“You’re a boob, Annie. Some absolute stranger tells you to call another stranger, and you think you’ve got a swank suite to move into. What if the rent is five times what it is here? What are you doing with your suitcase open? You haven’t even called the man yet!”

“It’s not only the dog—it’s the German grunting and crying all night. And these crazy old people who live here.”

“Listen, my dear, with the money we have, that’s our crowd you’re being so hoity-toity about.” He giggled.

Annie split open a brown paper sack and emptied her handbag over it. Shreds of tobacco and a dozen or so pennies fell on the paper along with a New Jersey bus timetable and a square piece of cardboard to which had been stapled a dozen small vials of the world’s greatest perfumes Annie had bought in the five-and-ten. She sniffed at the card.

“I’m going out to call that actor. Where’s Sycamore Street?” she asked.

“Up by Grauman’s,” Johnnie answered, snatching the perfume samples from her hand. He uncorked one of the miniature bottles and rubbed the entire contents over his chin. “What do you intend to pay the rent with? Faith?” he asked.

He looked grimy and unlovely sitting there on the mussed bed. She understood that he liked the way things were; he didn’t want her to move.

She was wearing an old white shirt of Walter’s and a pair of Levi’s he’d bought for her at a seamen’s supply shop in New York. She sat down next to Johnnie to put on her sneakers.

“Bring back something to eat, will you?” he asked.

“I have to find another room before Walter comes,” she said.

“Walter! Some sailor whistles and you fall down all in a heap!”

“He’s not some sailor. He’s an actor and a playwright.”

“I know actors. You’d be better off with a sailor.”

They wrangled while she made the bed and Johnnie shaved over the sink with the razor he carried in the pocket of his jacket.

She went off to the drugstore to call Jake Cranford. A woman with a speech defect answered the phone; it seemed to have affected her hearing also, for Annie had to repeat Cranford’s name several times. All at once a bell clanged loudly, drowning out the woman’s voice. There was a momentary silence, then a man said, “Yeah? Jake Cranford here.”

“Mr. Cranford, I met Max Shore yesterday. He said you were giving up your room. He said I might be able to rent it.”

“Not for two weeks I’m not, I don’t think. Who are you?”

“Annie Gianfala,” she said. “Well, do you think I could come and look at it anyhow?”

“Right! Any time.”

“Today?”

There was a deep groan, a whispered “Just a minute.” Had he hung up?

“Mr. Cranford?”