past and to the phone booth at the back and dialed Dolly Mason's number for the third time this evening. There still wasn't any answer.

He came back and sat down at the bar, watched while Chuck made drinks. He made two for the people in the booth first and took them over. He said, "Compliments of Mr. Fleck there." The couple looked over and thanked him and Ray nodded to them. He didn't know any of the customers so he didn't have to talk to them; he was just as glad because he didn't feel like talking.

Damn Dolly Mason, he thought. Was she going to be out all evening, just when he needed to see her? The more he thought about it the surer he felt that Dolly was his only good chance to borrow money in any sizable chunk this evening. And also that she'd give it to him if he could connect with her. He'd ask for a hundred; surely she'd have at least half that much on hand. It made sense, that short story he'd read once; the Frenchman knew what he was talking about. A wife will turn you down when a mistress won't. A wife has got you hooked, and knows it; a mistress is more understanding. Well, he'd keep phoning every fifteen or twenty minutes until he got her.

Oh, he wasn't the only man in Dolly's life, not by a long shot. He knew that. But she liked him a lot; he didn't think it was only because of the presents he gave her that she was so nice to him. If it was only that, then she was really a wonderful actress; she should be in Hollywood instead of here.

Dolly was tiny, not over five feet tall, and very slightly on the plump side, a brunette with olive skin. Just the opposite of Ruth on all counts; that was probably what had attracted him to her in the first place. A man likes a change. And she was vivacious while Ruth was quiet. She liked to drink; Ruth didn't, much. She was frankly passionate whereas Ruth—well, Ruth hadn't been cold at all when they were first married but she was tending more and more to become that way. Of course she said that was his fault, but he had a hunch that wives always said that.

Connolly was making drinks for the bar now, one screw-driver and two highballs for the strangers and a highball for Ray; he'd pour his own drink last, the short straight shot he always took when someone bought him a drink.

Ray watched him, thinking how easy it would be to borrow ten or twenty bucks from Connolly, once he'd got his order. But it was the one principle he'd always stuck to—never borrow money from a customer. His one virtue, he thought sourly; let them carve 

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