Atdtda37: Some said, others insisted, 1040-1041

[Paul Nightingale]

Lew has been mentioned in recent pages and now he is reintroduced via a
description of his 'offices in LA ... in one of those swank new buildings
going up along Broadway'. Cf the new Inconvenience (top of 1019) as well as
Randolph's and Lindsay's comments on the economy (top of 1033): this is just
'one of those swank new buildings', nothing exceptional. Moreover, Lew works
in the service sector, providing for clients able to pay (even if 'now
mostly provided "industrial security" ...' etc, on 1041, suggests a response
to a need created specifically by the growth of a manufacturing economy).
Having said that, of course, the first paragraph ('three layers of
security') confirms that he is not easily approached; later, the narrative
will confirm that the description on offer here, at least in part, is
dependent on reports ('some said ... others insisted', 1041). The detective
will be exposed by detective work. Moreover, if the 'deceptively sylphlike
receptionists' (juxtaposed to 'dwarf palms and Dieffenbachia', 1040) run
interference more effectively than one might at first think them capable,
the deception extends to another occupation 'as "stunt" performers'.

This section updates the reader on what has happened to Lew since he was
last seen at the end of 'Bilocations' (692, this being the final chapter in
'Against the Day'); and Lew does not appear as yet. Indeed, the narrative
makes it clear that we might be dependent on 'how the storyteller felt about
Lew' (1041). Cf his reputation and the 'sin he was supposed once to have
committed', 'denounced in the local newspapers' (37). The last time we saw
Lew he had just 'stumbled down to the breakfast salon to find that everyone
had left town' (692). Here, we find that, when he did return to Chicago, he
found that White City Investigations had also moved on (1041). Lew is now
established in LA ('all it took was a couple of years') but he remains a
solitary figure: cf the passage beginning: 'As the evening crept across the
valley .' on 174. That passage confirmed his exclusion from a society based
on family life and, here, relationships seem few: 'Occasionally ...' etc
(1041).