The Metro editor sauced through the door. “Sorry, sorry,” he sang. He gazed around for a chair, saw what was to be Don’s, and said, “Taken?” Adam, looking over his half-moons, said, “That’s for Don.” Metro editor did an eye bounce around the room, casting about for another wowzer glance. He got one from the National projects editor. Then he found the printout of Vera’s story on a table and pushed his backside onto the windowsill.

There was a hoot from outside the door. Vera made room. Tabitha’s head came in and said, “We just have one set of contact sheets.”

Adam frowned. “Where’s Joseph?”

“He says he doesn’t want to come in here or you’ll yell at him.”

The Photo editor was suddenly nattering in the center of them. “See, you’re not smiling,” Vera picked out from what he was saying.

Adam pouted a smile.

Tabitha handed the sheets to Adam, along with the glass piece. “This will be good enough,” he told her, then, “Go.” He looked down into the images, then added, “Tabitha, call Don on his cell phone, please.”

From the desire of being esteemed, deliver me, Jesus.

Gordon, claiming his intimacy with Adam, leaned in to the contact sheet. They back-and-forthed a few comments Vera couldn’t hear. Bray seemed amused by one of the photographs. Adam’s one smile was tight. After a while, it got plain Adam was unwilling to adopt Bray’s air of cheerio disdain. Bray lounged back, doubly bored, now by Adam’s probity.

Tabitha, at the door again, said, “Don is stuck in traffic coming from the Pentagon. Terribly sorry. At least another ten minutes.” The rookie Pentagon reporter looked aggrieved. Don Grady encroaching at the Pentagon might always be happening, but it usually went unannounced.

“We’ll start, then,” Adam said. He pulled his lower lip upward. Could he be trying to look like an eagle?

“Remind me,” said the Metro editor, slumped on the windowsill. “Who is it that says this Wizards fan is some kind of a spook?”

“Let’s not. Let’s have some … I don’t want that kind of discussion just yet,” Adam said sternly. It seemed as if the diction, not the question, offended him, but Vera couldn’t be sure. From the desire of being loved, deliver me.

“I am having a great deal of trouble following, but maybe it’s just me,” said the zaftig, whose name was Constance. She spoke out of her nose, scanning and reading. “Oh yes. That’s right. Never mind.”

From the desire of being extolled.

Harriet, the seasoned Pentagon reporter, cleared her throat. She took a sip of coffee. “How much of the report did you get?” she asked Vera without malice. Vera liked her calm face.