“Grace, leave him alone!” Thomas Reynolds ordered.
“I’m only kidding, and he knows it.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“But whatever were you thinking about, keeping her out until all hours?”
“Well, we got pretty tied up in conversation,” Matt said. “I don’t often meet girls with such an intimate knowledge of hog belly futures. Time just flew!”
“Susan doesn’t know—” she began to protest, in confusion.
Reynolds laughed again, interrupting her. “He’s telling you, politely, to mind your own business, Grace. You may finally have met your match.”
“This is an occasion,” Grace Reynolds said, cheerfully changing the subject. “I think I’ll have a martini.”
Reynolds turned to make her one.
“Susan’ll be down in just a minute or two, Matt—you don’t mind if I call you by your Christian name, do you?”
“No, ma’am.”
“Susan’s having her shower,” Mrs. Reynolds went on.
A quite clear image of Susan in her shower popped up in Matt’s brain.
Cool it. For one thing, she is not at all interested, and Wohl was right. It would be really stupid.
“That’s nice,” Matt said.
“I called her at work. I’m not supposed to do that, unless it’s important, but after I asked you to join us, I didn’t want her running off to the movies with a girlfriend, or anything.”
“And she was no doubt thrilled to hear I was coming?”
“Actually, it was more surprise than anything else, to tell you the truth,” she said.
Her husband handed her a martini, and then, suddenly, a warm smile appeared on his face.
“Princess!” he said.
Matt turned and saw Susan coming toward them. She was dressed like her mother, Matt thought, and then amended the thought: simple black dresses and single strands of pearls were very nearly a uniform for females of her age and social position.
Susan smiled—it looked genuine—and gave him her hand.
“A pleasant surprise, Matt,” she said.
“Ten thousand horsemen,” Matt said, very seriously, “and all the king’s men could not have kept me away.”
“Jesus Christ!” Susan said, shaking her head in disbelief.
“Susie!” her mother said, in shock.
“If you’re going to blaspheme like that, Susie, we’ll just have to call the whole thing off,” Matt said piously.
Susan’s father laughed, and her mother looked confused.
“I should have warned you, Daddy, he’s an idiot.”
“So far, I like him.”
“Daddy, could I have a scotch?” Susan said.
“Well, as Mommy said, this is an occasion,” he said. “Why not?”
“Give her a weak one,” Matt ordered, “And only one. Two drinks and she’ll want to stay up until the sun comes up.”>
“Is that what really happened?” Mrs. Reynolds asked. “Susie had too much to drink?”
“I did not,” Susan protested automatically.
“How much?” Mommy demanded to know.
“Not much, really,” Matt said, “I mean, after the mar tinis—and, of course, the champagne—at Daffy’s, all you had was a couple of tequila surprises in the Mexican place, and then no more than three, well, maybe four, beers in the Dixieland place.”
“What’s a ‘tequila surprise’?” Mrs. Reynolds asked.
“They call them that because after the second tequila surprise, nothing surprises you,” Matt said seriously.
“Mommy,” Susan protested. “He’s pulling your leg.”
If I called Mother “Mommy,” she’d throw up.
“I didn’t believe him for a second,” Mrs. Reynolds said.
“Are you a golfer, Matt?” Mr. Reynolds asked.
“Yes, sir.”
“Did you bring your clubs?”
“No, sir.”
“What I was thinking was that I could call the club, and get you a guest membership while you’re here.”
“That would be very kind of you, sir.”
“How long will you be here?”
“That’ll depend on how long it takes me to get what I’m after. A week, or ten days, anyway.”
“Then I’ll call the club and set you up,” Reynolds said.
A middle-aged woman in a black dress with a white maid’s apron appeared in the door.
“Anytime you’re ready, Mrs. Reynolds,” she announced.
“Thank you, Harriet,” Mr. Reynolds said. “We’ll be right in.”
The dining room was so small that Matt decided there must be another, larger one, and that they were dining en famille. Confirmation of that came immediately when Mr. Reynolds asked him if “he would like to watch a master of the broiler at work.”
“Yes, sir.”
“We can finish our drinks out there,” Reynolds said.
Reynolds led Matt out to the patio, where a gas charcoal grill was giving off clouds of smoke. What looked like a London broil was on a large white plate.
“It’s one of the unanswered questions of my life,” Reynolds said as he opened the grill’s top, “whether women are congenitally unable to cope with a charcoal grill, or whether they are all united in a conspiracy