I boosted the ball with the stick. It went in the hole. I said, “That’s another ten cents you owe me.”

“Damn,” Leonard said. “What is that now, forty cents?”

“Fifty.”

“You’re not countin’ the first game, are you?”

“Why not?”

“That was a warm-up game.”

“You didn’t say anything about a warm-up game. Did he say anything about a warm-up game, John?”

John shook his head, said, “And you owe me all the games I beat you, Leonard. Don’t try and weasel.”

“I’m not weaslin’.”

“I call it weaslin’. Hap?”

“Weaslin’.”

“I just think you ought to have least one warm-up game,” Leonard said.

“John, we do that, does that mean I don’t owe you first time you beat me?” I said. “Could that be a warm-up game? You want to do that, I’ll go with Leonard.”

“Everybody owes,” John said.

“Yeah, you say that,” Leonard said, “ ’cause you’re the only one hasn’t lost a game.”

John said, “My turn. It’s you and me, Hap. Loser racks.”

Leonard fed some quarters into the slot on the side of the table and the balls were released. Leonard gathered the balls, racked them.

It was my break, but I let John go first. He burst, and I never so much as picked up my stick after that. He ran the table. When he was finished twenty minutes later, he said, “Ten more cents.”

I looked at Leonard. “Give him a dime out of the money you owe me.”

John held out his hand and Leonard gave him the ten cents.

“That’s a beginning,” John said.

Leonard bought beers for himself and John, got me a Sharps. We sat at a table and watched some women shoot pool. One of the women, a blonde with black roots, had a large but well-formed butt, like the kind R. Crumb draws. The other one was tall and thin with brown hair and big doe eyes. They were in their thirties, attractive. They were interested in two guys at the bar, however, and they were playing pool with them in mind, moving their butts so that those two got a good view.