She looked over at Roy, who had retained and was now studying the latest issue of Thoroughbred and Cla.s.sic Cars, a glossy British monthly that provided a wealth of useful information in his area of professional interest, including prices being asked in the U.K. for the marques in which he traded. Such research was part of his job, but he suspected Mrs. F. believed he did no work at all.

"Did you want to ask me something?"

"I went to see poor Mrs. Holbrook last night. She looked beautiful."

He was not prepared for this. "Did you know her?"

"Unfortunately, I never saw her when she was alive." Mrs. Forsythe moued as if holding back tears. "I heard her on the phone a lot." She squinted and said, with the hint of a sob, "She had such a sweet voice."

Roy produced the kind of lie that is informed by sincerity of intention. "She was a sweet person."

"What time is the funeral?"

This was pushing it. "I'm not going," he said, with a putting-the-foot-down edge of voice. "I've sent flowers." He nodded, signifying the messages that had acc.u.mulated. "See if a decent offer has come in for the E-Type Jaguar. Remember, that's also called XKE."

"You've told me that many times," Mrs. F. said reprovingly and turned back to her sandwich, mug, and keyboard.

But she could forget it as often. Ignorance, and perhaps even dislike, of cars was the source of the only weakness in her work. Mrs. Forsythe could have strolled past a 300SL without noticing that its gullwing doors were raised.

Roy found the special hand mop for the purpose, took it into the showroom, and whisked the dust off the cars, the high-sheen finishes of which were magnets for it, even on such a lightly traveled side street as this. He would do the same several times before the day was over.

When he returned to the office, Mrs. F. smiled at him. "You keep those things cleaner than I do my house."

"That's because I'm trying to sell them." He should not have had to point that out.

Beaming, she waggled a stubby forefinger. "Bet you'd do it anyhow."

Which no doubt was true, but her manifest satisfaction was due to something else. "You've got something?"

"Fort Lauderdale." She peered at the monitor. "He'll meet your price, but what about delivery? He doesn't want anybody driving it that far."

"Tell him about Exotic Car Transport," said Roy. "You know the drill." In fact, better than he.

Though without bearing on matters of life and death, this was the rare positive occurrence of the past several days, and a quarter hour later Mrs. Forsythe introduced another.

"Here's a person in Vermont looking for an old Ford," said she. She had finished her sandwich but still sipped at the tea as if it were not stone cold by now. "Thirty-seven. I think my grandpa had one of those when he was young. Didn't they call them Model Tees?"

"I believe the Model T was even further back," said Roy. "Any other details?"

She snickered, "Well, he has mistyped 'Cord' for 'Ford.'"

"I think he means Cord, Mrs. F.! Tell him I can put my hands on an Eight-Ten, but it's rough. Make us an offer as-is, and/or if we handle the restoration."

"You've got my head spinning," said Mrs. Forsythe. "If I didn't know you, I would think you were joking about Cord versus Ford." She first patted her hair just above her nape and then made her fingers dance over the keyboard.

Roy's afternoon went by in such a fashion. He had made no appointments for today. He pa.s.sed up lunch, being still devoid of an appet.i.te. At four o'clock Mrs. Forsythe went around the corner to a deli and brought herself back a piece of yellow layer cake and a plastic cup of heavily milked coffee.

As it happened they never heard back from the guy in Vermont, who perhaps after all had meant a 1937 Ford. But the deal for the Jag XKE seemed to be holding. There were more e-mails and messages by fax, as well as a number of telephone calls on business matters.

And then, while Mrs. F. was en route to the delicatessen, having switched on the machine-Roy's practice at the office was never to answer the phone directly-he heard a juicy young female voice ask, "Then there really is an Incomparable Cars?"

He lifted his extension. "Who is this?"

"Mich.e.l.le."

"Oh."

"You don't have any idea who I am, do you?"

"I'm waiting for you to incriminate yourself."

"You always seem to have a ready answer," she said with a lilt that elevated the final words as if they posed a question.

"That's supposed to create the illusion that I'm clever," said Roy. "But I doubt you are fooled." Without making a conscious effort to identify her, he suddenly, for no good reason, could do so. "You collect money for animals."

