Lake No Bottom

This comic drama by the author of Moonchildren, Loose ends, Spoils of War and The Ballad of Soapy Smith involves a literary critic and his wife who have retired to an idyllic New England lake. Their weekend visitor, a promising novelist whose work was discovered by the critic, has just published a kiss-and-tell trashy best-seller

Ostensibly, the young author is stopping on his way to lecture at a nearby college. In fact, he has come to see the wife, his former love whom he still desires. She is bored in the boondocks and willingly resumes the affair

When her husband finds out, he suggests they settle the matter like gentlemen - with duelling pistols. The duel in the forest provides male gratification and a thrill for the woman being fought over. As the defeated lover limps off, the marriage he leaves behind is poignantly refreshed