“When’s the physical?”

“Next week. I’ll tap-dance through it.”

“So what if you fall on your ass, tap dancing?” Elaine knew how to get to the point.

“So, then I’m a retiree.”

“Best thing could happen to you.”

“I can think of better things.”

“Come on, Stone, you’re too good looking to be a cop. Too smart, too. You went to law school, didn’t you?”

“I never took the bar.”

“So take the bar. Make a buck.”

“It’s fifteen years since I graduated.”

“So? Take one of those cram courses.”

“Maybe. You’re coming on kind of motherly, aren’t you?”

“Somebody’s gotta tell you this stuff.”

“I appreciate the thought. Who’s the guy at the bar?” To a cop’s eye the man didn’t fit in somehow. He probably wouldn’t fit anywhere. Male Caucasian, five-six, a hundred and seventy, thinning brown hair, thick, black-rimmed glasses adhesive-taped in the middle.

“In the white coat? Doc.”

“That his name or his game?”

“Both. He’s at Lenox Hill, I think. He’s in here a lot, late, trying to pick up girls.”

“In a hospital jacket?”

“His technique is to diagnose them. Weird, isn’t it?”

Doc reached over to the girl next to him and peeled back her eyelid. The girl recoiled.

Stone laughed out loud and finished the Wild Turkey. “Bet it works. What girl could resist a doctah?”

“Just about all of them is my guess. I’ve never seen him leave with anybody.”

Stone signaled a waiter for the check and put some cash on the table.

“Have one on me,” Elaine said.

“Rain check. I’ve had one too many already.” He stood up and pecked her on the cheek.

“Don’t be such a stranger.”

“If I don’t pass the physical, I’ll be in here all the time. You’ll have to throw me out.”

“My pleasure. Take care.”

Stone glanced at Doc on the way out. He was taking the girl’s pulse. She was looking at him as if he were nuts.

Stone was a little drunk—too drunk to drive, he reckoned, if he had owned a car. The night air was pleasant, still warm for September. He looked up Second Avenue to see a dozen cabs bearing down on him from uptown. Elaine’s was the best cab spot in town; he could never figure out where they were all coming from. Harlem? Cabdrivers wouldn’t take anybody to Harlem, not if they could help it. He turned away from them; he’d walk, give the knee another workout. The bourbon had loosened it up.