<P> Considerable academic analysis has been written about the story, with scholars divided on whether it is intended to be taken literally or as allegory . Several writers focus on the series of numbers written on Friend's car, which he indicates are a code of some sort, but which is never explained: </P> <P> "Now, these numbers are a secret code, honey," Arnold Friend explained . He read off the numbers 33, 19, 17 and raised his eyebrows at her to see what she thought of that, but she didn't think much of it . </P> <P> Literary scholars have interpreted this series of numbers as different Biblical references, as an underlining of Friend's sexual deviancy, or as a reference to the ages of Friend and his victims . </P> <P> The narrative has also been viewed as an allegory for initiation into sexual adulthood, an encounter with the devil, a critique of modern youth's obsession with sexual themes in popular music, or as a dream sequence . </P>

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