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“Your wife moves well,” Sandy said

“She’s good,” Paul ventured

“Yeah,” Sandy said “She’d be great in a war”

Billy Litchfield, as strolling behind the their conversation At that roup to catch up She looked unabashedly triumphant Billy took her are-old rule at house parties, said, “Of course, it’s always a good idea to let the host win”

She stopped “But that would be cheating I could never do that”

“No,the path “I can see that you’re the kind of girl who plays by her own rules It’s wonderful, and you e But it’s alise to knohat the rules are before you break them”

4

Billy Litchfield arrived back in the city at six o’clock on Sunday evening Taking a taxi to his apart had an unexpectedly fruitful weekend Connie Brewer had agreed to buy a small Diebenkorn for three hundred thousand dollars, froh, he was thinking about Annalisa Rice A girl like her rarely cainal, froray eyes to her keen uessed that with his guidance, she reats

Billy’s apartment was located on Fifth Avenue between Eleventh and Twelfth Streets; his narron building, a forle ladies, arfed into invisibility by the fine redbrick buildings on either side His building had no doorh a porter could be summoned with a buzzer Billy collected his mail and climbed the stairs to his apartment on the fourth floor

In this building, every floor and every apartment were the same There were four apartments per floor, and each apartment was a one-bedroom of approximately six hundred square feet Billy liked to joke that it was an early-retirement home for spinsters such as himself His apartment was comfortably cluttered, furnished with the castoffs of wealthy ladies For the past ten years, he’d been telling himself that he would redecorate and find hiet around to either, and time passed and it mattered less and less Billy had had no visitors for years

He began opening his mail as a matter of course There were several invitations and a couple of glossy al-size envelope that was hand-addressed, which Billy put aside He picked out thethe heavy cream stationery, turned it over The address on the back was One Fifth Avenue The stationery ca’s, and there was only one person he kneho still used it—Mrs Louise Houghton He opened the envelope and extracted a card on which was printed PRIVATE MEMORIAL SERVICE FOR MRS LOUISE HOUGHTON, ST AMBROSE CHURCH, with the date, Wednesday, July 12, written in calligraphy below It was so Louise, Billy thought, to have planned out her uest list

He put the card in a place of honor on the narrow mantelpiece above the small fireplace Then he sat down to the rest of his al-size envelope, he saw that the return address was that of his building’sdread, Billy opened it

“We’re happy to inforo co-op as of July 1, 2009…you may purchase your apart their apart date…” A dull throb started up in his jaw Where would he go? The ht hundred thousand dollars He’d need two or three hundred thousand as a down paye payment and a maintenance fee It would add up to several thousand a month He paid only eleven hundred dollars aanother apart overwhelmed him He was fifty-four Not old, he rey for such things

He went into the bathroo his medicine cabinet, took three antidepressants instead of his usual dose of two Then he got into the tub, letting the water fill up around hiure out how to get the money to buy the apartment instead

Later that evening, clean and in a better fra for the Rices’ roo “Hello?” she said curiously