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a person. He’s insightful and supportive. He hears and listens and responds.”
    â€œSounds like you know him well.”
    She was proud to admit it. “We have a history. I met him when he was Father Fran, just about to be appointed Bishop of Albany.”
    â€œNo kidding?”
    Something about his nonchalance was a bit much. It reminded her that he was a reporter. She nodded and checked her watch. “I have to get back to work.”
    â€œHow late do you play tonight?” he asked, walking beside her.
    â€œTen-thirty.”
    â€œWithout dinner?”
    â€œI ate before.”
    â€œCan I buy you a snack when you get off?”
    He had offered something similar when he called her apartment. At the time, she had thought it an attempt to make the idea of an interview more palatable. Now, with him standing there in person—the right height for her, the right age, and maritally free, Mitch Rellejik had said—it almost felt like something else. Almost—but there was still that mustache, which was alternately dashing and hard. And there was an intensity in his eyes that didn’t hit her right.
    She wasn’t that desperate for a date.
    At the dining room entrance now, she smiled and shook her head. “Thanks, anyway,” she said and went on inside.
    Back at the piano, she began playing the kind of music that this later crowd would enjoy. She sang “Almost Paradise,” “Candle in the Wind,” and “Total Eclipse of the Heart.” She did some Carly Simon, some James Taylor, some Harry Connick, Jr. She loved every song she played. If she didn’t, she wouldn’t be able to perform with feeling, but the feeling came easily with these songs. They were her generation’s favorites.
    Playing without effort, swinging her hair back from her face and leaning forward to sing into the mike, she blotted out the audience and let her heart take over. Singing had always been her salvation, the only time when she was naturally free of a stutter. Though time and training had freed her to speak, singing remained special. She might not have been able to make it on Broadway, but when she was lost in a song this way, shecould just as well have been there. The feeling of pleasure, of success, of escape was the same.
    Halfway through the second set, the Frisches came over to thank her for helping make their anniversary special. A short time after they left, another patron, Peter Swift, sat beside her on the piano bench and sang harmony. He had a beautiful voice and often joined Lily in a song or two when he and his wife ate at the club. The spontaneity of it never failed to please the crowd. Soon after Peter returned to his table, the Cardinal took his place. She was playing “I Dreamed a Dream” from Les Miz at the time. He played along in the lower registers through the end of it, then joined right in with the more throbbing chords of “Red and Black.” When it was done, he gave her hand a squeeze, rejoined his waiting guests, and left the dining room.
    All told, it was a good show. Lily was tired but satisfied when she finally closed the piano lid. A handful of guests lingered over second or third cups of coffee, but the rest of the tables had been cleaned and reset. Half of the wait staff had left. The chef, George Mendes, who had trained in New York and was just Lily’s age, had changed from his whites into jeans and was waiting for her in the office.
    He held out a bag. “You like risotto. Tonight’s was great.”
    She was touched that he remembered. He hadn’t been at the club for long, and she was only one of many who raved about his food. “Thanks,” she said with feeling and took the bag. “This’ll be tomorrow’s dinner. Are you walking home?” He lived in her direction.
    â€œNot yet. I have to run a few menu changes past Dan. He’s upstairs.”
    The third floor of the brownstone held private