Joseph Heller - Closing Time

"Her name is Melissa."

"Let her know it's safe to trust me. Even though I'm rich and fashionable and used to have some bitchy fame as an actress. I'm glad you're not marrying for money."

"Who's thinking of marriage?"

"By my time with Patrick it was much more than the money. I think I approve. Although I don't like her girlfriend. Patrick has taken to sailing again. I think he may be flying as well. What more can you tell me?"

"I can't tell you a thing."

"And I don't want to know, not this time either. I would feel so guilty if he thought I suspected. I would not want to step on anybody's happiness, especially his. I wish I could have more too, but you know my age. Our friend Olivia may be my exception. She won't visit often but fills the room with this glut of flowers. And she signs each card 'Olivia Maxon,' as though it were a British title and you knew a thousand Olivias. I adore your catering company."

"It's Milo Minderbinder's."

"Two tons of caviar is divine."

"We could have got by with one, but it's safe to have a little more. This wedding in the terminal is just aboul the biggest piece of fun I see in my future."

"It's just about my only fun. Oh, John, Johnny, it's a terrible thing you just did to me," said Frances Beach. "When I learned you were sick, I finally felt old for the first time. You will recover, and I never will. There's somebody here. Please come in. Your name is Melissa?"

"Yes, it is. There's someone else here to see him."

"And my name is Rabinowitz, madam, Lewis Rabinowitz, but friends call me Lew. Here's someone else-Mr. Marvin Winkler, just in from California to pay his respects. Where's our lovely friend Angela? Marvin, this is Mr. Yossarian. He's the man who will set it up for you. Winkler wants to meet with Milo Minderbinder about a terrific new product he's got. I told him we'd arrange it."

"What's the product?"

"Lew, let me talk to him alone."

"Well, Winkler?"

"Look down at my foot." Winkler was a man of middle height with conspicuous girth. "Don't you notice anything?"

"What am I looking at?"

"My shoe."

"What about it?"

"It's state-of-the-art."

Yossarian studied him. "You aren't joking?"

"I don't joke about business," answered Winkler, issuing words with strain as though emitting sighs of affliction. His voice was low and guttural, almost inaudible. "I've been in it too long. I manufactured and sold surplus army film after the war. I was in baked goods too and was known for the best honey-glazed doughnuts in New York, Connecticut, and New Jersey. Everything I did was state-of-the-art. I still make chocolate Easter bunnies."

"Have you ever hit it big?"

"I've had trouble with my timing. I was in the food-service business too once and offered home-delivered breakfasts Sunday mornings so that people could sleep late. My firm was Greenacre Farms in Coney Island, and I was the sole proprietor."

"And I was a customer. You never delivered."

"It was not cost-effective."

"Winkler, I will get you your meeting. I can't resist. But I will want you to tell me about it."

"I won't leave out a word."

"We've been thinking of a shoe," Milo admitted, "to sell to the government."

"Then you certainly want mine. It's state-of-the-art."

"Just what does that mean?"

"There's none better, Mr. Minderbinder, and no good reason for the government to choose any other. Look down at my foot again. I see the flexibility? The shoe looks new when you first start to wear it; when it's older it looks used as soon as you break it in. If it's dull you can polish it, or you can leave it the way it is or wear it scuffed, if that's what you want. You can make it lighter or and even change its color."

"But what does it do?"

"It fits over the foot and keeps the sock dry and clean. It helps protect the skin on the sole of the foot against cuts and scratches and other painful inconveniences of walking on the ground. You can walk in it, run in it, or even just sit and talk in it, as I'm doing with you now."

"And it changes color. How did you say it does that?"

"You just put this magic plastic insert into the slot of the heel and then take them to the shoemaker and tell aim to dye it to whatever color you want."

"It seems like a miracle."

"I would say that it is."

"Can you make them for women too?"

"A foot is a foot, Mr. Minderbinder."

"One thing escapes me, Mr. Winkler. What does your shoe do that the ones I'm wearing will not?"

"Make money for both of us, Mr. Minderbinder. Mine is state-of-the-art. Look down at the difference."

"I'm beginning to see. Are you very rich?"

"I've had trouble with my timing. But believe me, Mr. Minderbinder, I'm not without experience. You are doing business with the man who devised and still manufactures the state-of-the-art chocolate Easter bunny."

"What was so different about yours?"

"It was made of chocolate. It could be packaged, shipped, displayed, and, best of all, eaten, like candy."

"Isn't that true of other Easter bunnies?"

"But mine was state-of-the-art. We print that on every package. The public did not want a second-rate chocolate Easter bunny, and our government does not want a second-rate shoe."

"I see, I see," said Milo, brightening. "You know about chocolate?"

"All that there is to know."

"Tell me something. Please try one of these."

"Of course," said Winkler, taking the bonbon and relishing the prospect of eating it. "What is it?"

"Chocolate-covered cotton. What do you think of it?"

Delicately, as though handling something rare, fragile, and repulsive, Winkler lifted the mass from his tongue, while maintaining a smile. "I've never tasted better chocolate-covered cotton. It's state-of-the-art."

"Unfortunately, I seem unable to move it."

"I can't see why. Have you very much?"

"Warehouses full. Have you any ideas?"

"That's where I'm best. I will think of one while you bring my shoe to your procurer in Washington."

"That will definitely be done."

"Then consider this: Remove the chocolate from the cotton. Weave the cotton into fine fabric for shirts and bedsheets. We build today by breaking up. You've been putting together. We get bigger today by getting smaller. You can sell the chocolate to me for my business at a wonderful price for the money I receive from you for my shoe."

"How many shoes do you have now?"

"At the moment, just the pair I'm wearing, and another one at home in my closet. I can gear up for millions as soon as we have a contract and I receive in front all the money I'll need to cover my costs of production. I like money in front, Mr. Minderbinder. That's the only way I do business."

"That sounds fair," said Milo Minderbinder. "I work that way too. Unfortunately, we have a Department of Ethics now in Washington. But our lawyer will be in charge there once he gets out of prison. Meanwhile, we have our private procurers. You will have your contract, Mr. Winkler, for a deal is a deal."

"Thank you, Mr. Minderbinder. Can I send you a bunny for Easter? I can put you on our complimentary list."

"Yes, please do that. Send me a thousand dozen."

"And whom shall I bill?"

"Someone will pay. We both understand that there is no such thing as a free lunch."

"Thank you for the lunch, Mr. Minderbinder. I go away with good news."

"I come with good news," called Angela buoyantly, and swept into the hospital room in an ecstasy of jubilation. "But Melissa thinks you might be angry."

"She's found a new fellow."

"No, not yet."

"She's gone back to the old one."

"There's no chance of that. She's late."

"For what?"

"With her period. She thinks she's pregnant."

Defiantly, Melissa said she wanted the child, and the time left to have a child was not unlimited for either one of them.