Free Welcome to the Monkey House: The Special Edition by Gregory D. Sumner Kurt Vonnegut Page B

the clients’ lists of securities, and relay our experts’ suggestions for ways of making their portfolios—or bonanzas or piles—thrive and increase. I can speak of tens of thousands of dollars without a catch in my throat, and look at a list of securities worth more than a hundred thousand with no more fuss than a judicious “Mmmmm, uh-huh.”
    Since
I
don’t have a portfolio, my job is a little like being a hungry delivery boy for a candy store. But I never really feltthat way about it until Herbert Foster asked me to have a look at his finances.
    He called one evening to say a friend had recommended me, and could I come out to talk business. I washed, shaved, dusted my shoes, put on my uniform, and made my grave arrival by cab.
    People in my business—and maybe people in general—have an unsavory habit of sizing up a man’s house, car, and suit, and estimating his annual income. Herbert Foster was six thousand a year, or I’d never seen it. Understand, I have nothing against people in moderate circumstances, other than the crucial fact that I can’t make any money off them. It made me a little sore that Foster would take my time, when the most he had to play around with, I guessed, was no more than a few hundred dollars. Say it was a thousand: my take would be a dollar or two at best.
    ·    ·    ·
    Anyway, there I was in the Fosters’ jerry-built postwar colonial with expansion attic. They had taken up a local furniture store on its offer of three rooms of furniture, including ashtrays, a humidor, and pictures for the wall, all for $199.99. Hell, I was there, and I figured I might as well go through with having a look at his pathetic problem.
    “Nice place you have here, Mr. Foster,” I said. “And this is your charming wife?”
    A skinny, shrewish-looking woman smiled up at me vacuously. She wore a faded housecoat figured with a fox-hunting scene. The print was at war with the slipcover of the chair, and I had to squint to separate her features from the clash about her. “A pleasure, Mrs. Foster,” I said. She was surrounded by underwear and socks to be mended, and Herbert said her name was Alma, which seemed entirely possible.
    “And this is the young master,” I said. “Bright little chap. Believe he favors his father.” The two-year-old wiped his grubby hands on my trousers, snuffled, and padded off towardthe piano. He stationed himself at the upper end of the keyboard, and hammered on the highest note for one minute, then two, then three.
    “Musical—like his father,” Alma said.
    “You play, do you, Mr. Foster?”
    “Classical,” Herbert said. I took my first good look at him. He was lightly built, with the round, freckled face and big teeth I usually associate with a show-off or wise guy. It was hard to believe that he had settled for so plain a wife, or that he could be as fond of family life as he seemed. It may have been that I only imagined a look of quiet desperation in his eyes.
    “Shouldn’t you be getting on to your meeting, dear?” Herbert said.
    “It was called off at the last minute.”
    “Now, about your portfolio—” I began.
    Herbert looked rattled. “How’s that?”
    “Your portfolio—your securities.”
    “Yes, well, I think we’d better talk in the bedroom. It’s quieter in there.”
    Alma put down her sewing. “What securities?”
    “The bonds, dear. The government bonds.”
    “Now, Herbert, you’re not going to cash them in.”
    “No, Alma, just want to talk them over.”
    “I see,” I said tentatively. “Uh—approximately how much in government bonds?”
    “Three hundred and fifty dollars,” Alma said proudly.
    “Well,” I said, “I don’t see any need for going into the bedroom to talk. My advice, and I give it free, is to hang on to your nest egg until it matures. And now, if you’ll let me phone a cab—”
    “Please,” Herbert said, standing in the bedroom door, “there are a couple of other things I’d like to