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door. Nothing. It was as if the apartment were empty. For a moment I thought of going on in. Then I turned, got down on my knees and began rerouting the letters and magazines. It’s a job without a case. Twenty minutes later
    I had the mail up. I stuck some letters in the lock box, dropped the magazines on the porch, locked the box, turned, looked at the screen door again. Still not a sound.
    I finished the route, walking along, thinking, well, he’ll phone and tell Jonstone that I threatened him. When I get in I better be ready for the worst.
       I swung the door open and there was The Stone at his desk, reading something.
    I stood there, looking down at him, waiting.
    The Stone glanced up at me, then down at what he was reading.
    I kept standing there, waiting.
    The Stone kept reading.
    “Well,” I finally said, “what about it?”
    “What about what?” The Stone looked up. “ABOUT THE PHONE CALL! TELL ME ALL ABOUT THE PHONE CALL! DON’T JUST SIT THERE!”
    “What phone call?”
    “You didn’t get a phone call about me?”
    “A phone call? What happened? What have you been doing out there? What did you do?”
    “Nothing.”
    I walked over and checked my stuff in. The guy hadn’t phoned in. No grace on his part. He probably thought I would come back if he phoned in. I walked past The Stone on my way back to the case. “What did you
do
out there, Chinaski?”
    “Nothing.”
    My act so confused The Stone that he forgot to tell me I was 30 minutes late or write me up for it.

16
    I was casing next to G.G. early one morning. That’s what they called him: G.G. His actual name was George Greene. But for years he was simply called G.G. and after a while he looked like G.G. He had been a carrier since his early twenties and now he was in his late sixties. His voice was gone. He didn’t speak. He croaked. And when he croaked, he didn’t say much. He was neither liked nor disliked. He was just there. His face had wrinkled into strange runs and mounds of unattractive flesh. No light shone from his face. He was just a hard old crony who had done his job: G.G. The eyes looked like dull bits of clay dropped into the eye sockets.
    It was best if you didn’t think about him or look at him.
    But G.G., having all that seniority had one of the easiest routes, right out on the fringe of the rich district. In fact, you might call it the rich district. Although the houses were old, they were large, most of them two stories high. Wide lawns mowed and kept green by Japanese gardeners. Some movie stars lived there. A famous cartoonist. A best-selling writer. Two former governors. Nobody ever spoke to you in that area. You never saw anybody. The only time you saw anybody was at the beginning of the route where there were less expensive homes, and here the children bothered you. I mean, G.G. was a bachelor. And he had this whistle. At the beginning of his route, he’d stand tall and straight, take out the whistle, a large one, and blow it, spit flying out in all directions. That was to let the children know he was there. He had candy for the children. And they’d come running out and he’d give them candy as he went down the street. Good old G.G.
    I’d found out about the candy the first time I got the route. The Stone didn’t like to give me a route that easy but sometimes he couldn’t help it. So I walked along and this young boy came out and asked me,
    “Hey, where’s my candy?”
    And I said, “What candy, kid?”
    And the kid said,
“My
candy! I want
my
candy!”
    “Look, kid,” I said, “you must be crazy. Does your mother just let you run around loose?”
    The kid looked at me strangely.
       But one day G.G. got into trouble. Good old G.G. He met this new little girl in the neighborhood. And gave her some candy. And said, “My, you’re a
pretty
little girl! I’d like to have you for my own little girl!”
    The mother had been listening at the window and she ran out screaming, accusing G.G. of child