Richard Squibb appeared beside the backgammon players, in his tiny bikini beneath pink potbelly, hands on hips, puffing on his cigar. "Who's won, who's lost?"

"Need you ask," said Dominick. "He's taken forty pounds off me."

"Well, why the bloody hell do you play with him, then?" asked Richard.

Cassian looked up at Richard through his yellow lenses, one side of his mouth slightly raised in a tight-lipped half smile. "He likes playing the loser." He lowered his eyes to Dominick across the table. "That's his gambit."

"Yes, but he keeps losing," said Richard. "I don't understand."

"Richard, will you take that massive smoldering log out of my ear, please?" said Susie.

"Sorry." Richard walked to the other side of the bar. He saw Lulu coming across the patio from the garage. "Lulu. Have you just been on one of your long drives in the campo?"

"I have, Richard, yes."

She paused as they pecked cheeks.

"Wasn't it a bit gloomy in this weather?"

"Not at all, I love it," said Lulu. "But I'm glad the rain's gone, so we can have our live music."

"Yes, me too," said Richard. "He's good, isn't he, old Jackson?"

"Yes, he is." Smiling beatifically, Lulu swept on. "Darlings," she said in answer to several hails, and disappeared into the house.

She'd caught Jackson Rale's catatonic scotch-and-soda set at the Miravista weeks earlier. Mateo had no objections to Jackson playing somewhere else on his union-obligated contractual single night off, so he'd played at the Rocks for the last three Sunday nights, sitting like a Buddha in the shadows beside the pool, an electrical cord snaking up the steps to his amplifier, a hit among the local British and European residents, as well as Rocks guests. Sunday nights had turned into a money-spinner for Lulu. It wouldn't have worked in the rain.

Lulu passed through her bedroom, and ran a bath. She had driven from the other side of Arta, where she'd had a chat with Bartolome Llobet in El Claustro-"the cloister"-he liked to call it: the small finca he'd fixed up as a sanctuary for study and contemplation during his family summers in Cala Marsopa. The spare dwelling had a small kitchen, books and writing materials, a fireplace, a large bed, and a telephone into which Llobet would voice soft entreaties to Lulu whenever he could get her on the phone. She knew his schedule well, the afternoons when he might call, and she'd instructed her staff as to when she was at home or not to the Spanish gentleman-her lawyer, she described him-who called to advise her on her affairs with increasing urgency as the summer advanced.

"Querida," he would say, his deep, sonorous madrileno accent in the earpiece making her think of stones grinding together on the shore under the pull of a retreating wave, and continuing in English, "I am here."

Lulu enjoyed Llobet's company. He was intelligent and amusing, but he was an unintuitive lover. One didn't want to have to give directions, and when she did, Llobet became narrowly focused to the point of tedium, requiring her soon to say, "That's lovely, Barty. You can do something else now." And he would.

No one knew of her friendship with the youngest son of the old Nacionalista pirate Juan Llobet, Cala Marsopa's most notorious citizen. Bartolome Llobet was merely a rich madrileno maritime lawyer who brought his large, immaculate family across the sea to the patriarchal home every summer; a local grandee who presided over the opening of the Festa de Sant Lloren in August, and was a principal of the Banco Llobet. He and Lulu had never formally met, but the previous spring at Palma airport a tall man in a blazer and tie with slicked-back silvering hair had begged her pardon for his intrusion but surely he knew her from somewhere? Of course, he said, smiling with recognition when they had worked it out: la dama de la Villa Los Roques in Cala Marsopa. Driving along the shore road, and in town, he had seen her. He was delighted to finally meet her.

He worked assiduously at giving her pleasure. He took a boyish pride in maneuvering Lulu to her climaxes, which she bestowed rather than achieved. They were soft shudders, from which she quickly recovered. He was simple and undeviating in his own requirements, and dependable as good hotel plumbing.

