More so, since for the past two days Mr George Lorsch had been spending a great many hours in the building. Mr Lorsch was the vice-president of the company in charge of operations. His picture often appeared in the society pages of the newspapers. And because he spent only a few busy days of the year in the building, inspecting and going over the efficiency of the various departments, Mr Newman could easily imagine Mr Gargan’s gratitude at the hiring of an exceptional employee at this particular time. For it was Mr Lorsch who, according to well founded rumor, had laid down the original specifications for the type of person to be employed by the company. The man never walked onto a floor without thoughtfully scanning the girls as he made his way from office to office. In the past two days he had twice looked squarely into Mr Newman’s face as he passed the cubicle and once had smiled in at him. Mr Newman bent to the quest for the perfect girl.

He looked down at the three remaining job applications on his desk. The name at the top of one form pleased him. Gertrude Hart, age thirty-six, three years of high school. Unmarried, Episcopalian. Born in Rochester, New York. He called the receptionist’s desk through his phone and asked for Gertrude Hart to be sent in.

She arrived before his desk quite strangely. Girls applying to him rarely smelled even of cologne; her perfume hung heavy in the air around her. Never did they arrive with flowers in their hair; she had a real pink rose pinned atop her upswept brown crest. And yet she was stately, quite erect and refined. She was resting her hands loosely and gracefully upon the chair back as she stood there looking at him, and she had a way of lounging on one hip that was not suggestive, but only a posture of abounding ease. Most startling of all – even above that black and glossy dress – was her smile, which raised her left eyebrow a fraction higher than the other: without uncurving her full lips she was smiling. Mr Newman heard his voice saying, ‘Please sit down.’

His stomach twitched as she swung closer to him and sat beside his desk. When she rested her arm on the edge of the top he went dry, as though she had reached over and smoothed his face, for his desk was as personal and alive a part of him as a member of his body. Suddenly he was aware of the astonishing curve of her legs and her thighs, one of which was touching his desk. His neck, his chest, his arms felt bloated.

He looked down as though to study her application form. The words on the sheet turned grey and then vanished. Not daring to look up at her, he tried to remember what her face had looked like. It further astonished him, now as he stared at the application form, that he had not taken in any facts about her face. She was like the woman of his vision – an odor and thighs and an erect back. And he looked up and found her face.