“Well aren’t you togged to the bricks!” said the curvaceous brunette standing at the end of the bar. The small glass of amber liquid in her hand glittered as did her lustrous hair shining with hundreds of tiny jewels. Her smile was warm and welcoming and her eyes glinted.

The man lit a cigarette and smiled.

Setting her drink down on the bar she turned to him eyes alight with fire; “The atmosphere in here just got a bit thick. Care to take a walk? I hear the moon is riding high in the sky tonight and the way is bathed in silver…”

He decided it would be good to walk a bit. He took one last swig of his drink, grabbed his hat and gave her a smile.

The air though dense in the bar relaxed into a cool breeze once they stepped out onto the cobbled walk. They paused under a nearby hanging street lamp which cast a pale golden glow upon her upturned face.

As he looked at her pretty face he wondered at this odd luck.

“Do you sail Mr…?” she let the question hang in the air waiting for it to catch.

They turned as one and began to walk north toward the pier looming long and dark in the near distance. She glanced sideways at him from under long black lashes. She liked his look – sure footed and cool like Sam Spade. She’d seen him in the talkies not too long ago at the Orpheum on Broadway, The Maltese Falcon it was. His hands were pushed into the pockets of his dark grey trousers and he walked with his head high and proud. She imagined those hands sliding along her bare arms and down her curved hips. She faced forward again as they approached the pier, the tang of the water strong and cloying but not distasteful.

“Mr. Finnegan and you are Ms.?”

“Bell.”, she replied tilting her head. “Lucy and may I say Mr. Finnegan your quite brave coming out onto a darkened pier with a strange woman. Perhaps my motives are not at all as virtuous as you might expect.” she smiled sweetly at him and leaned closer to the rail and in the process her hair swung in silky fragrant wave over his arm. She winked wickedly at him then and said.” And what of your motives Mr. Finnegan?” she noticed his voice had a slight upward tilt to it. Irish perhaps? It was very slight.

"Well Ms. Bell to answer your first question I’ve been on a boat but once and have no liking for them." He flicked his cigarette and continued his walk wondering where the conversation was going.

She turned and began to descend a barnacle covered ladder that was almost invisible but for the patches of metal here and there. Her feet were bare as she had removed small red buckled shoes before swinging herself over the side of the dock. Her thin red dress billowed out behind her in the rush of sea air and her black stockings and lace garters were just visible briefly before she landed spritely on the gunwale of a small sailboat bumping softly against the pilings.

Lucy smiled to herself and watched him walk along the boardwalk his eyes cast heavenward. All coyness aside she called to him in a clear voice that drifted echoing on the empty walk next to the dark and wet piles that lined the dock, “Well then Mr. Finnegan, do let us rectify that lapse in your life experience.”

Next Chapter: Lyllian December 1981 Seattle