Vic Daniel 6 - As she rides by

thousand licks, anything but that!”
    “When you two are done,” I said, “perhaps one might be allowed to enter, to mingle, to meet your other guests. Can I let him off the leash, by the way? How’s your cat with dogs?”
    “Loves them,” Rick said, scrambling back up to his moccasined feet. “Has one for breakfast every morning regular, when she tires of raccoon tartar.”
    “King, search and destroy,” I said, unsnapping his leash. My friend led the way into the front room. Aside from the moccasins, all he was wearing were the paint-stained bottoms of a lime-green jogging outfit tied at the waist by a length of extension cord. There were four people in the room, none of whom took the slightest notice of my entrance. One was a very pretty girl wearing two bandanas and a charm bracelet, who was stretched out on the sofa with her eyes closed. One was a tall, skinny guy in a blue denim suit and matching engineer’s cap who was seated at Rick’s synthesizer blasting out a version of the old Stones number, “I used to love her—but it’s all over now.” The third was a shorter, stockier type wearing huge, round horn-rims and a baggy white suit three sizes too big for him; he was perched on a stool alongside the pianist accompanying him on electric guitar.
    The remaining individual, seemingly in a trance, was standing in one corner, like bad boys in school (and I name no names) used to have to do; all I could see of him from the back was that he was short and wore brown denims tucked into elaborately tooled, high-heeled cowboy boots, a cream-colored cowboy shirt, and at least a fifteen-gallon, pale gray Stetson, with a row of gleaming silver dollars adorning the hatband.
    On the cocktail table in front of the sofa was an open lid of weed; beside it a pack of those cigarette papers that look like dollar bills, a pack of Zig-Zags, and a pack of licorice-flavored skins. Every taste catered to, obviously. Beside them were two hash pipes—a wooden North African type with a small clay bowl, and an elaborate, twisty, glass affair. Beside them was a gigantic plastic pitcher of what had to be Bloody Marys, or rather the dregs thereof. In front of that was an unopened fifth of Wild Turkey. Alongside the booze was an almost-empty box of those chocolates called turtles, as that’s what they’re shaped like.
    Summing up the situation in one piercing glance, I remarked to my host, “Ah. Ladies’ bridge night. Glad I could make it.”
    The music the boys were producing was already deafening, but when Rick picked up his guitar and climbed aboard, it was too much for this old square so I betook myself out onto the balcony to wait till they finished the set or, more likely, their amps exploded. I was closely followed by the dog. I had decided that I wasn’t going to teach King any tricks— OK, except for fetch—as I always thought a dog doing tricks was almost as sorry a sight as dolphins and killer whales doing them. Impersonations, however... now you’re talking. He could already impersonate Lassie in that scene where he scratches at the kitchen door, looking back pointedly over his shoulder until Mom puts down her rolling pin and says, “Do you know, I believe that dog wants us to follow him!” And do you remember that scene where Rin Tin Tin had to make his way through enemy lines carrying secret dispatches in his mouth? That sort of thing, I thought. But maybe I would teach him one trick, after all: At a hidden signal from me, like when the decible count was high enough to stun vampire bats in their flight, he’d put his paws over his ears and howl piteously.
    Anyway. Out on the balcony, I sat and leafed through some music publication until the boys finally ran out of steam or choruses or licks or whatever, then Rick beckoned me inside. Inside I went. The dog, already an astute music critic despite his youth, remained adamantly outside. Introductions followed. I was told the two musicians who’d been jamming with my pal were Limeys, although being a highly trained detective and all I could have probably figured that out for myself, as, on being introduced, the lanky one in the denim suit grasped my hand firmly in both of his and exclaimed, “My dear chap! So you’re Victor. I’m Jerry, the good-looking one. Delighted, I’m sure. We’ve heard ever so much about you from Rickie, have we not, Tom?”
    “I haven’t heard that much, actually,” the one in the horn-rimmed glasses said morosely, giving