"Ready or not, here I come, Michael Devlin," she said low. "And just remember it's my work you're buying, so who cares what I look like." She went to join Aaron Fischer. "Let's walk," she said to him.

"Why not," he agreed. "It's only five blocks, and we'll get there faster."

"If you're going to Felicity's bring me back one of those divine little lemon curd tarts," Kirk called from his office. "I've ordered a salad in with these damned contracts. And one for Sandra too," he said, remembering their shared secretary, who sat at a large desk in the gracious and elegantly decorated reception foyer of their office, which took up the entire top floor of the small old Park Avenue office building where Fischer and Browne, Literary Agents, was located.

"Make mine fruit," Sandra said as the elevator doors opened up. She was an older, motherly-looking woman who had been with the partners for years, coming to them fresh from the Katharine Gibbs Secretarial School. "I'm not into lemon curd, and Kirk knows it. Better bring him two." She waved them off as the doors closed smoothly with a faint hiss, and they descended swiftly without a single stop.

They walked from Park and up Madison Avenue until they arrived at Felicity's Tea Company, which served both luncheon and high tea six days a week. It was Emily's favorite place to eat in the city despite the plethora of elegant restaurants available. She could hear herself think in Felicity's, and the food was delicious. Felicity herself came forward smiling as they entered, holding out her hands to Emily.

She was a pretty woman with premature silver hair and dark eyes. She and her waitresses always wore the flowered, low-necked panniered satin gowns of the eighteenth century, and adorable little snow-white caps.