"I thought you just knew him because he’d consulted on some cases with the FBI."

"No, I knew him way before that. Met him when I worked for NATO in Europe, and we kicked around together for a while. We still get together fairly often. Why so amazed?"

"I’m not amazed," she said, picking up the sandwich again and nibbling at it, "I’m impressed. When I was finishing up my anthropology minor a couple of years ago, we spent a whole quarter just discussing his book."

"He wrote a book?"

The sandwich went back down to the table. "Are you serious? He wrote the most controversial-and I think brilliant-book on human evolution to come out in decades. And he must have published hundreds of articles."

"No kidding," John said. "Are you going to eat that pickle?"

She shook her head. "Well, what’s he like? He must be a lot older than you."

John bit off half the pickle and shook his head. "No, he’s about my age-forty, a little less."

"Forty! That’s hard to believe. I always assumed he was one of the grand old men of anthropology. Tell me more." She returned to her sandwich, but her mind obviously was elsewhere.

"Like is he married?"

"That’s not a bad place to start."

John finished the pickle. "No, he’s not married. Are you planning on leaving the chips over?" She handed him the bag, and he tore it open. "He was married before I knew him, for nine or ten years, and I guess they had some kind of fantastic relationship. She got killed in a car accident three, four years ago, and I don’t think he’s ever gotten over it. I think he’s still in love with her. Nora, I think her name was."

She frowned at her sandwich as if suddenly absorbed in it. "He doesn’t go out with women?"

John munched a potato chip with a loud crackle. "Do you always show this much interest in the grand old men of anthropology?"