Eris and Home at Six
by Lee Falk

THE STORIES: Eris .

It is late at night on a high bridge over the Hudson, where a lone man watches the dark river slide silently by.

A stranger appears, whistling for his lost dog, and a conversation, casual at first, begins.

Enigmatically the man tells the stranger that he has been waiting for him, and then relentlessly, his probing, taunting questions and revelations drive the shaken stranger perilously close to the man's sinister intention—his suicide.

A sudden turn of fate spares him, but then a second man appears and the game begins again—this time, perhaps, to reach its fateful conclusion.

(4 men.) Home at Six .

The family, wife, son, daughter, grandmother and maid, are startled by Dad's sudden arrival at four, as he never comes home before six.

Dad acts as if all is as it should be, but subsequent revelations make it clear that such is not the case: The daughter admits to being an arsonist; the son guzzles beer because it keeps him off Scotch; grandmother is hooked on drugs; the maid is caught red-handed in her thievery; and Dad's best friend emerges blushing from his wife's bedroom closet.

Dad is at his wit's end when, mercifully, six o'clock arrives—and all falls miraculously into proper place, just as it should be and would have been if he had come home at the right time to begin with.

(2 men, 3 women, 1 boy, 1 girl.)