Leiter ordered two dry martinis. “Just watch,” he said sourly. The martinis arrived. Leiter took one look at them and told the waiter to send over the barman. When the barman came, looking resentful, Leiter said, “My friend, I asked for a martini and not a soused olive.” He picked the olive out of the glass with the cocktail stick. The glass, that had been three-quarters full, was now half full. Leiter said mildly, “This was being done to me while the only drink you knew was milk. I’d learned the basic economics of your business by the time you’d graduated to Coca-Cola. One bottle of Gordon’s gin contains sixteen true measures—double measures, that is, the only ones I drink. Cut the gin with three ounces of water and that makes it up to twenty-two. Have a jigger glass with a big steal in the bottom and a bottle of these fat olives and you’ve got around twenty-eight measures. Bottle of gin here costs only two dollars retail, let’s say around a dollar sixty wholesale. You charge eighty cents for a martini, a dollar sixty for two. Same price as a whole bottle of gin. And with your twenty-eight measures to the bottle, you’ve still got twenty-six left. That’s a clear profit on one bottle of gin of around twenty-one dollars. Give you a dollar for the olives and the drop of vermouth and you’ve still got twenty dollars in your pocket. Now, my friend, that’s too much profit, and if I could be bothered to take this martini to the management and then to the Tourist Board, you’d be in trouble. Be a good chap and mix us two large dry martinis without olives and with some slices of lemon peel separate. Okay? Right, then we’re friends again.”
The barman’s face had run through indignation, respect, and then the sullenness of guilt and fear. Reprieved, but clutching at his scraps of professional dignity, he snapped his fingers for the waiter to take away the glasses. “Okay, suh. Whatever you says. But we’ve pot plenty overheads here and the majority of customers they doan complain.”
Leiter said, “Well, here’s one who’s dry behind the ears. A good barman should learn to be able to recognize the serious drinker from the status-seeker who wants just to be seen in your fine bar.”
“Yassuh.” The barman moved away with Negro dignity.
Bond said, “You got those figures right, Felix? I always knew one got clipped, but I thought only about a hundred per cent—not four or five.”
“Young man, since I graduated from Government Service to Pinkertons, the scales have dropped from my eyes. The cheating that goes on in hotels and restaurants is more sinful than all the rest of the sin in the world. Anyone in a tuxedo before seven in the evening is a crocodile, and if he couldn’t take a good bite at your pocketbook he’d take a good bite at your ear. The same goes for the rest of the consumer business, even when it’s not wearing a tuxedo. Sometimes it gets me real mad to have to eat and drink the muck you get and then see what you’re charged for it. Look at our damned lunch today. Six, seven bucks with fifteen per cent added for what’s called service. And then the waiter hangs about for another fifty cents for riding up in the elevator with the stuff. Hell”—Leiter ran an angry hand through his mop of straw hair—“just don’t let’s talk about it. I’m fit to bust a gut when I think about it.”
The drinks came. They were excellent. Leiter calmed down and ordered a second round. He said, “Now let’s get angry about something else.” He laughed curtly. “Guess I’m just sore at being back in Government Service again watching all the taxpayers’ money going down the drain on this wild goose chase. Mark you, James”—there was apology in Leiter’s voice—“I’m not saying this whole operation isn’t a true bill, hell of a —— mess in fact, but what riles me is that we should be a couple of arse-end Charlies stuck down on this sand spit while the other guys have got the hot spots—you know, places where something really may be happening—or at least likely to happen. Tell you the truth, I felt like a damned fool gumshoeing around that feller’s yacht this afternoon with my little Geiger toy.” He looked keenly at Bond. “You don’t find you grow out of these things? I mean it’s all right when there’s a war on. But it seems kinda childish when Peace is bustin’ out all over.”