Chaya Nautiyal. Deputy Director, Secondary Education. Directorate of Education. AllahabadGayatri Khanna, ELT Consultant. New Del

The Third Level Jack Finney Before you read Charley Have you ever had any curious experience w find hard to believe? THE presidents of the New York Central and the New York, New Haven and Hartford railroads will swear on a stack of timetables that there are only two. But I say there are three, because I've been on the third level of the Grand Central Station. Yes, I've taken the obvious step: I talked to a psychiatrist friend of mine. among others. I told him about the third 1level at Grand Central Station, and he said it was a waking- dream wish fulfillment. He said I was unhappy. That made my wife kind of mad, but he explained that he meant the modern world is full of insecurity, fear, war, worry and all the rest of it, and that I just want to escape. Well, who doesn't? Everybody I know wants to escape, but they don't wander down into any third level at Grand Central Station. But that's the reason. he said, and my friends all agreed. Everything points to it, they claimed. My stamp collecting, for example: that's a temporary refuge from reality. Well, maybe, but my grandfather didn't need any refuge from reality: things were pretty nice and peacefulin his day, from all I hear, and he started my collection. It's a nice collection too, blocks of four of practically every U.S. Issue, first-day covers, and so on. President Roosevelt collected stamps too, you know. Anyway, here's what happened at Grand Central. One night last summer I worked late at the office. I was in a hurry to get uptown to my apartment so I decided to take the subway from Grand Central because It's faster than the bus. Now, I don't know why this should have happened to me. I'm Just an ordinary guy named Charley. thirty-one years old, and I was wearing a tan gabardine suit and a straw hat with a fancy band: I passed a dozen men who looked just like me. And I wasn't trying to escape from anything: I just wanted to get home to Louisa, my wife. I turned into Grand Central from Vanderbilt Avenue, and went down the steps to the first level, where you take trains like the Twentieth Century. Then I walked down another flight to the second level, where the suburban trains leave from, ducked into an arched doorway heading for the subway and got lost. That's easy to do. I've been in and out of Grand Central hundreds of times, but I'm always bumping into new doorways and stairs and corridors. Once I got into a tunnel about a mile long and came out in the lobby of the Roosevelt Hotel. Another time I came up in an office building on Forty-sixth Street, three blocks away. Vno Sometimes I think Grand Central is growing like a tree, pushing out new corridors and staircases like roots.In began angling left and slanting downward and I thought that was wrong, but I kept on walking. All I could hear was the empty sound of my own footsteps and I didn't pass a soul. Then I heard that sort of hollow roar ahead that means open space and people talking. The tunnel turned sharp left; I went down a short flight of stairs and came outThere were brass spittoons on the floor, and across the station a glint of light caught my eye: a man was pulling a gold watch from his vest pocket. He snapped open the cover, glanced at his watch and frowned. He wore a derby hate a black four-button suit with tiny lapels, and he had a big, black, handlebar mustache. Then I looked around and saw that everyone in the station was dressed like eighteen-ninety-something: Ilie many beards. sideburns and fancy mustaches in my life. A woman walked in through the train gate; she wore a dress with leg-of- mutton sleeves and skirts to the top of her high-buttoned shoes. Back of her, out on the tracks, I caught a glimpse of a locomotive, a very small Currier & Ives locomotive with a funnel-shaped stack. And then I knew.To make sure, I walked over to a newsboy and glanced at the stack of papers at his feet. It was The World: and The World hasn't been published for years. The lead story said something about President Cleveland. I've found that front page since, in the Public Library files, and t was printed June 11, 1894. I turned toward the ticketI turned toward the ticket - on the third level at Grand windows knowing that here Central I could buy tickets that would take Louisa and me anywhere in the United States we wanted to go. In the year 1894. And I wanted two tickets to Galesburg, Illinois. Have you ever been there? It's a wonderful town still, with big old frame houses, huge lawns, and tremendous trees whose branches meet overhead and roof the streets. And in 1894, summer evenings were twice as long, and people sat out on their lawns, the men smoking cigars and talking quietly, the women waving .palm-leaf fans, with the fire-flies all around, in a peaceful world. To be back there with the First World War still twenty years off, and World War II over forty years in the future... I wanted two tickets for that.The clerk figured the fare he glanced at my fancy hatband, but he figured the fare and I had enough for two coach tickets, one