It is along about four in the morning, and The Brain is walking me up and down Broadway in front of Mindy’s restaurant. The Brain is talking with great importance about something, but I wish to confess I am only somewhat listening, although The Brain believes he has my full scope, on account of I am nodding my head most pleasantly. Truthfully I want no truck at the moment with walking up and down Broadway in front of Mindy’s, as I am newly loaded with lettuce and eager for some action. But as I do not wish to upset The Brain, here I am, and it is not an unpleasant time, at that.

But I am paying attention enough to see that The Brain is already upset more than somewhat. He is saying that something or other just is not right, and that everything has somehow become most different indeed from what is naturally expected. Because The Brain is the type of guy who knows whereof he is talking, I am beginning to get interested.

“Come with me and I will show you,” says The Brain, and he takes my arm and leads me into Mindy’s. “See what I am getting at?” asks The Brain when we are inside.

And I do see what The Brain is getting at. We walk through the doors of Mindy’s restaurant, but the place in which we find ourselves is not Mindy’s restaurant, but some other place entirely. I do not see The Brain’s usual table, and I do not see Mindy himself, and I do not see any of the usual citizens such as are to be found at Mindy’s along about four in the morning – guys between action, bookmakers, and some of the dancing dolls from the Hot Box and the Sixteen Hundred Club. Instead it is strange characters in strange clothing, and nothing looks very normal at all.

“I do not understand this,” The Brain says. I suggest that we go back outside, turn around, and come back in again, and perhaps this puts things back in an agreeable way. But it does not.

We go back into this place which is not exactly Mindy’s restaurant, and The Brain finds somebody to talk to, a doll who is waiting tables. He explains to her what is his predicament, and I see right away that The Brain is most fortunate to encounter a doll who is so knowledgeable in such matters as this.

“Oh, I get it,” says this doll. “You are The Brain, and you” – meaning me – “are the unidentified Narrator, and you have wandered over from a Broadway which does not any longer exist. This is 2011, and the Mindy’s you are looking for is closed for decades. The restaurant you are standing in is an unrelated one, which the Riese Organization establishes in 1979, realizing that the Mindy’s name might attract tourists craving a taste of old New York.”

Well, this is almost too much for The Brain and me, and our knees begin to grow unsteady more than somewhat, and The Brain says he must sit down, despite the fact that The Brain’s regular table is not to be seen.

“Only a slice of Mindy’s cheesecake can revive me,” says The Brain weakly. I tell The Brain that under the circumstances, the cheesecake is likely to have no relation whatever to what he is expecting, but The Brain seems willing to take on the risk, and asks this doll to bring him a slice of cheesecake. Upon tasting it The Brain admits that it is not exactly hitting the correct spot, but it is nevertheless a top-notch slice of cheesecake at a time when such a proposition is most agreeable. Feeling somewhat relieved but still not entirely in the pink, The Brain asks for the check. And how much dough do you suppose this slice of cheesecake costs The Brain?

I kid you not: A complete sawbuck! For one slice of cheesecake! At Mindy’s restaurant!

Well, when he hears this, The Brain begins to shake most violently, and before I can think what to say The Brain has keeled over and seemingly popped off. And I think of all the very tough characters who brush up against The Brain and are unable to do him distress, while this doll offs him with nothing besides a check for a sawbuck for cheesecake.

But by and by The Brain opens his eyes somewhat and looks at me darker than the inside of a wolf. “I want to go home,” says The Brain, and we get up, very slow and uncertain, looking out toward Broadway.