Swan boats at four - George V. Higgins

David and Frances are a middle-aged couple with problems - mostly David's. His bank is failing, as is his attention to the marriage. In the background there's a bank examiner named Clyde Ramsey with the moves of a bounty hunter ready to pounce.

Whe France talks David into a transatlantic crossing on a delux ocean liner, she hopes the change of air might break the tension. But it's a dangerous game she's putting into play, dangling the bait (whose name is Melissa) squarely in fromt of her unfaithful husband. No sooner have she and David settled themselves in the first-class dining saloon than a stranger appears at their dining table. It's no coincidence. Their dinner companion turns out to be a charming bounder named Burton Rutledge, the sort, David says, 'who if he can convince us he's got plenty of money, then there's no way we'd suspect he might be after ours.