Journey to an 800 Number (15 page)

As soon as the call was finished, they returned to the long, dark hall, where the heat and the music swallowed them. Mrs. Zender paused to say, “I suppose you put central air-conditioning into your place.”

Amedeo hesitated. Until that moment, he had never thought of central air-conditioning as something a person put in. He thought it came with the walls and roof. “I suppose so,” he said.

“Sissies,” Mrs. Zender said. Then she laughed again. She had a musical laugh. “I chose a sound system over air-conditioning.”

“But,” Amedeo replied, “I think you’re allowed to have both.”

“No,” she said crisply. “Karl Eisenhuth is as dead as my husband.”

“Oh, I’m sorry.”

“Yes, a pity. There never will be another sound system like this one.”

Reluctantly, Amedeo left Mrs. Zender, her veils, her house.

Now, Amedeo watched William walk through that peeling, painted front door without stopping or knocking and Mrs. Zender’s world of sound and shallow.

This is what
E. L. Konigsburg
has to say about
Journey to an 800 Number:

“Several years ago my husband and I attended a conference of insurance executives in Boston, Massachusetts. We checked into the large hotel, which was to be headquarters for the next three days. On Saturday night we were scheduled to go to a cocktail reception and the annual awards banquet that was to follow.

“David and I got dressed—
dressed up
would be a more accurate description—put on our hello badges, and made our way down to the conference rooms on the third floor. We entered one of the rooms, stopped at the bar where we each got a glass of white wine, helped ourselves to some peanuts and pretzels, and—ready to mingle—we made our way into the middle of the crowd. But when we looked around, we noticed that although everyone there was
dressed up
like us, was smiling a friendly and familiar smile like us, was wearing a hello badge like us, we didn’t know a soul in the room.

“We had gone to the wrong party. Our party was next door.

“No one had stopped us. No one made us return our drinks or pay for our peanuts. Actually, we could have stayed there and partied all night. We found out later that the hotel at which we were staying was host to three conventions that weekend.

“It was then that it occurred to me that if a person were to dress properly and wear a proper hello badge, he could easily live off the dozens of conventions that take place every day in any major city in the United States. And then I started thinking about what it would take to pull that off.

“I also started thinking about how some people know who they are regardless of where they are or what they are wearing at any given time, but others need to wear something like a school blazer to let others know who or what they think they are. I wondered what would happen if one of the latter met some of the former. The result is this book. I hope you enjoy the trip.”

E. L. Konigsburg
is the author of several books for young readers, including the Newbery Medal winners
From the Mixed-up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler
and
The View from Saturday,
and the Newbery Honor Book
Jennifer, Hecate, Macbeth, William McKinley, and Me, Elizabeth.
Mrs. Konigsburg has a degree from Carnegie Mellon University and has done graduate work in organic chemistry at the University of Pittsburgh. Before becoming a writer, she taught science at a private girls’ school. She and her husband live on the beach in north Florida. Their three children are all married.