“Having a good time, Major?” Ferguson was carrying a glass of Scotch and chewing on an unlit cigar. “I was on my way out for a smoke.”

“Very good, thank you,” said the Major, who was trying to follow Alec’s head through the crowd as he twirled Mrs. Ali around the room with rather an excessive number of spins.

“I was glad your sister-in-law could make it,” said Ferguson.

“I’m sorry—what?” asked the Major still looking at the dancers. She was as light on her feet as he had dreamed, and her dress flew around her ankles like blue waves.

“She told me all about her plans to take a cruise when she has the money,” he said.

“What money?” asked the Major. He was torn between a sudden urge to throttle Alec and a small voice that told him to pay attention to Ferguson. With great difficulty, he dragged his eyes from the dance floor.

“Not to worry.” Ferguson now also seemed to be watching Mrs. Ali spinning though the crowd of dancers like a brilliant blue flame. “I’m ready to deal square with you if you’re square with me.” The cigar moved up and down like an insult. Ferguson turned to face him and added. “As I told Sterling, sure I could just pay the widow a big premium for her gun now, then take it out of Pettigrew’s hide later, but why would I do that? I respect the Major too much as a gentleman and a sport to pull a fast one.” He smiled, but it did not reach his eyes.

“You invited her to the dance,” said the Major.

“Least I could do, old chap,” said Ferguson, slapping him again on the back. “Got to have the whole Pettigrew family to witness your receiving this award.”

“Of course,” said the Major, feeling sick.

“You might want to grab those guns quick after the show,” Ferguson added as he moved away. “She did seem very interested to know they were here.”

The Major was so dazed by the implied threat that he sank back into the shadow of the door’s curtain to recover his composure. He was just in time to escape the notice of Daisy Green, who promenaded by with Alma. She, too, had noticed Alec and Mrs. Ali dancing, for she paused and took Alma by the arm.

“I see she’s ensnared your husband.”

“Oh, doesn’t she look pretty,” said Alma. “I asked Alec to make sure she wasn’t left out.”

“I’m just saying that maybe if Grace showed a bit more cleavage, he wouldn’t have been led on by more exotic charms.”

“You mean Alec?” asked Alma.

“No, of course I don’t mean Alec, you ninny.”

“I think Grace is worried about neck wrinkles,” said Alma, smoothing her own neck, which was swathed in a purple satin scarf with orange glass balls clicking on the fringed ends. She wore a Victorian high-buttoned blouse set over a voluminous and crumpled velvet skirt that seemed to have sustained many a moth.

“She’ll have more to worry about when her so-called friend snaps him up and rubs all our noses in it,” hissed Daisy.

“If she marries him, I suppose we should invite her into the garden club?” asked Alma.

“We must all do our Christian duty, of course,” said Daisy.

“His wife wasn’t much of a joiner,” said Alma. “Maybe she won’t be, either.”

“Unfortunately, it wouldn’t be appropriate to ask her to join in activity related to the church.” Daisy gave an unpleasant smile. “I think that keeps her off most of the committees.”

“Maybe she’ll convert.” Alma giggled.

“Don’t even joke like that,” said Daisy. “Let’s just hope it’s just a last fling.”

“One last small bag of wild oats found in the back of the shed, so to speak?” said Alma. The two women laughed and moved away deeper into the hot, crowded room.

It was a moment before the Major could move his body, which seemed to have stuck itself to the cold glass of the French door and was strangely numb. A brief thought that perhaps he should not have invited Mrs. Ali to the dance made him ashamed of himself and he instantly changed to being angry at Daisy and Alma. It was astonishing that they would consider making up such stories about Mrs. Ali and him.

He had always assumed gossip to be the malicious whispering of uncomfortable truths, not the fabrication of absurdities. How was one to protect oneself against people making up things? Was a life of careful, impeccable behavior not enough in a world where inventions were passed around as fact? He looked around at the high-ceilinged room filled with people he considered to be his friends and neighbors. For a moment he saw them as complete strangers; drunk strangers, in fact. He stared into the palm tree but found only a label that identified it as plastic and made in China.

