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as a storm of trepidation sweeps over her.
    “Laurel . . . sweetheart, where are you? I’ve collected the morning papers whilst I was out and you’ll have a good laugh when you see what the Sun has to say . . . Laurel?” Colin peers into the room.
    A little after noon, a subdued group assembles at the long refectory table that saw such a joyous gathering a day ago. No one wants the lunch that’s been prepared, including Simon, who seems to have picked up on the prevailing mood. Chris Thorne, who arrived on horseback when he learned of the tragedy, is nothing if not pensive—brooding, even—as though it wouldn’t take much more to transform his dark good looks into something sullen and saturnine. Susa Thorne, who arrived later, is a sphinx compared to yesterday, and possibly more beautiful in her numbed silence.
    The Earles and other staff became distant and strictly in service once the news reached them. Gemma Earle is now screening phone calls at the far end of the kitchen, where a muted television set is tuned to the Sky channel and a continuous loop of conjecture about Rayce’s death.
    Laurel has hardly taken her eyes off Colin since giving him the news and his devastation is a horrible thing to see. When she’s not looking at his ashen countenance, she’s touching him in some way, making no secret of her concern that contains fear as well as compassion.
    When Gemma signals that Colin should take a particular call, he remains unresponsive, slumped where he is until the handset is brought to him and he’s told that Nicola Bridgman, one of Rayce’s adult daughters, is on the line. He doesn’t exactly liven to the task, but does manage to murmur a few words of condolence before the conversation becomes one-sided. Then it’s apparent to every person at the table that he’s being subjected to an earful; a readily overheard, however unintelligible, tirade that goes on unabated when he drops the receiver mid-rant.
    “She’s wanting to know how the fuck I could let this happen. Me. It’s me she’s holding responsible.” Colin overturns a chair on his way out of the room. “Some things never bleedin’ change,” he bellows as he slams the outside door hard enough to rattle the glassware.
    Laurel’s impulse is to go after him; the others warn her off with Chris as their spokesperson.
    “Leave him be for now, luv,” he says, “He’ll be all right, we’ll all see to it.”
    She can’t very well argue with the experts, and she can’t torture herself one second longer with faithless thoughts about dissociative disorders as brought on by overwhelming events. And she cannot remain passive—in houseguest mode—even if she does give the appearance of working on David’s behalf as well as Colin’s.

FOUR
    Midday, April 13, 1987
    After sipping potent Bloody Marys that have no effect and picking at salads they don’t want, lunch conversation tapers off into the desultory, then stops altogether. Amanda stares out the window as though skaters still occupied center stage at Rockefeller Center—as though she could see some truth other than the dominant one. Nate gives her another minute or so before interrupting her somber reverie with one of the less burning questions spawned by Rayce’s sudden death.
    “By calling you first . . . by calling you more than once this morning, do you think Laurel was hoping you’d offer to go there and assist in some way?”
    “I think she would’ve asked directly if that were the case.”
    “Does she think you’re now working for me?”
    “I kind of doubt that. I mean, things have been happening awfully fast, but I don’t think she—”
    “I believe that’s exactly what she thinks and because of my fracture with Colin she can’t see her way clear to raid the enemy camp,” Nate says.
    “You don’t consider yourself the enemy, do you?”
    “No, but Colin does and Laurel’s first allegiance has to be to him.”
    “Speaking of trying to get your head wrapped around