The Blue Room Ballroom was just off Broadway. It had a canopy over the sidewalk from which dangled blue paper half-moons. On each moon, in brilliant gold letters, was the legend: 5 Cents A Dance.
5 Cents A Dance.Barney Bowers c****d his head to one side and looked up owlishly at the paper moons. He appeared to be slightly under the weather. The dark-blue suit he wore was new enough, but the collar of it was turned up in back, his necktie was pulled halfway to his left ear and his hair was mussed.
He walked wobbly to the entrance of the Blue Moon, a flight of stairs leading down into the basement. A uniformed doorman stepped up briskly. “Yes sir, right downstairs,” he droned. “Bee-yoo-tiful hostesses!”
yooBowers started to descend, missed a stair and almost plunged down the entire flight
