“We’re above the turbulence here,” Felix said. “Concorde used to fly this high, but now it’s the guys with their own jets. Come on, I’ll introduce you.”

He led me three paces down the aisle to the bankers. The older, more talkative one was tall, and his swept-back blond hair was graying at the temples but luxuriant. His face was long and watchful, and he had chiseled features that should have been handsome but were slightly too perfect. Sitting by him was a man in his early thirties, wearing a suit, dark tie, and spectacles. He was viewing a spreadsheet on a laptop computer, and he nodded at me silently, in the manner of a junior partner.

“Ben, this is John Underwood,” Felix said, indicating the older man.

“Good to meet you, Ben,” Underwood said. “This is Peter Freeman, he’s on my team.” He gestured toward the younger man. “Felix, I thought we were going to Teterboro. What’s all this about Bangladesh?”

“Not Bangladesh. Bangor. Maine,” Felix said patiently. “We’re going through customs there to drop Ben on Long Island. It’s quicker. No one else around.”

It was the first I’d heard of Long Island-I’d assumed I would return to New York-and it added to my unease.

Underwood turned to me. “I didn’t catch your second name, Ben,” he said.

I hesitated. I didn’t want more people to know who I was or my connection to Harry. It was already too open a secret for my liking.

“Ben’s a friend,” interjected Felix. “Let’s grant him his privacy.”

“Ben the mystery man, then,” Underwood said, a glint in his eye.

“John’s a fig banker to the stars and confidant of our new chief executive,” added Felix, making both sound suspicious.

“Fig?” I asked.

“Financial Institutions Group,” said Felix. “A banker who advises other bankers. Go figure.” He shook his head. “So here we all are, a happy band of brothers. It sounded as if you were having some trouble there, John.”

“Unfortunately, yes. Deals that used to take weeks go on for months now. Nothing’s simple anymore.”

Freeman tapped a pile of documents. “I’ve found something on the recap,” he said to Underwood. “We might be able to shed the tax liability.”

“Two bankers devise a clever way to avoid tax,” Felix whispered to me. “What could go wrong? We should leave these wizards to it.”

After an hour, Michelle laid out some plates of meats and cheeses, and Felix sipped a glass of red wine as he read. I took a nap. Soon Maine’s greensward appeared below, with its ridged coastline and leopard-skin lakes, as if God had picked up Cornwall and splattered it on the other side of the Atlantic. The aircraft floated over a pine forest and a small town dotted with the blue circles of backyard pools before settling gently on a runway.

We had Bangor Airport to ourselves. Apart from a couple of USAF air tankers sitting by corrugated steel hangars, there were no other aircraft in view. We taxied across to the terminal and halted. Michelle opened the front door, and Felix carried on reading without acknowledging that we were no longer in the air. Then a van drove up and a chubby official with a buzz cut entered the cabin.

“Hello, Officer Jones,” Felix said, reading his badge. “What’s the weather doing today?”

“Going up to about seventy, I believe,” the man said, leafing through Felix’s passport. He pronounced “about” as “aboot,” and I figured we must be close to the Canadian border. Having glanced at our papers, he went to the back to give the bags a cursory glance.

“How are you enjoying the flight, Ben?” Underwood asked, approaching up the aisle and placing his arms on two seats to examine me better.

“I wish I had one of these myself.”

“Friends of mine do, but then they worry about the things sitting on the tarmac, costing them money. If it flies, floats, or fucks, rent it-that’s what I say.”

“Or just cadge a ride, eh, John?” said Felix. His BlackBerry rang. “I’m in Maine.… Yes, Maine. Checking out summer camps,” he said. My wife, he mouthed at me.

“You gentlemen have a good flight,” said Officer Jones, and he departed. I seemed to have passed through U.S. Customs and Border Protection while seated in a chair. Within a few minutes, we were aloft again and following the coast south.

“Felix, where are we going?” I said.

“Oh, didn’t I mention it? So sorry,” he said, turning his head to check what the others were doing. They were heads down in work again, and he spoke quietly. “Nora thought it would be best to take Harry back to East Hampton. I said I’d drop you there.”

“Okay,” I said, feeling control slipping from me but unable to stop it. Episcopal didn’t expect me back for a couple of days, so I was free to visit the Hamptons, but this was a further step into the unknown. I’d started by suspending my judgment to discharge Harry, and then I’d found myself on board his jet. Now I was being taken to him, when convention said we should meet at Episcopal.

“Is this reallyMr. Shapiro’s jet?” I asked Felix.

“Not exactly. It belongs to the bank. We’ve got a few, although it’s awfully politically incorrect. But one of the Gulfstreams is the chief executive’s and Harry got to keep it for a year when he left. Smoothed the deal, you know. Mind you,” he said, nodding at the two bankers, “some people treat it as public transport.”

It was lunchtime as we headed over the ocean to Long Island, and there were few clouds. I saw the tip of the South Fork reaching into the Atlantic like a beckoning finger and the strip of sand lining the coast all the way to the Rockaways. An airstrip stood out below us, like an encircled gray “A” against the green.

“It’s been a pleasure, Ben. I do hope everything goes well. Give my best to Harry. I think Nora’s sent a car to pick you up,” Felix said.

We made a low pass over the ocean and then sank over woods and fields to the tiny bump of our landing. Michelle opened the door at the front with a sad face, as though she were going to miss me terribly. Freeman was talking on a phone as I got up to depart and gave another silent nod.

“I’m going to get a breath of fresh air,” Underwood said, following me along the aisle and down the aircraft’s steps. He halted at the bottom with one foot on the tarmac as I pulled up the handle on my suitcase.

“I wish I was getting off, too,” he said. “I’ve got a place in Sag Harbor. Harry’s in East Hampton, isn’t he?”

I shrugged in mock ignorance.

“There’s one thing you ought to know, Ben,” he said. “Don’t you believe Felix’s sob stories. Harry brought this thing on himself. He’s the one to blame.”

“Good to meet you, Mr. Underwood,” I said. I walked off toward the low clapboard terminal building, determined not to stay for long.

6

I’d been to the Hamptons a few times to visit friends with summer rentals or to hang out on the beach for a day, but I’d never penetrated those high hedges and pristine gardens. How could I have? Staked by each house on the roads south of Route 27, where the wind rustled the tall trees, were foot-high signs with security company logos and white heraldic boards with black script: Private Property. Private Way. No Trespassing.

So as I sat in the front seat of a stone gray Range Rover, scanning white wooden gates and broad driveways, I enjoyed being welcome for once. I glanced to my left every so often, not only to observe a cottage or mini-mansion, but also to take a glimpse at my driver. I knew only her first name: Anna. It was all she’d given away.

When I’d emerged from the airport building into the parking lot, she’d been standing by the car, one black flip-flop-clad foot propped against the driver’s door, chewing a stalk and refixing her straw blond hair in a ponytail. She’d been hard to miss because there was no one else in sight and she’d given me a wave and a broad smile, pulling her lips so far back to show her teeth that it looked like a contortionist’s trick. I’d grinned back stupidly, wondering what someone like her was doing there-I’d have expected to find her in the city.