The band was blaring, and five thousand half-swacked voices were roaring
accompaniment.
_In Muenchen steht ein Hofbräuhaus!
Eins, Zwei, G'sufa!_
At the _G'sufa_ everybody upped with their king-size mugs and drank each
other's health.
My head was killing me. "This is where I came in, or something," I
groaned.
Arth said, "That was last night." He looked at me over the rim of his
beer mug.
Something, somewhere, was wrong. But I didn't care. I finished my _mass_
and then remembered. "I've got to get my bag. Oh, my head. Where did we
spend last night?"
Arth said, and his voice sounded cautious, "At my hotel, don't you
remember?"
"Not very well," I admitted. "I feel lousy. I must have dimmed out. I've
got to go to the Bahnhof and get my luggage."
Arth didn't put up an argument on that. We said good-by and I could feel
him watching after me as I pushed through the tables on the way out.
At the Bahnhof they could do me no good. There were no hotel rooms
available in Munich. The head was getting worse by the minute. The fact
that they'd somehow managed to lose my bag didn't help. I worked on that
project for at least a couple of hours. Not only wasn't the bag at the
luggage checking station, but the attendant there evidently couldn't
make heads nor tails of the check receipt. He didn't speak English and
my high school German was inadequate, especially accompanied by a
blockbusting hangover.
I didn't get anywhere tearing my hair and complaining from one end of
the Bahnhof to the other. I drew a blank on the bag.
And the head was getting worse by the minute. I was bleeding to death
through the eyes and instead of butterflies I had bats in my stomach.
Believe me, _nobody_ should drink a gallon or more of Marzenbräu.
* * * * *
I decided the hell with it. I took a cab to the airport, presented my
return ticket, told them I wanted to leave on the first obtainable plane
to New York. I'd spent two days at the _Oktoberfest_, and I'd had it.
I got more guff there. Something was wrong with the ticket, wrong date
or some such. But they fixed that up. I never was clear on what was
fouled up, some clerk's error, evidently.
The trip back was as uninteresting as the one over. As the hangover
began to wear off--a little--I was almost sorry I hadn't been able to
stay. If I'd only been able to get a room I _would_ have stayed, I told
myself.
From Idlewild, I came directly to the office rather than going to my
apartment. I figured I might as well check in with Betty.
I opened the door and there I found Mr. Oyster sitting in the chair he
had been occupying four--or was it five--days before when I'd left. I'd
lost track of the time.
I said to him, "Glad you're here, sir. I can report. Ah, what was it you
came for? Impatient to hear if I'd had any results?" My mind was
spinning like a whirling dervish in a revolving door. I'd spent a wad of
his money and had nothing I could think of to show for it; nothing but
the last stages of a grand-daddy hangover.
"Came for?" Mr. Oyster snorted. "I'm merely waiting for your girl to
make out my receipt. I thought you had already left."
"You'll miss your plane," Betty said.
There was suddenly a double dip of ice cream in my stomach. I walked
over to my desk and looked down at the calendar.
Mr. Oyster was saying something to the effect that if I didn't leave
today, it would have to be tomorrow, that he hadn't ponied up that
thousand dollars advance for anything less than immediate service.
Stuffing his receipt in his wallet, he fussed his way out the door.
I said to Betty hopefully, "I suppose you haven't changed this calendar
since I left."
Betty said, "What's the matter with you? You look funny. How did your
clothes get so mussed? You tore the top sheet off that calendar
yourself, not half an hour ago, just before this marble-missing client
came in." She added, irrelevantly, "Time travelers yet."