"Left me in this condition. Buy me a Scotch."
I sent the word.
She threw herself on the divan, blew down the front of her rose-pink dress—which was wrinkled now, wet under the armpits, city-smudged at the edges—and fixed her fidgety eyes on me. "We went down to the Palais and danced a bit. He's lousy. We started in having a flock of drinks. He talked. Good God, how Wylies talk! He told me the story of his life—including the full saga of Marcia. He got to that later—at the Club Mauve."
"Nice little spot!"
"He said we were both in a revolting mood and so we should go to some repulsive place."
"Then you told him the story of your life, too?"
"Up to when I met you."
"Is that going to be a date, from now on? Milestone? And millstone, too? Try to bear in mind—it's your life and you're of age."
"So all right, lambie-pie! No hard feelings. The point is—the more he told me about his Marcia—the less he noticed me. We switched to Planter's Punches, in due time, and had a zombie somewhere along the way. For a while I thought the rum was going to do what my gilded fleece couldn't. We necked. It's dark as a bat's groin there, anyhow."
"Pretty metaphor."