That evening, after a coffee-less supper—both the gas and the water had been turned off that afternoon—he totaled up his figures. They made quite a respectable sum. He looked across the coffee table, which he had commandeered as a desk, to where Judith, with the dubious help of Zarathustra, was sorting out a pile of manila envelopes which she had placed in the middle of the living-room floor. “I'll do my best to sell everything,” he said, “but it's going to be difficult going till we get a few families living here. People are reluctant about moving into empty neighborhoods, and businessmen aren't keen about opening up business places before the customers are available. But I think it'll work out all right. There's a plaza not far from here that will provide a place to shop until the local markets are functioning, and Valleyview is part of a centralized school district.” He slipped the paper he had been figuring on into his brief case, closed the case and stood up. “I'll keep in touch with you.”
Judith shook her head. “You'll do nothing of the sort. As soon as you leave, I'm moving to Pfleugersville. My business here is finished.”
“I'll keep in touch with you there then. All you have to do is give me your address and phone number.”
She shook her head again. “I could give you both, but neither would do you any good. But that's beside the point. Valleyview is your responsibility now—not mine.”
Philip sat back down again. “You can start explaining any time,” he said.
“It's very simple. The property owners of Valleyview signed all of their houses and places of business over to me. I, in turn, have signed all of them over to you—with the qualification, of course, that after selling them you will be entitled to no more than your usual commission.” She withdrew a paper from one of the manila envelopes. “After selling them,” she went on, “you are to divide the proceeds equally among the four charities specified in this contract.” She handed him the paper. “Do you understand now why I tried so hard to find a trustworthy agent?”
Philip was staring at the paper, unable, in his astonishment, to read the words it contained. “Suppose,” he said presently, “that circumstances should make it impossible for me to carry out my end of the agreement?”
“In case of illness, you will already have taken the necessary steps to transfer the property to another agent who, in your opinion, is as completely honest as you are, and in case of death, you will already have taken the necessary steps to bequeath the property to the same agent; and he, in both cases, will already have agreed to the terms laid down in the contract you're holding in your hands. Why don't you read it?”
Now that his astonishment had abated somewhat, Philip found that he could do so. “But this still doesn't make sense,” he said a short while later. “Obviously you and the rest of the owners have purchased new houses. Would it be presumptuous of me to ask how you're going to pay for them when you're virtually giving your old houses away?”