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Authors: Richard Matheson
Tags: Fiction - Sci-Fi/Fantasy
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gathered. Would I like to look through them? she asked. I was welcome to as long as I left them in the order in which I found them. She was working on a full-length history of the hotel and was using the material for research.
I thanked her and sat at the desk, glanced quickly through what was there, and saw, with a pang so sharp it was like physical pain, that what I was looking for wasn't there.
I couldn't just get up, though. If what I wanted did exist somewhere, I'd have to ask her help in finding it and, if I stood up right away and said I had no use for all this carefully gathered material, she'd probably be offended; have a perfect right to be.
So I sat there, agonized, looking at scrapbooks with newspaper accounts of tennis tournaments and dress balls and the Pillsbury baking contest; at photographs of the hotel at various dates in its history; at books with carbon copies of letters written by various managers. "Our resident physician has had many years experience in New York in native practice. . . . Business is springing up and we anticipate a busy season.... It gives me pleasure to let you know our winter rates. . . . Your favor of the 14th is received but we cannot use any hogs at present...." I pretended to record the information.
Finally, when I felt that a respectable period of time had passed, I got up and walked back to Marcie Buckley's desk. All good, I said; most helpful. I wondered though if there was any more; a storage room somewhere, perhaps?
My heart jumped when she said there was. Sank when she said she'd try to show it to me later; she was very busy then. I didn't dare say more than thank you. I wanted to drag her away from her desk and force her to take me there that very instant. I couldn't, of course. I smiled and nodded and asked her when she thought she could do it.
She checked her watch and said she'd try to do it at about a quarter to twelve. I thanked her again and left. I looked at my watch. It was just past eleven. Those forty minutes looked, to me, longer than those seventy-five years.
I returned to the chair in the lobby and sat again, feeling numb and out of touch with everyone who moved around me. Does a ghost feel like this? I remember wondering. I tried not to look at my watch. I tried to drift into a reverie, to pull myself away from Time 1. What if I was doing all this for nothing? I kept thinking. I felt I couldn't survive that.
At a quarter to twelve, I went back to the Lawrence office. She was still working. I couldn't insist. What right had I to insist even though my mind screamed out my need to get things going?
At three minutes after twelve, Marcie Buckley got up and we left the office.
I don't know what I said; I can't remember the words. She kept asking me about the special. My lies were dreadfully apparent. I prayed she didn't know anything about the television industry; if she did, she'd know that I was talking gibberish. I told her that ABC had hired me but gave her the name of a producer who does "Ironside" for NBC. I gave her my agent's name as that of the director. I lied incessantly and poorly. I apologize, Miss Buckley.
Then, somehow, I managed to shift the questions to her so I could listen instead of lie.
She told me she'd taken on the job of hotel historian on her own; that there hadn't been one, that the hotel's records were in terrible condition, and that she was trying to rectify the problem. I know I got a very good impression of her. She loves the hotel and wants to preserve its history; wants to help make it a national as well as a state landmark, which it is.
All the time she spoke, she led me downstairs, through what seemed like endless catacombs and to an office where she got some keys from a man.
By then my head felt like someone else's head. I could hear and feel my shoes thudding on the concrete floor but it seemed as though someone else was wearing them. I think, in that period of time, I came as close to losing my sanity as I've ever
I thanked her and sat at the desk, glanced quickly through what was there, and saw, with a pang so sharp it was like physical pain, that what I was looking for wasn't there.
I couldn't just get up, though. If what I wanted did exist somewhere, I'd have to ask her help in finding it and, if I stood up right away and said I had no use for all this carefully gathered material, she'd probably be offended; have a perfect right to be.
So I sat there, agonized, looking at scrapbooks with newspaper accounts of tennis tournaments and dress balls and the Pillsbury baking contest; at photographs of the hotel at various dates in its history; at books with carbon copies of letters written by various managers. "Our resident physician has had many years experience in New York in native practice. . . . Business is springing up and we anticipate a busy season.... It gives me pleasure to let you know our winter rates. . . . Your favor of the 14th is received but we cannot use any hogs at present...." I pretended to record the information.
Finally, when I felt that a respectable period of time had passed, I got up and walked back to Marcie Buckley's desk. All good, I said; most helpful. I wondered though if there was any more; a storage room somewhere, perhaps?
My heart jumped when she said there was. Sank when she said she'd try to show it to me later; she was very busy then. I didn't dare say more than thank you. I wanted to drag her away from her desk and force her to take me there that very instant. I couldn't, of course. I smiled and nodded and asked her when she thought she could do it.
She checked her watch and said she'd try to do it at about a quarter to twelve. I thanked her again and left. I looked at my watch. It was just past eleven. Those forty minutes looked, to me, longer than those seventy-five years.
I returned to the chair in the lobby and sat again, feeling numb and out of touch with everyone who moved around me. Does a ghost feel like this? I remember wondering. I tried not to look at my watch. I tried to drift into a reverie, to pull myself away from Time 1. What if I was doing all this for nothing? I kept thinking. I felt I couldn't survive that.
At a quarter to twelve, I went back to the Lawrence office. She was still working. I couldn't insist. What right had I to insist even though my mind screamed out my need to get things going?
At three minutes after twelve, Marcie Buckley got up and we left the office.
I don't know what I said; I can't remember the words. She kept asking me about the special. My lies were dreadfully apparent. I prayed she didn't know anything about the television industry; if she did, she'd know that I was talking gibberish. I told her that ABC had hired me but gave her the name of a producer who does "Ironside" for NBC. I gave her my agent's name as that of the director. I lied incessantly and poorly. I apologize, Miss Buckley.
Then, somehow, I managed to shift the questions to her so I could listen instead of lie.
She told me she'd taken on the job of hotel historian on her own; that there hadn't been one, that the hotel's records were in terrible condition, and that she was trying to rectify the problem. I know I got a very good impression of her. She loves the hotel and wants to preserve its history; wants to help make it a national as well as a state landmark, which it is.
All the time she spoke, she led me downstairs, through what seemed like endless catacombs and to an office where she got some keys from a man.
By then my head felt like someone else's head. I could hear and feel my shoes thudding on the concrete floor but it seemed as though someone else was wearing them. I think, in that period of time, I came as close to losing my sanity as I've ever
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