With the crowd inside, and me watching the football game while Morrell talked politics with Marcena’s father, we hadn’t really spent any time together today. The sky was already dark, but the garden was protected by a high wall that kept the fiercest of the lake winds at bay. We sat under the trellis where a few late-blooming roses produced a feeble sweetness. I tossed sticks for the dogs to keep Mitch from digging.

“I’ve been jealous of Marcena.” I was astonished to hear myself say that.

“Darling, not to be indelicate, but a Siberian tiger in the living room is less obvious than you are.”

“She takes so many risks, she’s done so much!”

Morrell was astounded. “Victoria, if you took any more risks, you’d have been dead before I ever met you. What do you want? Skydiving without a parachute? Climb Mount Everest without oxygen?”

“Insouciance,” I said. “I do things because people need me, or I think they do—Billy, Mary Ann, the Dorrados. Marcena does things out of a spirit of adventure. It’s the spirit, that’s what’s different between us.”

He held me more tightly. “Yes, I can see that—she must look as though she’s free, and you feel too tightly bound. I don’t know what to say about that, but—I like knowing I can count on you.”

“But I’m tired of people counting on me.” I told him the image I’d had, the rhino and the greyhound.

He gave a loud shout of laughter but took my hand. “Vic, you’re beautiful in motion, or even when you’re lying still—not that that happens very often. I love your energy, and the grace you have when you run. For Christ’s sake, stop being jealous of Marcena. I can’t imagine you casually helping Bron Czernin rig a lethal device in his back kitchen and then not telling the cops because you didn’t want to ruin your big story. And it’s not because you’re so damn conscientious, it’s because you use your brain, okay?”

“Okay,” I said, not really convinced, but ready to drop the subject.

“Speaking of jealousy, why does Sandra Czernin have it in for you?” Morrell asked.