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way to the door, ducked my mystery out of sight, and opened the door. “Good afternoon,” I said, only slightly out of breath.
    There were six of them. “Good afternoon,” said a gentleman in a red, white, and blue striped tie, who was, it turned out, the spokesman. “My name has been Horogai Yashamoto. Thank you very much for invitation to your home.”
    â€œWe are delighted that you have come,” I said, trapped without thinking into a kind of stilted formality. “Will you come in?”
    I held the door open and they filed solemnly in past me, and then lined up inside. Each of them was wearing an identification button, and as Mr. Yashamoto introduced them one by one I kept trying to look sideways at the names on the identification buttons, hoping that they would forgive mispronunciation. The two Japanese men were Mr. Yashamoto and Mr. Masamitsu, there were three people from Argentina, Mr. and Mrs. Fernandez and Mr. Lopez, and a tall gentleman with a black beard, who was from Ceylon and whose name I never learned, because I got it first as Babar and no amount of correction, after that, could make me change it. “How do you do,” I kept saying, “how do you do.”
    For one hideous minute we all stood just inside the front door, smiling eagerly at one another and all obviously trying helplessly to find some civil, neat, appropriate comment for the situation; then, blessedly, the side porch door opened and my husband, inadequately briefed by Laurie, came in with his mouth open. “Good afternoon,” Mr. Yashamoto said, with his little bow, “thank you very much for invitation to this home. We are pleased to have met you. We are pleased at seeing family life here.”
    My husband took a deep breath. “Glad you could come,” he said manfully. “Hi,” said Laurie, appearing behind him. “Hi, fellas.”
    Mr. Yashamoto bowed again to Laurie. “Our small friend Lorri,” he said, pleased. “We are meeting your parents now.”
    â€œAnd my sisters,” Laurie said, waving at Jannie and Sally, who were standing shyly in the kitchen doorway. “This big one’s Jannie. The little one’s Sally.”
    Mr. Yashamoto approached formally, and bowed to each of them. “Jonni;” he said. “Salli.” “H’lo,” said Jannie almost inaudibly, and Sally giggled and crossed her feet.
    â€œ
And
my brother Barry,” said Laurie.
    Mr. Yashamoto, following Laurie’s pointing finger, bowed again, to the playpen. “Balli,” he said.
    â€œWell,” said Laurie, who seemed at the moment to be in entire control of the situation, “let’s all siddown, then.”
    Hesitantly, edging and backing and bowing and countering, they found chairs. I sat briefly until I was positive that our visiting gentlemen were firmly set into position, and then said, “Excuse me,” and raced back into the kitchen, where I took down glasses and set them on a tray, got out ice, spread the doughnuts thinly on a plate, and padded the spaces between them with gingersnaps. Give the coffee another five minutes, I thought, sugar and milk, spoons. When I came back into the living room I found our guests sitting, each with hands folded in lap, and all turned intently to Laurie, who was saying, “And the thing is, when you’re playing second and there’s a man on first, see, you wanna—” Everyone stood up again when I came to the doorway, and I said, “No, no, sit down, please,” and finally sat myself, abruptly, onto the telephone table chair so that Mr. Yashamoto and Mr. Masamitsu and Mr. Fernandez and Mr. Lopez and Mr. Babar would also sit down. Hastily, I noted that Mrs. Fernandez was giving Laurie that gaze of hypnotized attention which usually means a state of utter bewilderment, that my husband was eying Mr. Yashamoto in the manner of a monomaniac who intends shortly to enter upon his