Jonathan pressed back into the shallow entrance to Dragon's office building, trying to avoid the rain which fell in plump drops that exploded into a haze on the sidewalk. The liquid roar eclipsed the city's babble. An empty taxi came slowly up the street, and Jonathan jumped out to take his place in a line of supplicants who waved and shouted as the cab cruised majestically by, the driver whistling contentedly to himself, doubtless contemplating some intriguing problem of Russian grammar. Jonathan returned to the shelter of his meager cave and looked out glumly on the scene. Streetlights came on, their automatized devices duped into believing it was evening by the darkening storm. Another taxi appeared and Jonathan, knowing better, nevertheless stepped forward to the curb on the outside chance that this driver was not independently wealthy and had some mild interest in profit. Then he saw that the taxi was occupied. As he turned back, the driver sounded his horn. Jonathan stood still, puzzled and getting wetter. The driver beckoned him over. Jonathan pointed at his chest with a foolish "me?" expression on his face. The back door opened and Jemima called out, "Are you going to get in, or do you like it out there?"

Jonathan jumped in, and the cab turned out into traffic, disdainfully ignoring trumpeted protests from the car abreast that was forced into the oncoming stream.

"I don't mean to drip on you," Jonathan said, "but you really do look lovely. Where did you come from? Did I mention you look lovely?" He was boyishly glad to see her again. It seemed that he had thought of her often. But probably not, he decided. Why should he?

"I saw you step out," she explained, "and you looked so funny that I took pity on you."

"Ah. You fell for an ancient ploy. I always try to look funny when I'm drowning in the rain. You never know when some passing stewardess will take pity on you."

The cabby turned and looked over the back of the seat with classic indifference to competing traffic. "That'll be double fare you know, buddy."

Jonathan told him that was just fine.

"Because we ain't supposed to pick up two fares in the rain like that." He deigned to glance briefly at the oncoming traffic.

Jonathan said he would take care of it.

"Hell, everybody and his brother would be picking up the whole damned city if we didn't charge double fare. You know that for yourself."

Jonathan leaned forward and smiled at the driver politely in the rearview mirror. "Why don't we divide up the labor here? You drive, and we'll talk." Then he asked Jemima, "How do you manage to look so calm and lovely when you're starving to death?"

"Am I starving to death?" The harlequin flecks of gold danced with amusement in her warm brown eyes.

"Certainly, you are. Its a wonder you haven't noticed it."

"I take it you're inviting me out to dinner."

"I am that. Yes."

She looked at him quizzically. "Now, you know that when I picked you up in the rain, I didn't pick you up in all the possible senses of that phrase, don't you?"

"Good Lord, we hardly know each other! What are you suggesting? How about dinner?"

She considered it a moment, tempted. Then, "No-o, I think not."

"If you hadn't said no, what would your second choice have been?"

"Steak, red wine, and a small tangy salad."

"Done." Jonathan leaned forward and told the driver to turn south to an address on Fourteenth Street.

"How about making up your mind, buddy?"

"Drive."

When the taxi pulled up in front of the restaurant, Jemima touched Jonathan's sleeve. "I saved you from melting. You are going to buy me a dinner. And that's it, right? After dinner everybody goes home. Each to his own home. OK?"

He took her hand and looked earnestly into her eyes. "Gem, you have very fragile faith in your fellow man." He squeezed the hand. "Tell me about it? Who was he—the man who hurt you so?"

She laughed, and the cab driver asked if they were going to get out or not. As Jemima dashed into the restaurant, Jonathan paid the cabby and told him he had been a real brick. Rain and traffic obscured the last word, so the driver stared at Jonathan for a moment, but he decided it was wiser to drive off in a wheel-squealing miff.

The restaurant was simple and expensive, designed for eating, not for gazing at the decor. Partly because he felt festive, and partly to impress Jemima, Jonathan ordered a bottle of Lafite.

"May I suggest 1959?" the wine steward asked, with the rhetorical assumption that his guidance was impeccable.

"We're not French," Jonathan said, not taking his eyes from Jemima.

"Sir?" The arch of the eyebrow had that blend of huff and martyrdom characteristic of upper echelon servants.

"We're not French. Prenubile wines hold no fascination for us. Bring a '53 if you have it, or a '55 if not."

As the steward departed, Jemima asked, "Is this Lafite something special?"

"You don't know?"

"No."

Jonathan signaled the steward to return. "Forget the Lafite. Bring us an Haut-Brion instead."

Assuming the change was a fiscal reconsideration, the steward made an elaborate production of scratching the Lafite off his pad and scribbling down the Haut-Brion.

"Why did you do that?" Jemima asked.

"Thrift, Miss Brown. Lafite is too expensive to waste."

"How do you know, I might have enjoyed it."

"Oh, you'd have enjoyed it all right. But you wouldn't have appreciated it."

Jemima looked at him narrowly. "You know? I have this feeling you're not a nice person."

"Niceness is an overrated quality. Being nice is how a man pays his way into the party if he hasn't the guts to be tough or the class to be brilliant."

"May I quote you?"

"Oh, you probably will."

"Ah-h—Johnson to Boswell?"

"James Abbott McNeill Whistler to Wilde. But not a bad guess."

"A gentleman would have pretended I was right. I was right about your not being a nice person."

"I'll try to make up for it by being other things. Witty, or poetic perhaps. Or even terribly interested in you, which, by the way, I am." His eyes twinkled.

"You're putting me on."

"I admit it. It's all a facade. I just pretend to be urbane as an armor for my vulnerable hypersensitivity."

"Now I'm getting a put-on within the put-on."

"How do you like being on Flugle Street?"

"Help."

Jonathan laughed and let the con lie where it was.

Jemima sighed and shook her head. "Man, you're really a social buzz saw, aren't you. I like to put people on myself by skipping logical steps in the conversation until they're dizzy. But that sort of thing isn't even in your league, is it?"

"I don't know that you could call it a league. After all, there's only one team and one player."

"Here we go again."

"Let's take time out for dinner."

The salad was crisp, the steaks huge and perfect, and they washed them down with the Haut-Brion. Throughout the meal they chatted lightly, allowing the topic to pivot on a word or a sudden thought, ranging from art to politics to childhood embarrassments to social issues, clinging to a subject only so long as there was amusement in it. They shared a sense of the ridiculous and took neither themselves nor the great names in art and politics too seriously. Often it was unnecessary to finish a sentence—the other predicting the thrust and nodding agreement or laughing. And sometimes they shared brief, relaxed silences, neither feeling a need to keep up conversation as a defense against communication. They sat next to a window. The rain alternately rattled and relented. They made ludicrous guesses about the professions and destinations of the passersby. Without recognizing it, Jonathan was dealing with Gem as though she were a man—an old friend. He drifted with the stream of conversation honestly, forgetting the pre-bed banter that usually constituted the basis of his small talk with women.