They rarely saw, and never acknowledged, each other outside El Claustro. No one would ever find her there. It was the sense of complete dislocation that she loved. The fact that their association at no point touched any part of the rest of her life, and that that could not change.

But today Lulu had brought the physical side of their relationship to a close.

"Dear Barty, it's much better this way. Now we can truly be friends and know each other publicly. I can actually see you more often. Sex gets old and I don't want that to happen with us. It's been perfectly lovely, so let's keep it that way."

They spoke in English. Lulu's acquisition of Spanish, now decades old, had plateaued and calcified once she had mastered basic commands and necessary instructions-el bano absolutamente necesario ser reparada por seis de la tarde-and Llobet's English, honed through dealings with the international maritime community, was faultless and capable of the subtlest nuance.

He looked at her, dumbfounded. "But querida, I don't understand. We have the perfect, indeed, the most extraordinarily ideal situation here. Absolute discretion. Fulfillment of our desire for each other, the most charming intimacy and friendship-unless I completely misunderstand you. You don't want to marry me? You know it's impossible-"

"Good lord, no, Barty. I wouldn't dream of marrying you or anybody. No, no, you see, really, I've come to like you too much. I want us to be real friends."

"But we are real friends," he protested. "We have the most delicious, perfect friendship-"

"Yes, but it's hidden away here. We can't be real friends like this, and that's what I want us to be: real friends. I'd love to have you and Maria come to the Rocks for dinner."

"Maria? And me? Both of us, for dinner?"

"Yes. Why not, Barty? If she's your wife, she must be a wonderful woman. I'm sure we'd be great friends too, don't you think?"

Llobet stared at her. He stood and walked to the door that led into the little garden, where a fountain was surrounded by small orange trees. Then he turned and looked at her with a tragic expression. "Lulu. My darling. You are saying we will not make love again?"

"Yes, Barty. It's been very sweet. But let's move on, no?" She smiled at him with a look of genuine friendship.

I'd like to get my leg over that," said Dominick, his eyes following Lulu as she crossed the patio after they'd exchanged darlings. "What do you reckon my chances?"

"Nil," said Cassian. He shook the red leather dice cup and rolled eleven.

"Really? Why not?"

Cassian moved his pieces.

"Where's she getting it, then?" Dominick wondered aloud. Lulu was at least a decade older than either of them, but age in her case only meant enhancement. "She must be getting it off with someone. Who?"

"It's your move."

"Well, aren't you interested?" asked Dominick. "You've known her forever. What's the game, then?" He was pretty sure Cassian wasn't bent. He was about Dominick's age, mid-thirties, not nearly as good-looking, short red hair brushed back, dressed like a schoolmaster on holiday, apparently entirely unaware of what had been going on in Carnaby Street and on the King's Road. Supposedly Cassian had a girlfriend in London, but he never brought her down.

"No, I'm not interested. There is no game."

"You don't want her?" pressed Dominick.

"Don't be revolting. She's a close friend of my parents'. She's like an aunt to me."

Dominick looked at the house like a reconnoitering burglar. "Well, I've decided"-sotto voce-"I decided this winter, in fact-that this is the summer I'm going to give Lulu a tumble. I'm going for it, I can tell you. I'm going to give her such a thrashing-"

"Oh, shut up and play, you idiot. It's your move."

Seven.

They were eating pulpo, calamares a la plancha, hamburguesas and plates of papas fritas at the Maritimo in the port. Florence and Aymar, Sylvie, Franois, Teddy, Serge and Alain, Natalie, Aegina, and Luc. The gang. Les mecs de l'ete. They sat at a table out on the edge of the terrace, away from the lights. Francesca, Rafael Soller's wife, would serve them only Coca-Cola or TriNaranjus, but Aegina had given Natalie money to buy a liter of vino Planisi to put in Teddy Trelawney's goatskin bota, and they passed the bag around under the table, filling their water glasses. Billie had given Aegina a thousand pesetas "just to spend as you like, sweetie. Treat yourself to something." Aegina used the money to drink more and stay away from the house. Now that Billie had arrived, she visited the hospital less.

