Shelley put a thumbtack in the center of each doorway on the other side of the house to take into account the flimsy walls of the tiny rooms that would be coming down eventually. Then they went downstairs and spent another quarter hour measuring the ground-floor rooms. Jane acted as holder of the far end of the metal tape and the recorder of the information in a notebook Shelley had brought along. Shelley herself determined the measurement.

"We're both filthy," Jane said when they were done. "Let's go home and get showers, tidy up, and look over the contracts over lunch."

"I think it's going to take a long soak in the tub," Shelley said, brushing sawdust off the knees of her stylish jeans. "And don't let me forget to get the architectural drawings."

Six

It was nearly two-thirty in the afternoon before the two women were cleaned up enough to go to lunch. Jane had staved off her hunger with a handful of Cheez-Its and brushed her teeth afterward to hide the evidence that she hadn't been able to tough it out.

Most of their favorite restaurants were open for lunch and dinner but closed for the afternoon. So they tried a buffet they knew perfectly well they wouldn't like.

"Buffets are all grease and starch but no salt. Inhabited solely by the elderly," Shelley said.

"You can ask for salt," Jane said. "It's a safe place to go with almost no danger of running into young to middle-aged feminists who might overhear our conversation."

Shelley rushed through the line, getting only soup and a roll. Jane dawdled over everything and finally ended up with macaroni and cheese with a side salad and overcooked green beans. It took her a while to find Shelley, who had the con-

tract from Bitsy in front of her face. Meanwhile, she wandered all over the place, nearly losing her grip on the tray several times as she tripped over walkers, crutches, and oxygen containers on little trolleys some of the older customers had left in the aisles.