The Ugly Duckling

Personal notice, change is my stock and trade. If the job's too tough for you to handle, you got a job for me, George Valentine. Right full details. Standard oil company of California, on behalf of independent chevron gas stations and standard stations throughout the West, invites you to let George do it.

The ugly duckling, another adventure of George Valentine. My dear Mr. Valentine, Having devoted my entire life to music, to the management of concerts, development of singers, I find that sometimes my knowledge of simple human nature is lacking.

A friend of mine needs help, quite desperately. A woman who gave up her own musical career just for the sake of a man who is as cold and bleak as incapable of tenderness as the music he composes or the dreary stone house that they hibernate in.

His name is Edmund Solter. She is very ill, it's true, but caring for him has made his wife even more than ill. She can't even smile anymore. Nor will she tell me, her oldest and only remaining friend, the strange secret of her unhappiness, her worry, her fear, perhaps even her danger.

Mr. Valentine, since I must leave shortly for New York, the opening of a new ballet, will you please, please come immediately to meet me, the Sauter's home. It is far out of an ocean drive, Pacific Bluffs, California.

Sincerely, Yasha Hardwick. Come on, George. He won't mind. He? I'm just beginning to waste off. It's the husband playing Edmund Talford, must be. Mr. Hardwick said, composer, and it never occurred to me, but there was an Edmund Talford who was famous.

You couldn't prove it by me. Can't you, pianist? When I was in school, he performed once. But there's something strange about him. He's a little tiny man, George. Makes a lot of big music. He was... he was shy and...