My husband, Grant, is the one who possesses the qualifications that
make our partnership in this business a success. He is efficient,
patient (if there is money in it) and ingenious--and buying a motel was
his idea in the first place.
It was all very sudden.
For a month Los Angeles had been having the kind of weather the Chamber
of Commerce members mention only in whispers. Grant and I and our two
children had colds, already a month old, which the fog and dampness
were cherishing lovingly. Memorial Day and a weekend had been courteous
enough to get together and arrange a three-day holiday; and so we
decided to take a trip to the desert.
We stopped in Banning, a little town on the edge of the Mojave desert
which boasts both altitude (2350 feet) and dryness, and which is
popular with sufferers from all kinds of bronchial and respiratory
troubles. Banning is about ninety miles from Los Angeles, and has a
population of under eight thousand. It has a lot of motels, and of
these we selected the one we considered the most attractive, and
engaged a cabin for the next three nights.
The Moonrise Motel was a big, new, sparkling-white, green-shuttered
structure, shaped a little like a horseshoe with its open end toward
the highway. Wide graveled driveways curved in front of the cabins and
around three central islands of grass. The interior of our
cabin--artistically plastered, carpeted, well-furnished, and with
superlatively rich details--was in keeping with the exterior. From the
beginning I was awed by the beauty and the size of the motel, but no
premonitory tickle hinted to me the incredible fact that within two
months it would be ours. After unloading the car, we put David and
Donna into the back seat again and drove around idly exploring Banning.
Trees and flowers flourished everywhere, and high, rocky, beautiful
mountains towered close toward the north and south and more distantly
in the east.
"Let's move to Banning," I said. "Perfect scenery, perfect
climate--what more could we want?"
Grant looked at me. He has a habit of simply looking at me on the
occasions when he thinks I am more stupid than usual--a look that any
fair-minded judge would consider ample grounds for divorce. Fortunately
his endearing qualities so far outweigh his annoying ones that I have
never considered testing any judge's fair-mindedness. The last time
Grant gave me that look was when I came home from an antique shop with
five perfectly matched silver deer bookends. The deer were bent forward
in attitudes of straining, so that when their antlered heads were
placed against a row of books they appeared to be holding them up by
sheer force of muscle.
"But why five bookends?" Grant had asked, exasperated.
He is very unimaginative and practical. There's no use in trying to
explain to a person of his type what effect the contents of an antique
shop can have on a susceptible browser. Besides, I always get too mad
to say anything at all when he looks at me like that.
And now he was giving me that same look.
"I'll speak to the manager of General Motors about moving the Los
Angeles factory to Banning," he said.
It was hot, but there was a cooling wind all afternoon, and when we
went to bed it was so chilly that it felt good to snuggle under the
blankets. The children were asleep in their bed, and we lay there and
talked--or, rather, I did.
"How much do you suppose a motel like this is worth?"
"Uh . . . uh . . . mm h'm."
"Let's see, they have fourteen cabins," I went on. "I counted them. The
owners live in one, so that leaves thirteen to rent. There are eight
other cabins that seem to be as big as this one, with two rooms, and
they must get six and a half dollars a night for them, like they do for
this one. And then those four cabins in the back; they seem to be
smaller, just one room and one bed, probably, but they must bring in at
least three or four dollars a night. Why, this place must earn about
seventy dollars a night! Why, that's over two thousand a month!"
"Uh."
"And what wouldn't I do with two thousand dollars a month," I went on
reverently.
Grant, it seemed was more than half awake, after all. "I don't know
what you wouldn't do," he said, "but I know what you would do. You'd
quick go to some junk shop and buy three earrings. You'd come home with
half a pair of scissors, or one giant size bronze shoe tree."
"Seriously, though," I said, "Why don't we buy a motel--this very one,
maybe? It would pay for itself in a few years, and then--"
"Uh. Mm h'm."
While he slept, I lay there and thought about going into the motel
business. Grant could quit his job at General Motors, and together we
could keep the cabins clean and the place looking its best. The more I
thought about it, the more excited I became.
In the morning we drove into the business district of Banning, about a
mile from the Moonrise Motel, and went into Pillyer's cafe, for
breakfast. Pillyer was a thin, stooped old man with an embittered
expression and a few lonely hairs on a broad expanse of skull.
"What's he mad about, Mama?" David whispered, when Pillyer had taken
our orders and disappeared into the dim regions beyond the counter.
"Probably because everyone calls him Pill," I ventured.
Grant shifted Donna onto his other knee, feeling her diaper gingerly.
He took a sip of water, and drummed his lean fingers on the counter.
"How would you like to go into the motel business?" he asked me.