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front and wrapped a paper collar around my neck.
“Quite a lot,” I said truthfully.
“Well, you’re in God’s country now. How short do you want it?”
“Short enough so I don’t look like”—a hippie, I almost finished, but Baumer wouldn’t know what
that was—“like a beatnik.”
“Let it get a little out of control, I guess.” He began to clip. “Leave it much longer and you’d look
like that faggot who runs the Jolly White Elephant.”
“I wouldn’t want that,” I said.
“Nosir, he’s a sight, that one.” That-un.
When Baumer finished, he powdered the back of my neck, asked me if I wanted Vitalis, Brylcreem,
or Wildroot Cream Oil, and charged me forty cents.
I call that a deal.
5
My thousand-dollar deposit at the Hometown Trust raised no eyebrows. The freshly barbered look
probably helped, but I think it was mostly being in a cash-and-carry society where credit cards were
still in their infancy . . . and probably regarded with some suspicion by thrifty Yankees. A severely
pretty teller with her hair done up in tight rolls and a cameo at her throat counted my money, entered
the amount in a ledger, then called over the assistant manager, who counted it again, checked the
ledger, and then wrote out a receipt that showed both the deposit and the total in my new checking
account.
“If you don’t mind me saying so, that’s a mighty big amount to be carrying in checking, Mr.
Amberson. Would you like to open a savings account? We’re currently offering three percent interest,
compounded quarterly.” He widened his eyes to show me what a wonderful deal this was. He looked
like that old-time Cuban bandleader, Xavier Cugat.
“Thanks, but I’ve got a fair amount of business to transact.” I lowered my voice. “Real estate
closing. Or so I hope.”
“Good luck,” he said, lowering his own to the same confidential pitch. “Lorraine will fix you up
with checks. Fifty enough to go on with?”
“Fifty would be fine.”
“Later on, we can have some printed with your name and your address.” He raised his eyebrows,
turning it into a question.
“I expect to be in Derry. I’ll be in touch.”
“Fine. I’m at Drexel eight four-seven-seven-seven.”
I had no idea what he was talking about until he slid a business card through the window. Gregory
Dusen, Assistant Manager, was engraved on it, and DRexel 8-4777.
Lorraine got my checks and a faux alligator checkbook to put them in. I thanked her and dropped
them into my briefcase. At the door I paused for a look back. A couple of the tellers were working
adding machines, but otherwise the transactions were all of the pen-and-elbow-grease variety. It
occurred to me that, with a few exceptions, Charles Dickens would have felt at home here. It also
occurred to me that living in the past was a little like living underwater and breathing through a
tube.