"You mean why did I get a job, Ma?" Rudi said. "Listen, let's have supper and we'll talk about it, huh?" "Supper?" Mrs. Wladek snorted. "Supper we will have when I find out what I need to know. Not before." "But I'm hungry, Ma, and ... oh, all right." Rudi sat down on the old brown couch and sighed. "I just thought it would be a good idea to get a job, bring some bread into the house, you know? So I went down to the agency, and they had this application waiting, and I went down and got the job, and I start tomorrow. That's all. Now let's eat." "You got the idea to have a job?" Mrs. Wladek said. "Fine. Fine. Just fine. And when did you get this idea?" "I don't know," Rudi said, and shrugged. "Some time. This morning, maybe. Look, what difference does it make? I thought you'd like the idea, Ma. Some more dough coming in ... you know." "This morning." Mrs. Wladek raised clenched fists over her head. "Cossacks!" she screamed. "Monsters! Witches!" Lunchtime. Gloria looked up and smiled sweetly and distantly as Harold Meedy appeared at her desk. "Got any special place to go?" he said. "As a matter of fact--" she began, but he was too quick for her. "It's always 'as a matter of fact,'" he said. "What's the matter--you got another boy friend or something? You don't like poor Harold? Look, Gloria, if you want to avoid me, then you go ahead and avoid me. But--" "It's nothing like that," Gloria said. "So come on," Harold said. "Listen, I'm really a sweet guy when you get to know me. You'd like me. Sure you would." "I'm sure," Gloria said. "But I really do have something to take care of." "Can't you take care of it later?" She shook her head. "Well ... all right, if you want me to grow up all frustrated." He grinned at her and moved away. When they were all gone, and only Mr. Fredericksohn remained in his private office, behind the closed door, Gloria opened a drawer of her desk and took out a piece of modeling clay a little bigger than her fist. Working without haste, and never bothering to look up she made a doll in the shape of a tall, thin boy. The voodoo sects in Haiti used hair or fingernail parings from the subject, Gloria knew; she had learned that in her college research, but she had known about the doll long before. Hair and fingernail parings: what superstition! And it wasn't as if you really needed the doll; if necessary, you could get along very well without it. But it was a help; it made things easier; and why not? She tried to picture Tom Francis. His mother's description of him had been pretty vague, but Gloria found she could locate him at his house; she turned the doll until she had the feeling of contact, and then-- There.