The words came from somewhere near my right shoulder, causing us both to startle and turn to the doorway, where Mr. Thorpe stood in his white dinner jacket, long and wide-shouldered and lean as a wooden cross. His head was bare and the spectacles perched at the very end of his nose. He pushed them up and smiled.

“My dear Thorpe,” said Wenner-Gren. “I thought you had disappeared, as usual.”

“Merely counting my profits in the back office.”

“Don’t tell me you’ve finished raiding all the pockets already,” I said.

“Every shilling accounted for.” Thorpe held out his elbow. “Might I have a private word with you, Mrs. Randolph?”

I suppose I gaped. He hadn’t shown the slightest sign of recognition earlier, and though I’d caught glimpse after glimpse of him during the course of the party, we had never come face to face, as if some contract had been drawn up between us, some agreement not to acknowledge each other. I thought he had probably forgotten me, forgotten the episode on the airplane, or at least my face in the middle of it. And now he held out his elbow to me.

“Thorpe, old chap,” said Wenner-Gren, in the funny way that men of all nations will ape certain expressions of the English upper classes. “I didn’t know you were a friend of Mrs. Randolph’s.”

“We met on an airplane,” said Thorpe, pronouncing the word in three syllables, air-o-plane, “and formed an instant connection. Didn’t we, Mrs. Randolph?”

His face was grave, his fair skin pink beneath the freckles. I considered his eyes, which were blue and slightly hooded behind his spectacles, giving you an impression of great depth. I glanced back at Wenner-Gren’s face and discovered a cool, pale stare like a reptile’s.

I set down my half-finished bourbon on the edge of the Duke of Windsor’s desk. “That’s a wonderful question, Mr. Thorpe. I guess we might as well find out.”

We didn’t say a word until we reached the center of the main hallway, right between the staircase and the front entrance, where the panic hit my stomach once more. I snatched my hand from Thorpe’s elbow. “Thanks very much for rescuing me in there. I won’t trouble you further.”

“Now, wait just a moment, Mrs.—”

But I was already pushing open the door, already hurrying across the portico. He caught up with me a few steps later and touched my elbow. I stopped and whirled to face him.

“Did I say I wanted company, Mr. Thorpe?”

“Look here. You can’t just fly off alone like that.”

“You can’t possibly think I’d go off with you.”

“Why not?”

“Why not? I don’t even know you. For all I know, you’re a homicidal maniac. Or worse.”

“Worse? What could be worse than that?”