She pursed her lips. The lipstick felt odd. It had been a long time since she had worn any. Her hair was pulled back and held in place by a hair clip. She was wearing a knee-length, black dress, modestly cut, but it did accentuate her long neck and shoulders. Two men at the other end of the bar were staring at her. Both wore gray suits. One directed a half-smile at her. She tried to keep her face blank. The smiling man called the bartender over, spoke softly to him, and nodded his head toward her. Oh shit, she thought.

Grayton sat down on the stool next to her.

“I hate to begin with an apology, so instead: ‘It’s nice to meet you, Julia.’”

He held out his hand and she took it.

“No apologies needed.”

“Hungry?”

She nodded.

“Good. To the table, then.”

The hostess guided them to a booth. Grayton asked the hostess to inform Michael that he was here tonight and that he had brought plastic pouches to collect evidence. She laughed and walked away.

“The sous-chef used to be in the Bureau,” Grayton explained to Lancette. “Left us, studied cooking, and—bang!—a whole new life. Last time President Hanover came here—shit, shouldn’t have said ‘last time,’ but it was—he got food poisoning. Bad oyster. Nothing the place could have done about that. Hanover was great. Sent Bertis, the chef, a note inviting him to the White House for dinner. ‘No hard feelings,’ he wrote. ‘But watch out. I’ll be cooking.’ Bertis and Michael were so relieved no one found out about the incident. Think of the publicity. But you didn’t see anything about that, did you?”

“No, I didn’t.”

“And you must read a lot of papers and watch a lot of news.”

Was he referring to her job?

“Yes, I do,” she said.

“And nothing on this. See, some secrets can be kept … . Want to try the oysters?” He laughed.

“No thanks … . And if no one found out about the bad oyster, how do you know about it?”

“Well, no one rarely means no one.”

Without consulting the wine list, Grayton ordered a bottle. He suggested several choices for dinner that were not on the menu. They ordered.

“On to the obligatory portion of the evening?” he asked.

“Sure,” she said.

He went first: Dartmouth, Eighty-second Airborne, NSC staff aide, several jobs in the community, headed the Bureau’s antiterrorism office, then deputy directory. He mentioned the divorce.