“I don’t give a damn,” he said simply.
“Charley, I desperately need a bath.”
“Not for me, you don’t.”
“For me, I do.”
“Jesus!”
“Charley, give me ten minutes, please.”
He had somehow managed to move very close to her. She didn’t remember him doing it. But all of a sudden, there he was, with his hands on her upper arms.
“I have to kiss you,” he said matter-of-factly. “I can’t wait ten minutes.”
He kissed her, but not the Johnny Weismuller “You-Jane-Me-Tarzan” squeezing-the-breath-out-of-her kiss she expected. He slowly moved his head to hers and, barely touching her, very gently kissed her forehead, and her eyebrows, and her cheeks, and even her nose. And then he found her lips.
By then, her knees seemed to have lost all their strength. She was sort of sagging against him.
“Oh, God, Charley,” she said when he took his lips away.
“What I thought about,” he said, “was taking your clothes off and then taking a shower with you. Like the last time. Remember?”
“What are you waiting for, Charley?” Carolyn asked.
[FOUR]
The Lobby Bar
The Andrew Foster Hotel
San Francisco, California
1735 Hours 24 October 1942
Lieutenants Pickering and Dunn shouldered their way through the crowd at the bar and finally caught the attention of the bartender.
“Gentlemen?” the bartender asked, then took a good look at Lieutenant Dunn. “Lieutenant, I’m sorry, but I’m going to have to see your ID card.”
“He’s with me,” Pick said.
“And I better have a look at yours, too,” the bartender said. “They’re really on us about serving minors.”
Identity cards were produced.
“I’m sorry about that,” the bartender said. “What can I fix you?”
“No problem,” Pick said. “Famous Grouse and water. A lot of the former, just a little of the latter. Twice.”
“Sir, I’m sorry, we’re out of Famous Grouse.”
“There’s a couple of bottles in the cabinet under the cash register,” Pick said.
The bartender stared at him for two or three beats, smiled uneasily, and walked down the bar for a quick word with a second bartender. He was a gray-haired man with a manner that said he’d been standing behind that bar from at least the time when the first was in kindergarten. He glanced up the bar, then quickly walked to Pickering and Dunn, pausing en route to take a quart bottle of Famous Grouse from the cabinet under the cash register.
“He didn’t know who you were, Pick,” he said, smiling. “And you were asking for the Boss’s private stock.”
“It looks as if the boss is making a lot of money,” Pick said, indicating the crowd at the bar. “I thought he might be in here, checking the house.”
“You just missed him,” the bartender said. “But I’ll tell you who is in here, and was asking about you.” ,
“Female and attractive, I hope?” Bill Dunn asked.
“Paul, this is Bill Dunn,” Pickering said. “Bill, Paul taught me everything I know about mixing drinks. And washing glasses. Are you aware that I am one of the world’s best glass polishers?”
The two shook hands.
“No, he’s not. He’s a lousy glass polisher,” Paul said. “But I did make him memorize the Bartender’s Guide.”
“Tell me about the attractive female who’s been asking about him,” Dunn said.
“Over there,” Paul said, chuckling and nodding his head toward a table in the corner of the room. It was occupied by two attractive women and six attentive Naval officers, all of whom wore wings of gold.
The taller of the two women at that moment waved, then stood up. Her hair was dark, and red.
“She is not what she appears to be, Bill,” Pick said. “Or, phrased another way, she does not deliver what she appears to be offering.”
The bartender chuckled. “Don’t tell me you struck out with her, Pick? That’s hard to believe.”
“She ruined my batting average, if you have to know. And God knows, I gave it the old school try.”
“What’s her name?” Dunn asked as the redhead made her way to the bar.
“Alexandra, after the Virgin Princess of Constantinople,” Pick said.
“Pick,” Alexandra said, giving him her cheek to kiss. “I heard you were in town. You could have called me.”