Bill had bought a new shop a year back, and he'd been extremely worried that I wouldn't be able to find it. He even gave me a street directory. He'd drawn a big texta circle in it so I could see where his new shop was. It was on Collins Street, which is where all the banks and everything are, in case you didn't know.
I didn't like the new shop. It wasn't cluttered - in fact there was hardly anything in it at all. There was a big stained-glass window hanging from the ceiling, and a fat book in a glass case, and a chair standing on a white pedestal with hidden lights pointing up at it, but that was it. I didn't see any of the things I'd brought him. His new shop was probably too nice for old crap like that.
There was a sign: CAVEAT EMPTOR. When I asked him about it Bill told me that it meant: BUYER BEWARE! I asked him why he didn't just write BUYER BEWARE! but he only laughed. I didn't mind Bill, but he could be a weird fucker sometimes.
His shop might have looked nice, but Bill didn't. There were dark pouches under his eyes and his skin looked yellowish and greasy. I could see his scalp through his hair, and when he reached out to take the thing I'd brought (a strange old pewter cup) his hand shook.
I'm one of those people that just says what he thinks.
"What's wrong with you, Bill?"
"Nothing."
"Where's Theresa?" Theresa was Bill's wife. His family were nearly always in the old shop, his wife dusting the antiques and the kids playing out the back, but I realised I'd never seen them in the new one. Not even once.
Then, the strangest thing happened. Bill started to cry.
I pretended to be interested in the fat book. When I turned back he was wiping his eyes.
"She took the kids," he said.
"Where?"
"Away. Left me."
"Why?"
"Christ I don't know. Ever since the business took off -" He looked away at the chair on its pedestal. "Why am I telling you this?" he said, with a choked little laugh.
I didn't know why he was telling me. But I felt responsible somehow.
"What've you got there anyway?" he said, and his voice was back to normal.
From then on Bill paid me even more than he used to. I suspected he was Losing His Marbles. When you Lose Your Marbles you begin to make Errors of Judgment.
Poor Bill.
YOU ARE READING
Hotel Ambrose
FantasyTwo runaway children steal a baby and attempt to raise it themselves in the world's most haunted hotel. To Ben and Sophie the abandoned hotel seems like the perfect place to hide. No adult will ever find them there. Within its strange walls they ca...
