Judy rushed towards her. She felt a mixture of emotions, not all of them pleasant. So Sophie had fired Gregoire: good. And trusted her: better. And yet, as much as she loathed the woman, it was hard not to feel sympathy for somebody who was actually crying.

“Sophie—don’t cry. Look, here’s a handkerchief.” She un-clipped her bag and drew forth one of her neat little squares, crisp white Irish cotton.

“Thank you,” Sophie sobbed.

Stop the goddamn crying, Judy thought fiercely. I don’t need to feel anything for you. She reminded herself that it was a knee-jerk reaction. Judy steeled her heart against further compassion. This woman was the reason, she believed, that Pierre had never married her, had always had to leave her every night; the reason Judy got little gifts on holidays, instead of his arms around her; the reason she spent Christmas by herself.

“I’ve been so stupid,” Sophie said, gulping for air.

Judy wasn’t about to disagree.

“Sit down,” she said, pulling Gregoire’s chair out, solicitously.

“Thank you.” Sophie dabbed at her eyes, struggling for, and achieving, a measure of control. She waved Judy to the Eames chair in front of the desk. “You too.”

Judy sat, obediently. “Do you want to talk about it?”

Sophie looked at her, with reddened eyes, but with a directness that made the younger woman uncomfortable.

“Do you think I did wrong to fire Gregoire? You seemed devoted to him.”

Judy paused. The baseball fan in her immediately tagged this a fastball, but Judy was ready for every pitch.

“I believed he worked very hard. . . . I told you he was always in the office,” she said humbly. “And that’s true, but of course, I don’t know what he did there. I just handle PR.” She gave an expressive shrug. “From where I was sitting he seemed devoted to the company. Sophie . . . was I wrong? I trusted him.”

She nodded. “So did I; I’ve been a fool.”

Judy decided to gamble, again. She put her cropped head down, humbly, and summoned up a thickness in her throat.

“But I’ve been working here for years. I should have seen it,” she said. “You’ll want my resignation. I’ll bring it up to your desk right away.”

“Resignation? Oh, no, there’s no cause for that—that’s not what I meant,” Sophie said, quickly. “You were loyal—I admire loyalty.”

“Has he been embezzling money?” Judy asked. She did not have to fake interest in that.

Sophie sighed. “Nothing so dramatic. I made a few calls from my car before I got here today—calls I ought to have made months ago.” Judy saw the other woman flush with embarrassment. “First I rang my broker. Well, Pierre’s broker,” she added with a little self-deprecating laugh. “I never did much stock trading. . . .”