A business agent spoke on the union’s behalf in negotiations with management, and made sure employers honored union contracts. He also sold employees on the idea of union membership. And handled grievances. And collected dues. Zukor was not sure what sort of house he would be visiting; his imagination played between mansion and shotgun lean-to. Would he be taken prisoner by frothing men in overalls?

His chauffeur walked him to the curb under the umbrella. It was one of a dozen nearly identical places recently built on the block. A duplex, it had a front lawn now sodden with rain, and a tiled entryway. The front door was painted a Barcelona blue. Zukor could not hear the doorbell when he rang. The problem with unions was that they could easily stand in the way of the consolidation Zukor had in mind. He didn’t understand whether they were motivated more by greed or by desire for anarchy.

The rain continued. The door opened.

“Hello, Mr. Zukor.” Zukor’s thin eyebrows shot upward. A young girl had answered the door. She had black, straight hair and probing eyes. She was, of course, Rebecca Golod. “My father is in the living room.”

She took his coat. The entryway was lined with bookshelves, and the bookshelves, full to bursting with odd volumes in several languages, were also lined with small craft projects, postcards, shells from the beach, animal bones, and so forth. The rooms were overheated, and the living room even had a fireplace, before which Mordecai Golod stood.

“Sit, sit, please, Mr. Zukor,” he said. He had shaved his beard, had his hair fashionably slicked back with pomade, and was dressed in blue serge. “My daughter will bring us tea.”

As Zukor carefully chose an overstuffed chair to sit on, Rebecca went to the kitchen to put the kettle on. She stood without moving by the stove, setting two cups on a tray, with sugar, milk, teapot, while the flames veered around the bottom of the kettle.

She was listening to her father and Zukor. She was listening not for words but for tone. She had let the world’s most suspicious man into their house, and that had immediately relaxed her, for suspicious men were the best marks. But her father’s tone had puzzled her—as she had been puzzled all month by what his new scam actually was. Skimming? Bribes? Each time she had tried to wheedle it out of him, he had shrugged. “I’m concerned about the desires of the common man. His aspirations,” he said one night.

Maybe. He was now saying roughly the same thing to Zukor. So, whatever it was, it was a long con, something involving wheels within wheels. Which was fine. She had time.