in, but before they’d even been married six months, she showed her true colors. Poor Billy, he pleaded with her to behave herself. But when she started carryin’ on in front of all their friends—why, he had to ask her to leave.”
“They’re divorced now, I take it. So what’s the problem?”
“Well, naturally he divorced her. At least she had the decency to leave town, but we’re afraid now that he’s runnin’ for the state senate, she’ll come back and cause trouble.”
“Why?”
“Well, for goodness’ sake, John Stone, for money! What else would her kind want?”
“You mean that flock of tame lawyers you keep on a leash didn’t sew her fingers together before they let Billy marry her?”
“I was out of the country at the time, and that girl had poor Billy so besotted he just up and married her without makin’ her sign doodlysquat! Lord knows what she threatened to do, but he ended up paying her two hundred thousand dollars a year for three years just to stay out of Georgia. Poor Billy, he’s always been too softhearted for his own good.”
Or too softheaded. Six hundred thousand was a lot of loot!
“Now that the payments have ended, we’re afraid she’s goin’ to try and get more by threatenin’ to go to the papers with her vicious lies. She knows good and well he’s lookin’ to go to Washin’ton after one or two terms in Atlanna. That’s just the sort of thing her kind would do. Like all those hussies who end up on the television by threatenin’ decent men in high places. You know who I mean, John Stone?”
“I seem to recall a few such incidents, but why would you—”
“I just told you—there are already rumors circulatin’ around town. They can’t have come from any other source, because everybody here loves Billy. He’s always been a good boy.”
Stone grimaced. Billy loved Billy. Aunt Alice loved Billy. The rest of the world probably knew him for what he was—the spoiled, immature product of privilege and neglect. Not for the first time, Stone was glad he’d broken with the family at the age of fourteen, when he’d been shipped off to military school, and that it had never been “convenient” for him to spend much time with his aunt after that.
“Exactly what is it you think I can do?” he asked.
She didn’t beat around the bush. “I understand you’ve been hurt right bad, and you’re goin’ to be laid up for a while. I thought you might like to—”
“You thought I might like to go down to Atlanta and take her out for you?”
“What? Don’t be foolish, John Stone. If you want to take her out, that’s your concern, but I warn you, she’s not Our Kind of People.”
“I didn’t mean— That is, take her out means—” He gave up. He spoke three languages fluently and got by in a couple more. He had never spoken his aunt’s language, and probably never would.
“It just so happens that I’ve arranged for this woman to spend the summer at a place called Coronoke—it’s a little speck of an island off the North Carolina coast. I understand there aren’t any telephones there, and certainly no reporters, so I thought if you could go along and kind of keep an eye on her, just make sure she doesn’t get up to any more mischief—”
“Whoa! Aunt Alice, I don’t even know this woman, and you want me to be her jailer?”
“Don’t raise your voice to me, John Stone. I didn’t say that. All I ask is that you go down there and take advantage of the cottage I’ve leased in your name. You don’t have to let her know who you are—in fact, it’s probably better if you don’t—but you can keep her entertained so she’ll forget about causin’ trouble for Billy, at least until after his weddin’.”
“His wedding?”
“Oh. Did I forget to mention that Billy’s gettin’ married again in August? This lovely girl—she’s the granddaughter of old Senator Houghton—”
“In other words, you want me to pen this woman up on a deserted island— What did you call it?”
“Coronoke, and it’s certainly not deserted.”
“Right. Pen her up, don’t let her near a phone, and if she makes any suspicious moves, sic the federales on her, right?”
By the time he finished, Alice had very politely hung up on him. Feeling worse than he had when he’d come out of the hospital five days earlier, Stone called her back and, after apologizing, found himself reluctantly agreeing to finish up his recuperation on the island of Coronoke.
And, incidentally, to do his best to distract the greedy little hustler who was out to ruin Billy’s chances for marital happiness and political success.
Actually, he’d sort of had other plans, but...
“How’d you find out I’d been in the hospital, Aunt Alice?”
“Carrie Lee Hunsucker’s great nephew works for the Constitution. Carrie Lee belongs to the Wednesday Morning Music Club.”
And he’d thought he had contacts.
“I’m doing this partly for your sake, John Stone, because I understand you don’t even have a decent place to live. This way, you can just lie around until you’re feelin’ well enough to go back to work doin’ whatever it is you do these days.”
Whatever it was he did. As if she didn’t know. Why else had she tracked him down and sicced him on some bimbo who was out to ruin her son’s political career before it even got off the ground? Which just might, incidentally, be the best thing that could happen to the state of Georgia.
On the other hand, he did need a vacation. Gazing around at the hotel room he had taken when he’d left the hospital, Stone compared it to a cottage on a small island somewhere down South. The room was about average for a residential hotel. He’d bunked in far worse, under far worse conditions, but now that he thought about it, soaking up the sun on a private beach didn’t sound half bad, either.
“I guess I can do that,” he’d said finally, adding a halfhearted thanks.
“You don’t have to thank me, John Stone. It’s the least I can do for my own sister’s boy.”
Stone hung up the phone with the uncomfortable feeling that he’d just been hooked, gaffed and landed.
Noblesse oblige.
One
The first day belonged to Stone, and he was determined not to waste a single salt-cured, sun-soaked minute of it. By tomorrow the Dooley woman would probably be here. Which meant his baby-sitting duties would begin. But for now there was nothing to keep him from lying on an inflated inner tube, his naked feet dangling in the cool waters of Pamlico Sound, while a half-empty beer bottle rested on the bright pink scar on his belly.
Coronoke. Translated, it had to mean paradise. Stone had never heard of the place. It wasn’t even on the map! But now that he’d
