“Where the hell did you find that girl?” he said. “Under a rock?”

“Who? Daisy? I told you, she works at the Bibelot.”

“Have you ever talked to her?”

“A little. She seems very nice and bright.”

“She’s a spook. She’s just like some of the kids we bust who start smart-mouthing us in the station.” He made a drink for Meadows, then poured another for himself. He looked up and saw Ellen staring at him.

“What’s the matter with you?” she said.

“I guess I don’t like strange people coming into my house and insulting me.”

“Honestly, Martin. I’m sure there was no insult intended. She was probably just being frank. Frankness is in these days, you know.”

“Well, if she gets any franker with me, she’s gonna be out, I’ll tell you that.” He picked up the two drinks and started for the door.

Ellen said, “Martin …” and he stopped. “For my sake … please.”

“Don’t worry about a thing. Everything’ll be fine. Like they say in the commercials, calm down.”

He refilled Hooper’s drink and Daisy Wicker’s without refilling his own. Then he sat down and nursed his drink through a long story Meadows was telling Daisy. Brody felt all right—pretty good, in fact—and he knew that if he didn’t have anything more to drink before dinner, he’d be fine.

At 8:30, Ellen brought the soup plates out from the kitchen and set them around the table. “Martin,” she said, “would you open the wine for me while I get everyone seated?”

“Wine?”

“There are three bottles in the kitchen. A white in the icebox and two reds on the counter. You may as well open them all. The reds will need time to breathe.”

“Of course they will,” Brody said as he stood up. “Who doesn’t?”

“Oh, and the tire-bouchin is on the counter next to the red.”

“The what?”

Daisy Wicker said, “It’s tire-bouchon. The corkscrew.”

Brody took vengeful pleasure in seeing Ellen blush, for it relieved him of some of his own embarrassment. He found the corkscrew and went to work on the two bottles of red wine. He pulled one cork cleanly, but the other crumbled as he was withdrawing it, and pieces slipped into the bottle. He took the bottle of white out of the refrigerator, and as he uncorked it he tangled his tongue trying to pronounce the name of the wine: Montrachet. He arrived at what seemed to him an acceptable pronunciation, wiped the bottle dry with a dish towel, and took it into the dining room.

Ellen was seated at the end of the table nearest the kitchen. Hooper was at her left, Meadows at her right. Next to Meadows, Daisy Wicker, then an empty space for Brody at the far end of the table, and, opposite Daisy, Dorothy Meadows.

Brody put his left hand behind his back and, standing over Ellen’s right shoulder, poured her a glass of wine. “A glass of Mount Ratchet,” he said. “Very good year, 1970. I remember it well.”