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"It is?"

"We had a top-to-bottom house cleaning a week ago."

The Senator winced, nudged a beer can with his toe. "Not on my account, I hope. Just because I fear an outbreak of cholera is no reason you should, too." This was said quietly.

"You know Delbert Peach, I believe?"

"I know of him." The Senator nodded. "How do you do, Mr. Peach. I'm certainly familiar with your war record. Deserted twice, didn't you? Or was it three times?"

Peach, cowering and sullen in the presence of such a majestic person, mumbled that he had never served in the armed forces.

"It was your father, then. I apologize. It's hard to tell how old people are, if they seldom wash or shave. "

Peach admitted with his silence that it probably had been his father who had deserted three times.

"I wonder if we might not be alone for a few moments," the Senator said to Eliot, "or would that run counter to your concept of how open and friendly our society should be?"

"I'm leaving," said Peach. "I know when I'm not wanted."

"I imagine you've had plenty of opportunities to learn," said the Senator.

Peach, who was shuffling out the door, turned at this insult, surprised even himself by understanding that he had been insulted. "For a man who depends on the votes of the ordinary common people, Senator, you certainly can say mean things to them."

"As a drunk, Mr. Peach, you must surely know that drunks are not allowed in polling places."

"I've voted." This was a transparent lie.

"If you have, you've probably voted for me. Most people do, even though I never flattered the people of Indiana in my life, not even in time of war. And do you know why they vote for me? Inside of every American, I don't care how decayed, is a scrawny, twanging old futz like me, who hates crooks and weaklings even more than I do."

"Gee, Father—I certainly didn't expect to see you. What a pleasant surprise. You look wonderful."

"I feel rotten. I have rotten news for you, too. I thought I'd better deliver it in person."

Eliot frowned slightly. "When was the last time your bowels moved?"

"None of your business!"

"Sorry."

"I'm not here for a cathartic. The C.I.O. says my bowels haven't moved since the National Recovery Act was declared unconstitutional, but that's not why I'm here."

"You said everything was so rotten."

"So?"

"Usually, when somebody comes in here and says that, nine times out of ten, it's a case of constipation."

"I'll tell you what the news is, boy, and then let's see if you can cheer up with Ex-Lax. A young lawyer working for McAllister, Robjent, Reed and McGee, with full access to all the confidential files about you, has quit. He's hired out to the Rhode Island Rosewaters. They're going to get you in court. They're going to prove you're insane."

The buzzer of Eliot's alarm clock went off. Eliot picked up the clock, went to the red button on the wall. He watched the sweep secondhand of the clock intently, his lips working, counting off the seconds. He aimed the blunt middle finger of his left hand at the button, suddenly stabbed, thus activating the loudest fire alarm in the Western Hemisphere.

The awful shout of the horn hurled the Senator against a wall, curled him up with his hands over his ears. A dog in New Ambrosia, seven miles away, ran in circles, bit his tail. A stranger in the Saw City Kandy Kitchen threw coffee all over himself and the proprietor. In Bella's Beauty Nook in the basement of the Court House, three-hundred-pound Bella had a mild heart attack. And wits throughout the county poised themselves to tell a tired and untruthful joke about Fire Chief Charley Warmergran, who had an insurance office next to the firehouse: "Must have scared Charley Warmergram half out of his secretary."

Eliot released the button. The great alarm began to swallow its own voice, speaking gutturally and interminably of "bubblegum, bubblegum, bubblegum."

There was no fire. It was simply high noon in Rosewater.

"What a racket!" the Senator mourned, straightening up slowly. "I've forgotten everything I ever knew."

"That might be nice."

"Did you