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Stanley's retirement--some of the older men had died--but the judge was still there, looking about the same as he had in the beginning. Stanley, when he looked in the mirror to shave each morning, didn't think that he had changed much either. He realized deep down that he must have aged somewhat, because the others had, but he felt better in Florida than he had ever felt back in Michigan when he had had to go to work every day.
     
    One morning the topic under discussion was the "dirtiest thing in the world." Theories and suggestions had been tendered, but they had all been shot down by the judge. Finally, toward noon, Stanley had looked at his cane, cleared his throat, and said: "The tip of a cane is the dirtiest thing in the world."
     
    "That's it," the judge said, nodding sagely. "There's nothing dirtier than the tip of a cane. It taps the ground indiscriminately, touching spittle, dog droppings, any and everything in its blind groping. By the end of a short walk, the septic tip of a cane probably collects enough germs to destroy a small city. I believe you've hit upon it, Mr. Sinkiewicz, and we can safely say that this is now a closed topic."
     
    The others nodded, and they all looked at Stanley's cane, marveling at the filthy things the rubber tip had touched as Stanley had carried it through the years. After that triumph, Stanley had contributed nothing more to the morning discussions, but he was definitely considered a fringe member and was greeted by name when he sat down to listen.
     
    But Stanley didn't go to Julia Tuttle Park every single day like the others. He was too restless. He sometimes drove to Palm Beach instead, parked, and walked along Worth Avenue, window shopping, marveling at the high prices of things. Like Maya, he visited the International Mall on U.S. 1, or parked in the visitors' lot of the West Palm Beach Public Library. He would browse through the obituaries in the Detroit Free Press, looking for the names of old acquaintances. The fact was, Stanley didn't quite know what to do with his long free mornings, yet although he was frequently bored, searching for something to do to pass the morning hours, he was unaware of his boredom. He was retired, and he knew that a man who was retired didn't have to do anything. So this was what he did: Nothing much, except for wandering around.
     
    Once a week he cut the lawn, whether it needed it or not. In the rainy season, lawns had to have a weekly cutting; in the winter, when the weather was dry, the lawn could have gone for three weeks or more. But by mowing one day every seven, on Tuesday afternoons, he broke up the week. Maya did all the shopping and paid all the monthly bills from their joint checking account. Stanley cashed a check for thirty-five dollars every Monday at the Riviera Beach bank, allowing himself five dollars a day for spending money, but almost always had something left over at the end of the week.
     
    In the evenings, Stanley and Maya watched television. They were hooked up to the cable, with Showtime and thirty-five other channels, but they rarely changed the channel once they were sitting down. Sometimes they watched the same movie on Showtime four or five times in a single month. Maya went to bed at ten, but Stanley always stayed up and watched the eleven o'clock news. Because of his afternoon nap, he could rarely fall asleep before midnight. He rose at six A.M., though, got the -Post-Times- from the lawn, drank some coffee, and read the paper until Maya got up to fix his breakfast.
     
    On a Wednesday afternoon in June, Stanley was asleep on the screened porch behind the house at three-thirty when Pammi Sneider, the nine-year-old daughter of a retired U.S. Army master sergeant who leased a Union gas station out on Military Trail, came through the unlocked screen door. Pammi was a frequent visitor when Maya was home, because Maya would give the girl cookies and a glass of red Kool-Aid, or sometimes, when she had been baking, a