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once and for all, and the only way to accomplish that happy end is to grind out another thirty thousand words of drivel to match the thirty thousand words I’ve got done so far. Jesus, I wish this book were out of the way!”
    The book was a mystery, tentatively going under the title of Murder By Moonlight. The title would probably be changed, if only because it had a too-familiar ring to it and Linc was certain it had been used before at least once. Now, however, the title was the least of anybody’s worries.
    “Why don’t you try something else?” Roz suggested. “A new book, one you can enjoy working on. Something to break the slump.”
    “It won’t work.”
    “How do you know?”
    “Because I tried. Oh, last week—I didn’t bother to tell you about it. I put fresh paper in the typewriter and went to work on a straight novel, just swinging along off the top of my head. I did ten pages.”
    “Why, that’s wonderful!”
    “The hell it is. I ripped it up, Roz. It was lousy. Wooden prose, stiff dialogue, the works. Genuinely bad. All I managed to do was waste ten sheets of paper. That’s all.”
    She looked at him, then looked away. “This is a bad one,” she said.
    “The worst yet.”
    “It’ll straighten itself out, Linc. It—”
    “It has to, but God knows how or when. Roz, maybe I should take a job. It wouldn’t have to be permanent, just a stop-gap measure until things start to click again. Editorial work, something along those lines. There’s no sense starving.”
    “Is that what you want?”
    His hand went to his beard, stroking it thoughtfully. “Sure,” he said, forcing a weak grin. “Hell, I can hit one of the cheap houses for a job. I can pick up something that’ll mean steady money, a check every week that we can count on. And I’d go on trying to write in the evenings until we worked our way out of this jam, and then—”
    “No!”
    He looked at her.
    “Damn it,” she said, “you’re a writer, Linc. You’re not an editor and you’re not a hired hand. You’re a writer.”
    “Some writer.”
    “Yes, some writer. A damned good writer, Linc. And you don’t have to scoot into New York on the damned 8:30 with the rest of the galley slaves. You can stay right here and you can lick this slump. We’ll manage.”
    He reached across the table, rumpling her dark brown hair. “Wise guy,” he said. “Tough old broad.”
    “I mean it, Linc.”
    “I know you do.”
    He stood up, stuffing the pack of cigarettes into his shirt pocket, picking up a pack of matches. “What the hell,” he said. “I’m going to sit in front of the machine for awhile. The blessed typewriter. Maybe something’ll happen. I’ve been on page 98 of good old Murder By Moonlight for one hell of a long time. Maybe I can make it to page 99.”
    She stayed in her seat and watched him go. She thought how much she loved him, during the good times and the bad times as well. Now he was going to torture himself, was going to tear his hair out trying to make words come, trying to draw water from a dry well. But he had to do this, had to continue going to the typewriter every day and sitting there as long as he could. Eventually something would happen. Eventually the words would come again, the well would yield water, the words would push out at breakneck pace. Then he’d be in his study for hours on end, punching typewriter keys like a madman, going without food and sleep, living on coffee and cigarettes until the book was done and another book was started. When Linc worked, he was a dynamo. Now, in a slump, the current was off and he could do nothing about it.
    The slump would end. All slumps ended.
    Soon, she wished. God, make it be soon!

6
    E LLY C ARR hadn’t heard the car stop at the curb in front. She was busy vacuuming the living room rug, and the noise of the vacuum cleaner was enough to drown out the sound of the big Buick hardtop pulling to a stop in front of her house. She heard the doorbell, though,