"Where--where are we?" he asked the cabbie. For some reason, he fingered the business card in his pocket. The one the new masseur, the masseur who apparently did not exist, had given him. The cabbie, shrugging, told him an address which was not immediately familiar. Then, with a sudden quickening of his heart, Horner realized it was the address on the business card in his pocket. "You mean," Horner demanded, "we're on Long Island? I don't remember telling you to take me here." * * * * * "Well, I didn't dream it up myself, Mac," the cabbie said. "Look, I don't care if you get out or you don't get out. The flag is still down and I'm still making money. So, what'll it be?" "I ought to call my wife," Horner said. The driver shrugged. "You getting off here?" Slowly, Horner nodded. He looked outside. He saw night darkness, a dimly lit driveway, a hemlock hedge twelve feet high. "Sign said 'Positively no vehicles,'" the cabbie told him. "So I guess you walk from here." "I guess I walk," Horner said. He consulted the taxi meter, took four dollar bills from his money clip and a half dollar in change from his pocket. Then he got out. The cab door closed. The driver put the clutch down, then up, and the cab rolled away into the darkness. Horner lit a cigarette. It tasted harsh and bitter, stale. The darkness engulfed him and a pulse hammered, of all places, in his right leg. He felt all at once old--or at least aging. He sighed and it was not a sound a young man would make. In the darkness on the unknown road, he longed for his youth, his lost youth. Then he walked resolutely up the dimly lit driveway flanked by the high hemlock hedge. * * * * * The door-knocker was brass, and Horner let it fall. It made a resounding noise and the door opened within a second, as if someone were standing half a foot away on the other side with no job but to admit Hugh Horner the instant he knocked. "Come in, Mr. Horner," the girl said. "Naturally, we were expecting you." She was tall and she wore a cashmere sweater, loose but not so loose that it failed to reveal high, maidenly breasts. She wore a skirt not provocatively tight, but tight enough to suggest the good thighs that she had. Her hair fell almost to her shoulders in abundant auburn waves. She had a lovely face and Horner thought she was about twenty years old. "You were expecting me?" Horner said. "Of course. You see, _Bodies, Inc._ carefully screens its applicants...." "But I didn't apply!" "Ah, but we knew you were going to. We have to be sure of our clients. Because if a single client decided to talk, we'd be out of business." "The authorities?" "Certainly. But since you're here, we can get down to business at once. You have the three thousand dollars with you?" "Why, no. No, I don't." "Bankbook?" "Yes, I have that."