way. But when I counted out the money and looked up, the clerk was staring at me. He nodded at the bills. That ain't money, mister," he said. "and if you're trying to skin me, you won't get very far." and he glanced at the cash drawer beside him. Of course the money was old-style bills, half again as big as the money we use nowadays, and different-looking. I turned away and got out fast. There's nothing nice about jail, even in 1894. Read and find out Would Charley ever go back to the ticket-counter on the third level to buy tickets to Galesburg for himself and his wife? And that was that. I left the same way I came. I suppose. Next day, during lunch hour. I drew three hundred dollars out of the bank, nearly all we had, and bought old-style currency (that really worried my psychiatrist friend). You can buy old money at almost any coin dealer's, but you have to pay a premium. My three hundred dollars bought less than two hundred in old-style bills, but I didn't care: eggs were thirteen cents a dozen in 1894. But I've never again found the corridor that leads to the third level at Grand Central Station,, although I've tried often enough. Louisa was pretty worried when I told her all this, and didn't want me to look for the third level any more. and after a while I stopped; I went back to my stamps. But now we're both looking, every weekend, because now we have proof that the third level is still there. My friend Sam Weiner disappeared! Nobody knew where, but I sort of suspected- because Sam's a city boy, and I used to tell him about Galesburg - I went to school there - and he always said he liked the sound of the place. And that's where he is, all right. In 1894 Because one night, fussing with my stamp collection. I found Well, do you know what a first-day cover is? When a new stamp is issued, stamp collectors buy someTo make sure, I walked over to a newsboy and glanced at the stack of papers at his feet. It was The World: and The World hasn't been published for years. The lead story said something about President Cleveland. I've found that front page since, in the Public Library files, and t was printed June 11, 1894. I turned toward the ticketI turned toward the ticket - on the third level at Grand windows knowing that here Central I could buy tickets that would take Louisa and me anywhere in the United States we wanted to go. In the year 1894. And I wanted two tickets to Galesburg, Illinois. Have you ever been there? It's a wonderful town still, with big old frame houses, huge lawns, and tremendous trees whose branches meet overhead and roof the streets. And in 1894, summer evenings were twice as long, and people sat out on their lawns, the men smoking cigars and talking quietly, the women waving .palm-leaf fans, with the fire-flies all around, in a peaceful world. To be back there with the First World War still twenty years off, and World War II over forty years in the future... I wanted two tickets for that.The clerk figured the fare he glanced at my fancy hatband, but he figured the fare and I had enough for two coach tickets, one way. But when I counted out the money and looked up, the clerk was staring at me. He nodded at the bills. That ain't money, mister," he said. "and if you're trying to skin me, you won't get very far." and he glanced at the cash drawer beside him. Of course the money was old-style bills, half again as big as the money we use nowadays, and different-looking. I turned away and got out fast. There's nothing nice about jail, even in 1894. Read and find out Would Charley ever go back to the ticket-counter on the third level to buy tickets to Galesburg for himself and his wife? And that was that. I left the same way I came. I suppose. Next day, during lunch hour. I drew three hundred dollars out of the bank, nearly all we had, and bought old-style currency (that really worried my psychiatrist friend). You can buy old money at almost any coin dealer's, but you have to pay a premium. My three hundred dollars bought less than two hundred in old-style bills, but I didn't care: eggs were thirteen cents a dozen in 1894. But I've never again found the corridor that leads to the third level at Grand Central Station,, although I've tried often enough. Louisa was pretty worried when I told her all this, and didn't want me to look for the third level any more. and after a while I stopped; I went back to my stamps. But now we're both looking, every weekend, because now we have proof that the third level is still there. My friend Sam Weiner disappeared! Nobody knew where, but I sort of suspected- because Sam's a city boy, and I used to tell him about Galesburg - I went to school there - and he always said he liked the sound of the place. And that's where he is, all right. In 1894 Because one night, fussing with my stamp collection. I found Well, do you know what a first-day cover is? When a new stamp is issued, stamp collectors buy someand use them to mail envelopes to themselves on the very first day of sale; and the postmark proves the date. The envelope is called a first-day cover. They're never opened: you just put blank paper in the envelope.tool bar