woke to the faint sound of voices.It felt early, but when he opened his eyes the ceiling and walls of the room were strangely bright.He rolled out of bed, tested his arthritic knee gingerly before putting his weight on it, and limped over to the window.Snow.Thick, large-flaked snow, falling steadily and already deep on the ground.No wonder everything was so bright.What was the date? Almost the end of March.It was unusual in this area to have snow so late in the year, but not unheard of.Ten years ago snow had fallen in April.But not snow like this.Not a dense whiteout that reduced visibility to forty or fifty yards, covering plants that had been seduced by early warmth to a late spring stage of growth.If this year's harvest had been a question mark before, it was now a guaranteed disaster.Art went across to the toilet and used it, but he did not flush it.He closed the lid and opened the tank, leaned over, and sniffed.It smelled fresh.He rubbed cold water on his face, dried himself using the sleeve of his sweater, and closed the tank.He could no longer hear the voices.Still in his stockinged feet, he picked up his waterproof bag, opened the door, and headed downstairs.The person he would most like to have seen was Morgan Davis.Morgan was only in his early forties but he had lost all his hair before Art met him, either naturally or as a by-product of some dubious treatment preceding the telomod therapy.His smooth, well-shaped skull and even features combined with a thoughtful way of speaking and an urbane manner to suggest a distinguished Chinese elder.Everyone in the treatment group recognized his authority.If Morgan were here, Art would certainly be glad to hand over his own role in major decision making.No such luck.Morgan was far-off in Arizona.The only people in the dining room were Dana—fresh-faced and lively, her light brown hair pulled back from her face—and Seth Parsigian.At every previous meeting of the treatment group— which Parsigian insisted on calling the Lazarus Club— Seth had been groomed and coiffured and impeccably outfitted in expensive business suits.Now, dressed in dark gray pants and a slick black overcoat three sizes too big, he squatted over a tiny gas stove.His black hair had been trimmed to an uneven stubble, marked and furrowed by the scars of past surgery, and now it was wet with flakes of melting snow.Somehow, amid all the rain of the past weeks, Seth had acquired a heavy tan.He glanced up at Art with alert, dark brown eyes and grinned."Hey there, big boy.Slept well, eh? You must have a real clear conscience."The old incongruity, Middle Eastern looks and polished manner combined with a West Virginia good-old-boy accent, had vanished.Art felt that he was seeing Seth clearly for the first time.Here was the real man, poised, primitive, and confident, crouched over a pan of snow melt."No one else made it?" Art spoke to Dana, but it was Seth who answered."Anybody with any sense will be holed up someplace, 'til it's over.It's real rough out there.""The weather?" Art recalled the agonized scream in the night."That, too." Seth jiggled the pan impatiently."Come on, you.Boil.""You brought the stove with you?" Art put down his bag, opened it, and felt around inside."Let's just say, I came across it.I knew from bein' here yesterday there was plenty of propane, a couple of five-hundred-gallon tanks of it down in the basement.Too heavy to haul out, I guess, without equipment."Art, with a mixture of satisfaction and regret, pulled the jar of coffee crystals from his bag and handed it to Dana.Seth saw it, and his eyes gleamed."Now we're smokin' [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]