अध्याय 1The Third Level

The railroads’ presidents say there are only two levels, but Charley says there are three. (पृष्ठ 1)

• ★The presidents “will swear on a stack of timetables that there are only two”.
• ★Charley’s reason is that he has “been on the third level of the Grand Central Station”.

The psychiatrist friend calls the third level “a waking-dream wish fulfillment” and says Charley is unhappy. (पृष्ठ 1)

• ★By unhappy he meant that “the modern world is full of insecurity, fear, war, worry and all the rest of it, and that I just want to escape”.
• ★Charley’s own reply is: “Everybody I know wants to escape, but they don’t wander down into any third level at Grand Central Station.”
• ! Write the psychiatrist friend says, because this is his view, as Charley reports it.

So, in the psychiatrist’s view, the third level is a wish to escape, while Charley says it is a place he has been to.

The statement is wrong in two ways. (पृष्ठ 1, 6)

• ★The line is not the story’s own. The story has “the modern world is full of insecurity, fear, war, worry and all the rest of it”; the word “stress” comes from Q3 of Reading with Insight on page 6.
• ★The speaker is wrong. The psychiatrist friend says it, and Charley only reports it.

So quote the story’s own words, and say whose they are.

The corridor is empty and slopes downward, and then Charley hears a crowd ahead. (पृष्ठ 3)

• ★It “began angling left and slanting downward”, and Charley “thought that was wrong, but I kept on walking”.
• ★He hears only “the empty sound of my own footsteps” and does not pass a soul.
• ★Then comes “that sort of hollow roar ahead that means open space and people talking”.

After that the tunnel turns sharp left, and a short flight of stairs brings him to the third level.

Charley sees that the room is smaller, older and lit by flames. (पृष्ठ 3)

• ★The room is “smaller”, with “fewer ticket windows and train gates”.
• ★The information booth in the centre is “wood and old-looking”, and the man in it wears “a green eyeshade and long black sleeve protectors”.
• ★The lights are “dim and sort of flickering” because “they were open-flame gaslights”.

At first Charley is fooled: “For just a moment I thought I was back on the second level”.

To make sure of the year, Charley glances at the newspapers at the newsboy’s feet. (पृष्ठ 4)

• ★The paper is The World, and “The World hasn’t been published for years”.
• ★Its lead story “said something about President Cleveland”.
• ★Later Charley finds the same front page “in the Public Library files”, and “it was printed June 11, 1894”.

Charley goes to the newsboy “To make sure”; a moment before, at the sight of “a very small Currier & Ives locomotive with a funnel-shaped stack”, he says, “And then I knew.”

The statement is wrong. The front page of The World was “printed June 11, 1894”. (पृष्ठ 4)

• ★July 18, 1894 is the date of the postmark on the first-day cover (पृष्ठ 5) and of Sam’s letter (पृष्ठ 6).
• ! Keep the two dates apart: June 11, 1894 is the newspaper; July 18, 1894 is the cover and the letter.

The clerk does not accept Charley’s bills and thinks Charley is trying to cheat him. (पृष्ठ 4)

• ★The money of 1894 was “old-style bills, half again as big as the money we use nowadays, and different-looking”.
• ★So Charley’s modern bills do not look like money to the clerk, who warns him: “if you’re trying to skin me, you won’t get very far”.

The clerk starts by helping Charley and ends by suspecting him. (पृष्ठ 4)

• ★First he “figured the fare”, though he “glanced at my fancy hatband”, and Charley “had enough for two coach tickets, one way”.
• ★Then, when Charley counted out the money, “the clerk was staring at me”, and he “glanced at the cash drawer beside him”.
• ★Charley leaves at once: “I turned away and got out fast.”
• ! Charley does not buy the tickets.

Charley adds, “There’s nothing nice about jail, even in 1894.”

A first-day cover is an envelope that stamp collectors mail to themselves on the first day a new stamp is sold. (पृष्ठ 5)

• ★“the postmark proves the date”.
• Such covers are “never opened”; “you just put blank paper in the envelope”.

The cover is strange because it was mailed in 1894 to Charley’s grandfather, yet Charley finds it in his own collection. (पृष्ठ 5, 6)

• ★“someone had mailed it to my grandfather at his home in Galesburg”, and the postmark showed July 18, 1894.
• ★The stamp was “a six-cent, dull brown, with a picture of President Garfield”.
• ★It went into the grandfather’s collection and stayed there “till I took it out and opened it”.
• ★A first-day cover should hold blank paper, but on page 6 “The paper inside wasn’t blank.”

This cover is the “proof” Charley means when he says, “now we have proof that the third level is still there”.

Sam tells Charley that he has found the third level and has been there two weeks. (पृष्ठ 6)

• ★He writes, “it’s true; I found the third level!”, and says, “I’ve been here two weeks”.
• He describes the evening: “someone is playing a piano”, and he is “invited over for lemonade”.
• ★He asks Charley and Louisa to “Come on back” and “Keep looking till you find the third level!”

