“I wonder if you could tell me where my hotel is, officer?” Oliver began. “What hotel?” said the policeman uninterestedly. Oliver noticed with an inane distinctness that he had started to swirl his nightstick as a large blue cat might switch its tail. He wondered if it would be tactful to ask him if he had ever been a drum major. Then he realized that the policeman had asked him a question—courtesy demanded a prompt response.
“What?” said Oliver.
“I said 'What hotel?'” The policeman was beginning to be annoyed.
Oliver started to think of his hotel. It was imbecile not to remember the name of your own hotel—even when your own particular material and immaterial cosmos had been telescoped like a toy train in the last three hours. The Rossiter was all that he could think of.
“The Rossiter,” he said firmly.
“No hotel Rossiter in this town.” The policeman's nightstick was getting more and more irritated. “Rossiter's a lotta flats. You live there?”
“No. I live in a hotel.”
“Well, what hotel?”
“Oh, I tell you I don't remember,” said Oliver vaguely. “A big one with a lot of electric lights.”
The policeman's face became suddenly very red.