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HAPPY: Do that, will you, honey? And see if you can get a friend. We’ll be here for a while. Biff is one of the greatest football players in the country.

GIRL [standing up]: Well, I’m certainly happy to meet you.

HAPPY: Come back soon.

GIRL: I’ll try.

HAPPY: Don’t try, honey, try hard.

[The GIRL exits. STANLEY follows, shaking his head in bewildered admiration.]

HAPPY: Isn’t that a shame now? A beautiful girl like that? That’s why I can’t get married. There’s not a good woman in a thousand. New York is loaded with them, kid!

BIFF: Hap, look—

HAPPY: I told you she was on call!

BIFF [strangely unnerved]: Cut it out, will ya? I want to say something to you.

HAPPY: Did you see Oliver?

BIFF: I saw him all right. Now look, I want to tell Dad a couple of things and I want you to help me.

HAPPY: What? Is he going to back you?

BIFF: Are you crazy? You’re out of your goddam head, you know that?

HAPPY: Why? What happened?

BIFF [breathlessly]: I did a terrible thing today, Hap. It’s been the strangest day I ever went through. I’m all numb, I swear.

HAPPY: You mean he wouldn’t see you?

BIFF: Well, I waited six hours for him, see? All day. Kept sending my name in. Even tried to date his secretary so she’d get me to him, but no soap.

HAPPY: Because you’re not showin’ the old confidence, Biff. He remembered you, didn’t he?

BIFF [stopping HAPPY with a gesture]: Finally, about five o’clock, he comes out. Didn’t remember who I was or anything. I felt like such an idiot, Hap.

HAPPY: Did you tell him my Florida idea?

BIFF: He walked away. I saw him for one minute. I got so mad I could’ve torn the walls down! How the hell did I ever get the idea I was a salesman there? I even believed myself that I’d been a salesman for him! And then he gave me one look and—I realized what a ridiculous lie my whole life has been. We’ve been talking in a dream for fifteen years. I was a shipping clerk.

HAPPY: What’d you do?

BIFF [with great tension and wonder]: Well, he left, see. And the secretary went out. I was all alone in the waiting-room. I don’t know what came over me, Hap. The next thing I know I’m in his office—paneled walls, everything. I can’t explain it. I—Hap, I took his fountain pen.

HAPPY: Geez, did he catch you?

BIFF: I ran out. I ran down all eleven flights. I ran and ran and ran.

HAPPY: That was an awful dumb—what’d you do that for?

BIFF [agonized]: I don’t know, I just—wanted to take something, I don’t know. You gotta help me, Hap, I’m gonna tell Pop.

HAPPY: You crazy? What for?

BIFF: Hap, he’s got to understand that I’m not the man somebody lends that kind of money to. He thinks I’ve been spiting him all these years and it’s eating him up.

HAPPY: That’s just it. You tell him something nice.

BIFF: I can’t.

HAPPY: Say you got a lunch date with Oliver tomorrow.

BIFF: So what do I do tomorrow?

HAPPY: You leave the house tomorrow and come back at night and say Oliver is thinking it over. And he thinks it over for a couple of weeks, and gradually it fades away and nobody’s the worse.

BIFF: But it’ll go on for ever!

HAPPY: Dad is never so happy as when he’s looking forward to something!

[WILLY enters.]

HAPPY: Hello, scout!

WILLY: Gee, I haven’t been here in years!

[STANLEY has followed WILLY in and sets a chair for him. STANLEY starts off but HAPPY stops him.]

HAPPY: Stanley!

[STANLEY stands by, waiting for an order.]

BIFF [going to WILLY with guilt, as to an invalid]: Sit down, Pop. You want a drink?

WILLY: Sure, I don’t mind.

BIFF: Let’s get a load on.

WILLY: You look worried.

BIFF: N-no. [To STANLEY] Scotch all around. Make it doubles.

STANLEY: Doubles, right. [He goes.]

WILLY: You had a couple already, didn’t you?

BIFF: Just a couple, yeah.

WILLY: Well, what happened, boy? [Nodding affirmatively, with a smile] Everything go all right?

BIFF [takes a breath, then reaches out and grasps WILLY’S hand]: Pal . . . [He is smiling bravely, and WILLY is smiling too.] I had an experience today.

HAPPY: Terrific, Pop.

WILLY: That so? What happened?

BIFF [high, slightly alcoholic,