"And there's no… girl friend coming with you tomorrow?"

"There's a girl friend-" he mimicked her pause perfectly "-but I'm not sure if she'll make it back in time. She's gone to South Dakota for a funeral."

"Nobody close, I hope."

"An aunt."

"Mmm…"

They fell silent for a moment. Their plates were empty. Winnie carefully wiped her mouth and more carefully avoided eye contact with the man beside her. But after some moments curiosity got the better of her, and she turned to find he'd been sitting with an elbow propped on the table, jaw to knuckle, studying her for some time. Discomfited by his close scrutiny, she groped for a conversational diversion.

"What's her name?"

"I have no idea."

A puzzled frown puckered Winnie's eyebrows. "You have no idea what your girl friend's name is?"

He laughed and seemed to force himself out of a deep reverie long enough to stop staring. "Oh, I thought you meant her aunt. My friend's name is Lee Ann Peterson, but I wouldn't really call her a girl friend. We've been seeing each other, that's all."

"And what's she like?"

He squared his shoulders and pressed them against the cane-backed chair. "Like all the rest." Did he pronounce that rather wearily, she mused. "A little bit smart, but a lot more dumb. A little on the ball, but often vague. Not quite as mature as she should be for her age and kind of scatterbrained." He glanced at Winnie sharply, as if owing her an explanation. "These are only impressions, of course. I don't know her well enough."

"And what does she look like?"

He flashed his devilish grin. "She's got a great body."

Winnie felt herself blushing. He hadn't passed his eyes down her torso, but she felt as if he had, for comparison's sake.

"You're a body man, then?" she ventured, trying to cut him down with a note of cool disdain.

A wicked glint sparkled in his eye. "Yes, as a matter of fact, I am. You see I have this-"