“Did you read what you left? Why didn’t you just write another note?”

“Not now, Joe. This woman is—”

“To hell with her.” He was squeezing her arm. He let go. “It will only take a moment.”

“You’re getting yourself worked up over nothing,” she said. “I only had that one piece of paper and I didn’t want to start rummaging around in your desk for another. What would you have thought if I had crossed out a dozen lines? I just wanted to tell you something, that’s all. I thought I had. I’m sorry.”

“I’m sorry.” He stroked her arm where he had held it.

“Are you all right?” she asked. “I don’t want to leave you now if you don’t feel right about something.” She kissed him quickly, her lips dry and warm. “Joe? Please? Maybe I was stupid.”

“No—no.” He shook his head. “I did this to myself. Go back inside. I’ll see you later.”

She touched his cheek. She didn’t want to kiss him again here. He was going to wait a moment. He remembered that he wanted to take a look at the two men who had been talking about him. Karen went down the steps, watching what she was doing. She looked as if she had had a working-over. All morning, he had known what he had been doing. If this had not been a public place, he could have made it much worse. Certainly he didn’t want to think about what he had forced her to carry for the rest of the day.

When he returned to the table there were fresh cups of coffee. “I took the liberty,” Norma MacIver said. “I hope you don’t mind.”

“No, not at all.”

“Is everything all right?”

“Oh, yes. Another result of the trouble that that reporter made for me. My wife overheard a conversation at another table.”

“On the way up in the train today I read the article in the Herald-Press. Indirectly, that’s been the cause of it all. Your father wouldn’t have called you, would he? What was the point of running an article like that? I mean, besides selling newspapers?”

“That’s right. It was truth to no good purpose.” He stirred his coffee.

“Are you sure everything is all right?” she asked.

“Excuse me?”

“Your personal business,” she said. “Were you able to get it transacted? Don’t answer me if you don’t want to.”

“No, that’s all right. The truth is that I transacted my personal business when my wife came to the table. This is something else. I wish you weren’t so sensitive to people’s moods. You bring a mood to the surface and make it more acute than it might be otherwise.”

“Perhaps that’s truth to no good purpose,” she said.