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It was their first date—possibly their second, if helping her move into a new apartment was “a date,” or maybe even their third, if you counted “tea at the Reichstag.” A third date, of course, would have implied certain rules, but Kate had just one for the evening:

“The rule is we can’t talk about Irving or my play,” said Kate.

Sean agreed, and for the first half of the date, it was easy to stick to the rule. They were in the Kennedy Center Concert Hall enjoying the National Symphony Orchestra perform Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No. 5. At intermission they got a glass of wine, red for Kate and white for Sean. They waited in the grand foyer, near the thirteen-foot-high, three-thousand-pound bronze bust of John F. Kennedy that almost seemed to be eavesdropping on their conversation.

“Just one thing about your play,” he said.

“Breaking the rule already?”

“Sorry. We have to cut the scene where Watson’s wife jumps down his throat for writing that letter to Adolf Hitler.”

“That letter is real.”

Sean drank his wine. “But it sounds made-up.”

“I’ve seen a copy of the letter. It’s real. November 1938. Right after Kristallnacht. Over seven thousand Jewish homes and businesses were vandalized. They burned synagogues to the ground. Dozens of people were killed. And what does Watson do? He fires off what he thinks is a strongly worded letter to Hitler saying, ‘I respectfully appeal to you togive consideration to applying the Golden Rule in dealing with these minorities.’”

“Do they even have the Golden Rule in Germany?”

“Yes,” said Kate, resisting the urge to add,you moron.

“Maybe you should double-check.”

“Trust me, they had the Golden Rule. What they didn’t have was IBM’s latest technology. Unless Watson was willing to sell it to them. That’s why this scene has to stay.”

“Claude says it has to go.”

“Who’s Claude?”

Sean hemmed and hawed, then answered, “A screenwriter. He’s in Hollywood.”

Kate froze. “Irving Bass is shopping my play to Hollywood without telling me?”

“Actually, Irving knows nothing about this.”

“Soyou’reshopping it behind Irving’s backand mine?”

“I wouldn’t call it ‘shopping.’”

“But you admit you went behind our backs.”

“Look, Kate. Irving is delusional about this play. It was his idea, so he’s trying to shoehorn it onto the stage. But it’s too big for live theater. This story is screaming to be a five-part series.”

“But I’m not writing a TV series.”

“That’s why I connected with Claude.”

“You have no right to show Clyde my script.”

“Claude, not Clyde.”

“Whatever the fuck his name is.”

An elderly woman within earshot gave Kate a reproving look. Sean moved closer and said, “Calm down, Kate.”

“Don’t tell me to calm down. This ismystory.”

“Technically, it’s a true story.”

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