Four and Twenty Beds

by Nancy Casteel Vogel

Oddly enough, though, there was a light at the Palace Motel, in the room that I knew was Featherbrain's living room.

Well, I wasn't going to ask them for help, I resolved. Mr. Featherbrain would be very pleased to know that I was having trouble.

I tried to figure out what Grant would do about the situation if he were home. Of course, he would have the difficulty resolved, and everything going smoothly, in less than twenty minutes--but how would he do it? And why couldn't I myself do whatever it would be that he would do?

I drew my robe more tightly around me, and sat down on a cold kitchen chair. I thought.

Dimly I recalled hearing something about the water having been turned off, before we bought the motel, by a bunch of mischievous Indian boys. I knew that the meter was out back in the field, near the deserted road where I had learned to drive. Maybe there was a handle out there with which our water could I be turned on and off.

My duty was clear. I put my coat on top of my robe, took a quick glance at David and Donna to be sure that they were sleeping soundly and wouldn't be apt to awaken before I came back, armed myself with a flashlight, and set forth into the frigid night.

Nothing can describe the utter blackness of a midnight in Banning, six hundred feet from the highway and civilization. When my back was turned to the few neon signs that were still shining, and the intermittent flash of headlights, it was as though I were alone in a cold, windy world of pressing, almost tangible darkness. There was no moon to point up the ghostly, shadow-like mountains--lowering shapes that I felt, rather than saw--and the stars, so many and so brilliant that they looked like glittering jewels that had been tossed up there by a lavish, wasteful hand, selfishly drew their light closely around them.

All I knew about the water meter was that it was somewhere toward the back of our land, near the road. The smug certainty of men in general that men are superior to women in every respect, except possibly motherhood, has always annoyed me. However, I admitted to myself as I stumbled over the rocky road toward the back of our land, the chances were excellent that no man who had lived at the motel as long as I had would fail to know the exact location of the water meter, and what to do to it if the water suddenly refused to come into the cabins and be sociable. I resolved, feeling my way along with tentative, reluctant toes, that from this bleak hour forward I would take an efficient, masculine attitude toward everything that had bolts or screws. I'd show the world that it's due to early training and environment that women aren't mechanically inclined or good fixers, and not to any lack of brain power; while it is mostly the pressure of public opinion that makes the average boy grow up to be a minor mechanical genius.

I turned the flashlight on only intermittently, only at the moments when the darkness was pressing too forcibly upon me. I felt the presence of ogres and banshees (whatever they are) and even a few werewolves. I didn't want to make myself conspicuous by shining the flashlight any more than necessary; if all these horrible things could hide from me in the dark, then I could just as well hide from them, too, instead of lighting myself up so they'd know exactly where to pounce.

When at last I reached Williams street, which marked the end of our property, I turned the flashlight on bravely and began to search for the water meter. Coyotes were howling close in the hills to the north, which didn't help matters any. All of the land around me was settled by fat, stickery bushes which regarded me stolidly, defying me to dispute their squatters' rights or to try to get any information from them. They knew where the meter was, all right, but they had no intention of letting me in on the secret.