About the book: year / The dinner was quite boring, and now that the two other guests had left, accompanied by their people, to catch a plane, the Governor and Bond were left alone in large living room of the administrative building, furnished with upholstered furniture. They tried to start a conversation. Bond had a keen sense of the absurdity of what was happening. He always felt uncomfortable sitting on soft pillows. He preferred to sit in a chair upholstered with something hard, with his feet resting on the floor. And he felt stupid, sitting with the old bachelor on that pink chintz sofa, staring at the coffee and liqueurs standing on the low table between their outstretched legs. There was something overly friendly, intimate, even feminine in this situation, and therefore inappropriate. ...