Date With Darkness (1947) by Donald Hamilton

Author:Donald Hamilton [Hamilton, Donald]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Google: NGa2MgEACAAJ
Publisher: Hamilton & Company
Published: 1959-11-14T12:00:00+00:00

IN THE MORNING he ran the shining satin of her nightgown through his fingers, pleased with the texture of it, before packing it away, with the other articles she had left out, in her suitcase. Well, he thought, that’s over; and he carried the small black bag into the bedroom and set it by the door. You were always losing part of yourself to other people. He debated keeping the nightgown as a remembrance but was deterred by the knowledge that, when he got home, his mother would inevitably find it; and it was a silly idea anyway.

As he left the room he glanced at his watch; it read a little after nine. He went down to the dining room and ate breakfast slowly under the ancient ostentatious chandeliers that always looked a little tawdry in daylight, like the tinsel on a Christmas tree. Beyond the porch the day was a dull gray color and the trees were stirred by brief gusts of wind, but it was not raining.

From the table he had chosen he could see the door to the lobby without turning his head; and he watched the people coming in and, having breakfasted, leaving. Constance Bellamann was not among them, and none of the others were in evidence. Now in the morning he did not feel very strongly about them. His feet, having blistered, were uncomfortable but not excessively painful. Everyone had to do what he had to do, he told himself philosophically; if he had been kicked around enough perhaps he would be screwy too.

Then the old colored waiter came up to refill his coffee cup and he looked at his watch and it read a quarter of ten.

He could not sit there indefinitely, obviously waiting for a call that, if genuine, he would have wanted to keep desperately secret and, filling his pipe, he wandered out into the lobby. He walked to the front door and stood at the top of the high steps looking about him. The wind was not so strong this morning. He wondered if she would get seasick in the boat; and how the cold would affect her, and if she would be afraid. It was seven minutes of ten, and suddenly it seemed to him that he knew very little about her, after all; he did not know the thing that, in the normal course of events, you always ]earned first about a girl: whether she was punctual or would keep you waiting. He could recall the sound of her voice and the shape of her mouth and the texture of her hair, but like a girl met in a dream, she had only physical characteristics.

He shivered a little, turned abruptly, and went inside; everything that had happened suddenly churning inside his head like a series of newsreel snapshots played too fast.

“I’m checking out,” he said to the clerk at the desk. “Will you get my bill ready?”

“Shall I send a boy… ?”

“I’ll call. I haven’t packed yet.” He ran up the stairs to his room and began to throw his belongings into his suitcase.

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