Fewer cars were present than the day before.He found Mrs. Mendoza, Connie he mentally corrected himself and a woman he recognized as one of her sister..., in the kitchen."There you are," Connie said. "Luisa dropped by with your costume." She pointed to the ensemble hanging over the back of a chair. "Janie's changing upstairs. You can use the hall bath." How'd Ed doing?"She snorted, "He's in the den, doing an impression of a coma patient."The elf costume Mrs. Delgado had selected for him had red. "This is our Chatsworth. Five bedrooms, two en-suite," he says proudly. "Looks like we missed them." Missed who?" she asks."My sales staff. I could have introduced you."She follows him through to a bright lounge, imagines her family living in such a home, wonders how long before the gloss would fade, the trying too hard decor a background noise hardly ever noticed.She is wandering, examing the furnishing, picking up items of strategically placed bric-a-brac. He comes to her and takes a moulded. She was late! I hoped her final hadn't been a disaster. That would make any of my preparations seem inappropriate. I pictured Wendy collapsed against me, sobbing with the knowledge of a wasted Spring quarter.This time I did vacuum, then dusted the living room, hoping that she would be happy when she got home, dreading that she might not be. When I finished, it was nearly eleven-thirty, and still no sign of her. By now, I was concerned something had happened to her, but had no idea what it might. "No, what I was looking for in my travels was more for a sense of how well we are meeting the challenges for growth in the marketplace around the world. That's where I found some things to think about."We have offices in 15 countries, with more than 600 centers in all, most of them in North America, where we are showing excellent growth. That sounds respectable on the face of it, but I think we are missing the boat in many ways."Outside North America, our offices are mostly in countries or.