The letter is from 941 Willard Street, Galesburg, Illinois, and is dated July 18, 1894.

The last paragraph tells us what Sam bought, what he may do in Galesburg, and who he was. (पृष्ठ 6)

• ★Charley “found out that Sam bought eight hundred dollars’ worth of old-style currency”.
• Charley thinks it “ought to set him up in a nice little hay, feed and grain business”, which “he always said … he really wished he could do”.
• ★The last line says, “Why, Sam was my psychiatrist.”

So the man who was Charley’s psychiatrist is the man who now writes, “I got to wishing that you were right.”

The story does not settle this question; it gives lines for both readings. (पृष्ठ 1, 4–6)

• ★Reading 1, a wish and not a place: the psychiatrist friend calls it “a waking-dream wish fulfillment”; Charley says, “Everybody I know wants to escape”; and he has “never again found the corridor that leads to the third level at Grand Central Station”.
• ★Reading 2, a real place: the front page of The World that Charley later finds “in the Public Library files” was “printed June 11, 1894”; “My friend Sam Weiner disappeared!”; a first-day cover postmarked July 18, 1894 holds a letter that says, “I found the third level!”; and Charley says, “now we have proof that the third level is still there”.
• ! Do not write either reading as the story’s own answer. Write Charley says for what only his word supports.

The story ends with Charley’s telling and leaves the final decision to the reader.

The statement is wrong. Charley himself says, “I wasn’t trying to escape from anything; I just wanted to get home to Louisa, my wife.” (पृष्ठ 2)

• ★He went there to take the subway home: “I decided to take the subway from Grand Central because it’s faster than the bus”.
• ★He reached the third level by getting lost: he “ducked into an arched doorway heading for the subway — and got lost”.
• ! Charley does long for 1894 later, once he sees it: “I wanted two tickets for that.” (पृष्ठ 4) That longing comes on the same night, after he gets lost, not before.

The statement is wrong. The clerk would not take Charley’s money, and “I turned away and got out fast.” (पृष्ठ 4)

• ★Next day Charley “drew three hundred dollars out of the bank” and bought old-style currency (पृष्ठ 5).
• ★But he has “never again found the corridor that leads to the third level at Grand Central Station”.

Charley tells the story himself, in the first person, and he talks to the reader. (पृष्ठ 2, 4, 5)

• ★He calls himself “just an ordinary guy named Charley, thirty-one years old”.
• ★He asks the reader questions: “Have you ever been there?” (पृष्ठ 4) and “Well, do you know what a first-day cover is?” (पृष्ठ 5).
• ★Talking like a friend makes even an odd event sound believable.
• ! Everything, even Sam’s letter, reaches us through Charley. Write Charley says for what only his word supports.

So the way of telling helps us believe him, but the final decision still rests with the reader.

Not completely. Charley’s picture of 1894 is warm, but the story also shows a worry there. (पृष्ठ 1, 4)

• ★For: Charley pictures Galesburg in 1894 as “a peaceful world”, where “summer evenings were twice as long” (पृष्ठ 4), and his grandfather’s day was “pretty nice and peaceful in his day, from all I hear” (पृष्ठ 1).
• ★Against: the clerk suspects Charley of cheating, and Charley says, “There’s nothing nice about jail, even in 1894.” (पृष्ठ 4)
• ! For his grandfather’s day Charley says only “from all I hear”. Write that 1894 looks peaceful to Charley, not that it was perfect.

The hobby that his friends call a refuge is the place where Charley finds the proof. (पृष्ठ 1, 5)

• ★At the beginning his friends call his stamp collecting “a ‘temporary refuge from reality.’”, but Charley says his grandfather “started my collection”.
• ★Later “among my oldest first-day covers, I found one that shouldn’t have been there”, and it holds Sam’s letter.

So the stamps, which the friends see as a way of escape, give the evidence that the third level may be real.

The statement is wrong. The last line of the story says, “Why, Sam was my psychiatrist.” (पृष्ठ 6)

• ★Charley first calls him “My friend Sam Weiner” (पृष्ठ 5), so Sam is both his friend and his psychiatrist.

★कसौटी: हर row में दोनों तरफ़ किताब की line हो। 1894 की हर बात वही है जो Charley ने third level पर देखी या Galesburg के बारे में सोची; इसे Charley sees या Charley pictures लिखिए, अलग से इतिहास का तथ्य मत बनाइए।

★कसौटी: दोनों के बीच का बड़ा फ़र्क यह है कि Charley ढूँढ रहा है और Sam पहुँच चुका है।

! eight hundred dollars Sam ने ख़रीदे। Charley के three hundred dollars से less than two hundred के old-style bills मिले।

★कसौटी: पहले हर fact के साथ पृष्ठ पर वह line ढूँढिए, फिर नाम लिखिए। (b) और (e) में सबसे ज़्यादा ग़लती होती है: (b) Sam का है, Charley का नहीं; (e) में cover Charley को नहीं, उसके grandfather को भेजा गया था।