As we entered, couples turned to stare, their voices lowering. A flashbulb exploded from amidst a clutch of media people about three times too many and too badly dressed to be society editors. Kris Ann blinked, startled. Angrily, under her breath, she said, “Damn them.”

I took her arm, kept moving as a hard-eyed tractor magnate stopped castigating Jason Cantwell to his willowy lawyer and their plump wives long enough to announce, “The little bastard should be executed,” and look to me for an answer. He sounded as if Lydia’s death were the ultimate thing that had gone wrong. For him and his friends too many things had gone wrong already—blacks, inflation, their children who couldn’t stand them, that first burglary next door—until their pride of place had become mere twitches: harassing waiters, inspecting the greens, reviewing membership with a jeweler’s eye as they slid gradually closer to that national nervous breakdown that produced angry shoppers, battered wives, charge-card deadbeats, and born-again Christians by the thousands. It was clear from their stares that my finding Lydia’s body was common knowledge. “This is grotesque,” I muttered.

“Adam, Kris Ann.”

I turned to see Ardrey Carr tottering toward us, the fat of soured youth dulling his jawline, face florid to match his hair. Fifteen years ago Carr’s forearm shiver had shattered the face of a Mississippi right end before a howling mob at Legion Field, where Alabama played, and brought him fame, a thriving insurance business, and the disgruntled look of a man who has passed his peak and can’t remember where. “We’re over there,” he said, jerking his thumb toward a group we hadn’t spotted. “Figured for sure you’d want to be with friends.”

For once Carr watched me instead of Kris Ann, avid with curiosity. I wished fiercely I were somewhere else. But Kris Ann smiled with relief and went toward the circle of expectant faces.

“I’ll get drinks,” I told Carr.

The barman was a slight, smooth-faced black with a gray mustache and cautious eyes. “Evenin’, Mr. Adam.”

“How’re you tonight, Carter?”

A dubious smile crossed his face like trouble. “Just fine, sir.” He handed me the usual drinks and slipped quickly back into his profession, a small black man in a red jacket, polishing the clean wet glasses from the kitchen with a white towel, snapping the towel and polishing again, until they gleamed. Someone called for a drink. “Yessuh,” he said.