Short Story (The Hasty Act) - Beginners

The Hasty Act - Marc Brandel

 I didn't get into this thing on purpose. I'm not tough; I'm a coward. I'm not ashamed to say it. And I'm not ashamed to say that I'm frightened and confused. I don't know what to do. The only thing I can do now is wait. Wait for the telephone or the doorbell to ring. Wait for whoever he is.  Yet I can't see how I deserved to get into this trouble. It wasn't really my fault. It could have happened to anyone...  It started this morning or rather at noon - all because it was raining. If it hadn't been raining I would have gone to Chester's Restaurant as usual. But it's a long way to Chester's from my office, so I put on my raincoat and ran across the street to Pierre's instead. Pierre's is expensive, a place where I can't afford to have lunch very often.  Well, I left my raincoat in the coatroom in the hall, followed the manager to a table, and ordered a drink. I had two; that was my real mistake, I suppose. It probably influenced what happened then, because the drinks made me feel freer and braver than I usually do.  Just as I finished lunch I saw her. She was the kind of girl who works for a very expensive fashion magazine, with a beautiful hat, and long white gloves. She was too nice-looking. Her hair was too golden, her face was too perfect, her clothes were too expensive. She walked straight toward me and smiled charmingly.  "Hello," she called. "Where have you been lately?"  I looked behind me. There was nothing there but the wall. She was talking to me! I stood up.  "Hello," I said. She was even more beautiful close up. I pushed a chair toward her, and she sat down.  "I can stay only a moment," she said. "But it's so wonderful to see you again." She took my hand and pressed it between her cool white-gloved ones.  I had never seen her before in my life. I should have told her that at once, of course, but I didn't meet girls like this every day. I pressed her hand.  "Peter's with me," she said, smiling.  I looked up. She was right. There was a young man standing behind her.  "Peter," she said, "You remember Jim."  I was surprised, because the strange thing is that, although my name is Charles, there had been a time years ago in school when some people had called me Jim.  "Sure," the young man said. "Sure. How are you, Jim?" He gave me his hand in a friendly way, and I took it. I didn't like him at all. He was a large young man in a gray suit. But something was wrong. He was too handsome, his suit was too expensive, his hair too short, his tie too loose.  "Hello," I said.  He leaned over the table. "I'm sorry we have to go, Alice," he said to the girl, and then, turning to me, "We've got to get back to the Waldorf and pack our bags. We're leaving for the West tonight."  That's what I mean about him. He didn't have to tell me that he could afford to stay at the Waldorf. He could have said just "the hotel" and left it at that.  I stood up. "Well, it was nice seeing you both," I began, trying to get away. But when I'd left the table I found I was still with them. Peter put his hand on my shoulder as we started for the door.  "Where have you been all this time, Jim?"  "Oh, around." The effect of the drinks was beginning to fade. Now I just wanted to get away before they discovered that I wasn't Jim after all. I wasn't their Jim, anyway. I hot the ticket for my coat out of my pocket.  "Here. Let me do it." He took the ticket out of my hand before I could stop him. I stood with Alice while he got our coats. I watched him give the tickets to the coatroom girl.  "I wish we weren't going now," Alice was saying.  "So do I," I said, smiling uncomfortably at her while Peter came back with my plain raincoat and his own expensive coat. He started to help me put mine on, but I took it and threw it over my arm.  "Good-bye," I said. "It was nice seeing you."  When I got outside, it had stopped raining, so I just carried my raincoat back to the office over my arm and hung it up beside my door. It wasn't until I was leaving at six that I put it on again. I was half way down the stairs before I noticed that there was a bundle in the pocket. It was a long envelope. It felt as though it were filled with papers. I took it out and looked at it, wondering where it had come from. There was no name on it. Then I saw that it wasn't fastened shut. I opened it and looked inside.  I almost fainted, right there. It wasn't papers -it was money! I went back up to my office. I locked the door, and then took out the money and counted it. I counted it twice. Two thousand, three hundred and sixty-five dollars!  I decided what to do at once. I remembered that Peter had gotten my coat from the coatroom. I didn't know what they had planned to do or why they had put all that money into my pocket or what I was supposed to do with it. I didn't care. All I knew was that I didn't want any part of their game. I went to the Waldorf at once.  It took me some time to find their room. I only knew their first names, but I described them carefully. I was afraid that they had gone, but they were both in the room when I walked in. Peter was packing some shirts. He looked up and smiled when he saw me.  "Well, look who's here," he said. "Hello, Jim."  I didn't smile back this time. "I don't know what you want," I said. "And I don't want to know. But in case you made a mistake about who I am, I never saw either of you before in my life. Here!" And I threw the envelope on the bed.  He didn't even look at it. He just stood there, with a frozen smile on his face, staring at me, his large hands hanging at his sides. He was a lot stronger and bigger than I am.  I turned and walked out of the room as fast as I could. In fact, I almost ran down the hall. I felt good. I felt I had done the best thing I could and had gotten myself out of a questionable situation.  I went and had a good dinner feeling better all the time. In fact, I felt good all this evening -until just an hour ago.  Then I went to hunt in my raincoat pockets for my cigarettes. But there weren't any cigarettes in the coat. I looked at the name of the store sewn inside my coat. It wasn't my coat!  Yes, of course I called the hotel. They'd gone a few hours before. They must have gone as soon as they looked in the envelope. And they didn't leave any messages, any envelope, any address where I could reach them.  What can I do now? I sit here and worry. And wait. What will happen next?  Sometimes I try to pretend that the raincoat is mine after all. But I know that someone else has mine. He must know it too by now. He has to know it.  Because my raincoat has my name in it.