I always give in finally and go back to count the stairs, check on the exact wording of the ad, or belatedly crease my skirt in the required manner; and I always wind up by tracing the news item to its lair. Sometimes I wish I had never heard of newspapers.
Tyrone Power had once stayed at the Peacock, and I waited eagerly for him, or some equally famous personage, to spend a night with us, so that I would have a really worthwhile story for the paper--one that would make Banning's citizens sit up and gasp--and, incidentally, give the Moonrise Motel a little good publicity. I turned over in my mind the few famous people I had met, wishing I knew them well enough to be able to write a casual note suggesting that they take a vacation in Banning. I had interviewed Margaret Lee Runbeck and Rupert Hughes, before we left Los Angeles, but of course neither of them would remember. And I had met Dick Powell one Sunday afternoon. I was introduced to him by Virginia Gregg, a radio actress I was interviewing who was working with him on that afternoon's broadcast of "The Rogue's Gallery." Dick Powell, I'm sure, will always remember the day--not because of meeting me, but because of the fluff he made. Closing the drama in a narrated summing up of the afternoon's story, he let the radio audience in on the fact that the villain had been convicted of "robbery and murdery."
A green coupe drove into our driveway with a swish of gravel. I sighed. I felt almost too tired to cope with customers. Grant, with his usual lack of system, had started the big job of washing all the soiled bedspreads, doilies and dresser scarves--forgetting that he had an appointment with the dentist in half an hour. Remembering the appointment just in time to keep it, he left me to finish the job he had started.
The spreads, scarves and doilies were hanging on the line now. I opened the office door and walked wearily out toward the green coupe.
The middle-aged driver reached onto the seat beside him for his hat, put it on quickly and removed it with a courtly gesture. His narrow brown eyes were amused.
"Mr. Hawkins!" I exclaimed. My first impulse was one of joy at seeing him again, but then I remembered the blanket he had made me think was stolen, and the apple-pie bed he had made for the new occupants of his cabin the day he left on his honeymoon.
Miss Nesdeburt's plump little body was already halfway out of the car. She hugged me, tears running down over the fine wrinkles around her eyes.
"Ma chere amie!" she exclaimed, dabbing daintily at her eyes with a lace-edged hanky. Her fair skin was flushed with emotion. "It's simply terribly good to see you again, and to be back at the sweet little motel where I first met my Herbert! We just thought we'd drive out this way for old times' sake! After all, it's only a few miles from Burbank, n'est-ce pas?"
When we were all seated in the living room Mr. Hawkins caught my eye almost guiltily and said, "I apologize deeply, madame, for any unpleasantness that may have occurred during my stay at your charming motel. I seem to recall something about--ah--a blanket, wrongly supposed to have been stolen, and--ah--"
"An apple pie bed?" I refreshed his memory.