After one or two outings, you will probably start to become more specific in your requirements. You won’t want any old limo. You’ll want a limo in which the details are exactly right. A compact-disc player instead of a tape deck. Leather upholstery rather than cloth. Single-malt scotch, a freshly ironed copy of The Wall Street Journal, a Fax machine, a silver vase of freesias—once you get into the refinements, you’ll never want to get out. But these come later.
While, as we have stated, only a black limo will do, we draw the line at black-tinted windows, for two reasons. First, they encourage autograph hunters, who will sidle up when the car is stopped at a light and peer at you and possibly mistake you for Mick Jagger or, worse, Ivan F. Boesky. And second, they make it virtually impossible for your friends—or, better still, your enemies—to catch a glimpse of you as you place phone calls and come to grips with the crystal decanters. Clear-glass windows are our recommendation, but it’s a matter of personal choice.
In the stretch business, as in most other businesses, there exists a reduced-price trial offer. It works like this: let’s say that you find yourself in Manhattan at the corner of Fifty-fifth and Third one evening around 6:30. All the cabs are taken, but if you make yourself sufficiently obvious as a man in need of transport, it won’t be long before a prowling limo slows down. Hail it. Providing the driver likes the look of you, he’ll stop, because he’s just dropped his passenger and has a couple of hours to kill before picking him up again. Imbued with the spirit of enterprise, the driver will want to use this time profitably. As long as your destination won’t make him late for his pickup, nobody will be the wiser and he’ll be a little richer. The exact price should be agreed on before you get in, but you can be sure that it will be less than a formal arrangement with the limo company.