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slender, with discreet touches of grey at his temples. His three-piece suit had clearly been made for him, and he always wore the vest. His shoes gleamed with polish. An antique signet ring glinted on one hand. His tie was a marvel of luxurious restraint. He cocked his aristocratic head to listen patiently to an anecdote from a doddering lady in dirty diamonds; he laid a firm and manly hand on the arm of a tweedy academic type standing next to him, who I happened to know had just published a critically acclaimed book; he made a self-deprecating joke that had the circle around him laughing.
    Oh, he was good. Though it remained to be seen whether his obvious skills would translate into long-term help for the Society. Based on what I had seen in my years here, the place seemed to chew up and spit out directors: the most recent disaster had been exiled; her predecessor had fled to Vermont and refused to answer any communications, written or oral; the one before that had apparently succumbed to a lengthy wasting illness attributed to the stress of the position—or maybe some evil fungus that lurked among the old books. But I had a feeling that Charles was going to put them all to shame, and what was more, he seemed to enjoy his role.
    Time to remind him to make his formal welcome. I wove through the crowd and touched his arm. He turned quickly, and seeing me, unleashed one of his high-voltage smiles. Sorry, Charlie, I don’t have any money to give you , I thought. Save it for the paying guests.
    I leaned close to speak, savoring his subtle after-shave. “Charles, you should welcome our guests now. I’ll tell the caterer to start serving in fifteen minutes, but it’s going to take some time to move everyone in to dinner.”
    “Of course,” he responded, sotto voce . He made his apologies to the group he’d been speaking with, then moved toward the center of the main wall to pose against the array of portraits of past presidents and board members, cleared his throat, and waited for the din to subside. Which it did promptly. Not for the first time, I wondered just how he did that.
    “Ladies, gentlemen, I am delighted to welcome you this evening to celebrate the first hundred and twenty-five years for the Pennsylvania Antiquarian Society, as we take our first step toward a greatly enhanced future. It is gratifying to see so many old friends and supporters here, because we face some daunting challenges in the days ahead. But with the assistance of our able board and the valuable input from our architects and planners, we have developed a strategy to meet the challenges of the future, all the while preserving the best of the past. For that is our mission: to preserve and to protect our treasures, so that future generations may benefit from them.
    “As you know well, our primary goals continue to be: to create the best possible physical environment in order to maintain our world-renowned collections; and at the same time, to create a place that welcomes scholars and visitors, that provides a suitable setting in which to learn and explore. We strive to marry these two goals, and we must work together to forge an institution that will be a credit to this wonderful city. Please help us both to honor our past and to celebrate our future.”
    I had to admire the way the words rolled off his tongue as though they were spontaneous, which I knew they weren’t, because I had written them for him. And of course that last line was a delicate hint to those present that they should take out their checkbooks.
    I sneaked a quick look at the audience, which appeared well lubricated. Time to begin herding people toward their tables—no easy task, even though elegantly hand-lettered place cards had been carefully distributed by Carrie, after days of soul-searching over seating charts. With my eyes I gathered the junior staff’s attention: they moved promptly to the double doors into the reading-slash-dining room, armed with fresh copies of the