Emile sat down and forced Rich to finish the barrel of wine. Rich shifted the baby and grabbed the wineglass. Emile said he was disappointed, he had thought Rich was going to make a speech tonight. He explained that when a man is ready to commit himself, he needs to let the whole world know. A man needs to be confident, to stand tall, and if he can’t do that, he must pretend, as well as he possibly can, that he knows exactly what he’s doing.

He stood up and did a funny imitation of Rich, trying to hold his bride’s hand, shaking very badly, his knees buckling.

He placed a wine cork in the candle flame until it was burning, and pulled it out and blew out the flame on the end of the cork, and although it appeared to be smoldering, he grabbed Rich by the back of the head and pressed the cork against Rich’s face, wiping it on him. The cork had become charcoal. He explained that a man needed to look distinguished, and in charge, and that with his baby face, maybe what Rich needed was a mustache. In Rich’s lap, Jean-Louis slept soundly.

Emile told Rich about his friend Yacob, who had wanted to be a photographer; he was brilliant, but his camera got stolen and in the winter of 1948 he went off to Morocco looking for some wild experiences, and ended up going blind—from fungus (Emile demanded Martina’s help translating, and spoke to her in a stern voice Rich hadn’t heard before; Martina yelled back at him in French)—and then he killed himself. Rich leaned forward and kept his face taut; the cork was still warm. In the candlelight Rich got a long, careful look at the lines, the bent flesh, the gravity of Emile’s disappointments, the ailing glow in his eyes as he looked into Rich’s face. Emile never forgave Yacob, he said. Rich smelled the burning cork, the wine on Emile’s breath, the scent of mothballs from the old man’s sweater

In his grand gesture to befriend the kid, to lighten the mood, Emile wanted to complete his thought, that a young man needed to believe the miracles of the natural world were within his reach, but he couldn’t say it, because he was frightened for Rich and felt responsible. He put his hand on top of Rich’s head and smoothed his hair.

“What did I ever do to you?” Rich said, when he walked into the bedroom, surprised to find Gynnie still awake. He stared her in the face, defiant. He couldn’t take it anymore.

She said she was sorry. She wondered why he had dirt on his face. She asked him why his pants were wet. He explained that it was from sweat, from where Jean-Louis had slept across his lap; he’d been afraid to move for fear of waking the baby.