Returning to the table, he was in time to see Alec depositing Mrs. Ali in her seat with a flourish.

“Now, remember what I told you,” said Alec. “Don’t you pay them any attention.” With that he added, “Your lady is a wonderful dancer, Ernest,” and disappeared to find his dinner.

“What was he talking about?” asked the Major as he set down their drinks and took his seat at her side.

“I think he was trying to be reassuring,” she said, laughing. “He told me not to worry if some of your friends seemed a bit stiff at first.”

“What friends?” asked the Major.

“Don’t you have any?” she asked. “Then who are all these people?”

“Blessed if I know,” he said and added: “I didn’t think you danced, or I would have asked you myself.”

“Will you ask me now?” she said. “Or are you going to have seconds on the roast beef?” Mrs. Rasool’s waiters were circling with vast platters.

“Will you please do me the honor?” He led her to the floor as the dance band struck up a slow waltz.

Dancing, the Major thought, was a strange thing. He had forgotten how this vaguely pleasant exercise and social obligation could become something electric when the right woman stepped into one’s arms. Now he could understand why the waltz had once been as frowned upon as the wild gyrations that today’s young people called dance. He felt that he existed only in the gliding circle they made, parting the other dancers like water. There was no room beyond her smiling eyes; there were no people beyond the two of them. He felt the small of her back and her smooth palm under his hands and his body felt a charge that made him stand taller and spin faster than he would have ever thought possible.

He did not see the two men who gossiped at his back as he swung past the stage and the bar but he heard, in a brief silence between cascades of melody, a man ask, “Do you really think they’ll ask him to resign from the club?” and then a second voice, speaking a little loud over the sound of the music: “Of course I wouldn’t, but the club secretary says it does seem like George Tobin all over again.”

The Major’s face burned; by the time he risked a glance at the bar, the men had turned away and he could not be sure whom they had been talking about. As the Major looked around for any other impropriety that might suggest censure, Old Mr. Percy swept by with his lady companion in his stiff arms. Her strapless dress had turned quite around so that her ample bosom threatened to burst from the top of the zipper, while on her back two boned protuberances suggested the buds of undeveloped wings. The Major sighed with relief and thought that perhaps the club would benefit from certain tighter standards.

The case of George Tobin, who had married a black actress from a popular television series, still made him uneasy, though it had been considered merely a question of privacy. They had all agreed that Tobin had gone beyond the pale in exposing the club to the possible attention of paparazzi and a celebrity-hungry public by marrying a TV star. As the Major had reassured a very upset Nancy, the membership committee had vigorously denied any suggestion that color was an issue. After all, Tobin’s family had been members for several generations and had been very well accepted despite their being both Catholic and of Irish heritage. Tobin was happy to resign quietly on the understanding that his son from his previous marriage would be allowed his own membership, so the whole thing had been handled with the utmost discretion. Nancy, however, had refused to set foot in the club again, and the Major had been left feeling vaguely uncomfortable.

As the music began to reach its crescendo, the Major shook all thoughts of the club from his mind and refocused on Mrs. Ali. She looked slightly puzzled, as if his slipping away into thought had registered in his expression. Cursing himself for wasting any moment of the dance, he gave her a big smile and spun them around until the floor threatened to come away from their feet.

A drumroll at the end of the dance and an enthusiastic flashing then dowsing of the main chandeliers announced the after-dinner entertainment. In the sudden dark, the room roiled with squeals, muttered oaths, and a small crash of glassware in a distant corner as people struggled to their seats. Old Mr. Percy continued to spin his partner around and had to be urged off the floor by one of the waiters. The Major did his best to navigate Mrs. Ali smoothly back to their table.

A crash of cymbals from the band gave way to the flat squeal of recorded music and the whistle of a train. In the darkness, a single slide projector lit up a white scrim with sepia-toned images of India flickering and cascading almost too fast to register actual scenes. The Major felt a horrible sense of familiarity build until a brief image of himself as a boy, sitting on a small painted elephant, told him that Roger had indeed raided the tin box in the attic and put the family photographs on public display.