Burt had run a successful ad agency in New York for more than ten years. In those days he had been driven. His goal was to make enough money by the time he was forty to leave the squalid city of his misspent youth forever. The greatest day of his life was when he finally achieved his goal.

When he came home to his humble Bronx apartment with the news more than ten years before, Helen had been livid.

"Are you out of your mind!" she snapped.

"Helen, I've been talking about this for fifteen years."

"Talking, shmalking. I figured that was all it was with you. Talk. I'm not going."

"Fine. Stay."

Helen was surprised by his indifference.

Although she pretended nothing was changing the entire time he was selling his agency and transferring funds to Maine, three weeks after his announcement she could stand it no more. She finally asked a question.

"So where are we moving? Not that I don't think you should be moving to the rubber room, you're acting so crazy."

"A beautiful small town called Lubec."

"I hate it."

"Did you ever hear of it?"

"No, but I hate it."

"Don't come."

There it was again. Such firm indifference. Burt had never acted that way toward her before. Not only that, he looked different.

"Are you feeling okay?" Helen asked, a hint of genuine wifely concern in her shrill voice.

"Never better," Burt insisted.

"You look funny. Not as pale. And you're standing different. Straighter."

"My ulcer's almost gone. A month in Maine and I'll be a new man."

"I'll say. You'll be a schmuck who gave away a million-dollar business."