If you can picture a gigantic igloo fronted by southern mansion pillars and dotted with eighteenth century gables, and having each wing done in a combination early Mexican and eastern Mosque style, you'll have just the roughest idea of what it was beginning to look like. For miles around, people were driving out to see that house in the evenings after construction men had left. But the Stoddards were pleased. They were as happy about the whole mess as a pair of kids erecting a Tarzan dwelling in a tree. And the extra compensations I was getting for the additional trouble wasn't hurting me any. * * * * * I'll never forget the day when we completed the tiny belfry which topped off the monstrosity. Yes, a belfry. Just the kind you still see on little country churches and schoolhouses, only, of course a trifle different. The Stoddards had come out to the lot to witness this momentous event; the completion, practically, of their dream child. I was almost as happy as they were, for it stood as the symbol of the ending of almost all the grief for me. My foreman came over to where I was standing with the Stoddards. "You gonna put a bell in that belfry?" he asked. George Stoddard looked at him as if he'd gone mad. "What for?" he demanded. "So you can _use_ the belfry," the foreman said. "Don't be so ridiculous, my good man," Stoddard snorted. "It will be of pleasurable use enough to us, just _looking_ at it." When the foreman had marched off, scratching his head, I turned to the Stoddards. "Well, it's almost done," I said. "Pleased with it?" Stoddard beamed. "You have no idea, Mr. Kermit," he said solemnly, "what a tremendous moment this is for my wife and me." I looked at the plain, drab, smiling Laura Stoddard. From the shine in her eyes, I guess Stoddard meant what he said. Then I looked up at the belfry, and shuddered. As I remarked before, even the belfry wasn't quite like any belfry human eyes had ever seen before. It angled in all the way around in as confusing a maze of geometrical madness you have ever seen. It was a patterned craziness, of course, having some rhyme to it, but no reason. Looking at it, serenely topping that crazy-quilt house, I had the impression of its being an outrageously squashed cherry topping, the whipped cream of as madly a concocted sundae that a soda jerk ever made. A pleasant impression. Stoddard's voice broke in on my somewhat sickish contemplation. "When will we be able to start moving in?" he asked eagerly. "The latter part of next week," I told him. "We should have it set by then." "Good," said Stoddard. "Splendid." He put his arm around his wife, and the two of them stared starry eyed at their home. It made a lump come to your throat, seeing the bliss in their eyes as they stood there together. It made a lump come into your throat, until you realized what they were staring at.