《Idle Roomer 》作者：- Mike Resnick【EPUB】

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Idle Roomer Mike Resnick amp Lezli Robyn The room was on the second floor of the dilapidated old building overlooking what had oncebeen a garden and now was a concrete parking slab filled with cracks and potholes. It had anarrow bed next to a small nightstand with a cheap lamp and an old battered desk by the singlewindow. A rickety wooden chair a phone an ancient dresser a tarnished floor lamp and asmall closet completed its uninspired furnishings. And thought Maria Mr. Valapoli has lived here for sixteen months. How could anyone live inthis cheerless place for sixteen days let alone months Maria surveyed the room from the door. Shed been cleaning this room five days a week forsixteen months and shed still never laid eyes on him. His bed was always made the top of hisdesk always barren. The only way she knew he actually existed was the nightstand which had adifferent library book almost every morning and the bathroom which held a dozen bottles ofpills that were replaced with new bottles from time to time. Oh – and the statuette on the top of the dresser. She didnt quite understand what it was.Sometimes she thought it might be a woman holding her arms out to the viewer. Other times shewondered how she could have been so mistaken for clearly it was a small animal with largetrusting eyes possibly something from the deepest jungles of Africa. Once she even thought itwas a twisted tree. Maria shook her head she would never understand modern art. She would never understand Mr. Valapoli either. Every day she plugged the phone into the jackand yet the next morning the end of the cord always lay on the floor. She checked the dialtone it was functioning. Why did the man pay for a phone if he had no use for it She never liked Sherlock Holmes much but she thought it might be interesting to work at beingthe Miss Marple of housemaids and see what she could deduce about the mysterious roomer. He hadto have a beard because there was no shaving equipment manual or electric in the bathroom.Yet she never found any hairs from his head or his chin on the bed or the floor. He wasprobably color blind for there was nothing blue or