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Farmers Prime Butchery …
    There was no Farrell listed among the F’s.
    Thoroughly frustrated now, she began thumbing through pages at random, checking out F’s in towns with names like Chingold, Kazimuli, Kitwe, Kabwe. There seemed to be very few family names listed, and a vast number of government offices and co-ops. In small towns with only a dozen or so entries she noticed that telephone service was available for only a few hours each day, but none of these listed a Farrell either. Extensive research lay ahead, and she realized that in only six and a half hours she would be leaving for Chunga.
    This time she began at the very beginning of the directory, but after an hour’s diligent study she had still found no John Sebastian Farrell. Yet Bishop had reported that he was
here
, and that all of the checks sent to him in Lusaka had been picked up and cashed.
    Barclay’s Bank
, she thought abruptly and, reaching for the telephone, dialed the front desk to ask what hours the banks were open. From eight o’clock to twelve, the desk clerk informed her.
    It was half-past eight now. “And the afternoon hours?”
    There were no afternoon hours.
    Mrs. Pollifax thanked him, and with a wistful glance at her pajamas she picked up her purse and went out.
    Cairo Road was a bustling main street lined with modern shops. A strip of green divided its double roadway, and there were pleasing, tree-lined cobbled spaces inserted between the buildings, restful to the eye. Women in long bright skirts, blouses and turbans mingled with women in smart frocks and sandals. Almost all of the faces were black, and almost all of the voices she overheard had unexpected and very charming British accents.It was a noisy, cheerful scene, with a great deal of tooting from the small cars, motor scooters, Land Rovers and bicycles that streamed up and down Cairo Road.
    Mrs. Pollifax paid her driver and walked into Barclay’s Bank to the window marked INQUIRIES — MAIL . The man behind the counter looked forbidding, his black face buttoned into bureaucratic aloofness. She cleared her throat to gain his attention. “This is where mail is picked up?”
    “Yes, madam,” he said, regarding her with expressionless eyes. “Your name is—?”
    She shook her head. “I’m not looking for mail, I’m looking for a man who receives his mail here. For three years his mail has been directed to him in care of Barclay’s Bank, Lusaka. I don’t have his address,” she explained, “and I’ve come all the way from America and I find he’s not listed in the telephone book.”
    “This is rather interesting,” he said politely.
    “His name is John Sebastian Farrell,” she told him. “I thought perhaps after three years you might be forwarding his letters to an address?”
    His gaze remained aloof, but after a moment he turned and called, “Jacob?”
    The beaming young man who appeared was of a different generation; his tie was flaming red and his face eager. Mrs. Pollifax repeated her query to him, and he promptly said, “No address, he still gets his mail here.”
    “Personally?” asked his superior, who suddenly gave evidence of understanding exactly what Mrs. Pollifax wanted.
    “I’ve never seen him,” said Jacob. “A boy picks it up.”
    “Always?” faltered Mrs. Pollifax.
    “I have never seen this man either,” said the olderclerk. “There has been some curiosity about him, of course. I too have only seen a boy ask for Mr. Farrell’s mail. Not often, sometimes not for three months. A different boy each time.”
    “Oh,” said Mrs. Pollifax, her heart sinking. “Oh dear. Are there—perhaps I shouldn’t ask—but are there any letters waiting for him now, so that someone might be picking up his mail soon? I could write a note,” she explained.
    Now they were both gripped by her problem, touched by her dismay, their eyes sympathetic. “It would be good for you to write a letter to your friend,” Jacob said earnestly, “but only two