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terrified that Vangie was going to lead him straight on board the damn thing. But she stopped just inside the pier entrance and leaned down to lift the lid of a wooden box. Evidently it had been nailed into place on the boarding.
        The box was a cube about a foot in every dimension. There was a slot in its lid, like a ticket-taker's box, and on a stake above the box was a prettily lettered sign:
        
         DID YOU FORGET
         TO LEAVE YOUR HOTEL KEY
         AT THE DESK?
         LEAVE IT HERE!
         A Service of the San Francisco Hotel Assoc .
        
        From her enormous shoulderbag Vangie took a small key. It unlocked the padlock on the key box. She lifted the lid and removed the three keys that reposed in the box. Each key was attached to a wooden tag bearing the name of a hotel and a room number.
        She closed the box and locked it, putting the three wood-tagged keys into her bag. "Okay, we can go now."
        Gabe walked back up the street with her. "The San Francisco Hotel Association," he said. "You're the San Francisco Hotel Association."
        "Well, you know lodgings are terribly expensive."
        "Uh-huh. And your parents live in San Francisco, and someone stole all your money, and you were stranded up the river, and you'd never ever picked anybody's pocket before, ever."
        Vangie shrugged evasively and went on up the street with a cheerful grin. Her body swung alertly and the huge pocketbook flew from her little shoulder.
        She was damned pretty. Gabe found himself thinking it might be fun to show her around New York. She'd probably fit right in back there, which was something he hadn't expected from any Westerner.
        She paused to look back at him. "You coming?"
        "Oh, yes," he said. "I'm coming."
        He caught up with her and this time they walked directly into the city. They passed a Melodeon on a corner. Someone had splashed a huge X of red paint across its lurid poster of cancan dancers, and hung on the door a wooden shingle with CLOSED painted on it in the same vivid red paint.
        The sign on the corner was wreathed in fog but there was a gas street lamp next to it and Gabe could make out the printing. It seemed very important to know that they were at the intersection of Sansome and Pacific Streets. Not that Gabe would ever find it again without a guide. But he liked to know the names of places where there might be opportunities. And Pacific Street looked like such a place. Jammed from sidewalk to sidewalk with moving bodies, most of them unsteady on their feet. And it wasn't even sunset yet.
        "Pacific Street," he murmured.
        "We call it the Barbary Coast."
        "Is that right. What's that mean?"
        "I don't know. But I heard a politician say it's the most vice-infested square mile of corruption in the world." She said it with a note of triumph which Gabe didn't miss; suddenly she turned and jabbed a pretty little finger into his chest. "Nobody's ever said that about New York. Hah!"
        "Only because New York's bigger than a square mile. We like to spread the joy around a little."
        "Oh you're so smart." She lifted her chin and swung away toward a side street.
        "Where you going?" He had an instant's panic.
        "You wait there," she said.
        "For what?"
        "Don't you want dinner?"
        "We both know my stomach's empty."
        "Well, we won't get much for fifty-five cents."
        "You mean I'm the only one you hit on that boat?"
        She frowned for a moment. "I guess you must have distracted me. But anyway, you wait right here. I'll be back."
        And she drifted away into the crowd.
        It wouldn't do, he thought. He wasn't going to have a wisp of a girl picking pockets to feed him. It might be standard behavior out here, but back East where men were men…
        Pacific Street ran down from where Gabe stood to a flight of slippery