“If you and the economist are going,” Clen said, “then I should probably stay home.”

“Don’t be silly,” Dabney said.

“I’m not being silly,” Clen said. “We can’t all go.”

Dabney did not refute this.

But when the afternoon of the Fourth rolled around, Clen decided he would go to the party after all. He had gotten used to seeing Dabney every day, but he hadn’t seen her the day before and he wouldn’t see her the day after, or the day after that. Maybe Sunday, she’d said, if she could get away.

He was going to Elizabeth Jennings’s house because he missed Dabney and wanted to put his eyes on her.

He wore his blue seersucker suit, which he’d had custom-tailored in Hanoi in the months after he’d won the Pulitzer. One sleeve of the jacket hung limp as an air sock on a still day. Clen didn’t like parties because some drunk was always sure to ask about his arm.

Khmer Rouge, he would say. Machete.

The drunk’s eyes would pop. Really?

Yeah. Boring story.

The party started in the front yard, where everyone lined up to be photographed on the front porch by Elizabeth. She no longer used the old Leica she’d had in Vietnam; now, it was something fancy and digital.

The last thing in the world he wanted was to have his picture taken. He looked to the left and the right, wondering if he could skirt Elizabeth and her camera and enter the house from the side door. He wanted to get to the bar. Elizabeth, being a Washington hostess and the wife of a prominent journalist, would have good scotch.

Clen looked up in time to see Dabney and the economist smile for Elizabeth’s camera. Clen felt a wave of some nasty emotional cocktail—jealousy, anger, sorrow, longing. There they were together, a couple. Dabney was wearing a red silk halter dress that wasn’t like anything he’d ever seen her in. She had on red high heels. The dress and shoes were pretty and stylish, but she didn’t look like Dabney. She was, however, wearing pearls, and a navy headband with white stars, and she was carrying her Bermuda bag. The economist looked old—the white hair, the glasses, the double-breasted navy blazer as though he were the commodore of the Yacht Club (Was he the commodore? Clen wondered), the look of smug superiority because he had just spent the last week behind closed doors with the president and the Treasury secretary.

You’re going to tell him, right? Clen had asked.

Yes, she had said. Once he gets back. Once he gets back and settled in. I’m going to tell him. I have to tell him.

After the photo was taken, the economist held the door open for Dabney, and she disappeared inside.

Clen thought to go home, but he couldn’t leave her.

Box

He was impossible to miss—big, tall, bearded fellow with only one arm. Elizabeth Jennings had been leading him around all night, showing him off, the Pulitzer Prize–winning journalist, Clendenin Hughes. They had known each other in Vietnam, Elizabeth trilled. Can you imagine? Then she went on to hit the Clendenin Hughes highlights: the series about the Khmer Rouge, the tyranny in Myanmar, the best coverage of the caning of Michael Fay, the Thaksin debacle in Bangkok.

Box turned away. Elizabeth Jennings had no idea that Hughes had impregnated Dabney. If she had known this, she would never have invited all three of them to this party.

Dabney was talking to the Massachusetts congressman (D) by the raw bar. The guy was a windbag, but he had worked with Dabney on keeping chain retailers off Nantucket, and she was forever indebted, and thus had to listen to him detail his woes with the Steamship Authority. Box tried to swoop in to rescue her, in the process helping himself to a few oysters. Good food and better wine here at Elizabeth’s. And a glorious view across Nantucket Sound. It was a clear night, ideal for the fireworks. The secretary had tried to get Box to stay in D.C. and attend the celebration on the Mall, but Box found that he was happy to be on Nantucket.

He gave up on Dabney. He feared she might do the sorority bump-and-roll—hand Box over to the tedious congressman and disappear into the crowd.

Box fixed himself a plate of fried chicken and ribs and coleslaw and corn salad and then wandered into the living room. Cocktail parties weren’t really his thing anymore; they were too much work. People who knew who he was approached him with an agenda, and people who didn’t know who he was tended to bore him. Dabney thought him a terrible snob, but he was sixty-two years old and had, quite frankly, earned the right.

He had tried to get Agnes to come to the party; the evening would have been far superior with her there, besides which he had barely seen her since he’d been back. But she had been headed to Jetties Beach to watch the fireworks with some fellow who worked for Dabney at the Chamber. Box wondered aloud if this was a date—Agnes seemed to be going to a lot of trouble making a picnic—and he also wondered what had happened to CJ. Agnes said, “No, Daddy, not a date, we’re just friends, and Celerie is coming, too. I’m actually kind of chaperoning. It’s a long story.”

Box didn’t like long stories, especially not those related to scheming romance. That was Dabney’s territory.

CJ, Agnes said, was spending the holiday in a luxury box at Yankee Stadium. He had wanted Agnes to come down to the city, but Agnes had work the next day, so that wasn’t really practical, and Box agreed.

“Have fun,” he said. And Agnes gave him an extra-long hug and said, “Mom and I are so glad you’re home. We missed you so much.”

Box wondered about this.