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straight in again. It, too, was bright with high ceilings, polished wooden floors and more thick columns as you entered surrounded by indoor palms. Round tables with wicker chairsseparated the bar on your left and a piano on the right with another restaurant glassed off below that. Another lounge squared off with a wood-topped green railing, full of comfortable sofas and small tables with a bookcase and paintings on the walls was set above the piano in front of a passageway with a long, wooden table and prints of old sailing ships on the wall that ran along to another lounge area at the back. The whole place was very elegant and swish and built to take advantage of the beautiful ocean view outside and more than likely boomed on the weekends and the tourist season. Tonight, however, there was about a dozen or so people in there counting Les, the piano player and the three girls in dark green trousers and red paisley vests working the bar. Oh well, thought Norton, it’s only a Wednesday night. And there might be some punters in the disco. Right now, after that back-breaking walk down, I’m in dire need of a cocktail. The bar was in three sections. One faced the piano, another the door and the other the swimming pool outside shining in the moonlight. Les chose a bar stool facing the doorway and picked up the cocktail list. A minute or two later a young girl with neat, dark hair and a pretty, almost pixie kind of face came over.
    â€˜Yes, sir. What can I get you?’ she smiled.
    Norton perused the cocktail list again then placed it on the bar. ‘Yeah, I’ll have a Chocolate Surprise, please.’
    â€˜Certainly, sir.’
    The girl shuffled around behind the bar, a blender whirled and before he knew it, Norton had what looked like a chocolate milkshake spliced with strawberries sitting in front of him, only with a lot more kick. Afterpaying the girl, Les took another mouthful and checked out the punters. There was a skinny girl in a white shirt and black vest seated round the corner who looked like kd lang, a couple two stools up staring into each other’s eyes while they smoked their heads off, one or two more couples and half-a-dozen mixed shapes and sizes at a table near the piano player who could have been his friends. The piano player had thick brown hair over a salt-and-pepper beard and was crooning old Cole Porter and Ira Gershwin classics in a white tuxedo. He had a good voice and was an excellent pianist, but every now and again he’d slip in his own version of the lyrics. At the moment he was singing ‘Don’t Get Around Much Any More’, only it was coming out:
    Â 
    â€˜Bonked my girlfriend last night
    Shot all over the floor
    Cleaned it up with my toothbrush
    Don’t clean my teeth much any more.’
    It went over kd lang’s and the couple’s heads. But the mixed shapes lapped it up, along with the staff and Norton. That finished, then it was ‘These Foolish Things’.
    Â 
    â€˜Two shades of lipstick on an old French letter
    A case of syphilis that just won’t get better
    And when I piss it stings
    These foolish things
    Remind me of you.’
    Norton chortled away and finished his milkshake. It was lovely and tasty, but all the cream and liqueurs made you thirsty. He caught the same girl’s eye and she came over.
    Les looked at her for a moment and thought; why not? I’m just a tourist in town. ‘I’ll have a bottle of Corona and a stinger, thanks.’
    â€˜Certainly, sir. Lime in the Corona?’
    â€˜Yes, please.’
    Norton hoofed the stinger down in two belts followed by a third of the Corona. Bloody hell, he grimaced, when his eyes stopped spinning and the beer washed away the taste of creme de menthe. No wonder bloody Mitzi date-raped me back in Hawaii. She had about fifty of those rotten things. He took another sip of beer and decided to have a look out the back; there wasn’t much chance of him losing his