Glass smiled thinly. “It wasn’t so great,” he said, “the last time I looked.”

David ordered peppermint tea. He was dressed in a dark wool suit and a white silk shirt and silk tie. His watch was a Patek Philippe, one of the more discreet models. His mother pampered him; he was her only weakness.

“David has some news for you,” she said now. “Haven’t you, darling?”

The young man raised his eyebrows and briefly closed his eyes, his version of a shrug. “I thought you would have told him yourself by now, you’re so excited about it,” he said.

Louise turned to her husband. “David is joining the foundation.”

He looked at her blankly. “The foundation?”

“For goodness’ sake, John! The Mulholland Trust. In fact, he’s going to be the new director.”

“Oh.”

“Is that all you can say- oh?”

“I thought you were the director.”

“I was. It was becoming too much for me, I told you that. From now on I’ll take a back seat.”

“Isn’t he”-Glass took a small pleasure in speaking pointedly of his stepson as if he were not there-“isn’t he a little young, to take on so great a responsibility?”

David laughed shortly, for some reason of his own, and sipped his tea.

“I’ll still be there, to help him, at first,” Louise said, sharply. She always resented being required to explain herself. “Besides, there’s the staff. They’re all experienced people.”

Glass contemplated the young man sitting with his back to the window and smirking. “Well,” he said, lifting his wineglass, “congratulations, young man.” He tended not to address his stepson by name, if he could help it.

“Thanks, Dad,” David said, with high sarcasm, and lifted his teacup to return the toast.

Suddenly Glass remembered the first time he and Louise had met, one April afternoon at John Huston’s mansion near Loughrea in the wet and stormy west of Ireland.