To the two uniformed police officers, the journalist with her camera already up, the attorney with her folder, and the two movers with their enormous boxes.

And the annoyance on his face curdled, slowly, into confusion, and the laughter in the room began to die, table by table, replaced by a thick and awkward silence.

“Sloan?” Julian said, and his voice cracked as it climbed.

“What — what is the meaning of this?

Who are these people?

Where is my mother’s sixty-course feast?”