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Show 427 slovenly handwriting and her first name to turn up and scald him across the eyes. After work he offered to buy Maxine a drink at Mario's in order to sift her in case she happened to remember the woman with the wicker handbag crusted over with shells who had come to her window just before lunch-sometimes a customer would say something to make you remember her-but he had never offered to buy Maxine a drink before, and she made some excuse, looking at him with worried eyes. It was all right. He had better things to do than inquire after ghosts. He had been startled, was all. This was on the same day that street people had barricaded the sidewalk in front of Lew Ritter's in the Village, using oil drums stuffed with old clothes and set on fire. It was also the same day Janet had asked to be transferred to the Pasadena branch-he was sorry about that, he liked Janet-and that he learned Sam Bandera, one of his old teachers at UCLA, had died. He found that out from a copy of the Daily Bruin that one of the part-time tellers had left in the coffee room. The copy was a couple of days old, and he reflected, eating his tuna sandwich, that Sam would be cold and buried by now. Sam wouldn't have remembered him, but Lorin nevertheless felt a sense of loss. It was also the day he had hit all the signals wrong coming in from Santa Monica and consequently reached his usual parking lot too late to find a space and had been forced to use the multilevel lot at Bullock's, which made him late and guaranteed him an expensive ticket, and forced him into a different traffic pattern when he left to go home. A lane was blocked, and he had to turn right on Westwood Boulevard, which carried him into the university campus, which was overflowing with cars going the opposite direction. There was no turning around while the rush was on, and he didn't want to continue on through campus and join the logjam at the Sunset exit, so he pulled into a lot by the gymnasiums-it |