"Yeah, that's the way it goes. He don't like our service; don't think what we got is sweet enough and pretty enough for his fine taste; not now, he don't. It's gonna surprise him some, ain't it, dears, how he'll learn to like our dishes and our room service after a little time, hah?" The first charmer hummed an unrecognizable non-musical bar or two and lifted straggling skirts high, higher to prance a misshapen dance step. The others cackled wildly. "Show him Belle. Show him something to put in his dreams. He'll come around fast enough." He squeezed his eyelids tighter shut. "All right then, Sweetie, Jail-Birdie Boy," said Belle, dropping skirts. "Your appetite for our cell block service'll change. How d'you want your eggs, Bird-Boy?" She laughed. He raised his head, dully. "Any way you feel like laying them, goddamnit," he snarled. The harsh amusement dissolved. "A funny one? Did I say fresh meat, dears? Too fresh, hah? All right. Should we serve him a chef's special?" * * * * * The other two gruntingly pushed the steam table forward. One lifted a metal plate, something between a dish and a bowl, and scooped a ladle full of a greyish mess of whatever, mush of some sort. Edible? Conceivably. Then she reached into some nauseous recess of the table and brought out a stout roach, legs moving feebly. She dropped it into the mush. Number two drew a steaming cup of muddy liquid from an urn. Coffee? Well, it was a brown-grey, it had a smell, it wasn't soup. Coffee. The hag with the cup hawked gurglingly and spat into the cup. The third grinned evilly and dropped three slices of grey-white bread--grey was in everything--on the gritty corridor floor; stirred them around with her bunion cut left shoe; picked them up. "Breakfast is served, Birdie. Juicy worms for the early jail bird." Belle opened the cell door. The man sat still on his bunk, staring fixedly at the floor. The stout slattern laughed, slopped the filthy bread on top of the expiring roach and Belle took the plate-bowl and the cup to slap them down beside him. "Breakfast. Bread's your lunch. Maybe you'll be gladder to see us by supper. No? Then tomorrow, or the next day; or the next." She backed out and clanged the cell door shut. "No tipping," she said. The others cackled. "Please ... no tipping."