“How about buying me a little old drink, then? A girl can get awful thirsty sitting here by herself.”

This is it, Marty thought. Everything Tony told me worked out the way he said it would!

“What do you want?”

“Make it a Scotch and soda,” she said.

He cornered a passing waiter and ordered two Scotch and sodas. The drinks arrived almost immediately—this place operated efficiently—and the waiter wanted immediate payment. Two-fifty.

Marty wanted to say, “Two and a half for a lousy couple of shots of whiskey?” But he didn’t say it. Instead he pulled out that bulging wallet and handed the waiter three singles and told him to keep the change. He watched Margie’s eyes pop a little as she saw how thick the wallet was. She didn’t have to know that all those bills were just ones and fives, he thought. Let her figure they’re twenties or fifties.

He didn’t mix the Scotch and the soda, but put down the shot of liquor first and then drank the chaser, the way Tony had told him to do. Tony said it was a waste of good whiskey to mix it up with soda or ginger ale, concoctions like that. He noticed that Margie mixed her drink up and stirred it around, but he didn’t say anything.

He bought some more drinks a little while later, and again downed the shot straight. He forgot about the chaser. He was feeling very good. His hand had crept across the table and he was holding hers, and the music in the background had created a very pleasant mood. He made a mental note that he had to thank Tony specially when he got back to the ship. Everything was working out marvelously, just marvelously.

* * *

It was about quarter to eleven when Margie whispered to him, “Listen here, honey. There isn’t any sense in you handing over a buck and a quarter a shot for the cheap whiskey they sell here. Suppose we get out of here now. We can pick up a bottle of something in a liquor store and bring it up to my place for a little party.”

Marty grinned. This was what he had been waiting for all evening. Tony had said, Just wait and she’ll ask you to come up to her place!

“That’s sure okay with me, Margie!”

“Okay, then, lover-boy. Let’s get out of here.”

He left a tip on the table even though he had been tipping the waiter with each drink, and she took his hand and led him through the thick crowd at the bar and out into the street. It was a warm night and Times Square was crowded.