Woody was so surprised by the call that he could only answer Mary Jane's seemingly very casual questions in nonsyllables. He said yes he was feeling well, and no he hadn't been sick. He almost let Mary Jane hang up before he recovered himself sufficiently to ask her for a date. And when he came away from the phone, he was grinning as he hadn't grinned since he sold the wreckage of Cindy Lou. "Ye'll be taking yere lassie out tonight, nae doot?" said Worm. "Yes, _sir_," said Woody all smiles. "Nae doot ye'd like a leetle advance on yer pay," Worm went on. "Or are ye fixed for money? I could let ye have maybe a dollar." "Thanks," said Woody, "but I think I've got enough." "Weel," said Worm, "dinna spend a lot on her. Them that takes yere money aren't the housekeeping kind." When Woody called for Mary Jane he had the whole evening planned. He'd borrowed his father's car--a '54 Merc--and was dressed in the dark blue suit that Mary Jane liked. He had spent half an hour cleaning the grease from under his fingernails, and passing a drugstore, had had the happy inspiration to buy a box of candy. Mary Jane kept him waiting for only twenty minutes. When she appeared she looked slimmer and more vivacious and more attractive than Woody ever remembered. She was not an exceptionally pretty girl but had a certain grace to her ways and walk that completely captivated Woody. Her nose was perhaps a little too snub for perfection, but her dark brown eyes, set wide apart, gave her a frankness of expression that was especially appealing. "Hi, Woody," she said as she entered. "Sorry to keep you waiting. My hair just wouldn't stay in place this evening." Woody glanced at her hair, thick, dark, and curly, and didn't mind the twenty minutes of thumb twiddling in the Jackson living room. When they were in the car, he suggested that they go to Merton's for dinner. Unfortunately Merton's was the place to which Mary Jane had been with Bob Peters, and she now associated it with a certain amount of boredom. "We could eat there and then go to the civic auditorium," he suggested. "There's somebody giving a lecture there on something to do with psychology. I thought you'd like to hear it." Woody had been briefed on tactics by Steve, who knew that Mary Jane had developed a passion recently for lectures. "Woody Hartford," said Mary Jane. "If you mention the word 'lecture' to me again, I won't speak to you all evening." They went instead to the College Try, a place halfway between a soda fountain and a restaurant. It had a juke box, and Mary Jane played all the new swing records she could find, and they danced. Woody decided that Steve had given him a bum steer, but he didn't mind. He was having a wonderful time, and Mary Jane was even more vivacious and attractive than usual. She even asked him about Cindy Lou, and Woody told her that it had blown up and he'd sold what was left of the hot rod.