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230 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1962
“I sore that pitcha. Doctor Jack-o’-Lantern and Mr. Hide.”
There was a burst of wild, delighted laughter and a chorus of correction: “Doctor Jekyll!”
He was unable to speak over the noise. Miss Price was on her feet, furious. “It’s a perfectly natural mistake!” she was saying. “There’s no reason for any of you to be so rude. Go on, Vincent, and please excuse this very silly interruption.” The laughter subsided, but the class continued to shake their heads derisively from side to side. It hadn’t, of course, been a perfectly natural mistake at all; for one thing it proved that he was a hopeless dope, and for another it proved that he was lying.
“That’s what I mean,” he continued. “Doctor Jackal and Mr. Hide.”
That night she had told Martha, and she could still see the look on Martha’s face. “Oh, Grace, you’re not – surely you’re not serious. I mean, I thought he was more or less of a joke – you can’t really mean you want to –”
“Shut up! You just shut up, Martha!” And she’d cried all night. Even now she hated Martha for it; even as she stared blindly at a row of filing cabinets along the office wall, half sick with fear that Martha was right.
“Joe,” Walter said. “I’m leaving. Got the ax.”
“No!” But Collins’s look of shock was plainly an act of kindness; it couldn’t have been much of a surprise. “Jesus, Walt, what the hell’s the matter with these people?”
Then Fred Holmes chimed in, very grave and sorry, clearly pleased with the news: “Gee, boy, that’s a damn shame.”
“People think you gotta be one of two things: either you’re a shark, or you gotta lay back and let the sharks eatcha alive – this is the world. Me, I’m the kinda guy’s gotta go out and wrestle with the sharks. Why? I dunno why. This is crazy? Okay.”