Understrike by John Gardner Page A

pay off. Who’s goin’ to stay in a place like this when they can get the real thing in half an hour’s driving?” replied Henniger. “Anyhow, he’s got the trade today. We’ve taken the whole place justa be on the safe side.”
    They began to disembark from the ear. The patio was deserted. The pool looked stagnant “The living desert,” breathed Boysie, and, trying to make light of what promised to be a very fraught situation, began to sing softly, “There’s a small motel . .”
    “ Cut it, will ya, Oakes ...” said Henniger sharply.
    “ Now wait a minute ...” Boysie started, then he felt the power of the steely eyes and thought again. He much preferred the quiet efficiency of Lofrese and the cheery bombast of the late lamented Joe Siedler to this kind of treatment.
    “ Not here then. Not yet,” said the grey-haired man: the first words he had spoken, except for a short oath when the driver of a jumbo-sized convertible had cut in on them just outside Santa Rosa.
    “ Didn’t expect them ta be.” Henniger was looking around him. “Flight’s not due till eleven.” Boysie glanced at his watch. It was only eight-thirty and already, standing out in the open, the sun was beginning to fry the back of his neck.
    “ Where the hell’s that old fool.” Henniger raised his voice to a bellow. “Hey, Pop, where are ya! Pop!”
    “ OK. No need ta shout. I kin hear ya.” The old man came hobbling round the corner of the hacienda—a walking image of the old gag about ‘that’s waar the horse goes’: a beanpole in tight Levis, with a face held together by deep wrinkles and thick white stubble. He regarded the group with unflattering suspicion.
    “ These are the people I told ya ‘bout,” said Henniger with a gesture towards Boysie and Chicory.
    “ Thought th’was gonna be three more men.”
    “ Other two’ll be over later.”
    The old man spat at a crop of weeds. Boysie could have sworn they wilted. “OK, you’re payin’,” said the proprietor.
    “ The luggage is in the trunk.” Henniger walked slowly back to the car, keys in hand. The oldster continued to look at Boysie and Chicory. Boysie began to penetrate the mental processes which lay behind the look. The only people likely to stay at this place were couples bent on adultery. The old horror was obviously adept at spotting naughty weekenders. Bet he bleeds them white, thought Boysie.
    “ Ya together? Or are ya separates?” asked the nasty old man. Before Boysie could make an indignant reply, Chicory startled him:
    “ Together,” she said, meaning every word of it.
    “ Hey now ...” Henniger stood up quickly from behind the car.
    “ Together!” repeated Chicory, looking the security man full in the eyes.
    “ Are you sure that’s ...?” Henniger was smiling at her: putting on a little style.
    “ Together!”
    Henniger ’s smile curdled. He continued to look at her. The grey-haired man shuffled his feet. Henniger capitulated, nodded, and bent down again to unlock the boot. Pleased, Boysie turned to smile at Chicory, intending it to be a look of mingled warmth and desire. Ludicrously, he mistimed the turn and cannoned, undignified and hard, into the grey-haired man, who had been moving behind him towards Henniger.
    “ I’m so sorry.” Boysie noticed that the grey-haired man had a slight accent which suited the smooth manner. European, possibly Italian, he thought.
    The proprietor made a production number out of carrying the luggage: the limp and heavy breathing coming much into play as he led them across the patio to a ground floor room under the cloister in the central part of the jaded building. The motel room was strangely familiar to Boysie: the large bed, with curved lamps like horns sprouting from either side of the head, armchair, built-in wardrobe, towering television, the pitcher of water with the wax drum for ice cubes, and the compact bathroom with shower, wash basin and lavatory. It was exactly as he had imagined it