A minute later he left his stool and went to the rest room. He had to plan a way out in case of necessity. There was no back entrance to the rest room, he saw, and the only window was high above his head. Too small for a man's body to squeeze through. He'd be trapped if he let them corner him here. Back at the bar he found his drink still waiting. "I held your place for you," a woman's soft voice said. * * * * * Ostby glanced into the full length mirror above the bar. The girl next to him was young and pretty. He shifted his glance to his own reflection. The mustache and the little patch of beard between his chin and lower lip had grown well. His whiskers always came in heavy and black, and they were the style now. They altered his appearance considerably. Evidently it had not lessened his attraction for the opposite sex. That attractiveness had been with him so long that he had ceased being surprised by it. But it still puzzled him. There was strength in the features of the reflection that looked back at him, he admitted, but no beauty. Rather the outline was almost harsh, as though etched by a rough masculine hand. He wondered, without caring, why women were drawn to it. All this retrospection occurred in the split second after he glanced into the mirror. "I am in your debt," he said, turning to his companion. His manner and expression was disinterested, even a bit disdainful. Yet his voice was gentle and courteous. Perhaps that contrast was the thing that held women's attention. The manner seemed to imply a knowledge of their wiles, and an ability to read through their vanities. Yet his voice told them that he recognized their womanly need to be appreciated, and coddled, and that he would be invariably gentle with them. "May I buy you a drink?" he asked. "My glass is still full," the girl answered, and smiled at him. She did not look so young now that he saw her face to face. The features were young, but the eyes were old, and too wise for one of her chronological age. With his flameless lighter Ostby lit the white oval which the girl drew from its package and placed between her full red lips. All the while Ostby's eyes made their swift survey of the room and stamped its every feature in his eidetic memory. Only one exit, other than the front door, he saw. The windows were all about seven feet above the floor, and banded with burglar-bars. A man would have difficulty gaining entrance or exit. At the opposite end of the room he observed a small dance floor and a mechanical music box. His attention was held for a moment by a party seated in a booth at the edge of the dance floor. The men and women in the booth were too well dressed, too well bred, to be down here in the Flats. The apex of the party was a woman whose beauty attracted Ostby clear across the room. "Who are the people in the back booth?" he asked his companion.