g to bed."

"I could help with that," she said.

"No thanks, Beautiful--not tonight." She shrugged and moved on. Oliver
went up to his room and was asleep in five minutes.

At 4 a.m. he was wide awake. He dressed and returned to the casino. The
room was mostly dark and shut down. Only one row of slot machines by
the door was active. Overhead lights illuminated a single craps table,
a bright mahogany raft floating in the darkness. Old men held on to its
edges, playing quietly and grimly. Oliver put himself in their place.
Why go to bed? Save themselves for what? They clung to a different kind
of life raft than Jacky had been for him, but it was just as real. He
watched for ten minutes and left. He found an open cafeteria and took a
cup of coffee back to bed. The steam from the cup and the warmth in his
hand were comforting.

Oliver woke up late in the morning. He cashed in all but fifty dollars
of his chips and ate a large breakfast. He walked along the beach to
the Taj Mahal casino and found that it was much the same as Bally's. He
returned to the hotel and checked out. Before he left, he placed a
fifty dollar bet on pass. He would leave seventy dollars ahead or a
hundred and seventy dollars ahead, a winner either way. My kind of bet,
he said to himself. He won. Yesterday's pit boss was not there. Oliver
imagined himself nodding to him--superior, free, out of there. It
didn't matter. He could tell Jacky.

Finding the Delaware Bridge was the next challenge. Two hours later,
Oliver was in Maryland easing around a curve on a gravel driveway.
Stones crunched under his wheels as he stopped in front of a white
colonial. Jacky came out to meet him. She was wearing a Red Sox T-shirt
and a wrap-around cotton skirt.

"Well, well," she said looking at his suit and holding her arms open.
"What have we here?"

"A player," Oliver said, coming close. Her arms drew him against her.
He smelled honeysuckle, and his hands found their familiar places.

"Mmm," she said, "I'll bet you're hungry."

"You win."

Jacky stepped back. "Good. I'm going to show off. I've been practicing
my crab cakes."

"Yumm."

"I thought we'd eat home, relax, maybe go out later . . . I'll give
you the Bay Tour tomorrow."

"Finest kind," Oliver said. "Nice house. That T-shirt isn't going to
make you any friends."

"Just because I'm living in Maryland, doesn't mean I'm a traitor," she
said, leading him into the kitchen. "How was Atlantic City?"