uesque blonde, no longer young, was leaning her elbows on a kidneyshaped vanity of black glass and chrome, staring gloomily at her sun-ruined hair and skin in the pink-tinted mirror. She was fully dressed in a too-fancy cocktail gown and extremely high-heeled sandals.

Jean Fredricks, a smaller blonde with a tough, pugnacious face and tired blue eyes, sprawled in a wrought-iron-and-plywood chair of weird design, thirstily drinking a gin-sling through green plastic straws. Two more stood on the floor beside her, the moisture from the frosty glasses making little puddles on the black and yellow tiles. Her blue linen dress still showed the wrinkles of careless packing and she was barefoot. Wearily, Dana slumped on the edge of a chaise longue and rested her head on her forearms.

"I'm getting too old for this racket," she sighed.

The tall blonde abandoned the gloomy contemplation of her pinktinted image and glanced at Dana sharply.

"If true, that's the best news I've heard all season," she said, in a tone that left no doubt as to her sincerity.

A small, wiry brunette emerged from the shower room wearing nothing but a towel draped across her shoulders, although at first glance she appeared to be wearing brown knee sox, long brown gloves reaching halfway between elbow and shoulder, and a brown mask that covered her face and neck and came to a sharp V between her small breasts. The sharply contrasting two-tone effect of her body was somehow shocking, while her nakedness was not. She smiled at the

one

tall blonde.

"Won't help you, doll," she said sweetly. "You'd still have me to beat and you couldn't do that the best day you ever lived."

The blonde snorted and began to apply lipstick lavishly. Jean Fredricks sucked her glass empty and picked up another.

"How'd you make out, Farrell?"

"Seventy." Dana's voice was muffled by her arms.

"Hmmm. Here we go again. Your ex-girlfriend in yet?"

Toni Carver came through the door with four drinks balanced on a tray held high over her head.

"No, she isn't in yet!" she mimicked nastily. "Don't you ever get tired of playing with that needle, Fredricks?"

"Oh, knock it off, Lover!" Jean said tiredly. "Who appointed you captain of the guards? I merely asked--"

“I heard you,” Toni said shortly. She handed Dana a drink and took one for herself. "These are with the compliments of Mr. J. P. Frisbee. Never saw him before

in my life."

Phyllis dropped her lipstick into an enormous white handbag and leered at Toni. "Let's not make it too obvious, sweetie-give the group a bad name, you know."

"Alright, Phyl, that's enough." Dana took a long swallow of her drink.

"Don't call me Phyl!" she snapped. "And don't try to order me around! Just because-"

Kathy Johannsen yawned loudly and sat up. "Can't you bags read?" she inquired grouchily, "All the time yakkety-yak. And