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bedroom Ilka took her shoes off, got her list of Concordance numbers and the Rasmussens’ telephone, and lay down on the Rasmussens’ green bed cover: it had a glassy surface, colder than human skin. At a point in time, without her being aware of having made a decision in the matter, Ilka was dialing the number of the woman who had dated the man whose name Ilka was never able to remember, so she was relieved when they didn’t answer. She dialed the number Leina Shapiro had given her. They didn’t answer. She dialed Jacquelyn Rosen’s number and when they didn’t answer, Ilka felt snubbed. Ilka lay on the Rasmussens’ green cover. She lay and lay.
    Tuesday Ilka redialed her first number and a woman’s pleasant voice said, “I think she moved to New York. I’m sorry.” She sounded sorry—a gently brought-up voice that had always had its questions answered when it was young. “I could give you the number of someone I think would know her number in New York.”
    “Thanks,” Ilka said, “but I don’t actually know her. A man I know in New York knew her in Ann Arbor and gave me her number.
I’ve just moved to Concordance.” Ilka meant, Why don’t you invite me over for a cup of coffee, but said, “Thanks. Sorry.”
    Wednesday Ilka dialed the number Herbert had given her, and a child’s voice, neither male nor female, said, “They’re out. Whoa! Wait! This is them now. Hold it.”
    “Never mind,” said Ilka and heard the child say, “Dad this is a woman on the phone.”
    In the unseen room the unseen telephone changed hands. The dad’s voice said, “Who?”
    Ilka said, “I’m new, at the institute. My friend Herbert Meadmore gave me your number and said I should give a call.”
    “Herbert Who ?”
    “You don’t know Herbert Meadmore? I think . . .” Ilka flushed. The number Herbert had told her to call was the number underneath the number she had dialed. If this was the number Jules had given her she might be talking to the man whose brother-in-law played golf with the best friend of Winterneet’s lawyer. Ilka said, “Do you know Jules McCartin?” but the man must have removed the receiver from his ear. Ilka heard him calling to someone out in a hallway or a foyer, or it might be a kitchen, “Do we know a Herbert? Charlie, please take the bag from your mother, she has her hands full, as you can plainly see. Joanne, do we know any Herbert? There’s a woman on the phone.” The man’s voice came back full strength and said, “What did you say his name was?”
    Ilka said, “Jules McCartin. It doesn’t matter . . .”
    “Hold on.” The man shouted “HERBERT MCCARTIN!” and the woman’s tiny voice, distant and distinct, said, “ Into the refrigerator, Charlie, please. You are quite as capable as anybody else in this family of opening a refrigerator door. Get the bag out of the trunk, please, Charlie, close the refrigerator door. Wasn’t it Herbert Something, on the Hellenic cruise that we went with to—what’s the restaurant called—on Samos or was that Skiathos? Ask her if he went on a Hellenic cruise.”

    The man shouted, “Why the hell don’t you come and talk with her?” and the tiny voice shouted, “Because I’m the hell putting the goddamn ice cream in the goddamn freezer.”
    Ilka said, “It doesn’t matter . . .” but the man in her ear said, “Did Herbert go on a Hellenic cruise—Joanne,” he yelled, “was that four years ago?”
    Ilka said, “Herbert has never been to Greece. I don’t know about Jules McCartin.”
    Now the woman had taken the receiver. “Do you know Mary Anne Popper? She was on our cruise.”
    “No I don’t,” said Ilka. “What a lot of people there are that one doesn’t know!”
    “That’s a fact,” said the woman.
     
     
    Institute people were expected to make a portion of time available to the university. Would Ilka like to teach English 206, Conversational English, Thursdays 6-7 in Philosophy Hall, Room 777?
    Ilka said, “Good