“I’m not looking for spontaneity in the audience,” Mary told him. “Show me spontaneous, and I’ll show you the whack jobs.”

Young Fred was an indignant type. “As a rule, there isn’t a surfeit of whack jobs in our audiences—this is the Upper East Side,” Fred reminded Mary.

“We should have hooked up Fred to the electric breast pump—you know where,” Nora would say, with Em pantomiming, The bigger and bulkier, the better.

All Mary Marinelli said, at the time, was: “It takes just one whack job, Fred, to ruin the night—I’m not looking for a surfeit.” Behind his back, Nora gave Fred the finger—Nora’s spontaneous thing.

“Here are more questions, and there’s no time to gather more notecards—when you do the Q and A in writing, not everyone in the audience gets to ask his or her question,” Fred said in his pissy way.

“Not everyone in the audience should get to ask his or her question, Fred—hence the weeding,” Mary told him.

“Well, I’m sure you’ll show us the whack job—when you find one,” Fred said, in a pique.

“Oh, fuck off, Fred,” Nora said. This enlivening dialogue no doubt distracted me from what Em was trying to say, in her original way. Em was often sudden in her movements—jumping to her feet and dancing around, with no apparent purpose. I’d noticed that Em was calling our attention to the notecards. I hadn’t understood why Em was showing us her ballroom-dance repertoire. As usual, Nora understood what Em was trying to tell us before I got it. “We should look for a question from Jasmine?” Nora asked Em, who nodded her head off. Nora explained to Mary. “About five years ago, Adam’s mother told Jasmine that Adam said Jasmine had a vagina as big as a ballroom.”

“I see,” Mary Marinelli said.

“About the same time, you told Jasmine that her pussy was a subway station,” I reminded Nora. Em just kept nodding.

“Jasmine had a bed-shitting episode when she was having sex with Adam—I don’t think she’ll ever get over it,” Nora further explained to Mary. Em vigorously shook her head while rereading the notecards; Em clearly didn’t think that Jasmine was likely to get over the bed-shitting episode.

“Just tell me what Jasmine might ask, please,” Mary said to Nora.

“Bed-shitters are usually spontaneous, Fred,” Nora began. “Here’s a whack job for you—a question Jasmine might ask Adam: ‘Am I the only woman who has been befouled by you—beshitted, in your bed?’ Now there’s a question! I’ll bet Em and Mary might have noticed that one,” Nora said.

“That one would have caught my eye,” Mary Marinelli said.