I could see from the open dome that the sunlight was fading outside, and in fact the temple was darker now. But directly above me I could see the marble statues still locked in their eternal embrace, and from this perspective, their expressions and their whole demeanour looked more lustful and heated, as if their nine decades of frustration were about to explode into an act of sexual frenzy.

We must have fallen asleep, because when I opened my eyes, it was dark in the temple and I was cold. Susan stirred, and I felt her warm lips on my neck. I said, "That's nice."

"Feel better?"

"Yes." I replied. "You?"

"Yes." She added, "I love you, John."

"I love you."

She got to her feet and said, "Stand up."

I stood and Susan took my shirt, put it on me and buttoned it, then put my tie on and tied it. Next came my shorts and my socks, then my trousers. She buckled my belt and zipped my fly. Having a woman undress me is very erotic, but only Susan has ever dressed me after sex and I find it a very loving and tender act. She put my shoes on and tied them, then brushed off my jacket and helped me into it. "There," she said as she straightened my hair, "you look like you just left church."

"Except my groin is sticky."

She smiled, and I looked at her standing in front of me stark naked. I said, "Thank you."

"My pleasure."

I tried to dress her, but I got the panties on backward and was having trouble with the bra fasteners. Susan said, "John, you used to undress me in the dark with one hand."

"This is different."

We finally got Susan into her clothes and walked hand in hand back to the house in the dark. I said to her, "You're right, you know. I mean your perceptive analysis of how I feel. I don't want to feel bored or restless, but I do." "Maybe," she replied, "you need a challenge. Perhaps I can think of something to challenge you."

"Good idea," I said, which turned out to be the stupidest thing I ever said.

CHAPTER 9

I skipped church on Holy Saturday, having had enough of the Reverend Mr Runnings and the Allards. Susan played hooky, too, and spent the morning cleaning her stables with two college boys home on vacation. I don't do stables, but I did stop by with a cooler of soft drinks. As I pulled the Bronco up to the stable, I was struck by the awful smell of horse manure and the sounds of laughter and groans.

Zanzibar and Yankee were tethered to a post outside, under the huge, spreading chestnut tree, nibbling grass and oblivious to the humans slaving on their behalf. I think horses should clean their own stables. I used to like horses. Now I hate them. I'm jealous.

On the same subject, Susan, who can be cold as Freon to men her own age who show an interest in her, is very friendly to young men. This I'm sure is partly maternal, as she is old enough to be the mother of college-age children and in fact is. It's the part that is not maternal that annoys me. Anyway, they all seemed to be having a grand time in there shovelling shit. I pulled the cooler out of the rear of the Bronco and set it down on a stone bench.

A pile of manure had risen on the cobbled service court in front of the stable, and this would find its way to the rose garden behind our house. Maybe that's why I don't stop and smell the roses.

I opened a bottle of apple juice and drank, my foot propped on the bench, trying to strike a real-man pose in case anybody came out of the stable. If I had tobacco and paper I would have rolled one. I waited, but the only thing coming out of the stable was laughter.

I surveyed the long, two-storey stable complex. The stables are built of brick with slate roofs in an English country style, more matching the guesthouse than the main house. I suppose there's no such thing as beaux-arts stables with Roman columns. The stables had been built at the same time as the house, when horses were a more reliable and dignified means of transportation than automobiles. There were thirty stalls for the riding horses, the carriage horses, and the draught horses, and a large carriage house that probably held two dozen horse-drawn conveyances, including sleds and estate equipment The second storey was part haymow and part living quarters for the forty or so men needed to maintain the animals, buildings, tack, and carriages. The carriage house had become the garage by the 1920s, and the coachmen, grooms, and such had become chauffeurs and mechanics.

Susan and I sometimes used the garage for the Jag, and George always parks his Lincoln there, as he is of the generation that believes in taking care of possessions. The gatehouse, guesthouse, and main house were built without garages, of course, because if one needed one's horse, carriage, or automobile, one just buzzed the carriage house. I have a buzzer marked CARRIAGE HOUSE in my kitchen, and I keep pushing it, but no one comes.

Anyway, the stables are on Stanhope land, which presents a problem if the land is sold. The obvious solution to this is to construct a smaller wooden stable on Susan's property. I mean, we don't live in the great house: why should the horses live in the great stable? But Susan fears emotional trauma to her animals if they are forced to step down in life, so she wants at least part of the original stable moved, brick by brick, slate by slate, and cobble by cobble to her land. She wants this done soon, before the tax people start identifying assets. Her father has graciously given his permission to move all or part of the structure to her ten acres, and Susan has picked a nice tree-shaded patch of land with a pond for her precious horsies. All that remains to be done is to engage the Herculean Task Stable Moving Company and a hundred slaves to complete the job. Susan says she'll split the cost with me. I have to look at that prenuptial agreement again.

I finished my apple juice and hooked my thumb in my belt, waiting for somebody to push a wheelbarrow full of faeces out the door. I found a piece of straw and stuck it between my teeth.

After a minute or so in this pose, I decided to stop being silly and just go in. But as I walked toward the main doors, a puff of hay flew out of the loft overhead and landed on me. It sounded as if they were having a hay fight. Good clean American fun. Pissed off beyond belief, I spun around, got into the Bronco, and slammed it into gear, Baking a tight U-turn in front of the main doors. I could hear Susan calling after me from the open loft as I drove right through the pile of manure in four-wheel drive.

That afternoon, after a rational discussion regarding my childishness, we put on our tennis whites and walked down to the courts to keep a tennis date. It was warm for April, and after a few volleys while we waited for the other couple, Susan took off her sweater and warm-up pants. I have to tell you, the woman looks exquisite in tennis clothes, and when she fishes around in her panties for the second ball, the men on the court lose their concentration for a minute or two.

Anyway, we volleyed for another ten minutes, and I was blasting balls all over the place, and Susan was telling me not to be hostile. Finally, she said, "Look, John, don't blow this match. Calm down."

"I'm calm."

"If we win, I'll grant you any sexual favour you wish."

"How about a roll in the hay?"

She laughed. "You got it."

We volleyed a bit longer, and I guess I did calm down a bit, because I was keeping the balls in the court. I was not, however, a happy man. It's often little things, like Susan's horsing around in the hay, that sets you off on a course that can be vengeful and destructive.

Anyway, our tennis partners, Jim and Sally Roosevelt, showed up. Jim is one of the Oyster Bay Roosevelts still living in the area. Roosevelts, Morgans, Vanderbilts, and such are sort of a local natural resource, self-renewable like pheasant and nearly as scarce. To have a Roosevelt or a pheasant on your property is an occasion of some pride; to have one or the other for dinner is, respectively, a social or culinary coup. Actually, Jim is just a regular guy with a famous name and a trust fund. More important, I can beat his pants off in tennis. Incidentally, we don't pronounce Roosevelt the way you've heard it pronounced all your life. Around here, we say Roozvelt, teeth clenched lockjaw style, two syllables, rhymes with "Lou's belt." Okay?