A Canadian Werewolf in New York

Chapter Seven

As I was walking out of the restaurant, I caught the whiff of a familiar scent.  I physically twisted a full 360 degrees, but the scent was lost the moment I’d scented it.

     It was a familiar smell, though.  The smell of a person whom I’d been quite familiar with, and I knew it wasn’t Mack, because it was mingled with the smell of a sweet perfume.

     I just couldn’t place it.

     From across the street a horn quickly blurted to get my attention.  It was a blue Lexus.  The driver was a short cute Asian woman who was waving at me.

     I smiled at her.  It was Anne Lee, Max’s assistant.  She must have dropped him off for the meeting and been driving around, ready to swing by and pick him up.

     Yes, that must have been her scent that I’d caught.  I couldn’t smell her now though.  She and her car were downwind from me.

     “Hi Anne,” I called out across the traffic.

     She grinned at me, an amused smile, and shook her head before trying to negotiate getting the car across the street for her rendezvous with Mack.

     I looked down at what I was wearing, shrugged, waved goodbye and continued on my way.

     Anne was a decent woman with the patience of a saint.  Her relationship to Mack always reminded me of the relationship between Mister Burns and Smithers on The Simpsons.  Whatever Mack desired, Anne was there running the errand with that cute closed lipped smile on her face.

     I didn’t have far to walk from the restaurant to the Algonquin.  It was just around the block.  I headed up 6th Avenue and within a few minutes I was strolling past the people lined up outsideThe Red Flame on W 44th Street and in to the Algonquin lobby.

     The doorman, Paul, grinned at me, and, like Anne, shook his head.  “G’morning Mister Andrews,” Paul said, opening the door to let me in.  “Out for another early morning stroll?”

     Paul’s shift started at 7 AM.  Since he hadn’t seen me leaving, he’d assumed that I’d left before his shift started.  God knows, he was used to seeing me coming back on a regular basis like this.

     He being a fledgling writer, we’d chatted a few times about writing, and different techniques I deployed.  I’d passed along to him one of the things I liked to do with my characters, a tip passed along to me by Brooklyn’s own Denis Hamill, a columnist and successful thriller author whom I consider myself a protégé of, and that was taking the time to just go for a walk through a neighborhood with the character, listen to how he describes it, watch what he pays attention to, appreciate it in the way that only he could.

     I think Paul really liked that bit of advice, because while I have deployed that technique, getting wonderful results from it, Paul had told me on more than one occasion how useful it had been for him too.

     Paul told me that the one thing he felt really good about was his character development.  His job allowed him an opportunity rich with raw material for creating all kinds of different people.  He was right too, I’d read several of his short stories, he did display a solid raw talent with a penchant for characters.

     One evening, when his shift was over and we were sharing a coffee next door, after I’d given him some advice about a recent story he’d finished, he made a point of saying that even if he struck it big as a writer, he couldn’t see not doing his job.

     I could tell that he was honest about it too.  He naturally liked people, and an added bonus was that he was able to draw on that experience and create wonderfully lifelike and believable characters; so I hadn’t doubted him for a moment.  He wouldn’t want to give that up.

     And that I could see, could understand.

     “Walkin’ with a character this morning?” he asked.  He considered the way I was dressed once again with a crooked smile on his face.  “A homeless guy, perhaps?”

      “No, not this time, Paul.  I just can’t get enough of these New York August mornings.”

     He smiled and closed the door as I entered the lobby.

     That’s when the female scent hit me again, and I closed my eyes, breathing it in.  What the hell had Anne Lee been doing here in the lobby? I started wondering, when something darted out in front of me.

     I reacted quickly enough not to trip over it, but still stumbled forward for a few steps.

     I didn’t have to glance down to know that it was Matilda, the Algonquin’s house cat.  Though she mostly moved around like she owned the place and didn’t bother much with the staff or clientele of the hotel, she and I had a unique relationship.  I could tell that she understood my animal nature, and so she liked to play with me, her fun little game of prey vs. prey.

     I smiled at her, let out a low playful growl, to which she purred back softly before turning and casually wandering over to her lounge couch, as if nothing out of the ordinary had just occurred.

     The concierge wasn’t at the desk.  I could tell by the scent of her lingering perfume that it was Linda, and that she’d just moved into the office.  Of course, I didn’t have to be a werewolf to be able to detect the perfume that she wore -- she virtually bathed in it.  And no, the familiar scent I’d detected before Matilda distracted me wasn’t Linda’s either.

     As I stepped into the elevator, I decided to give up on figuring out that familiar female scent as well as thoughts of that other werewolf that was likely still somewhere in the city.  I needed to put it all aside and just focus on getting 5000 words in the next Maxwell Bronte novel out for early this afternoon.

     Boy, was I in for a rude awakening.