"Mais c'est de-gueul-asse, this shitting pulpo," said Franois, with a show of averting his head as the dish of little saffron-dusted octopuses Luc had ordered was passed around. He stuffed his mouth with ketchup-smeared papas.

"How would you know?" said Aegina. "You haven't even tried it."

"I don't need to. a pue."

"I love it," said Aegina.

"You'll stink of it," said Franois.

"I hope!"

When they finished eating, they descended to the dark quay and climbed the stone steps to the top of the breakwater that sheltered the fishing boats and the few small foreign wooden sailboats that found their way to Cala Marsopa. They walked single file out to the end of the wall and sat beneath the tower that held the port's one blinking white light. At the tower's base, they were in the shadow of its large stones. They were untouched by the light and could only see its intermittent loom above them.

Aegina sat between Luc and Franois, lying back against the wall, pleasantly high on the wine, her legs spread open, knees moving side to side. She wanted Luc or Franois to kiss her. To put their hands on her breasts. To maul her. Neither had touched her. She knew they both fancied her and that something was going to happen, but it hadn't yet. Franois was the more relaxed around her. With his French haircut like Jean-Pierre Leaud, he was the better-looking. Luc was moody this summer. And there seemed to be several versions of him going at once: when he spoke to her, about food, boats, people, plans, his large eyes seemed to belong to someone behind him, looking at her from over his own shoulder.

Natalie sat next to Luc, and Teddy was on the other side of Natalie. They passed Teddy's bag back and forth, drinking the wine. None of them spoke, rendered mute by the engrossing sound of the waves that pulsed over the rocks below and their own thoughts.

Natalie was only a year older than Teddy and Luc and Franois, but she was already in the other room with the grown-ups. She'd brought her boyfriend Marc down from Paris for two weeks last summer and she and Marc had occupied her room at her parents' house as if they'd been married guests. After Marc had left, she'd gone out with a German businessman who drove a Porsche whom she'd met at the Miravista. So far this summer Natalie was on her own. Marc wasn't coming down; they were no longer an item.

Craning his head around her, pretending to look for the bag, Teddy inhaled her unmasked odor of soap and perspiration, and looked down her shirt. He supposed she spent time with them as she was doing tonight because they'd all known one another for years, as she would with brothers and sisters, mates, while she waited for this season's mature, hirsute, chain-smoking, car-driving, financially independent lover to appear.

Aegina's swinging knees were knocking into Franois's and Luc's. It was annoying Luc. Abruptly he stood up. "I'm going. Are you guys coming to hear Jackson later?"

"Yeah, I'm coming," said Teddy. "What time's he start?"

"Ten." Luc started off along the wall.

"Why are you leaving?" Aegina called after him, sounding petulant.

"I've got stuff to do."

He had nothing to do, but he didn't like wordlessly sandwiching Aegina with Franois, waiting for something to happen that couldn't happen when they were all together like this, and her slamming her knee into him.

The other half of him kept seeing Arabella Squibb coming through the door into his toolshed, looking-maybe it was the rain earlier in the day-just a little like Dorothy Lamour in The Hurricane.

Just before ten, Jackson Rale set himself up beside the pool. Almost invisibly, with great economy of movement for a big man, he brought a barstool up the steps, ran an extension cord from the bar to his amplifier. He got the girl-Sally-behind the bar to make him a Cuba libre. He set it on top of his amplifier, sat on the stool, and plugged in the Gretsch. Soft muted notes floated out over the patio, the bar, the outdoor dining area, like soap bubbles that popped unnoticeably in the bushes and behind the ears. The tunes so well-known that they sounded as natural and subliminal as the waves breaking gently on the rocks across the road. "Mona Lisa," "Smoke Gets in Your Eyes," "I Cover the Waterfront," "Cuando Caliente el Sol," "Perfidia."

