Jared had no pity for Quentin Reed.

“Jared-” Quentin’s voice cracked under the strain of seeing his cousin for the first time since Tam’s death. In his business suit and huge, elegant office with its stunning harbor view, he looked out of place, like a little boy dressing up in his father’s clothes and playing boss. He cleared his throat and pushed back his executive’s leather chair. He didn’t get up. “Jared, it’s good to see you, but I can’t visit right now. I wish you hadn’t barged in here like this.”

Jared moved in closer, noting how awful his cousin looked. “What’s got you so scared? It can’t just be seeing me again. Has a certain white-haired man with a scar running from one end of his face to the other been to see you, as well? Come on, Quentin. Call off security and let’s talk.”

“None of this concerns you.”

“He was at my house and that concerns me.”

Quentin jumped to his feet, but didn’t seem to know what to do with himself once he was standing. He shoved his hands in his pants pockets, then pulled them out. He looked out his bank of windows, then swung back around to face Jared, as if he thought his cousin might decide to shoot him in the back.

“Talk to me, Quentin,” Jared said, holding back his anger and frustration.

Quentin drew himself up straight. “I have nothing to say to you. You were the one who walked out on your family. If you think you can just strut back in here and call the shots-well, you’re wrong.”

Jared shook his head in disbelief. “You know, for years I felt a little sorry for you. You lost a father who had faith in you and were stuck with a mother who didn’t-”

“My mother has faith in me.”

“Think what you want to think. I’m just telling you what I thought. I quit feeling sorry for you when we were in Saigon together and you used Tam.”

“I loved her!”

“Right-sure, you loved her. Then why didn’t you marry her?”

“Because of you, Jared,” Quentin said, as if that should have been obvious. He sounded pained and so sorrowful, Jared briefly wondered if he might be wrong, but he’d learned a long time ago that Quentin believed what he wanted to believe. He went on in that same pathetic tone, “You were the father of her baby. I would have come back for her, but Tam didn’t want me. She wanted you. How could I have married her when she didn’t love me?”

The arrival of two beefy security guards spared Jared having to answer. They called him sir and were very polite about it, but they didn’t take his word for it that he was leaving. With a nod from their chickenshit boss, they took him to the elevator, stuffed him inside and joined him for the ride down to the lobby. Then they escorted him outside and mentioned they’d be keeping an eye out should he decide to bother Mr. Reed again.

Jared glanced back as he crossed the plaza in front of Winston & Reed, where tulips were closed up in the gloom and pedestrians weren’t lingering today, and he saw the two beefs posted at the door.

He gave them a mock salute.

And then got out of there, fast.

Quentin fled into his private bathroom, splashed cold water on his face and shook unscented cornstarch powder into his armpits and down his back, hoping it would absorb the sweat pouring off him. First Jean-Paul Girard, now Jared. Jesus, next thing Tam’s ghost would walk into his office and point her finger at him and demand to know why he’d killed her.

You can’t think like that!

“Oh, Tam,” he sobbed, sinking his face into his hotel-weight hand towel. “Tam, Tam…whatever happened to us?”

Forcing himself at least to feign calm, he dried his face and returned to his office, informing Willa he didn’t want to be disturbed. If she didn’t feel capable of monitoring his calls and visitors, she should commence finding a replacement at once. Ever the professional, Willa didn’t bore him with excuses.

Then he dialed his mother’s Mt. Vernon Street number and held his breath until she answered. Even her hello sounded strong and ever-capable. Quentin felt tears spring to his eyes. Why did he always have to be the one to fall apart?

“Mother, it’s me,” he said, and he could hear how small and inconsequential he sounded. “I wanted to tell you…I thought you should know Jared’s back in town.”

Annette didn’t miss a beat. “How wonderful,” she said with heavy sarcasm. “So’s your blackmailer from Saigon.”

Quentin’s heart pounded; he was sure he’d faint. He couldn’t speak.

“Charming individual, isn’t he?” his mother went on. “Has he been to see you?”

“Mother-”

“Quentin, please, don’t try my patience. We both know what you did in Saigon. You were a fool and we’ve had to suffer for your mistakes. But that’s in the past. What I care about is now. We must be sensible and think about how we can resolve this situation to our advantage.”

Ever since he’d been a little boy, Annette had always been able to see through him. No wonder she despised him.

“He’s been to see you?” she repeated.

“Yes.” Why lie?

“I assumed he would, sooner or later. And Jared?”

Quentin licked his lips, but his tongue was dry. He wished he hadn’t called, wished he had the fortitude to tell his mother to go to hell and hang up. Instead he said, “He’s afraid for Mai, I think.”

“What a fool. Well, he’s not our problem.”

“Gerard-he said he wants a collection of sapphires you have.”

Annette sighed. “Yes, I know.”

“What are they?”

“It doesn’t matter. I don’t have them-”

“He insists you do.”

“He can insist whatever he likes, but he’s wrong. And at this point, Quentin, I’m afraid even if I did have them they wouldn’t be enough.”

She suddenly sounded very tired, and Quentin hated himself for taking pleasure in even this limited sign of weakness. He didn’t mind strong women. Jane was strong. Tam had been, as well, in a different way. Why did his mother’s strength bother him so much?

Finally, Annette said, “The sapphires aren’t really what Jean-Paul Gerard’s after.”

“Then what is?”

She answered, almost to herself, “I am.”

Thomas Blackburn stared through the tall, paned windows of the Congregational Library reading room, gazing down at the Old Granary Burying Ground. Benjamin Franklin’s parents were buried there, and the victims of the Boston Massacre and Eliza Blackburn. Back in 1892, the Congregational Association had deliberately chosen the 14 Beacon Street site behind the old graveyard for their new building to assure those who used the private library would enjoy peace and tranquility long into the future. Their foresightedness had proven worthwhile.

A squirrel scurried along the second-floor fire escape and hopped into one of the huge trees that shaded Old Granary, a perennial tourist favorite. Thomas could remember going to Eliza’s grave with his father, and taking Stephen for his first visit when he was five or six, and then Rebecca and Nate during one of his rare home leaves in 1960. Jenny had called him a ghoul and had confiscated the children’s charcoal rubbing of their famous ancestor’s headstone. Rubbings had since been outlawed, due to the damage they caused the stones.

Thomas considered the reading room, with its original Tiffany ceiling, Persian rugs, fireplace and eighteenth-century portraits of famous churchmen, one of Boston ’s great hidden treasures. The library itself was primarily a theological library, but it was also well-known for its substantial historical holdings, obtained by virtue of the Congregationalists having run the Commonwealth of Massachusetts until disestablishment in 1831. Thomas came to the library often, if, at times, only to think.

As today.

It seemed he was never without his memories, and the older he got the more vivid they became. Gisela, Benjamin, Quang Tai…his wife, Emily; his son, Stephen. In the night when sleep eluded him, he would often wander in the garden among the shadows, talking to the friends and family he’d lost. He would explain, apologize, cry. They never answered, but left him alone in his anguish. He didn’t blame them. What was there to say?