Vane was already standing in the middle of the clubhouse when Crane carried the folder in, and he did not sit down for it. Hands loose at his sides, chin level, that particular stillness of a man who has been in this room for worse reasons than a signing.

Kade took the chair nearest the door. Crane stayed by the bar with the pen. Nobody asked Vane to move, and he did not.

When you came in, all four men were waiting for you, and Scar did the talking.

your father said, and put one hand flat on the bar like a man closing a book.

Vane did not repeat it. He looked at you once, from your shoes to your eyes, and then kept looking, which in a room full of men is a language of its own. Behind him a chair scraped and somebody stopped it halfway through the scrape.

He took one step and stopped at the edge of the light, and the step was the whole speech.

Vane said, low and finished, and the quiet after it was every man in the room agreeing at once.