The Listener Read Free Page A

time.”
     
    “And you think the man — whoever he is — will have time?” asked the impertinent reporter.
     
    John appeared to consider this gravely, his tall old head bent. Then he said, “Oh yes. I think he’ll have time. All the time there is.” He looked at the reporters and repeated: “All the time that’s left.”
     
    They thought him old, prosy, and enigmatic. They were certain that they’d have the whole story very soon from any man or woman who came here to talk, alone in this white marble room with the soft light and the shut curtains. They looked at the bronze box below the slit. It was very uncomplicated. The simple-minded would drop their illiterate little notes in there and a hidden clergyman or social worker or psychiatrist would read the notes, retire behind the curtain, and give ponderous advice. Some of the older reporters said it was very nice, and modern. The man behind the curtain couldn’t even see the speaker, and so it would all be very confidential. Silly old men and women would talk their heads off, in solitude, and go out comforted. For who ever listened to their complaints, anyway? The reporters would soon know, they reassured themselves. A new kind of psychiatric treatment, without charge.
     
    No one ever told. Two months after the building was opened to the public John Godfrey died. His wants had been meager; he had left a large fortune, for he had speculated for his dream. His friends laughed affectionately and said, “Who would have thought that old John was in the stock market?” His fortune was given to his building for perpetual care. Cleaners who became curious found that they could not move the blue curtains in the alcove. It was as if the velvet had been woven of steel. It was finally decided by everyone — with some truth — that it was the voices of the desperate which operated some kind of electrical impulse that opened the curtain after they had finished their confidences and had touched the button. But those who came with false confidences, out of curiosity, found that even when they touched the button the curtains did not part. It was discovered, months later, that old John, over long years, had studied electronics. Only the genuine voice of sorrow and grief and loneliness and despair could part the curtains.
     
    The button was only an added impulse.
     
    It was noted that those who slipped through the rear exit had radiant faces, or peaceful ones, or thoughtful. Some were in tears. Some walked resolutely, as if about to take a journey. Some cried aloud, “Oh yes, yes! I’d forgotten!”
     
    The reporters went to the clergy, Catholic, Protestant, Jewish. “What’s all this flim-flam?” they would ask. “Do you approve of it?”
     
    The clergy would answer only with smiles. Some would say they really knew nothing of the man who listened behind the velvet-steel curtains. Some would frown and talk of “superstition in this modern age of the hydrogen bomb and science.” A very modern clergyman said, “I know nothing about it and want to know less. Have you read Professor Blank’s latest book on the nature of the physical universe? Very enlightening. But only for intellectuals, of course. He explodes superstition for all time. Not that I am against religion,” the clergyman added hastily as he lit an excellent Havana, “for, after all, I’m a clergyman, am I not? But Things Advance, and Knowledge Grows.”
     
    A very old minister said briefly, “I myself have talked to the man behind the curtain. He answered me fully. He made it possible for me to continue when I thought it was impossible.”
     
    “What did he say to you?” asked the reporter.
     
    The minister looked at the young man thoughtfully. “Why, he said everything.”
     
    National newspapers sent their reporters to the city in droves. They learned nothing more. The Man in the Street was interviewed and his sage opinions recorded. Sure, the guy behind the curtain was a psychiatrist. The