He looked at the new sea island cotton swatches and ordered a dozen shirts. He didn’t know what they cost; he didn’t want to know. Joan would pay the bill when it arrived, and he had instructed her not to enlighten him; some things were best left unknown. He picked out a few ties and waited while they were wrapped; the shirts would take eight weeks, or so. Then he left the shop and turned down Park Avenue toward home in Turtle Bay.

In the upper Forties, as he turned to cross Park, a stretched Bentley glided to a momentary halt, then drove on, but not before Stone had seen, through the open rear window, Elena Marks, now clad in proper New York widow’s weeds by Chanel, in earnest conversation with someone Stone knew. He pulled out his cell phone and speed-dialed Woodman & Weld and Bill Eggers.

“What is it, Stone?” Eggers asked, sounding rushed. It was a technique of his when he didn’t want to talk to somebody.

“Bill, I was crossing Park Avenue a moment ago, when I saw Elena Marks in her car with Robert Teller, of Teller and Sparks.”

“What?” Eggers cried.

“I kid you not.”

“That buccaneer! That bastard! Poaching my clients!”

“I thought you’d want to know.”

“What were they talking about?”

“Well, Bill, I couldn’t hear them. I just saw them in that big Bentley of hers, talking.”

“Well, I’ve already got our tax people working on something that might save her a few hundred grand. It’s the kind of thing she likes.”

“I’d tell her about it soon, Bill. Bye-bye.” Stone punched off. He thought about calling T&A and canceling his shirt order, but he thought better of it.

Stone arrived home and went upstairs to leave his new ties, before returning to his office. As he approached his bedroom, he heard a snore. He pushed open the door and peered inside. Carpenter lay on her back, a breast exposed, sawing lightly away. He tiptoed across the room toward his dressing room, left the ties and tiptoed back into the bedroom. He was greeted by a wide-awake Carpenter, sitting up in bed, clutching a sheet to her bosom with one hand while using the other to point a small, semiautomatic pistol at him.

“You caught me hanging up neckties,” he said, raising his hands in surrender.

“What are you doing here?” she asked, seeming confused.

“I live here,” Stone explained. He pointed at the bed. “I sleep there. Is that my Walther you’re pointing at me?”

“No, it’s mine. My firm has issued them to everybody since the first James Bond novel.”

“And why are you still pointing it at me?”

She lowered her hand. “Sorry,” she said, dropping the sheet, to good effect, and running her fingers through her hair. “I didn’t get any sleep last night.”