The “ant-proof cooler” was a small larderlike cupboard in the kitchen, with a circular metal shelving unit, a series of round trays which revolved like a lazy Susan.

But after the little matter at the mess Billy Budd no more found himself in strange trouble at times about his hammock or his clothesbag or what not.

During the auction, it is often a partnership's goal to find an eight-card major suit fit.

Williams's gay critics seem caught in this circular homophobiaphobia, in which the closet is obsessively opened and closed, its limits marked and remarked, its positive and negative charged and recharged.