"Now you really have impressed me." Mich.e.l.le chortled in a deeper tone than that of her speech. "I thought your business card was fake! Gee. Were you serious about letting me test-drive a Rolls?"

"No, I just said it to make fun of you." She produced more contralto laughter. "Of course I meant it. When can you come over?"

"G.o.d, any time you say."

"How about," asked Roy, "I pick you up in the Rolls-Royce at seven. You can drive it to the restaurant where we'll have dinner."

"You're not kidding, are you?"

"Where do you live? I'll come in so your parents or roommate can check me out."

"I'm twenty-one," said she. "I don't need anybody's okay."

"You need mine," said Roy. "Before you go out with somebody you don't know, you should at least identify him for someone else close to you."

"Now you sound like my father, not a guy with a Rolls. Are we going someplace fancy? I'm asking because I want to know how to dress."

Being ignorant of her tastes, personal or generational, Roy was tempted to ask what kind of place she would like, but when you do that with a woman you deny her the opportunity to blame you if it proves unsatisfactory. Francine was not the only one who had taught him that. From Mich.e.l.le's question he divined that she probably wanted to go to an expensive restaurant, or else she would not have asked it. But who could tell what her idea of a "fancy" place might be? Perhaps Baghdad, where the waiters, local lads, wore turbans and carried flaming shish kebabs through the dining room.

He would reserve his decision until he saw what she wore, always the most prudent course.

"Wear what you would want to be seen in by the people you admire most," he said now.

"You say the most original things I ever heard anyone say. I don't mind telling you that."

"That will probably end now that I'm aware of it. Do you have a last name?"

"It's Llewellyn."

"Mich.e.l.le Llewellyn," said Roy. "Anyone with a name like that should always travel by Rolls-Royce. Now I'd better have your address and phone."

Sam seemed to make a special effort to be amiable this evening, perhaps in atonement for his obnoxious performance last time.

"So, what are you driving tonight?" The patient showed no visible effects of the brief detour in his recovery; in answer to Roy's questions he had again disparaged his doctors as mercenary alarmists.

"A fifty-two Silver Wraith Rolls-Royce."

Sam made a face. "You park it in the lot out there?"

"n.o.body's going to steal it. What they steal are Honda Accords or Toyotas," said Roy, "which can be chopped for parts."

"How about scratching or denting?"

"I'm trying to impress a young girl." Roy could not have explained why he volunteered this information, which would only confirm Sam's opinion of him. He hastened to add, "But I'm not trying to seduce her."

"Then why impress her?"

"I guess I'm feeling old at the moment." He had craved girls in their twenties only when he was himself a teenager. He had always been attracted by a maturity relative to himself. His school-day crushes had been on teachers, not students. Of course he was now aware that everything he told Sam reached Kristin soon afterward. "I think I feel paternal."

Sam chuckled, though not derisively. He was still on his good behavior. "Well, that's a new one."

"Maybe I'm finally growing up."

Sam raised his big soft hands. "I don't want to hear that. Please, I'm a sick man."

Roy turned toward the door, as if by instinct, an instant before Kristin opened it and entered the room. He was not consciously expecting her, nor had he heard an annunciatory sound. It was strange as anything could be, perhaps disquieting.

She wore a sleek beige suit he had never seen before. He could not remember whether he had ever noticed that her eyes were on a level with his own when they stood near each other. Sam of course, if not flat on his back, would have dwarfed them both.

She gave Roy a quick, silent smile and went to Sam and kissed him. Only then did she say, "Oh, hi, Roy," as if he had been overlooked.

"Kristin." He brought a chair for her to the bedside.

She sat primly down and addressed her husband. "Maria wanted me to explain why she hasn't visited you. She's scared of hospitals. She wants you to come home soon so she can nurse you." Kristin smiled at Roy. "Maria's in love with Sam."

Was this some kind of mockery? Sam didn't seem to think so. He was grinning.

"Know about old Roy's latest conquest? My nurse Suzie."

Kristin looked up at Roy. "She's very attractive."

He shrugged. "Any connection between us is only a fantasy of Sam's. I just gave her a lift last night when her car wouldn't start." He waited for Sam to refute this invention, but it did not happen. Perhaps Sam had not stayed on watch long enough to see them leave the lot in separate cars.

