STetc ch 18 pp 126-131

[Michael Bailey]

Checking in with Unamalgamated New York branch (whose neon sign reminds one of Gatsby's optician & Doc Sportello's logo) Hicks encounters Connie McSpool, a dude (probably Cornelius, like the wonderfully-named Cornelius McGillicuddies, whose decision to truncate that delightful mouthful resounds disappointingly down the generations. They're up to at least IV, but he's got a child named Connie. With luck, maybe he or she will be the one to set their name free!) who shares with Hicks & the office at large a lot about Judge Crater, but pretends to ignorance of Milwaukee.

Hicks informs him it's near Racine, where Danish pastries were invented.
https://www.ohdanishbakery.com/hygge-blog/danish-culture/history-of-danish-pastries-in-racine?srsltid=AU7gw4V4szsg1zAGXz1bZn_AsYBdUZ4uMuInkm0B5eGb3IdpeNmyN91l

(inducement to click: right away, there's a b&w picture of 2 dudes, who are, like Nicholas Cage in that movie, working with dough. A-and if you scroll down, an inspiring story, with mouth-watering pictures in full color of various Danishes, culminating in the official designation of the Kringle as the official Wisconsin state pastry in 2013)


McSpool, or one of his cohort, slides in a reference to Daphne & the possibility that the ticket ultimately emanates from "that Big Al of Cheese himself in exile, natch, keeping an eye on his li'l girl. Oh — sorry, Hicks. Not tryin to talk you outa nothin here."

Although he hopes they'll put him onto Daphne's whereabouts in NYC so he can close her ticket & go home, Hicks learns she's on her way overseas via ocean liner. As he collects a 2 week advance on his pay at a "bank" (the oxymoronic Gould Fisk Fidelity and Trust) he's dismayed to also receive a "steamer ticket and a brand-new passport too."