"Still in their plastic," Dortmunder said.

"Thank you," Medrick said, and into the phone, "Still in their plastic, Harry, make it easier for your crew. You'll send somebody today? Oh, we'll be here, Harry. No, I understand, you're right, business is business. Nice to hear your voice again, Harry," Medrick said, with his savage smile, and slammed the phone into its receiver. "Eleven more of these bastards to go," he said, and the front door opened.

They all turned to look, and here came two more of them, or maybe two from an earlier occasion. Associates of Mikey, in any case, swaggering chunks of veal in Day-Glo shirts, ironed designer jeans, handtooled boots, and hair like chocolate mousse. Entering, looking around, they said, "This place isn't open."

"You're right," Medrick told them. "Come back after six, we'll be open then."

One of them placed himself in front of Medrick. "You're not following me, Pops," he said. "This place is closed."

Medrick spread his hands. "So whadaya doing in here, if it's closed?"

"I don't know who you think you are, Pops—"

"I am Otto Medrick. I own this joint. If I was your pop I'd kill myself. Lucky thing I'm not. Get outa here."

"Hey, you," the other one said, and they both did that thing of the hand reaching under the shirt to the waist in back.

Mildly Dortmunder said to Frank Medrick, "There's a pistol in that drawer there. Next to the parasols."

"And a telephone in my hand here," Medrick said. "What was that number again? Nine one one?"

As Frank opened the drawer in which Dortmunder, on an earlier occasion, had found that firearm, the two visitors backed away, hands out from under their shirts but many stormclouds on their brows. "You better know what you're doing," one of them said. "We're gonna call Mikey, we're gonna see about this."

"You do that," Medrick told them, turned away, and dialed a number. As the veal left, he said, "Rollo? It's me. Yeah, I'm here, in the O.J. Well, it's a mess, you know that, but we're gonna deal with it. Could you open here at six? Good. And those pals you told me about, all belong to that ex-Merchant Marine club? You still hang out with them? Good. Spread the word, in honor of me being back and you staying on, those pals of yours, it's open bar for a week. And you could tell them, they might even get a chance to bang some heads, like the old days. Great, Rollo. I'll be here."

Medrick banged the phone down and looked at the stacks of invoices. "Which bastard next?"

In far-off darkest New Jersey, Mikey hung up the phone and turned a plaintive face toward his father. "Well, what the fuck?" he asked.

29

THE MOST INFURIATING thing about men was that they were both predictable and impossible. Their buttons were ridiculously easy to push, but unfortunately, every button came with its own self-destruct program.

As Roselle had learned long long ago, on the very first occasion that she might climb into bed with a man he would be practically purple with lust, all stumbling haste and slack-jawed avidity, high on urgency and low on technique. With each repetition, though, the balance between hunger and technique would shift, as his initial craving for the fantasy he had originally pursued became replaced by his interest in this one actual woman. The lust would never return in that original incandescent way, at least not with her, and eventually, unless some other factors entered the picture — shared fondness, shared interests, shared phobias, shared something other than sex — the interest, too, would begin to wane, until eventually all of that heat was reduced to yesterday's campfire.

Roselle had no interest in sharing much of herself, other than her body, with anybody, so her time of ascendancy over every man she targeted was a limited one, and with someone like Preston Fareweather, all narcissism all the time, that window of opportunity would be a very narrow opening indeed. Time to crack the whip.

Tuesday morning, therefore, she donned her teeny-weeny polka-dot bikini, red polka dots on white — so much more carnal — and went off for breakfast with every intention of making Preston suffer a little. It was, after all, supposed to be good for the soul.

Preston was already in the dining hall, with the undertaker Pinkleton. Roselle collected her yogurt and fruit bowl and coffee and joined them: "Good morning."

Preston's eyes lit up at the sight of her: "Don't you look good enough to eat!"

"I am. Good morning, Alan."

"Morning, Pam." Sour as ever.

Preston, talking mostly to her breasts, said, "I thought, this morning, we might just nestle in for a while, then go over and watch the volleyball. That's always pretty amusing."

"Oh, Preston," she said, "that does sound like fun, but I had such a good time sailing yesterday, I just want to do that again."

"What, out in the ocean?" His nose wrinkled with distaste. "We're land creatures, Pam."

"Actually," Roselle said, "we all come from Mother Sea. Well, you don't have to go if you don't want to, we're all on vacation here, we can all do whatever we want."

"And I want us," Preston said, with a meaningful little grin, "to just have some kidding-around time together this morning, just the two of us."

"Maybe later," she said, "if I'm not too tired from sailing. I wonder if I could find someone else to go with me."

"I'm sure you could," Pinkleton said, with just a trace of the snide in his voice.

Innocent as a newborn hawk, Roselle smiled upon Pinkleton and said, "How about you, Alan? Sailing's really fun."

The look Preston gave Pinkleton at that point would have wrinkled aluminum. Affecting not to notice, the nasty little sycophant said, "Oh, I think I'm just another landlubber, thanks just the same."

It wasn't hard to find a single man — no husbands, please — who would be pleased to go sailing with her. Robert, his name was, and he claimed to be a stockbroker from Chicago, though that bushy mustache did read firefighter to her. Not that it mattered; Robert was only for show. And a perfect show, given that Preston was the primary audience — fortyish, tanned, well built, with a smile full of gleaming teeth.

The resort offered several small sailboats that the guests could either operate themselves within the adjacent cove or simply ride in while an accomplished sailor did the work if they wanted to venture out to sea. These professional seamen were all locals, and Roselle happened to know that the operator of the boat she chose was named Tonio. As they boarded, Tonio looked at Robert and then at Roselle, but she infinitesimally shook her head — not this one.

As they set off from the dock, gently bobbing, the sky huge and blue, the sun a fierce high gold, the sea a gently heaving gray-green as though it were the breast of the sleeping Earth, Roselle said to Tonio, "Oh, let's go along close to the shore for a while. It would be fun to see the resort from out here, wouldn't it, Robert?"

"Sure," he said.

So they sailed along past the curving row of little bungalows, and there were Preston and Pinkleton, on Preston's little porch, and Roselle gave him a big wave and a jolly, "Yoo hoo! We're off to have a wonderful time!"

Preston's answering wave could not have been more surly.