At noon I went back to the office where they had fibbed to me and asked for my availability slip, but they wouldn't return it. I asked, "Where is the next man higher up?" They showed me his office and I told him my story. But he was not impressed and he could not return my slip either. Then I asked him who was the top man. By this time I was tired of going up step by step. He told me and I went to see him and told him the same story. It was easy to tell by now, I had it memorized word for word. I told the same story and got the same results. Finally I told him, "It looks like you fellows want my slip more than I do. Okay, you can keep it. I'm going to California and go to work at a better job." He warned me that I would get into trouble and couldn't get a job without the slip. But I told him to just come along and watch me, I'd show him. I drove back through Hamlin and took Ima and the kids to San Angelo. They stayed there with Ima's folks and I went to California alone. At the employment office in California, I told the lady I didn't want to get into trouble, so I wanted to tell her the whole story and then ask her what I should do. She told me that wouldn't be necessary, and added, "Texas and California are two different countries; I'll give you another slip. We need you out here." I took the slip--my third one--and went back to work at the same job at Vega, through the same office where they kept my first slip when I quit and went back to Texas. I gave them this new slip and I guess they were happy, now they had two of my slips. Anyway, I went back to building boxes for them. All that running around had cost me quite a bit of money. I needed to make up for some of the loss so I worked ten hours a day at my regular job, got off at five in the afternoon, ate supper at the company cafe, drove seven miles and went to work at another plant that belonged to the same company. This second job paid time-and-a-half, and I could work an hour or all night, they didn't care which. The work was there to be done and laborers were scarce. I usually worked until ten o'clock and got to bed by eleven, so I wouldn't lose too much sleep. However, on Saturdays I worked all night. Then one day I got this telegram from Ima that read something like this, "Can you meet me at the Union Depot on Thursday, March 19th at 5:45?" Well, on my way down to my other place of work I had noticed a telegraph office. So I stopped in one afternoon and sent Ima a reply. After all, she had asked a question; the least I could do was to answer it. But I didn't see any need to send her a long message. I figured we could talk with each other after she got to California. Now, if her telegram had said, "Meet me at a certain place at a certain time on a certain day, I could have replied, "Okay." But since she put it in the form of a question, I replied, "Yes."