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gently, almost maternally, and telling him that it is all right, she expects nothing further from him, there is no reason for him to feel guilty, but then she understands that this would probably be very silly because sex does not seem to be what is on his mind now. “I guess they could make it fifty-five a day,” he says. “But for fifty-five a day you might have to get into some pretty weird stuff. I tell you frankly, this director has a lot of ideas which he wants to try and they may strike you as a little bit strange. Fifty-five would be the top rate and for that they would expect real cooperation. Your back would be to the camera most of the time though. You’ll notice there are very few full faces in this kind of stuff; that’s for the protection of the actors because you never know who’ll end up where in fifty years. Fifty-five a day and that’s the top. You get five days guaranteed at that rate; if there’s any more filming after that, it drops to forty-five. That has to be to protect against a cost-overload but it shouldn’t go more than five days.”
    “You said a week.”
    “A week, a working week, five days, what’s the difference. Anyway,” Phil says, “anyway, that’s the situation.” He stands ponderously, seems to weave in front of her, then turns and looks out a window. “If you don’t want to take it there are plenty others so you got to tell me now.”
    “I’ll take it,” Susan says. “I’ll be down tomorrow morning and start work.”
    “All right,” Phil says. “I’ll arrange for you to be on the payroll steady then. You doing anything tonight?”
    “What’s that?”
    He turns, leans over the desk, puts his palms down flatly and says, “I asked if you’re doing anything tonight, that’s all.”
    “Well,” Susan says, feeling her balance beginning to go; she has not figured this man out right at all, she has missed the situation as well. This is the way he conducts his life, his attitude has had nothing at all to do with what happened between them. “Well, I told you, I was living with this man; I mean we had nothing special planned tonight but I have to go
home —
”
    “I don’t understand it,” Phil says, shaking his head. “All these fragmentary relationships. Everybody’s always shacked up together; in my time you didn’t have to live with someone to have sex with them. It wasn’t that big a deal. Listen, you don’t have to explain your whole life-style to me, just give me a straight answer. You want to go out tonight and have a few drinks?”
    “I couldn’t. I just couldn’t.”
    “Because if you can’t, that’s all right too. Business is entirely separate. You don’t have to think that I’m forcing you or anything because I already offered you the job, right? So you know there’s no monkey business. Listen,” Phil says, “I’m a married man, right? You should know that about me right away. I’m a perfectly happy married man but you’ve got no idea of the tensions or pressures which build up in a marriage; sometimes you need a little something else just for a sense of relief. So it doesn’t mean anything serious whether or not you go out with me. I’ll meet you here about five?”
    “I told you,” Susan says rather frantically. “I told you, I just can’t have that kind of involvement. It’s nothing personal, I think that you’re very nice but — ”
    “All right,” Phil says. His eyes recede, his form seems to diminish subtly, he retracts to an edge of the chair. “It was only an idea. It has nothing to do with you at all.”
    “All right,” Susan says.
    “Because I know how your whole generation is and you start taking things seriously when it isn’t anything like that at all. I don’t want any messing around on the project. You got a big responsibility there and this thing has got to come off on schedule and on the money.”
    “Yes,” Susan says. “Yes.” She has the feeling that, somehow, her life will terminate sitting