"She was setting you up, kid." Sam snorted. "When did you ever hear of a new BMW not starting on demand? And you're the car guy."

Roy thought his best friend was a s.h.i.t for persisting in this vein, embarra.s.sing him before Kristin. The best way to dispose of the matter, however, was jocular. "And the upshot is that now she is bearing my child."

Kristin at last lost her smile and turned back to Sam, not offended but rather bored, her habitual response to their soph.o.m.oric banter. He feared he might fall back in her estimation to where he had begun.

It was a relief when Sam changed the subject. "How much are you asking for the Rolls?" To Kristin, "That's what he drove over here and left in the parking lot."

Kristin turned her golden head to Roy. He said, "n.o.body's going to bother it. If they did, they might do me a favor. I could collect the insurance."

Sam showed incredulity. "Why haven't you been able to sell it? What are you asking?"

Kristin said, "Sam."

Roy should have picked up on it at this point, but he was oblivious. "Well, starting at twenty-five, probably, but I'd probably go significantly lower if the offer was serious."

"How about twenty?" Sam asked brightly.

"Sam," said Kristin.

It would not be the first time Sam had found a supposed customer for one of Roy's automobiles. None of the several persons for whom he had Roy make appointments bought a car or even made a respectable bid. One did not even show up. But, with the probability that his friend's intentions had been kind-the delicate matter of whether he had expected a finder's fee never came to the moment of truth-Roy had not chided him till now.

"You're not going to send around another of those stiffs, I hope."

Sam pouted briefly. "Thank you too, pal." He lifted multiple chins; to see a prep-school picture of him nowadays would be a shocker. "I'm calling you on it: I'll pay you twenty."

Roy horselaughed for Kristin's benefit as much as Sam's. To her he said, "Can you believe this?" He reminded Sam, "You hate foreign cars, especially vintage models."

"Kris just became branch manager at First United. She ought to drive something that befits her position. I can't afford a new Rolls, but they look more or less the same whatever the year, don't they? n.o.body but you could tell the difference."

This statement evoked a number of emotions in Roy. Before the could find a voice for any of them, Kristin spoke up gently, asking her husband, "Can't we let this go till you come home?"

Sam pouted again. "I thought you'd be pleased. Take a test drive. Roy doesn't sell these things unless they are in tip-top condition, as he always tells me. Tell her, Roy."

Roy was under the complex pressure of conflicting importunities. Such dilemmas were necessarily resolved by satisfying n.o.body, if not damaging everybody. G.o.d d.a.m.n you Grandys, he could say only in fantasy.

In reality he caved in favor of Sam, who after all lay in a hospital bed with a faulty heart. Sam's wife had just become manager of a bank.

"Drive it on loan for a while, Kristin. See how you like it. No"-he was going to say "strings," but the word was incongruous in this context-"no obligation. I mean, it's among friends. Oh, and congratulations!"

"Thank you. The present manager is retiring, and-"

"They offered it to me," was Sam's jest, "but I got stuck here." He then made amends for the interruption. "Ain't she something? Fact is, she had to fight like h.e.l.l for the job. She's a tough customer. Don't fall for the modest act."

"Please shut up, Sam," said Kristin. "Roy shouldn't have to listen to the hustle, close as he is to us."

Roy was moved by the statement, but he addressed Sam. "So get out of here soon, will you? We've got some celebrating to do: Kristin's promotion and of course your recovery. My own sole accomplishment is keeping your friendship." For the last few words he turned to include Kristin.

"We'll go in the Rolls," said Sam. "I'll serve as chauffeur. I'll get me a black cap. You quality folk can drink in back, from the built-in bar."

Kristin rose in one fluid movement, without pushing the chair away.

"You just got here." Sam's triumphant tone had turned instantly to the plaintive.

"I'm only going to the bathroom."

When she had closed the door, Sam told Roy, in a lowered voice, "Talk her into taking the Rolls. She'll resist, but I know she'll like it. And thanks for offering to lend it to us. I really couldn't do it otherwise."

He wasn't "doing" it now, but of course Roy would not make that point, though he knew Sam would never pay him a dollar, no matter what. He walked to the window and looked down on the parking lot.