See, he shouldn’t have done it. He should never talk unaided on the phone. He needed more notes. Notes for when the conversation took an unexpected turn. But how had it? He couldn’t remember.

“I think we should try for a day you have off. When is that? Next. The next day you’re off.”

“That’s not until next week.”

“Monday?”

“Sunday. It’s Sunday night. Well, it’s Saturday night too, but you, you will have some kind of gathering, and Sunday, generally …” He was acting like an ex-lover or a bumbler with a crush. He was neither.

“I think we could sit in my garden on Saturday. If this crazy warm weather keeps up.”

“In your garden?”

“Yes. It’s a quiet weekend. Five would be good.”

“Don—he …”

“Don is home; he’ll say hello at some point.”

It couldn’t be. He tried to summon the quiet Saturday of Mabel Cannon and Don Grady.

“Stanley?”

“I’m here. Yes, here.”

“I’m so happy you called.”

“Oh.”

“I’ll see you at five on Saturday.”

Georgetown was dollhouses. Similar little trees and similar little houses lined up. Don and Mabel had found an irregular block canopied with oaks. The house was Victorian brick with Romanesque trim and mansard roof. It was a folly of a place, a bait-and-switch of a home. You thought it was small on one side, only to find it was huge. A large view gave way to a confining corner. The oversized edifice sat back from the sidewalk on a minor rise. There was a pair of Volvos in the driveway, one navy, one black.

At the door, he expected help to answer. But Mabel came. She was slim in dark-green flats, narrow pants, and mock turtleneck. She led him through a long hallway, past a cerise-painted living room, baronial dining room, kitchen made for catering the fêtes. They walked through the thickest glass doors, set into walnut frames, onto a porch that turned at right angles, screened, extending into a garden of still-bare ginkgos and year-round magnolia. He saw she’d been sitting on a cushioned armchair. A glass of white wine rested on a low table beside it. An overlong table, slim against a wall, carried wine bottles, glasses, liquor. Refrigerated shelves of wine took up another, smaller turn of a wall.

“What would you like?”

“The best wine you can give me.” He was at ease in this setting. It was where he was from, this profusion of no-cost-spared, of everything considered to the last beveled edge. In the Room, she was empress to his footman. Here, they were equal members of a damned elect—those who feel fiercely.

“You grew up in Kalorama, didn’t you?” she said.

“You remember.”

“You were always kin to me, Stanley.” She looked out into the garden. “Kalorama. Airless embassies. To think you came out of that.”