“Aren’t you?”

“What?”

“Happy.”

He shrugged. “I’m contented. I’m in love. I’ve got a hard-on.”

“You didn’t say you’re happy.”

“Maybe I’m not a happy type.”

“What does that mean?”

“Just that.”

“That I don’t make you happy.”

He hugged her to him. “Don’t be an ass. I love you. I love the kids. And I guess I like my work. But happy? Happiness is Eden. Kate. It’s childhood.”

“I’m not a child.”

“I’m just saying how it is for me.”

“And how is it?”

“I feel lucky, like a gambler with his winnings piled high in front of him. But the game goes on, and the house odds are four to one against him.”

She shivered between his legs. “God, you make a person feel so good.”

“I’m sorry, baby.”

“It’s the Swede in you—your dour Swedish half.”

“You believe His eye is on the sparrow. Well, my eye is on Him. I keep looking back over my shoulder.”

“You want too much.”

“I didn’t say I was unhappy.”

“Just not happy.”

Again he hugged her to him. He kissed her hair, her ear, her neck. “Can you promise me it’ll stay this way, Kate? Can you say we’ll live forever?” He took her silence as answer enough. “Then how can I be happy? The word is too small. Too shallow.”

Finally she turned between his legs and kissed him on the mouth, long enough to make him ready for her despite the late hour and the day ahead of him.

“Maybe you’re right,” she said. “But I’m stupid, honey. I’m happy. And I’m glad I’m happy.”

“I’m glad you are too.”

“And I wish you were.”

“Maybe I am. Maybe more than you. Could be it’s just the word, a semantic thing.”

“Then say it. Say you’re happy.”

“I’d rather show it.”

“Here?”

“Bed will do.”

“Say it.”

“I love you, Kate.”

“Bastard.” But she had kissed him again, and as truly as ever.

5

At ten-fifteen the next morning Hook sat drinking coffee in the sidewalk café of El Paseo, the carefully contrived “Street in Spain” that after the Old Mission was probably Santa Barbara’s main tourist attraction. Covering the better part of a block, the “street” was a picturesque warren of small curio and art shops lining a narrow pedestrian walk that meandered free as a mountain brook, leading into and out of the irregular central courtyard where Hook sat now, sipping scalding coffee at a small metal table next to a wall festooned with bougainvillea. But despite its being contrived, Hook found that he liked the place, enjoyed sitting out in the open in the cool lemony sunshine taking in the exotic plants and trees, the gnarled vines scaling the surrounding white adobe walls, none of which seemed in plumb, not truly straight or level or perpendicular, but life-shaped, human-scaled. There were hippies at a few of the tables, a scattering of businessmen reading the Wall Street Journal, and the inevitable representation of powdery old widows taking a morning breather in the grim rounds of their shopping. Hook hoped the coffee would relax him. He was feeling tight as strung catgut.