Smart Moves Read Online Free PDF

said. “Just look at the signature on that check.”
    He looked. Then he looked again. “I’ll have to have this authenticated,” he said, looking up with new respect.
    “Authenticate, validate, send someone over to the bank. I’ll wait right here while you do,” I said as pleasantly as I could, turning to smile politely at the three women. They were all well-dressed, hair piled neatly up off their ears, dangling earrings, white billowy blouses with frilly collars. One of the women was a little pudgy. A second was tall, stylish, and formless. The third was about forty and just right. I fell in love with her and would have been content to spend the next hour or so watching her and listening to the three women discuss where they were going to have lunch.
    “Are you going to be long?” asked the tall one, the obvious leader. Something about me fixed a polite, masked smile of distaste on her regal face, maybe the air of lunchtime onions on my breath.
    “I don’t know,” I said, looking at the cute one, who looked away. She reminded me of my ex-wife, Anne. “Are we going to be long?” I asked the clerk.
    He looked at Einstein’s check, made a decision, and said, “No. I’ll just check you in.”
    “Peters, Toby Peters,” I supplied and then added, to hear how it sounded to me and the waiting ladies, “Professor Peters.”
    “Professor Peters,” he said. “I’ll check on this … check while you make yourself comfortable.”
    “I’m sure Professor Einstein will appreciate it,” I said, loud enough for the three women to hear. “Please cash the check for me after you make your calls, and have a bellboy bring the money up to my room.”
    New respect was in the eyes of the three women when I turned to hand my suitcase to another ancient bellhop.
    “You know Albert Einstein?” asked the tall one.
    “Albert? Yes, we’re working together on supportive energy dysfunctions,” I said, waving at the bellboy to lead the way.
    The pretty one who reminded me of Anne touched her right ear. I’d remember that forever.
    “Is it secret?” she asked, her shrill voice breaking the spell.
    “Science stuff,” I whispered, putting my face close to hers. She was wearing perfume that smelled like a flower I couldn’t place but knew I had smelled as a child.
    I followed the bellhop and behind me heard,
    “… always a bit eccentric …”
    “… but he didn’t look like …”
    “… you can’t tell by how they …”
    And then the old guy and I were in the elevator. We were alone with the elevator operator, a woman with a uniform like the old guy’s. He told her to take us to five and up we went.
    “You really a scientist?” the old guy asked, shifting my suitcase from his left to his right hand and then resting it on the floor.
    “What do you think?”
    “I don’t think,” he said. “I make my living on tips. You think too much and you say something that can get you in trouble. I just want the day to go by fast and the tips to be respectable.”
    “I’ve got one for you,” I said, looking at the elevator operator, who appeared to be deaf as we shot by two and three. “War will be over in a year.”
    “That kind of tip won’t buy me Bull Durham,” he said with a sigh. “World is full of comedians. Everyone thinks he’s Jack Benny. I live in the Bronx. We’ve got blackout drills now. Blackout drills. So war jokes don’t tickle me. I’m not complaining. You want to tell jokes, I’m a good listener, but not for the war jokes. Aside from that, the guest is always right.”
    “Except when he’s wrong,” mumbled the elevator operator as the elevator snapped to a stop. “Five.”
    The doors slid open but we were about a foot shy of level. She inched the elevator up and missed by almost six inches. That was good enough for me but not for her. She motioned me back when I tried to step off. About two minutes later we were reasonably within target for her to let the bellhop and me debark. Lights