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through.
    Peter told him the universal had gone on number four’s truck and did he want to look at it before they sent it out to the shop? He said he didn’t. He asked Peter if Holiday Inn had gone out yet. Peter said it was being loaded, but the silly ass who ran the place had already called twice about his towels.
    He nodded and went back upstairs to look for Vinnie Mason, but Phyllis said Vinnie and Tom Granger had gone out to that new German restaurant to dicker about tablecloths.
    “Will you have Vinnie stop in when he gets back?”
    “I will, Mr. Dawes. Mr. Ordner called and wanted to know if you’d call him back.”
    “Thanks, Phyllis.”
    He went back into the office, got the new things that had collected in the IN box and began to shuffle through them.
    A salesman wanted to call about a new industrial bleach, Yello-Go. Where do they come up with the names, he wondered, and put it aside for Ron Stone. Ron loved to inflict Dave with new products, especially if he could wangle a free five hundred pounds of the product for test runs.
    A letter of thanks from the United Fund. He put it aside to tack on the announcement board downstairs by the punch-clock.
    A circular for office furniture in Executive Pine. Into the wastebasket.
    A circular for a Phone-Mate that would broadcast a message and record incoming calls when you were out, up to thirty seconds. I’m not here, stupid. Buzz off. Into the wastebasket.
    A letter from a lady who had sent the laundry six of her husband’s shirts and had gotten them back with the collars burned. He put it aside for later action with a sigh. Ethel had been drinking her lunch again.
    A water-test package from the university. He put it aside to go over with Ron and Tom Granger after lunch.
    A circular from some insurance company with Art Linkletter telling you how you could get eighty thousand dollars and all you had to do for it was die. Into the wastebasket.
    A letter from the smart mick realtor who was peddling the Waterford plant, saying there was a shoe company that was very interested in it, the Thom McAn shoe company no less, no small cheese, and reminding him that the Blue Ribbon’s ninety-day option to buy ran out on November 26. Beware, puny laundry executive. The hour draweth nigh. Into the wastebasket.
    Another salesman for Ron, this one peddling a cleaner with the larcenous name of Swipe. He put it with Yello-Go.
    He was turning to the window again when the intercom buzzed. Vinnie was back from the German restaurant.
    “Send him in.”
    Vinnie came right in. He was a tall young man of twenty-five with an olive complexion. His dark hair was combed into its usual elaborately careless tumble. He was wearing a dark red sport coat and dark brown pants. A bow tie. Very rakish, don’t you think, Fred? I do, George, I do.
    “How are you, Bart?” Vinnie asked.
    “Fine,” he said. “What’s the story on that German restaurant?”
    Vinnie laughed. “You should have been there. That old kraut just about fell on his knees he was so happy to see us. We’re really going to murder Universal when we get settled into the new plant, Bart. They hadn’t even sent a circular, let alone their rep. That kraut, I think he thought he was going to get stuck washing those tablecloths out in the kitchen. But he’s got a place there you wouldn’t believe. Real beer hall stuff. He’s going to murder the competition. The aroma ... God!” He flapped his hands to indicate the aroma and took a box of cigarettes from the inside pocket of his sport coat. “I’m going to take Sharon there when he gets rolling. Ten percent discount.”
    In a weird kind of overlay he heard Harry the gun shop proprietor saying: We give a ten percent discount on orders over three hundred.
    My God, he thought. Did I buy those guns yesterday? Did I really?
    That room in his mind went dark.
    Hey, Georgie, what are you—
    “What’s the size of the order?” he asked. His voice was a little thick and he cleared