“He’s an addict, isn’t he?” Dave said, fiddling with a paper filter.

Beep nodded.

“Do you think we can even make this album?”

“Yes!” she said. “Please don’t give up on him. I’m afraid . . .”

“Okay, stay calm.” He switched the machine on.

“I can manage him,” she said desperately. “He maintains in the evenings, just keeping going on small amounts while he works, then in the early hours he shoots up and nods out. This was unusual, today. He doesn’t often just crash like that. Normally I score the stuff and ration it.”

Dave was appalled. He looked at her. “You’ve become nursemaid to a junkie.”

“We make these decisions when we’re too young to know better, then we have to live with them,” she said, and she started to cry.

Dave put his arms around her, and she wept on his chest. He gave her time, while the front of his shirt got wet and the kitchen filled with the aroma of coffee. Then he gently disengaged himself and poured two cups.

“Don’t worry,” he said. “Now that we know about the problem, we can work around it. While Walli’s at his best we’ll do the difficult stuff: writing the songs, the guitar solos, the vocal harmonies. When he’s not around we’ll lay down backing tracks and do a rough mix. We can get it together.”

“Oh, thank you. You’ve saved his life. I can’t tell you how relieved I am. You’re such a good man.” She stood on tiptoe and kissed his lips.

Dave felt weird. She was thanking him for saving her boyfriend’s life and, at the same time, kissing him.

Then she said: “I was such a fool to give you up.”

That was disloyal to the man in the bedroom. But loyalty had never been her strength.

She put her arms around his waist and pressed her body to his.

For a moment he held his hands in the air, away from her; then he gave in, and put his arms around her again. Perhaps loyalty was not his strength either.

“Junkies don’t have much sex,” she said. “It’s been a while.”

Dave felt shaky. At some level, he realized, he had known this was going to happen, from the moment she drove up in that red convertible.

He was shaking because he wanted her so badly.

Still he said nothing.

“Take me to bed, Dave,” she said. “Let’s fuck like we used to, just once, for old times’ sake.”

“No,” he said.

But he did.

• • •

They finished the album the day FBI director J. Edgar Hoover died.

Over breakfast at noon the following day, in the kitchen of Daisy Farm, Beep said: “My grandfather is a senator, and he says J. Edgar liked to suck cock.”

They were all amazed.

Dave grinned. He was pretty sure old Gus Dewar had never said “suck cock” to his granddaughter. But Beep liked to talk that way in front of guys. She knew it turned them on. She was mischievous. It was one of the things that made her exciting.