Dinner over, the diners drifted to the bar. They took drinks to the tables that had been moved to the edge of the patio. Jackson turned up the beat: "Come Fly with Me," "I've Got You Under My Skin," "I Get a Kick out of You," "My Funny Valentine." A few couples, those old enough to know how to fling and be flung, began to dance. Then, touching the guitar's volume knob, Jackson let fly some well-mannered rhythm and blues: "I Got a Woman," "Blue Suede Shoes," "Maybellene." More dancers came onto the patio, frugging and shaking and waving their hands. White folks dancing like that, they always reminded Jackson of the night years ago in New Haven, opening with another band, he'd caught Pat Boone convulsing his way through "Tutti Frutti." It was something he'd never forget.

Dominick approached the table where Lulu sat with Tom and Milly. "Lulu," he said, pulsating before her in a floral shirt by Mr Fish; white, tropical-weight hipster bell-bottoms; his awful white Gucci loafers, snapping his fingers and gyrating slightly, "may I have the pleasure?"

"Certainly, Dominick." Lulu rose, smiling directly at him, giving every indication of being elevated by pure charm.

Dominick lifted her hand gallantly in his own, and led her onto the patio as if preparing to join a quadrille. As soon as he let her go, Lulu slid easily into the music. Dominick crouched, flapped his arms, and began to circle her like a bird of paradise targeting a mate. He closed in, shimmying upward to his full height and back down again.

Lulu laughed. "You're so funny, Dominick."

As Jackson's number finished, she said, "Thank you, Dominick. You're very entertaining. I'm going to sit down now. Do join us."

She returned to the patio table. Tom grinned companionably at Dominick. "Have a drink, Dominick!" His smile was always wide, white and confident. Tom never suffered any doubt that an unsightly shred of spinach might be lodged in his teeth for he'd had them all knocked out in a motorcycle accident when he was nineteen, and had been fitted with full sets of increasingly better dentures.

"Thank you," said Dominick, "I will. But no, let me get you all something. What will you have to drink, Lulu?" Lulu of course could drink for free, but guests could indicate a particular attentiveness by purchasing her request.

"How sweet of you, darling. I'd love a sherry. A fino, please."

Luc came up the pool steps. He stood near Jackson and watched him play. They made eye contact as he entered the musician's field of vision, Jackson acknowledging him with a slight upward nod. At the end of a number when Jackson took a sip of his Cuba libre, Luc said, "Can you play 'Perfidia'?"

"I did that a little while ago. I'll do it later for sure."

"Thanks, Jackson."

"Sure, man."

As Jackson began playing "Tuxedo Junction," Luc turned and saw Aegina rushing toward him. She didn't stop as he anticipated but pushed him backward into the pool. Jackson kept on playing. Aegina skipped back down the steps and ran between the dancers across the patio.

Luc climbed out of the pool and ran, squishing and dripping over the tiles, after her.

Outside the gate, he looked up and down the shore road where it disappeared against the lights of the port to the left and the pensions on Son Moll beach to the right. Then he saw her at the edge of the rocks right in front of him, her glossy hair and back and legs lit by the houses on the shore, standing against the heaving black sea. He walked across the road, squelching in his sneakers.

"Aegina," he called. The waves sucked noisily below, retreated, and came in again louder as Luc came toward her.

"Aegina-"

His call seemed to propel her into the air.

Luc ran to the ledge above the water. "Jesus Christ, Aegina!" he called to her when he saw her head surface in the confused chop below. "What are you doing?"

She didn't look at him. Her head began moving out to sea.

"Aegina! Come back!"

She wasn't coming back. Very quickly her small, dark head moved away into the jumble of glinting black water.

Luc kicked off his sneakers and jumped.

The water felt unexpectedly warm. He surfaced and couldn't see her for a moment. Then he saw her head silhouetted against the fluorescent glow of the town. He caught up with her quickly.

"Aegina."

She continued swimming seaward. Not fast. Luc paddled beside her.

"What did you do that for?"

She didn't answer.