McDermott looks up with an exaggerated grin and purrs, "Bud. Long neck. Beautiful."

"Very civilized." Goodrich nods.

Superstylish English guy Nigel Morrison stops by our table and he's wearing a flower in the lapel of his Paul Smith jacket. But he can't stay long since he has to meet other British friends, Ian and Lucy, at Delmonico's. Seconds after he walks away, I hear someone sneer, "Nigel. A pate animal."

Someone else: "Did you know that caveman got more fiber than we do?"

"Who's handling the Fisher account?"

"Screw that. What about the Shepard thing? The Shepard account?"

" Is that David Monrowe? What a burnout."

"Oh brother."

"For Christ sakes."

"...lean and mean..."

"What's in it for me?"

"The Shepard play or the Shepard account?"

"Rich people with cheap stereos."

"No, girls who can hold their liquor."

"...total lightweight..."

"Need a light? Nice matches."

"What's in it for me?"

"yup yup yup yup yup yup..."

I think it's me who says, "I have to return some videotapes."

Someone has already taken out a Minolta cellular phone and called for a car, and then, when I'm not really listening, watching instead someone who looks remarkably like Marcus Halberstam paying a check, someone asks, simply, not in relation to anything, "Why? " and though I'm very proud that I have cold blood and that I can keep my nerve and do what I'm supposed to do, I catch something, then realize it: Why? and automatically answering, out of the blue, for no reason, just opening my mouth, words coming out, summarizing for the idiots: "Well, though I know I should have done that instead of not doing it, I'm twenty-seven for Christ sakes and this is, uh, how life presents itself in a bar or in a club in New York, maybe anywhere, at the end of the century and how people, you know, me, behave, and this is what being Pat rick means to me, I guess, so, well, yup, uh..." and this is followed by a sigh, then a slight shrug and another sigh, and above one of the doors covered by red velvet drapes in Harry's is a sign and on the sign in letters that match the drapes' color are the words THIS IS NOT AN EXIT.