And she'd said she was living with her aunt. Would she have a phone listing under her own name, or would the listing be under her aunt's name--which he also didn't know?
At any rate, he could check listings under Dorothy Francis, he told himself.
There were lots and lots of people named Dorothy Francis, in Manhattan and in all the other boroughs.
Malone frowned thoughtfully. _I wish somebody would tell me how to get in touch with her_, he thought. _She might know more about that book than I do._
The thought bothered him. But, to offset it, there was a nice new feeling growing at the back of his mind.
He felt as if he were going to know the answer soon enough.
He felt as if he were going to be lucky again.
In the meantime, he went back to the bar to think some more. He was on his second bourbon-and-soda, still thinking but without any new ideas, when BeeBee tapped him gently on the shoulder.
"Pardon me," the _maître d'_ said, "but are you English?"
"Am I what?" Malone said, spilling a little of his drink on the bar.
"Oh," Malone said. "No. Irish. Very Irish."
Malone stared at him. "I think it's fine," he said, "but I'd love to know why you asked me."
"Well," BeeBee said, "I knew you couldn't be American. Not after the phone call. You don't have to hide your nationality here; we're quite accustomed to foreign visitors. And we don't have special prices for tourists."
Malone waited two breaths. "Will you please tell me," he said slowly, "what it is you're talking about?"
"Certainly," BeeBee said with aplomb. "There's a call for you in the upstairs booth. A long-distance call, personal."
"Oh," Malone said. "Who'd know I was--" He stopped, thinking hard. There was no way in the world for anyone to know he was in Topp's. Therefore, nobody could be calling him. "They've got the wrong name," he said decisively.
"Oh, no," BeeBee said. "I heard them quite distinctly. You _are_ Sir Kenneth Malone, aren't you?"
Malone gaped for one long second, and then his mind caught up with the facts. "Oh," he said. "Sure." He raced upstairs to the phone booth, said: "This is Sir Kenneth Malone," into the blank screen, and waited patiently.
After a while an operator said: "Person to person call, Sir Kenneth, from Yucca Flats. Will you take this call?"