Adam had to get up to pour his own. A feeling completely foreign to him had arisen. He was enjoying what he saw in her. He liked to see her struggling. He felt good about punishing her, but he was also watchful. “Now I must be careful,” he told himself. “Don’t talk, don’t talk.”

He said aloud, “Sam Hamilton has been a good friend to me all the years. I’ll miss him.”

She had spilled some rum, and it moistened the corners of her mouth. “I hated him,” she said. “I would have killed him if I could.”

“Why? He was kind to us.”

“He looked—he looked into me.”

“Why not? He looked into me too, and he helped me.”

“I hate him,” she said. “I’m glad he’s dead.”

“Might have been good if I had looked into you,” Adam said.

Her lip curled. “You are a fool,” she said. “I don’t hate you. You’re just a weak fool.”

As her tension built up, a warm calm settled on Adam.

“Sit there and grin,” she cried. “You think you’re free, don’t you? A few drinks and you think you’re a man! I could crook my little finger and you’d come back slobbering, crawling on your knees.” Her sense of power was loose and her vixen carefulness abandoned. “I know you,” she said. “I know your cowardly heart.”

Adam went on smiling. He tasted his drink, and that reminded her to pour another for herself. The bottle neck chattered against her glass.

“When I was hurt I needed you,” she said. “But you were slop. And when I didn’t need you any more you tried to stop me. Take that ugly smirk off your face.”

“I wonder what it is you hate so much.”

“You wonder, do you?” Her caution was almost entirely gone. “It isn’t hatred, it’s contempt. When I was a little girl I knew what stupid lying fools they were—my own mother and father pretending goodness. And they weren’t good. I knew them. I could make them do whatever I wanted. I could always make people do what I wanted. When I was half-grown I made a man kill himself. He pretended to be good too, and all he wanted was to go to bed with me—a little girl.”

“But you say he killed himself. He must have been very sorry about something.”

“He was a fool,” said Kate. “I heard him come to the door and beg. I laughed all night.”

Adam said, “I wouldn’t like to think I’d driven anybody out of the world.”

“You’re a fool too. I remember how they talked. ‘Isn’t she a pretty little thing, so sweet, so dainty?’ And no one knew me. I made them jump through hoops, and they never knew it.”

Adam drained his glass. He felt remote and inspective. He thought he could see her impulses crawling like ants and could read them. The sense of deep understanding that alcohol sometimes gives was on him. He said, “It doesn’t matter whether you liked Sam Hamilton. I found him wise. I remember he said one time that a woman who knows all about men usually knows one part very well and can’t conceive the other parts, but that doesn’t mean they aren’t there.”

“He was a liar and a hypocrite too.” Kate spat out her words. “That’s what I hate, the liars, and they’re all liars. That’s what it is. I love to show them up. I love to rub their noses in their own nastiness.”

Adam’s brows went up. “Do you mean that in the whole world there’s only evil and folly?”

“That’s exactly what I mean.”

“I don’t believe it,” Adam said quietly.

“You don’t believe it! You don’t believe it!” She mimicked him. “Would you like me to prove it?”

“You can’t,” he said.

She jumped up, ran to her desk, and brought the brown envelopes to the table. “Take a look at those,” she said.

“I don’t want to.”

“I’ll show you anyway.” She took out a photograph. “Look there. That’s a state senator. He thinks he’s going to run for Congress. Look at his fat stomach. He’s got bubs like a woman. He likes whips. That streak there—that’s a whip mark. Look at the expression on his face! He’s got a wife and four kids and he’s going to run for Congress. You don’t believe! Look at this! This piece of white blubber is a councilman; this big red Swede has a ranch out near Blanco. Look here! This is a professor at Berkeley. Comes all the way down here to have the toilet splashed in his face—professor of philosophy. And look at this! This is a minister of the Gospel, a little brother of Jesus. He used to burn a house down to get what he wanted. We give it to him now another way. See that lighted match under his skinny flank?”

“I don’t want to see these,” said Adam.

“Well, you have seen them. And you don’t believe it! I’ll have you begging to get in here. I’ll have you screaming at the moon.” She tried to force her will on him, and she saw that he was detached and free. Her rage congealed to poison. “No one has ever escaped,” she said softly. Her eyes were flat and cold but her fingernails were tearing at the upholstery of the chair, ripping and fraying the silk.

Adam sighed. “If I had those pictures and those men knew it, I wouldn’t think my life was very safe,” he said. “I guess one of those pictures could destroy a man’s whole life. Aren’t you in danger?”