With trembling hands Franky placed a cup in front of Manny and poured it full. Manny took a tiny sip, sighed heavily without any sense of relief, and opened his eyes at last. "All right," he said. And turning to Franky, he added, "Go clean up your hideous mess, and if I step on broken glass later, I swear to God I will disembowel you." Franky stumbled away, and Manny took another microscopic sip before turning his bleary glare on me. "You want to talk about your wedding," he said as if he couldn't really believe it.

"That's right," I said, and he shook his head. "A nice-looking man like you," he said. "Why on earth would you want to get married?" "I need the tax break," I said. "Can we talk about the menu?"

"At the crack of dawn, on a Saturday? No," he said. "It's a horrible, pointless, primitive ritual," and I assumed he was talking about the wedding rather than the menu, although with Manny one really couldn't be sure. "I am truly appalled that anyone would willingly go through with it. But," he said, waving his hand dismissively, "at least it gives me a chance to experiment."

"I wonder if it might be possible to experiment a little cheaper." "It might be," he said and for the first time he showed his teeth, but it could only be called a smile if you agree that torturing animals is funny, "but it just won't happen."

"Why not?"
"Because I've already decided what I want to do, and there's nothing you can do to stop me."

To be perfectly truthful there were several things I could think of to stop him, but none of them-enjoyable as they might be-would pass the strict guidelines of the Harry Code, and so I could not do them. "I don't suppose sweet reason would have any effect?" I asked hopefully.

He leered at me. "How sweet did you have in mind?" he said.
"Well, I was going to say please and smile a lot," I said.
"Not good enough," he said. "Not by a great deal."
"Vince said you were guessing five hundred dollars a plate?"
"I don't guess," he snarled. "And I don't give a shit about counting your fucking pennies." "Of course not," I said, trying to soothe him a bit. "After all, they're not your pennies."
"Your girlfriend signed the fucking contract," he said. "I can charge you anything I fucking feel like." "But there must be something I can do to get the price down a little?" I said hopefully.
His snarl loosened into his patented leer again. "Not in a chair," he said. "Then what can I do?"