Rapture

Jeff's rooms were perhaps too austere and imper sonal, but they were bachelor quarters and wouldn't necessarily acquire the cluttered, lived-in look of a family residence. Georgianne sat down on a deck chair. The heat seemed to have let up a bit, and there was even a hint of a breeze in the air.

Jeff appeared a minute or two later, carrying a large silver ice bucket. He set it down on a table, darted inside again, and was back almost immediately with a crystal goblet for Georgianne and his own drink. She didn't try to hide her smile now; she laughed aloud.

"You're trying to get me paralytic."

'Not really." He smiled. "You can add a little water if you want, and I've got a fat steak in the fridge whenever you feel you need some ballast."

Georgianne leaned forward to see exactly what was packed in the ice. There were two green Mosel bottles, a Wehlener Sonnenuhr 1976 and a Graach Him- melreich 1975. The third bottle was a liter of Contrexbville water. Jeff poured some of the Graach into her goblet.

"Cheers. It's great to see you again."

And you."

They touched glasses, sat back, and sipped. The wine was too good to water down, Georgianne thought. She would enjoy it, but slowly. Had Jeff taught himself wines? No, more likely he'd gone into a good store and bought by the price tag. For her benefit, of course.

"What's that?"

"What?"

Your drink."

"Laphroaig. It's a single malt Scotch."

"Oh." Then she seemed to be speaking mechanically, without thinking about it. "I was going to bring you a bottle, but I couldn't remember what you like. Is that your favorite?"

"I drink various things," Jeff told her. "But, yeah, I guess you could say I like this best. Ted introduced me to malt Scotches about a year ago."

Ted. Sure. Lots of people probably drink malt Scotch, Georgianne thought. It stood to reason. Single malt scotch, they call it. They'd even found some in Bonnie's stomach.

That was the first thing.

Jeff took her for a selective tour on Saturday. Wisely, he didn't try to cram too much into a single day. They cruised at a leisurely pace through Hollywood and Beverly Hills, taking in Laurel Canyon, Coldwater Canyon, the Strip, and Rodeo Drive. They ate a light lunch at the Polo Lounge, then drove on to Santa Monica and Venice, where they spent a while watching the crowd. The Ferrari never seemed out of place, and it drew many appreciative looks.

Georgianne felt out of place, though. L.A. was almost a foreign country. In a way that was healthy, she thought. Like fear, it was a form of negative definition. If she didn't belong here, she must belong somewhere else-but at least somewhere. She would just relax and enjoy the experience of being in a new and different environment.

Jeffs manner intrigued her. It was as though he was showing off his city, its exotic sights and people. There were moments when Georgianne was sure she saw pride in his expression. Steering his sixtythousand-dollar car through the precincts of wealth and privilege, he looked proprietorial, and there was something amusing about that, because it seemed fairly obvious that he didn't really move in these circles on a regular basis. Georgianne would have bet that the glamorous side of L.A. life was as new to him as his Ferrari.

She didn't know what to make of the car. A tenyear-old Camaro was Jeff's style. The Ferrari was something else altogether. It seemed too extravagant, all the more so since Jeff made the point that he'd paid the entire bill in cash, on the spot. But then, Georgianne had to admit that after more than twenty years she probably didn't know what Jeffs style was, or even what kind of person he had grown into. Now she was seeing him on his home ground, and getting to know him all over again.

They returned to Jeffs condo, relaxed for a while, then showered and changed before driving back into the city for dinner at Spago's. Later, Georgianne couldn't remember the exact context, but at some point she mentioned Janice. And Jeff made a toocasual remark that upset her.

"Isn't she-oh, it's probably just my imagination."

"What?"

"Ah, nothing, really. Well, is she a little ... uh ... butch?"

"No," Georgianne replied after a momentary silence. "No, I don't think so at all."

Jeff shrugged in a way that suggested he wasn't willing to concede the point, but he sipped his wine and changed the subject. The rest of the evening seemed a bit cooler.

It was nothing more than a minor annoyance at the time. But when Georgianne thought about it later, again and again, it began to seem like a piece of calculated nastiness. Jeff had never been the kind of person to say something like that, either casually or inadvertently. Why would he even think it? Whether Jan was gay or not (and she emphatically wasn't), how could Jeff have formed an opinion and suggested it the way he had on the basis of one brief meeting.

That was the second thing.