CV

25

Two weeks after the horror began, panic was growing in Sea Venture. Instead of going to restaurants for their meals, many people made forays on the kitchens, grabbed whatever food they could, and carried it back to their rooms. Sometimes other passengers took it away from them in the corridors. The reckless few who spent their time in public places were becoming more violent and unpredictable. The casino had to shut down after a series of free-for-alls; nearly all the shops and most of the restaurants were closed. Vandalism was becoming a problem; deck chairs and equipment were hurled about on the Sports Deck; light fixtures in the ceilings were broken.

At one of the staff meetings, now being held daily, they talked about the food problem.

“Let’s set up food-distribution stations in the lobbies,” suggested Arline Truman. “Just a line of tables—let people take what they want. Maybe it’ll be more orderly if they know we think it’s all right to take the food.”

“They’ll hoard it,” said Armand Schaffer.

“Well, perhaps, but then they won’t have to come back every day.”

“That means a lot of wastage. What if we do it this way—make up cartons of staple food, either cans or the kind of thing that will keep in refrigerators. Try to get some kind of nutritional balance. Buffet food. Ham, cold chicken, roast beef. They can survive on that awhile. Then you don’t have them grabbing for this and that. I agree that would be a mess.”

“What about deliveries to people who can’t get out so easily?”

“We can handle that,” Skolnik said. “I’m a little more worried about sanitation. Those rooms must be getting filthy— the maids can’t get in. We’re trying to keep up deliveries of clean sheets and towels and so on, but we’re shorthanded even for that. What if we get another outbreak of disease here? That would really put the capper on it.”

Luis Padilla wheeled his cart up to the door of 18 and knocked. “Just a minute,” came a slurred voice.

The door opened and Mrs. Emerton stood there, swaying a little. “Oh, it’s Luis,” she said. Her eyes did not quite focus. “Luis is back, isn’t that nice, David? Come in, Luis. Look, David, it’s Luis.”

She stumbled as she walked ahead of him. She was wearing a negligee, a blue one through which he could see the gleam of her enormous buttocks. Mr. Emerton, with a glassy smile, was sprawled on the divan with his necktie hanging. Mrs. Emerton made an elephantine turn, tipped and sat down heavily beside him. “Put there,” she mumbled. “Luis.”

Padilla moved the highball glasses aside and unloaded his cart: caviar, of course, crackers, a split of champagne. Mr. Emerton’s eyes were closed; he had slipped a little farther down the sofa. Mrs. Emerton mumbled something else; then her eyes closed and her mouth fell open. Mr. Emerton was snoring.

Beyond her, on the dressing table, he could see the open jewel box with necklaces scattered beside it.

“Mrs. Emerton?” he said, leaning over. She did not answer.

Padilla walked silently around the end of the divan and looked at the jewels. The emerald alone was probably worth fifty thousand dollars. In the jewel case was a star-sapphire ring, almost as big. The pearls were certainly genuine. Padilla picked them up and slipped them into his pocket, then the emerald and the sapphire, then two diamond clips and a solitaire. Together they might bring seventy or eighty thousand dollars in Manila; his cousin Renaldo would know how to dispose of them. With this and his savings, he could buy the home for his father’s retirement now.

He tiptoed back to the table, replaced the things he had brought on his cart, moved the highball glasses to their former positions.

Outside in the corridor, he left the cart beside the door. If he said he had knocked and no one answered, they would remember nothing when they woke up. In the service elevator, he began to whistle.