Mr Newman raised his chin and narrowed his eyes as though deliberating. Why, he asked himself, should I assume they mean to do it violently? And yet when he turned and looked at Fred he knew that they had only been talking about violence. Before he could answer with another hesitating remark, Fred said, ‘We want your class of people. This morning Carlson wanted to lay a real bet you’d buy from Finkelstein. He thought you were the type.’

Despite himself Newman’s wariness fled. ‘What type?’ he asked quickly.

‘You know what I mean,’ Fred said.

Newman did not exactly know. And instantly he feared that his confusion about what Carlson had meant was showing on his face. ‘I’ll join you,’ he said, shifting uneasily on the canvas seat of the chair.

Fred slapped him lightly on the thigh and got up, straddling the foot rest of the beach chair. Lifting one foot over, he hitched up his pants, and speaking with a grin of one letting fall a secret said, ‘You’re all right, Newman.’ He laughed at himself, like a salesman after a sale who is admitting his humanity: ‘You’re one of the few on the block I was having trouble with.’

Newman laughed,’ Having trouble with me?’

He had not realized until now that Fred’s remarks over the past year had been as earnest as all this. He had not realized how much-was going on …

‘I gotta go in, take my pups for a walk. I’m workin’ on a model sailboat down the cellar,’ Fred said, swinging his leg over the railing. ‘Come down later if you got an hour. I’m takin’ it up for a hobby. See ya.’

‘Take it easy now,’ Newman said, as Fred went into his house.

Staring across the street at Carlson’s house, he felt a little easier about it. Carlson was no Fred. Carlson was the chief teller of a bank. A bank man. Recalling how Carlson had turned to him across the street before and said, ‘Invasion’s on,’ Newman felt a little pride in the man’s solicitude. Fred’s, too … It would be rather pleasant being friendly with the neighbors. Perhaps through mingling with them he might meet the right kind of woman. Perhaps …

The thought of tomorrow again came to him. He rose from the beach chair in the pain of anxiety. Where was he to go? What would become of him? … From his right he heard a screen door open, and Fred came out with his two red setters sniffing wildly beside him and tangling each other in their leashes. Fred laughed across the porch barrier to Newman, laughed warmly. Then he went down the stoop to the street with the dogs, their long paw-nails ticking against the concrete walk. Talking in undertones to them he yanked roughly at their leashes whenever they strayed from his heels, and the three moved away into the gathering twilight.

Mr Newman stood for a moment listening to the vanishing ticking of the dog’s nails, and then the silence of the street filled in. Standing there he felt a deep thankfulness at the memory of Fred’s warm smile. A sense of comradeship suffused him. Thank God, he nearly said aloud, not everybody is as stupid as Gargan! He would charge into the city tomorrow and get placed. A better job, even. A …