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Army," Letty said.
    I was impressed. A girl could read insignia. I nodded. I wanted to impress her back. "But in real life I'm a businessman."
    "In America?"
    "Oh, sure," I said. "My partner in New York, he's 4-F. We both want to be good citizens. I know you understand. I went into the military, but I have to make money, too." I didn't like the way I sounded, like a rich American—and to myself like a liar—but the words kept coming.
    Letty gave me a look of disapproval, almost as if she were mirroring my own thoughts about myself. "Actually I don't understand. Right now nobody
needs
to make money except if they're greedy."
    I wanted to go back in time a full minute, but all I could do was say, "It's not what you think."
    "Then what is it."
    "I have very private reasons for needing money."
    Letty took both of my hands, stopped dancing, stepped back and looked me right in the eye. "You can't be ill or you wouldn't be in the Army."
    "Please don't play Twenty Questions." I'd learned to enjoy that game. I always won because I knew so much obscure information. But I wasn't going to play it with the obscure information of my life.
    Letty shrugged. "You don't
look
like a money-grubbing businessman. So why won't you prove it?"
    This was a girl in a city I expected never to visit again. I saw no reason to tell her truths I didn't even want to face myself. "Maybe the reason I need money is painful," I said. "Think about my circumstances. All right?"
    I could see her thinking. Her eyes actually moved, almost as if she were running them across the landscape of her own life and then trying to imagine mine. The band hit the final crescendo of the song, stopped, the dancers applauded. And Letty put her arms around my neck and gave me a brief hug. "I'll leave you alone," she said softly into my neck.
    As soon as the next song struck up I remembered Letty was Alan's date, and I escorted her back to her seat, held her chair for her, got to claim my cold beer. Enough time had passed that I thought I could handle the alcohol.
    "Hey, Bernie, I'm really sorry about what I said about your family," Shirley said. She was comfortable and slurry.
    "So why'd you bring it up again?" Ted said. He was more comfortable and more slurry.
    "Apology completely accepted," I said. I liked Shirley.
    "Why don't you ask him about something good, like himself?" Letty said.
    "You mean like the fact that you're not like Ted, who was just lying around until some big net scooped him up?" Shirley said.
    I was tempted to be funny too, to say that a very big net had scooped me up, but I didn't want to let the conversation flip to seriousness, which often happens with humor. "I have a small business in New York," I said.
    "Yeah?" Shirley said. She didn't believe me. I looked at Letty. She didn't want to believe me. I think it was the business part she didn't want to believe. Not the small part.
    I pulled a cigarette case from my pocket. I always carried a piece of our merchandise. I never knew when I would need it. Of course I never put cigarettes in a case, and I always had it wrapped in tissue. That would be all I would need, to be beaten in the street and taken to the hospital with a woman's cigarette case on me, looking as if I used it. I'd be discharged from the Army with dishonor.
    "Very pretty," Letty said.
    "My partner expects to do well when he goes to Gimbel's in New York next month," I said.
    Shirley looked a little funny. "Nobody much has fur down here, you know. I mean fur coats and stuff." She laughed at her own joke.
    I had been thinking of going to Maison Blanche while I was in New Orleans, but I decided not to tell them that.
    Letty asked Shirley if she wanted to powder her nose. I didn't know what that meant, but both girls got up and left the table. I knew they were coming back, though I didn't know how soon, so I quickly asked Alan if Letty was his girlfriend. I didn't want a girlfriend because I was in New Orleans temporarily, but I wasn't going to take