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doesn’t come back from his mission and decide to beat my head in for sleeping with you.”
    “I won’t tell him if you won’t.”
    “We aren’t the only two people on the boat.”
    “Leave Roberto to me. I have ways of calming him down.”
    “That I believe.”
    “Come, I’ll show you something new.”
    “I can’t. The beast is in a coma, sorry.”
    “Want to bet your next month’s pay against a dollar on that? Have you ever heard of the Viennese Oyster?”
    “Can’t say as I have.”
    “Watch.”
    She rolled over onto her back and did something with her legs he wouldn’t have thought she was nearly flexible enough to do. Both feet behind her head. Damn.
    A good thing he didn’t take the bet.

7

    Washington, D.C.

    Another day had passed without any major assaults on his domain, and Michaels was careful not to allow himself to feel too good about that. He didn’t want to incur the wrath of a bored angel. He had finished his workout, and was looking forward to a beer and a quiet evening, maybe turn on the TV to watch some mindless sitcom, no heavy lifting.
    He had just gotten dry from his shower and was reaching for his bathrobe when Toni told him to hold it—then told him why.
    “Excuse me? You want me to try on a dress ?”
    “Not a dress, Alex—”
    “Okay, fine, a skirt.”
    “A sarong . Some places they call it a wrap. Half the men in the tropical Third World wear them every day of life.”
    “Not this man. That’s why God made short pants.”
    “Think of it as a kilt.”
    “A kilt, a sarong, a sixty-three Chevy Impala, it doesn’t matter what you call it, it’s a skirt!”
    Toni laughed.
    “I won’t wear it.”
    “Oh, yes, you will. You volunteered us for this demo, remember? And when we do formal demonstrations of Pukulan Pentjak Silat Serak , we wear formal clothes. You saw that Plinck videotape. You bought it for me.”
    “They were wearing sweatpants underneath,” he said.
    “Fine, you can wear sweatpants under yours if it makes you happy.”
    “It will make me less unhappy.”
    “Come on, Alex! You can’t have any doubts about your masculinity. The baby looks just like you.”
    “No, he doesn’t. He looks like you.” He tried to keep a straight face, but finally gave it up and laughed.
    “That’s what I thought,” she said.
    “Admit it, I had you going for a minute there,” he said.
    “Did not.”
    “Did too.”
    He followed her into the bedroom. She opened her closet and came out holding two hangers. “Okay, which do you want, the celestial or the bamboo?” She held up two squares of brightly colored cloth. “Genuine handmade Indonesian batik from Bali, the finest one hundred percent rayon.”
    “You don’t think I’m gonna wear a girl’s sarong?”
    “Give it up, Alex. They’re unisex and one size fits all.” She pulled the garments off the hangers and unfolded them in a cascade of patterned azure. One, with what looked like stars drawn by somebody tanked up on psychedelic drugs, was dark, mostly indigo; the other was also blue, but lighter, with bamboo plants done in blues and whites.
    “Maybe the bamboo. Jeez, it’s as big as a tablecloth!”
    “Come here, I’ll show you how to put it on.”
    “Hey, I can wrap a towel around my waist, thank you.”
    “And it would fall off the first time I threw you.”
    “You’d do it on purpose.”
    “Damned straight.”
    He smiled. She handed him the bamboo-patterned cloth, which was as big as a tablecloth, had to be seven or eight feet long by maybe four feet wide.
    “Watch me.”
    She demonstrated the way to put it on. “Okay, you wrap it around, like so, then fold it on your left side, and back upon itself, this way. Traditionally, it’ll stay in place with just folding it, but since we are going to be more active, we’ll use a safety pin for the demo, one here, then fold it back to the right, another pin there, then fan-fold it back and forth narrowing it each time, like this, then roll it down in