I pass the Carpenter Center for the Visual Arts on my left, and I must look like a holy mess. After all the trouble I went to before my ill-advised ride, showering in my office, changing into a suit that’s now wrinkled and sweat-stained. I dabbed on Benton’s favorite Amorvero perfume that he finds in Italy. It’s the signature fragrance of the Hotel Hassler in Rome, where he proposed to me. But I can’t smell the exotic scent anymore as I sniff my wrist, waiting at an intersection. Heat rises in shimmering waves from the tar-smelling pavement, and I hear Marino’s big voice before I see him.

“You know what they say about mad Englishmen and dogs going out in this shit?”

I turn around at the garbled cliché and he’s stopped at a light, the driver’s window open of his unmarked midnight-blue SUV. Now I know why the reception was so bad when we talked a moment ago. It’s what I suspected. He’s been cruising the area looking for me, talking to people in the Square. He turns on his emergency flashers and whelps his siren, cutting between cars in the opposite lane, heading toward me.

Marino double-parks, climbs out, and I don’t think I’ll ever get used to seeing him in a suit and tie. Smart attire wasn’t designed with the likes of him in mind. Nothing really fits him except his own skin.

ALMOST SIX-FOOT-FIVE, HE WEIGHS two hundred and fifty pounds give or take thirty. His tan shaved head is smooth like polished stone, his hands and feet the size of boats. Marino’s shoulders are the width of a door, and he could bench-press five of me he likes to brag.

He’s handsome in a primitive way with a big ruddy face, heavy brow and prominent nose. He has a caveman jaw and strong white teeth, and he tends to explode out of business clothes like the Incredible Hulk. Nothing dressy and off the rack looks quite right on him, and part of the problem is he shouldn’t be left to his own devices when he shops, which isn’t often or planned. It would be helpful if he would clean out his closets and garage occasionally but I’m pretty sure he never has.

As he steps up on the sidewalk I notice the sleeves of his navy-blue suit jacket are above the wrist. His trouser cuffs are high-waters that show his gray tube socks, and he has on black leather trainers that aren’t laced all the way up. His tie is almost color coordinated and just as unfashionable, black-and-red-striped and much too wide, possibly from the 1980s when people wore polyester bell-bottoms, Earth Shoes and leisure suits.