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By Root 1422 0

mind you, and the romantic ones: the ones who dream in the moonlight, those who make a fuss over ten lire, those who hope and swallow everything, and those who like to drag it out. They make us hop, all right. Well, that's the way they like it: like a bunch of she-cats in February. Nothing you can do about it. It takes patience! Then there are the other ones, the brisk ones, who come straight to the point. I tell you, Doctor, you have to know how to handle them. Each in his own way. But, believe me, if we're going to work the way we should, first they have to fall in love! I don't mean with us exactly, we're just middlemen, although ... not even a pretty doll would throw us away . . . what the hell ... no, not us but . . . you might say, with Standard in general. They have to fall in love with Standard Oil, learn to trust Standard blindly, take what we give them! Because, we know what to give them, better than they do, the kind of bottle each one needs: this kind, and not that. Why, a world-wide organization like ours! I should hope so! Tens of thousands of gallons per year, in Europe alone, of the finest kinds of oil, that tells you something about Standard Oil, eh? Not something to kid about.

"Our great secret, you see, is the secret we like to tell everybody: the constancy of the specifications for each different kind of oil. Now, for example, take our unbeatable Transformer Oil B, Grade 11-Extra. You can ask about it here in Rome: Engineer Casalis of the Anglo-Romana Company, or Engineer Bocciarelli of the Terni." He assisted himself with the fingers of his left hand, thumb, index, middle finger, unrolling them one after the other, to list the merits of Grade 11-Extra; he reached his little finger, and remained there: "Absolutely waterless: this is the most basic essential; yes, the sine qua non: freezing point . . . extremely low: viscosity . . . 2.4 Wayne, at the outside: acid value, negligible: dielectric strength, amazing: flash point ... the highest of all American industrial oils.

"Now, you tell me, what more can you ask from an oil for transformers? But then, as I said before, what really counts, more than anything else, is the constancy of the specifications in every grade: the characteristics that indicate the merit of a given oil . . . of our Transformer B, I mean. Always the same! Always! Identical, any time and any place: from one shipment to the next." He raised his voice. "Over a period of years! The world can come to an end, the phoenix can rise from its ashes, the Colosseum can catch fire ... but Standard's Transformer Oil B, 11-Extra, is what it is, and remains what it is. Our client can sleep the sleep of the just, believe me. We know what he needs. And a lot of our clients have finally caught on to this themselves. It's easy enough for them to be unfaithful to us. But then what? Here you have a transformer that's cost you a million, let's say, and you wake up one fine morning and realize that you've been pouring tomato sauce into it, instead of oil. And when your transformer has burnt out on you, the first storm that comes along, then what do you do? You can kiss any operating economy good-bye! And it's good-bye to amortizement in fifteen years, or ten years! ... Or in eight months, for that matter! . . . No, believe me, doctor, it isn't only the price that should determine the transaction, that's the bait ... the bald fact of the amount: four, nine, six the quintal. No. The price . . . well, you know. Take a watch for example: you can find one for fourteen-fifty in some little store in Via dei Greci; but a good watch sets you back two thousand lire at Catellani's. You try to buy yourself a Patek Philippe, a Longines, a Vacheron-Constantin ... for fourteen-fifty. Where are you going to find anybody who'll let one go for that? If you find me one, then that'll be the day I can make a present of my Transformer B 11-Extra at the price ... at the price of some of the other stuff they've got on the market!"

He sighed, "Ah, well, so it goes." Ingravallo was in a stupor. His eyelids had begun to drop forward