Claire had hit a home run, she had pocketed the eight ball with two banks, she had won the pot with a royal flush, she had served an ace, she had skied a black-diamond run in knee-deep powder. Ringer! Hole in one! Touchdown! Goal!

Her self-righteous elation, however, was her worst enemy. She dropped the eighth and final arm on the way to the annealer—she was shaking with joy and nerves and, truth be told, thirst—and it shattered at her feet.

Later that night, as she lay in bed, all cried out, all done apologizing to her husband, and to God, and to herself, she recalled the myth of Sisyphus. It was his job to roll a boulder up a hill again and again and again; the task was never-ending. When Claire was a glassblowing apprentice, her mentor had told her that story. Satisfaction was not to be gained from finishing the task; satisfaction was to be gained from the process.

She feared that, like Sisyphus, she would never finish. The last arm of the g.d. chandelier was her boulder to push and push again. It was her punishment.

The caller ID said Isabelle French, and Siobhan couldn’t help herself: she picked it up.

Then immediately regretted it.

Isabelle French wanted Siobhan to cater a party that very night—well, not a party, exactly, more like an evening at home. “Une soirée intime,” Isabelle said, and Siobhan thought it was a joke, her speaking French, because it was her last name. But no, Isabelle spoke in earnest: the soirée intime was the invitation stuffing for the summer gala.

“I’m thinking all-American picnic food,” Isabelle said to Siobhan. “Fried chicken, deviled eggs. My grandmother’s bread-and-butter pickles. If I give you the recipe, you’ll make them?”

“Make them?” Siobhan repeated. She did not want to cater this intimate evening at home. She wanted to turn down everything related to the summer gala. She did not want to make Isabelle’s grandmother’s bread-and-butter pickles.

“I know it’s last minute,” Isabelle said. “So I’ll pay you for your time and effort. Say, three thousand dollars?”

Siobhan coughed. “How many people?”

“I’m not sure exactly. Less than ten.”

Siobhan started scribbling down ingredients in her notebook. “What time?”

“Seven.”

“I’ll be there at six to set up,” Siobhan said.

She could be bought. Especially since Carter had lost six hundred dollars on Wednesday and four hundred on Sunday with the Red Sox. He had to stop gambling that fucking instant, she told him, or she was going to call a hotline. He promised he would, but that’s how all addicts were, right? They promised until they were blue in the face, and carried on behind your back. Siobhan had opened a bank account that Carter knew nothing about, and all the checks from this summer were going right into it. He wouldn’t be able to touch a penny.

Siobhan had catered at Isabelle’s house before and had gotten all of her ogling out of the way the first time. The house was technically on the “wrong side of the street”—not on the harbor, that is, but situated on a little hill overlooking the harbor. It wasn’t a huge house, but it was spacious and airy and perfectly appointed. There was a koi pond in the front foyer, which would have shouted overstatement in anyone else’s house, but in Isabelle’s house it was a delightful surprise. She had a bright, well-equipped kitchen, which opened onto the enormous room she normally used for entertaining. The soirée intime, however, would take place out on the sunporch, where two gaming tables had been set up side by side and topped with smooth brown leather surfaces. Isabelle had ordered floral arrangements of purple and white irises, white gerbera daisies, and fragrant Asiatic lilies that were as big as dinner plates. One wall of the sunporch was screened windows overlooking the water, and Siobhan was to set up the buffet along the back wall. She had made the fried chicken, as well as potato salad, marinated string beans, corn fritters, deviled eggs, and . . . the pickles. The pickles had been a snap, and they turned out perfectly (Siobhan was keeping the recipe to use again). She had also baked chocolate chip cookies and peach and blueberry hand pies. The all- American picnic had taken all day to prepare, but the first thing Isabelle did when Siobhan arrived was to hand her the check. Three thousand dollars.

“Thank you,” Siobhan said.

“Thank you!” Isabelle said. She leaned over and kissed Siobhan on the cheek, which took Siobhan by surprise. Isabelle was holding a rather full glass of wine, though she didn’t seem drunk, just excited and nervous. Was the invitation stuffing a big deal? Siobhan had called Claire while she was filling the deviled eggs to give her the update. Claire was aghast to find that the invitation stuffing was being catered at all.

“She’s calling it a soirée intime,” Siobhan said. “An intimate evening chez French.”

“Oh, Jesus,” Claire said. “Well, thank heavens I didn’t offer to have it at my house. It would have been crying children and a bag of Fritos. And Jason kicking us out at nine o’clock so he could watch Junkyard Wars.” Siobhan had laughed at this; they had laughed together. Siobhan wanted to ask Claire if Lock would be attending the soirée intime, but she hadn’t been able to mention Lock’s name even once since the day Claire confessed they were having an affair.

Siobhan did not bring any help to Isabelle’s house; Carter was doing a dinner party for forty people in Sconset—an event they now jokingly called “La Grande Soirée”—and he’d taken Alec and two Dominican busboy-dishwashers with him. Isabelle gamely pitched in, helping Siobhan carry dishes from the van to the buffet table on the sunporch.