The payments, he explained, with the easy confidence that had carried him through a thousand meetings, were retention incentives — aggressive, yes, unconventional, sure, but defensible, the cost of holding key talent in a competitive market.

When the silent faces did not soften, he tried distance: Selina, he said, was unstable, had pursued him, had manipulated the accounts herself, and he was as shocked as anyone.

And when that too slid off the glass, he turned, finally, to the tool he had always been able to use on me, and he used it now in front of the entire board.

“You all know what this really is,” he said, spreading his hands, reasonable, sorrowful.