one."
I popped the tops and handed her a can as we walked toward the No. 8 green, and skirted the sand trap. The green was on a gentle berm of filled earth, and we sat on the grassy slope facing the lighted backyard. The row of candles along the border made the milling people around the pool resemble actors on a stage set, with the candles serving as footlights.
"Where's Larry?" she said.
"I don't know how to tell you this, Jannaire, but he said he simply couldn't stand you. So he left, and I promised to take you home."
"I could tell he didn't like me," she said, "but you don't have to take me home. I can get a cab back to the Hojo's on Dixie."
"Why Hojo's?"
"That's where I left my car."
"Larry's crazy," I said. "You're the most attractive woman here tonight. Perhaps you said something to irritate him. Larry's very sensitive, you know."
"I don't know what it could be. I know he didn't believe me when I told him I didn't have any last name, but it's true. I had my name changed legally to Jannaire five years ago."
"From what?"
"That's what he asked. But that's the way things always go with me. Men either like me or they don't from the first moment we meet. And more men dislike me than like me. It's always been that way, ever since high school."
"What do you do, Jannaire?"
"About men, do you mean?"
"No. I 'like'' you. We've already got that established. Work, I mean."
"Many of the women here tonight would know—a lot of them, I think. I design clothes, pant suits, mostly, under the trade name of Jannaire. I also own the Cutique, on Miracle Mile in the Gables."
"Cutique?"
"Awful, isn't it? But they remember the name, women do, and they come back. I also own two apartment houses, and I'm a silent partner in a few other business ventures. I keep busy."
"I don't understand this dating business, then. Why would a woman as attractive as you, and with some money besides—and a business—sign up with Electro-Date?"
She laughed. "Does Larry tell you everything?"
"No, but we're friends, and we live in the same building. And he did tell me about Electro-Date."
"To tell you the truth, Mr. Norton..."
"Hank, for Christ's sake. I'm not going to call you Miss Jannaire."
"All right, Hank. That's an odd name, too, isn't it?"
"Come on, back to the truth about the electronic dating."
"I happen to own twenty percent of Electro-Date, and it isn't doing very well now, although it started out well enough. Miami is much too small for accurate matching, which is always halfassed at best, but there're too many dating services competing. Anyway, when someone really bitches, as Larry did after his first date, they call me. I study the application questionnaire and sometimes take the next date myself. I'm sure if Larry and I had had a chance to talk together, as you and I are doing now, I could've overcome his objections to me, whatever they are."
"No," I laughed. "Not unless you shaved under your arms."
"Fuck him, then! Do you want to blow a roach?" She opened her little gold mesh bag, and took out a stick. "Go ahead," I reached for my lighter, "but I never smoke pot. It doesn't do anything for me, and I've been brainwashed. I'm a detail man, and by the time we've finished our indoctrination course, we never touch anything in the drug line."
"Mary Jane isn't a drug," she protested.
"I know the arguments. And I can counter every one you bring up, too. But in my job, with drugs of every kind available to me, I leave them strictly alone. They scared us badly during training. I'm even nervous about taking an aspirin. And aspirin can be dangerous too. In some people, it burns
I popped the tops and handed her a can as we walked toward the No. 8 green, and skirted the sand trap. The green was on a gentle berm of filled earth, and we sat on the grassy slope facing the lighted backyard. The row of candles along the border made the milling people around the pool resemble actors on a stage set, with the candles serving as footlights.
"Where's Larry?" she said.
"I don't know how to tell you this, Jannaire, but he said he simply couldn't stand you. So he left, and I promised to take you home."
"I could tell he didn't like me," she said, "but you don't have to take me home. I can get a cab back to the Hojo's on Dixie."
"Why Hojo's?"
"That's where I left my car."
"Larry's crazy," I said. "You're the most attractive woman here tonight. Perhaps you said something to irritate him. Larry's very sensitive, you know."
"I don't know what it could be. I know he didn't believe me when I told him I didn't have any last name, but it's true. I had my name changed legally to Jannaire five years ago."
"From what?"
"That's what he asked. But that's the way things always go with me. Men either like me or they don't from the first moment we meet. And more men dislike me than like me. It's always been that way, ever since high school."
"What do you do, Jannaire?"
"About men, do you mean?"
"No. I 'like'' you. We've already got that established. Work, I mean."
"Many of the women here tonight would know—a lot of them, I think. I design clothes, pant suits, mostly, under the trade name of Jannaire. I also own the Cutique, on Miracle Mile in the Gables."
"Cutique?"
"Awful, isn't it? But they remember the name, women do, and they come back. I also own two apartment houses, and I'm a silent partner in a few other business ventures. I keep busy."
"I don't understand this dating business, then. Why would a woman as attractive as you, and with some money besides—and a business—sign up with Electro-Date?"
She laughed. "Does Larry tell you everything?"
"No, but we're friends, and we live in the same building. And he did tell me about Electro-Date."
"To tell you the truth, Mr. Norton..."
"Hank, for Christ's sake. I'm not going to call you Miss Jannaire."
"All right, Hank. That's an odd name, too, isn't it?"
"Come on, back to the truth about the electronic dating."
"I happen to own twenty percent of Electro-Date, and it isn't doing very well now, although it started out well enough. Miami is much too small for accurate matching, which is always halfassed at best, but there're too many dating services competing. Anyway, when someone really bitches, as Larry did after his first date, they call me. I study the application questionnaire and sometimes take the next date myself. I'm sure if Larry and I had had a chance to talk together, as you and I are doing now, I could've overcome his objections to me, whatever they are."
"No," I laughed. "Not unless you shaved under your arms."
"Fuck him, then! Do you want to blow a roach?" She opened her little gold mesh bag, and took out a stick. "Go ahead," I reached for my lighter, "but I never smoke pot. It doesn't do anything for me, and I've been brainwashed. I'm a detail man, and by the time we've finished our indoctrination course, we never touch anything in the drug line."
"Mary Jane isn't a drug," she protested.
"I know the arguments. And I can counter every one you bring up, too. But in my job, with drugs of every kind available to me, I leave them strictly alone. They scared us badly during training. I'm even nervous about taking an aspirin. And aspirin can be dangerous too. In some people, it burns
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