Mason said, “I’ll let you pay my luncheon check.”
Serle frowned, and said, “I’m not kidding.”
“Neither am I.”
“All right then, you had your chance and you’ve lost it.” Serle attacked his half-cold meat pie with savage haste.
Mason finished his salad, cleaned up his plate, lit a cigarette, and sipped coffee.
“Dessert?” the waitress asked.
“Bring me ice cream,” Mason said, “and the check to him,” indicating Serle.
Serle scraped his plate and pushed it back with a gesture of irritation.
“Your food won’t agree with you eating hastily that way,” Mason cautioned.
Serle said, “This is a hell of a way to act. I had to talk my head off in order to get a free hand, and now you start getting hard.”