She was three lemons, and you get arrested for putting a lead nickel in the machine. Moments after I rang the bell at the front door of the middle-bracket-nice house on a tree-shaded street, curtains fluttered behind a window on my left. Peeking out at me, I thought. Probably this gorgeous babe is in there alone, I thought; nude, dancing around the room to flutey music, trailing a couple of veils maybe. She’ll wrap a towel around her wild, naked body and come to the door and peek out, and say in a sexy voice—sexy voice! Maybe she was the one who’d phoned Hazel—“I don’t know who you are, but … I’ve been waiting for you.” It has happened before. Gal in a towel, I mean. More than once. Neither of them said “I’ve been waiting for you,” and like that—but it could happen. One of these days it will happen. I’m a very optimistic fellow. The curtains had stopped fluttering. The door opened a crack, and—yes—she was peeking out at me. Just as I’d had it pictured.
