They were well located, all fifty of them, in the wooded hills that stretched back from the lake, and the contractor had not indulged in the ruthless slashing out of trees. Set in natural surroundings with decent amounts of space around them, they stood, each one of them, in comparative privacy.
In the spring, there would be wildflowers, and in the autumn, the woods would flame with colour and there would be birds and squirrels and rabbits. And there was a stretch of white sand beach, the last left on the whole lake.
Homer began mentally to write the ad he'd put in the Sunday paper and found that he looked forward with some anticipation to setting down the words. This was one he could pull out all the stops on, use all the purple prose he wanted.
"I like it, Mr. Steen," he said. "I think they won't be too hard to move."
"That is good," Steen replied. "We are prepared to give you an exclusive contract for a period of ten years. Renewable, of course."
"But why ten years? I can get this tract handled in a year or two, if it goes at all."
"You are mistaken. The business, I can assure you, will be continuing."
They stood on the brick walk in front of one of the houses and looked toward the lake. There were two white sails on the water, far toward the other shore, and a rowboat bobbed in the middle distance, with the black smudge of a hunched fisherman squatted in the stern.
Homer shook his head in some bewilderment. "I don't understand."
"There'll be some subletting," Steen told him smoothly.
"When fifty families are involved, there are always some who move."
"But that's another story. Subletting…"
Steen pulled a paper from his pocket and handed it to Homer. "Your contract. You'll want to look it over. Look it over closely. You're a cautious man and that's the kind we want."
Homer drove along the winding, wooded road back to the shopping centre with Steen.
The centre was a lovely place. It stretched along the entire south side of the property, backed by the fourteen-foot wall, and was a shining place of brand-new paint and gleaming glass and metal.
Homer stopped the car to look at it.
"You've got everything," he said.
"I think we have," said Steen proudly. "We've even got our own telephone exchange."
"Isn't that unusual?"
"Not at all. What we have set up here amounts to a model village, a model living space. We have our own water system and our sewage plant. Why not a telephone exchange?"
Homer let it pass. There was no sense arguing. It all was just this side of crazy, anyhow. No matter how fouled up it was, Steen seemed satisfied.
Maybe, Homer told himself, he knows what he is doing.
But Homer doubted it.
"One thing more," said Steen. "It is just a minor matter, but you should know about it. We have a car agency, you see. Many agencies, in fact. We can supply almost any make of car…"
"But how did you do…"
"We know our way around. Any make of car a person would want. And anyone who leases must buy a car from us."
"Mister," Homer said, "I've heard a lot of fast ones in the auto business, but this one beats them all. If you think I'll sell cars for you…"
"There's nothing wrong with it," said Steen. "We have some good connections. Any car one wants at a fair and honest price. And we are prepared to give good value on their trade-ins, too. It would never do to have old rattle-traps in a high-class development like this."
"And what else? I think you'd better tell me how many other tie-in deals you have."
"Not a single one. The automobile is all."
Homer put the car in gear and drove slowly toward the gate.
The uniformed gateman saw them coming and swung the gates wide open. He waved to them cheerily as they went past his kiosk.
"I wouldn't touch it with a ten-foot pole," Homer told his wife, Elaine, "if there weren't so much money in it. But things have been kind of slow with this higher interest rate and all and this deal would give me a chance…"
"If it's Mr. Steen wearing his shoes on the wrong feet," Elaine said. "I don't think you need to worry. You remember Uncle Eb?"
"Sure. He was the one who wore his vest inside out."
"Pure stubbornness, that's what it was with Uncle Eb. He put it on inside out one day and someone laughed at him. So Uncle Eb said that was the way to wear a vest. And that's the way he wore it to his dying day."
"Well, sure," said Homer, "that might be it, of course. But wearing a vest inside out wouldn't hurt your chest. Shoes on the wrong feet would hurt something terrible."
"This poor Mr. Steen might be a cripple of some sort. Maybe he was born that way.
"If you lease all those houses, we can go to Europe like we've always planned. As far as I'm concerned, he can barefoot if he wants."
"Yeah, I suppose so."
"And we need a car," Elaine said, beginning on her catalog "And drapes for the living-room. And I haven't had a new dress in ages. And it's shameful to be using our old silver. We should have replaced it years ago. It's the old stuff Ethel gave us when we were married…"
"All right," said Homer. "If I lease the houses, if the deal holds up, if I don't get in jailwe'll go to Europe." He knew when he was licked.
He read the contract carefully. It was all right. It said black and white, that he got the whole five thousand.
Maybe, he told himself, he should have a lawyer see it. Congdon could tell him in a minute if it was ironclad. But he shrank from showing it. There seemed something sinful, almost shameful, about his getting all that money.
He checked on the Happy Acres Bank. A charter had been issued and all regulations had been met. He checked on building permits and they were in order.
So what was a man to do?
Especially when he had a wife who had yearned loudly for ten years to go to Europe.
Homer sat down and wrote an ad for the real estate section of the Sunday paper. On second thought he dismissed purple prose that he had planned to use. He employed the old key technique. The ad wasn't long. It didn't cost too much and read:
$4.16!!!!!
WOULD YOU PAY ONLY $4.16
a month to live in a house
that would sell for $35,000
to $50,00O?
If so, call or see
JACKSON REAL ESTATE
Specializing in Lake Property and Country Acreages
The first prospect was a man named H. F. Morgan. He came into the office early Sunday morning. He was belligerent. He slammed the folded want ad section down on Homer's desk. He had ringed Homer's ad with a big red-pencil mark.
"This isn't true!" yelled Morgan. "What kind of come-on is this?"
"It's substantially true," Homer answered quietly. "That's what it figures out to."
"You mean I just pay $4.16 a month?"
"Well," hedged Homer, "it's not quite as simple as all that. You lease it for ninety-nine years."
"What would I want with a house for ninety-nine years? I won't live that long."
"Actually, it's better than owning a house. You can live there a lifetime, just as if you owned the place, and there are no taxes and no maintenance. And if you have children, they can go on living there."
"You mean this is on the level?"
Homer emphatically nodded. "Absolutely."
"What's wrong with this house of yours?"
"There's nothing wrong with it. It's a new house among other new houses in an exclusive neighbourhood. You have a shopping centre just up the road that's as good as any city…"
"You say it's new?"
"Right. There are fifty houses. You can pick out the one you want. But I wouldn't take too long to decide, because these will go like hotcakes."
"I got my car outside."