“I’ve known her since she was in diapers,” Patricia Payne said. “I’ll call her whatever I please.”
“And it does fit, doesn’t it?” Susan Reynolds said.
“I didn’t say that,” Patricia Payne said.
“I think you’re a friend of Mr. Emmons, aren’t you, Mr. Payne?” Susan Reynolds asked.
“Charles Emmons?” Brewster Payne asked.
She nodded. “He’s a good friend of my father.”
“Does that make you Thomas Reynolds’s daughter, by chance?”
“Guilty.”
“Charley and I went to law school together,” Brewster C. Payne said. “I don’t know your father. But Charley often mentions him.”
“Matt,” Patricia Payne said. “You’re going to have to say hello to the Detweilers. They know you’re here.”
“Oh, God!”
“Matt!”
“Yes, ma’am,” Matt said.
“Now would be a good time,” Patricia Payne said.
“Will you excuse me, please?” Matt said to Susan Reynolds. “I will return.”
Making his manners with Penny’s parents was as painful as he thought it would be. And it took five minutes, which seemed like much longer.
When he returned to Susan Reynolds, his parents were gone, replaced by two young men who had also discovered the good-looking blonde without visible escort.
“What do you say, Payne?” one of them said. His name was T. Winslow Hayes, and they had been classmates at Episcopal Academy. Matt hadn’t liked him then, and didn’t like him now. The other one was vaguely familiar, but Matt couldn’t put a name to him.
“What do I say about what?”
“Can I get you another drink, Susan?” the other one asked.
“Thank you, but I have appointed Matt booze-bearer for the evening,” Susan said, and, raising her glass, added, “And I already have one.”
Am I getting lucky?
T. Winslow Hayes and the other left shortly thereafter.
Their hostess appeared.
“I feel duty-bound to warn you about him, Susan,” Daffy said.
“Daffy has never forgiven me for refusing to marry her,” Matt said. “Don’t pay any attention to her.”
“You shit!” Daffy said.
Susan Reynolds chuckled.
“He doesn’t look very threatening to me,” Susan said.
“There are some very nice boys here I could introduce you to,” Daffy said.