“So everything’s okay over there, eh?” Clinton said.

“Over where?”

“The Neighborhood!”

“Oh. Well, everything’s just the same.”

“Nobody’s house burnt down, huh?”

“Whose?”

“Nobody’s. I said, ‘Nobody’s house burnt down, huh?”

“Of course not! That’s a terrible thing to say.”

“I just meant, is there any news, for godsake.” Clinton was beginning to wish he had not telephoned Mildred Murphy at all.

“Oh. No, no news at all. But you’ll have to tell me about your trip. Some time.”

“Well, there’s not really anything I can discuss about it. Actually, everything that happened is pretty much secret. You know how it is.”

“I see. —Well, may I ask why you called up?”

“Just to say hello. And to see if there’s anything goin’ on over there I didn’t know about. But I should of known better. Because, let’s face it, there’s nothing over there to begin with but a bunch of scrags.”

“Oh, really?” Mildred said.

“All right, when did anything ever happen over there? Name something, say in the last four hundred years, and not counting Fritz Burns getting shot by a cop in a gas station and losing his left lung. Which is ancient history. Can you?”

“No, I can’t,” Mildred said after a slight pause. “Nobody has robbed a gas station since Fritz Burns got shot. I’m awfully sorry, Clinton.”

“Oh, that’s perfectly all right, Mildred. But what do you do when you get so bored you can’t stand it?”

“Well,” Mildred said, “I’ll tell you the truth, I don’t get that bored. But if I did, I think I’d sit down and decide who was the most fascinating person I knew. And then I’d call them up on the telephone.”

“Oh, would you?”

“Yes. Isn’t that exactly what you’d do?”

“No. But it’s a swell idea. My trouble is, I don’t know a single fascinating person in the whole State of Ohio.”

“Isn’t that a shame?”

“Yes, it really is. Well, I got to hang up now, Mildred. But I hope nobody over there drowns or anything like that.”

“Thank you, Clinton. It was just sensational hearing your voice.”

“Yeah, I thought it’d be quite a treat for you. G’bye.”

There was a click on the other end of the wire.

Clinton heard the sound of Annabel’s bath water running down the drain. He hurried up the stairs and had climbed into bed long before Annabel left the bathroom.

When he had entered certain fragments of his telephone conversation, Clinton read all that he had written on the previous day. It began with the rough draft of a suicide note:

[Clinton’s Notebook]

DEAR RALPH AND ANNABEL,

I suppose this news will come as a shock, but I have just killed myself and am now lying in the upstairs bathtub. Believe me, I am filled with deep regret over whatever mess this causes, but I have taken certain precautions to make it easy on all of us.

I have locked the bathroom door from the inside so that you would not just walk in without any warning and scream because of the horrible sight. I suggest you get a doctor or a policeman to go up there. The key is ten inches inside of the door. Tell the policeman to bring a small magnet and pull it through in this way. Then he can unlock the door and pull out the plug, and all the blood will go down the drain. I have chosen wrist slitting in a warm tub as my method, as it is known to be fairly clean and painless. I am sure the policeman will rinse out the tub if you so request.