Mark's. He found the curvature of the exposed portion of her upper bosom absolutely fascinating. During the ceremony his mind had wandered from what the bishop of Philadelphia was saying about the institution of marriage to recalling in some detail the other absolutely fascinating aspects of Amanda's anatomy, in particular the delightful formation of her tail.
The ceremony had gone off without a hitch. Although Chad Nesbitt had been as tight as a tick, his condition hadn't been all that apparent, and except for one burp and one incident of flatulence that had caused some smiles and a titter or two, the exchange of vows had been appropriately solemn and even rather touching: Matt had happened to glance at Daffy while the bishop was asking her if she was willing to forsake all others until death did them part, and she actually had tears in her eyes as she looked at Chad.
Outside Saint Mark's afterward, however, his plans to kiss Amanda tenderly and as quickly as possible were sent awry by Lieutenant Foster H. Lewis, Sr., of the 9^th District, who had been outside the church, seen Matt, and beckoned him over.
'Excuse me, please, Amanda,' he said, and touched her arm, and she had smiled at him, and he'd walked over to Lieutenant Lewis.
'Yes, sir?'
'Are you on duty, Payne?'
'No, sir.'
Lieutenant Lewis had examined him for a moment, nodded his head, and walked away.
By then Amanda had been shepherded into one of the limousines and driven off to the Browne estate in Merion. He had known that it was highly unlikely that Amanda would have gone back to his apartment with him before they went to the house for the reception, but it had not been entirely beyond the realm of possibility.
Matt had to drive out to the Brownes' place by himself.
But once there he had found her right away, by one of the bars, with a champagne glass in her hand that she, with what he thought was entirely delightful intimacy, had held up to his lips.
Chad had searched him out, by then more visibly pissed, and extracted a solemn vow that if something happened to him in the service, Matt would look after Daffy.
There had been an enormous wedding cake. Chad had used his Marine officer's sword to cut it. From the way he withdrew it from the scabbard and nearly stabbed his new bride in the belly with it, Matt suspected that it was no more than the third time the sword had been out of its scabbard.
An hour after that the bride and groom, through a hail of rice and bird seed, had gotten in a limousine and driven off.
And now, an hour after that, he and Amanda were dancing.
The vertical manifestation of a horizontal desire,he thought, delightfully aware of the pressure of Amanda's bosom against his abdomen, the brushing of his thighs against hers.
'I watched you during the wedding,' Amanda said against his chest.
He pulled back and looked down at her and smiled.
'I saw your gun,' she said.
'How could you do that?' he asked, surprised. 'It's in an ankle holster.'
'Figuratively speaking,' she said, pronouncing the words very carefully.
'Oh,' he said with a chuckle.
'Shipboard romance,' she said.
'I beg your pardon?'
'You know about shipboard romances, presumably?' Amanda asked.
'No,' he said.
'People fall in love on a ship very quickly,' she said.
'Okay,' he said.
'Because they are in a strange environment and there is an element of danger,' Amanda said.
'You have made a study of this, I gather?'
'The romance fades when the ship docks,' Amanda said, 'and people see things as they really are.'
'So we won't get on a ship,' Matt said. 'A small sailboat, maybe. But no ship. Or if we do, we'll just never make port. Like theFlying Dutchman.'
'They grow up, so to speak,' Amanda went on. 'See things for what they really are.'
'You said that,' he said.
'Or, 'she said significantly, 'one of them does.'
'Meaning what?' There was something in what was going on that made him uncomfortable.
'When are you going to stop playing policeman and get on with your life is what I'm wondering,' she said, putting her face against his shirt again.
'I don't think I'm 'playing' policeman,' he said.
'You don'tknow that you're playing policeman,' she said. 'That's what I meant when I saidone of them grows up.'
'I don't think I like this conversation,' Matt said. 'Why don't we talk about something pleasant, like what are we going to do next weekend?'
'I'mserious, Matt.'
'So'm I. So what's your point?'
'I know why you became a policeman,' she said.
'You do?'
'Because you couldn't get in the Marines with Chad and had to prove you were a man.'
'You have been talking to Daffy, I see,' he said.
'Well, now you've done that. You became a cop and you shot a man. You have nothing else to prove. So why are you still a cop?'
'I like being a cop.'
'That'swhat I mean,' she said.
She stopped dancing, freed herself from his arms, and looked up at him.
'The ship has docked,' she said.
'Meaning what?'
'Meaning I'm sorry I started this conversation,' she said, 'but Ihad to.'
'I don't know what the hell you're talking about!'
'Yes you do!' she said, and Matt saw that she was on the edge of tears.
'What's wrong with me being a cop?' Matt asked softly.
'If you don't know, I certainly can't tell you.'
'Jesus!'
'I'm tired,' she said. 'And a little drunk. I'm going to bed.'
'It's early,' he protested.
She walked away with a little wave.
'Call you in the morning before you go?'
There was no reply to that, either.
'Shit,' Matt said aloud.
Thirty minutes later, just as Matt had decided she wasn't coming back out of the house, and as he had indicated to the bartender that he would like another Scotch and soda, easy on the soda, his father touched his arm and announced, 'I've been looking for you.'
I am about to get hell, Matt decided. The party is just about over, and I have not danced with my mother. Actually I haven't done much about my mother at all except wave at her. And to judge by the look on his face, he is really pissed. Or disappointed in me, which is even worse than his being pissed at me.
'My bad manners are showing again, are they?' Matt asked.
'Are you sober?' Brewster C. Payne asked evenly enough.
'So far,' Matt said.
'Come with me, please, Matt,' his father said. 'There's no putting this off, I'm afraid.'
'No putting what off?'
'Leave your drink,' his father said. 'You won't be needing it.'
