At twenty seven years old, Ed Wolfe still felt and looked like an orphan. Even as he fought to cast off the signs of being an orphan, that loneliness and caution stayed with him. Heading into his office Cornucopia Finance Corporation, he begins calling clients who are behind on payments. With an overwhelming, aggressive rhetoric, he extorts and even threatens them over the phone. His boss calls him over to talk, and Ed knows that he is being fired. His boss explains that despite bringing in profit, Ed acts too gangster-like to the clients. Ed bargains to get extra pay, and his boss sends him off with $463.65 and a last message: “Look out for Ed Wolfe.” Unable to work as a salesman for the company, he resorts to selling off pieces of his life instead. From his car to the hangers in his closet, he pawns off anything he can make money from. Ed excessively tracks his money by the penny and becomes obsessed with the idea of detaching himself from everything in order to appraise the value of his life. When he is reduced to living in a single bedroom with a single set of clothes, he calculates that the going rate for orphans like himself is $2500. Ed starts spending his money indifferent and drunkenly approaches at black man at a bar. The man takes Ed to a party where he is the only white person. Ed starts dancing with a girl from the party, Mary Roberta, and is startled to feel the invisible weight of human life. He drags her up onto a bandstand and introduces himself as an orphan, referring to the crowd as brothers and sisters. He starts calling for bids to Mary Roberta, and the party crowd uncomfortably watches and angrily shouts at him. He lets her go and then takes all his cash savings left and throws it into the air, saying that he will start the bid. He says goodbye to Mary Roberta, and she holds his hand squeezes it, imparting on him a sense of freedom and peace.