Part 3 (1/2)

”You know,” said Francine, ”you could become bowling champion of the company, if you wanted to.”

”I never bowled in my life,” said Fuzz.

”Well, you can now,” said Francine. ”You can bowl to your heart's content. In fact, you could become an all-round athlete, Mr. Littler. You're still young.”

”Maybe,” said Fuzz.

”I found a whole bunch of dumbbells in the corner,” said Francine. ”Every day you could work with them a little till you were just as strong as a bull.”

Fuzz's toned-up muscles tightened and twisted pleasurably, asking to be as strong as the muscles of a bull. ”Maybe,” said Fuzz.

”Oh, Mr. Littler,” said Francine beseechingly, ”do I really have to go back to the Girl Pool? Can't I stay here? Whenever there's any work to do, I'll be the best secretary any man ever had.”

”All right,” said Fuzz, ”stay.”

”Thank you, thank you, thank you,” said Francine. ”I think this must be the best place in the whole company to work.”

”That may well be,” said Fuzz wonderingly. ”I-I don't suppose you'd have lunch with me?”

”Oh, I can't today, Mr. Littler,” she said. ”I'm awfully sorry.”

”I suppose you have a boyfriend waiting for you somewhere,” said Fuzz, suddenly glum again.

”No,” said Francine. ”I have to go shopping. I want to get a bathing suit.”

”I guess I'd better get one, too,” said Fuzz.

They left the building together. The entrance door closed behind them with a great, echoing ka-boom ka-boom.

Fuzz said something quietly as he looked back over his shoulder at Building 523.

”Did you say something, Mr. Littler?” said Francine.

”No,” said Fuzz.

”Oh,” said Francine.

What Fuzz had said to himself so quietly was just one word. The word was ”Eden.” ”Eden.”

SHOUT ABOUT IT FROM.

THE HOUSETOPS.

I read it. I guess everybody in Vermont read it when they heard Hypocrites' Junction was actually Crocker's Falls.

I didn't think it was such a raw book, the way raw books go these days. It was just the rawest book a woman ever wrote-and I expect that's why it was so popular.

I met that woman once, that Elsie Strang Morgan, the one who wrote the book. I met her husband, the high school teacher, too. I sold them some combination aluminum storm windows and screens one time. That was about two months after the book came out. I hadn't read it yet, hadn't paid much attention to all the talk about it.

They lived in a huge, run-down old farmhouse five miles outside of Crocker's Falls back then, just five miles away from all those people she gave the works to in the book. I don't generally sell that far south, don't know many people down that way. I was on my way home from a sales meeting in Boston, and I saw that big house with no storm windows, and I just had to stop in.

I didn't have the least idea whose house it was.

I knocked on the door, and a young man in pajamas and a bathrobe answered. I don't think he'd shaved in a week. I don't think he'd been out of the pajamas and bathrobe for a week, either. They had a very lived-in look. His eyes were wild. He was the husband. He was Lance Magnum in the book. He was the great lover in the book, but he looked like one of the world's outstanding haters when I met him.

”How do you do,” I said.

”How do you you do?” he asked. He made it a very unpleasant question. do?” he asked. He made it a very unpleasant question.

”I couldn't help noticing you don't have any storm windows on this beautiful old home,” I said.

”Why don't you try again?” he said.

”Try what?” I said.

”Try not noticing we don't have any storm windows on this beautiful old home,” he said.

”If you were to put up storm windows,” I said, ”do you know who would pay for them?” I was going to answer the question myself. I was going to tell him that the money for the windows would come out of his fuel dealer's pocket, since the windows would save so much fuel. But he didn't give me a chance.

”Certainly I know who'd pay for 'em-my wife,” he said. ”She's the only person with any money around here. She's the breadwinner.”

”Well,” I said, ”I don't know what your personal situation here happens to be-”

”You don't?” he said. ”Everybody else does. What's the matter-can't you read?” he said.

”I can read,” I told him.

”Then rush down to your nearest bookstore, plunk down your six dollars, and start reading about the greatest lover boy of modern times! Me!” he said, and he slammed the door.

My conclusion was that the man was crazy, and I was about to drive off when I heard what sounded like a scream from the back of the house. I thought maybe I'd interrupted him while he was murdering his wife, thought he'd gone back to it now.

I ran to where the screaming was coming from, and I saw that an old rusty pump was making all the noise.

But it might as well have been a woman screaming, because a woman was making the pump scream, and the woman looked like she was just about to scream, too. She had both hands on the pump handle, and she was sobbing, and she was putting her whole body into every stroke. Water was going into a bucket that was already full, splas.h.i.+ng down over the sides, spreading out on the ground. I didn't know it then, but she was Elsie Strang Morgan. Elsie Strang Morgan didn't want water. What she was after was violent work and noise.

When she saw me she stopped. She brushed the hair off of her eyes. She was Celeste in the book, of course. She was the heroine in her own book. She was the woman who didn't know what love was till she met Lance Magnum. When I saw her, she looked as though she'd forgotten what love was again.

”What are you?” she said. ”A process server or a Rolls-Royce salesman?”

”Neither one, lady,” I said.

”Then you came to the wrong house,” she said. ”Only two kinds of people come here anymore-those who want to sue me for a blue million and those who think I ought to live like King Farouk.”

”It so happens that I am am selling a quality product,” I said. ”But it also happens that this product pays for itself. As I was telling your husband-” selling a quality product,” I said. ”But it also happens that this product pays for itself. As I was telling your husband-”

”When did you see my husband?” she said.