The taxi-driver who brought him leant out of his cab and stared too. “Quite a joint, ain’t it?” he said. “Plenty of class. I bet you have to pay to breathe in a dump like that.” Jason groped in his pocket and found some small change. He paid the taxi-driver. Then, because he was in two minds about going into the club, he said, “I don’t know why I came here, do you?”
The driver shook his head. “Now you’re talking sense,” he said. “Most folk just go in there. They don’t ask themselves why. Personally, I wouldn’t be seen dead in a joint like that.”
Jason put his foot on the running-board. “Maybe you’ve got somewhere else to go,” he said. “Maybe you’re married or something.”
The driver nodded. “Yeah, I’m married all right. I don’t see what that’s got to do with it.”
“Oh, it has. It makes all the difference. You see, I’ve got no one at the moment. I only got into New York a few hours ago. I’ve got a room about ten floors up, which seems to me completely isolated from any earthly contacts. I was told that the Gaucho Club was the place to find company, but I’m not at all sure that it looks quite what I want.”
The driver regarded him thoughtfully. “It depends on what you want, boss,” he said. “If you’re looking for someone to sleep with, I should say that you’ve come to the right spot.”
Jason shook his head. “I hadn’t that in mind at all,” he said, “although the suggestion is worth considering. I’ll go in, anyway. If I don’t like it, I can always come out again, can’t I?”
The driver engaged his gears. “It’s your evening,” he said, and set his cab in motion.
Inside the club, Jason found the lights were soft, coloured and concealed, and the carpets very thick and springy to the feet. A number of impressively dressed flunkeys stood about doing nothing in particular, obviously too magnificent to be approached. They merely directed him towards a very crowded lounge simply by indicating the direction with their eyes. Feeling extraordinarily unimportant, and wishing that he had someone to share this initial ordeal with him, he went into the lounge and looked around for the cloakroom.
The lounge, however, was much more human than the entrance. A girl, wearing an extremely short white frock, a pale blue frilly little apron affair, and a large blue bow in her hair, suddenly appeared from nowhere and took his hat. She gave him a check and then, seeing he was unusually good-looking, added quite a nice smile.