The other two stared at him, Carlo with something like horror and Gloria with something like disgust. And something else he hadn’t noticed, some angry spark that shows up just before the fire ignites. With an elaborate sigh he said, “What, you don’t think that’s funny? I don’t think I’ll ever get used to this world.” But he was keeping his eye on Gloria, and decided to test his intuition. “Do me a favor, honey, and put the dog in the bedroom.”

“He’ll calm down,” she said, which, given Gloria, appeared to be full-on rebellion.

“Put the dog in the bedroom,” he repeated, and stared at her. “And would you give Carlo and me a minute? We have a little private business to discuss.”

She pointed outside. “I was just on my way—”

“One minute,” Beaufort said, lifting a finger from the arm of the chair where his hand rested. He gave her a look that did its best to communicate that she was making him look bad, and she gave up and finally did as she was told. When she had wrangled Achilles into the bedroom and shut the door, she didn’t give the men a minute, but came out and stood by the couch, her whole body a question.

“I thought you were just leaving,” Beaufort said.

“I am,” Gloria said, still with the question in her eyes.

“You said we should have friends,” Beaufort said to Gloria, answering the question. “Here’s one.” He couldn’t stop himself from chuckling when Gloria looked at him with a slow burn. But not wanting to push her too hard, Beaufort attempted to placate her with “We met at the stables.”

Gloria might have tried to stop the words if she’d been given more of a warning, but her anger flared, possibly as much of a surprise to herself as to Beaufort. “You don’t work at the stables,” she said.

Fifty–three

We landed at the Dallas/Fort Worth airport without incident. I checked in at the Dallas TSA office, showed them my badge, and gave them the name and number that I’d been given. Emergency, I said. So what if it wasn’t a national emergency. There was no time for hair-splitting.

Things had been quiet, and it was almost with a sense of relief at some shoe having dropped that the boss jumped into service. This was another man, one without postnasal drip. That’s all I can remember about that time. Oh, he looked at me as if with all his soul he wanted to ask who I really was, but at the same time knew that I would not tell him.

I came around his desk and looked at his computer screen.

“The next flight to Tucson leaves in two hours,” he said.

“There’s this one,” I said, pointing to the screen.

“It’s a full flight. They’re all full flights.”