Stone walked over to the car. "It's been a weird couple of days; I was going to call you from New York."

"I get to New York once in a while. Shall I call you?"

He gave her his card. "I'd be hurt, if you didn't." He leaned over and kissed her, then she drove away. Before she turned the corner, she waved, without looking back.

Stone got into the limo and settled into the deep-cushioned seat. He'd be home by bedtime.

Back in Turtle Bay, he let himself into the house. Joan had left for the day, but there was a note on the table in the foyer.

"A shipment arrived for you yesterday," she wrote. "It's in the living room. And there was an envelope delivered by messenger this morning."

Stone saw the envelope on the table and tucked it under his arm. He picked up his suitcases and started for the elevator, then he looked into the living room and set down the cases. Standing in the center of the living room was a clothes rack, and on it hung at least twenty suits. He walked into the room and looked around. On the floor were half a dozen large boxes filled with Vance Calder's Turnbull & a.s.ser shirts and ties. Then he noticed a note pinned to one of the suits.

You would do me a great favor by accepting these. Or you can just send them to the Goodwill.

I love you,Arrington

His heart gave a little leap, but then he saw that the note was dated a week before their parting scene, and it sank again.

He'd think about this later. Right now, he was tired from the trip. He picked up the suitcases, got into the elevator, and rode up to the master suite. Once there, he unpacked, then undressed and got into a nightshirt. Then he remembered the envelope.

He sat down on the bed and opened it. There were some papers and a cover letter, in a neat hand, on Eduardo Bianchi's personal letterhead.

I thought you might like to have these. This ends the matter. I hope to see you soon.

Eduardo

Stone set the letter aside and looked at the papers. There were only two: One was the original of the marriage certificate he and Dolce had signed in Venice; the other was the page from the ledger they and their witnesses had signed in the mayor's office. These made up the whole record of his brief, disastrous marriage.

He took them to the fireplace, struck a match, and watched until they had been consumed. Then he got into bed, and with a profound sense of relief, tinged with sorrow, Stone fell asleep.

Acknowledgments.

I AM GRATEFUL TO MY NEW EDITOR, DAVID HIGHFILL, AND my new publisher, Phyllis Grann, for their enthusiasm and hard work on this book. I look forward to working with them both in the future.

I must thank my agents, Morton Janklow and Anne Sibbald, and all the people at Janklow & Nesbit, for their continuing fine management of my career and their meticulous attention to every detail of my business affairs.

I must also thank my wife, Chris, who reads every ma.n.u.script, for her good judgment and acute insight, as well as for her love.

Author's Note I AM HAPPY TO HEAR FROM READERS, BUT YOU SHOULD know that if you write to me in care of my publisher, three to six months will pa.s.s before I receive your letter, and when it finally arrives it will be one among many, and I will not be able to reply.

However, if you have access to the Internet, you may visit my Web site at www.stuartwoods.com, where there is a b.u.t.ton for sending me e-mail. So far, I have been able to reply to all of my e-mail, and I will continue to try to do so.

If you send me an e-mail and do not receive a reply, it is because you are one among an alarming number of people who have entered their e-mail return address incorrectly in their mail software. I have many of my replies returned as undeliverable.

Remember: e-mail, reply; snail mail, no reply.

When you e-mail me, please do not send attachments, as I never open these. They can take twenty minutes to download, and they often contain viruses.

Please do not place me on your mailing list for funny stories, prayers, political causes, charitable fund-raising, pet.i.tions, or sentimental claptrap. I get enough of that from people I already know. Generally speaking, when I get e-mail addressed to a large number of people, I immediately delete it without reading it.

Please do not send me your ideas for a book, as I have a policy of writing only what I myself invent. If you send me story ideas, I will immediately delete them without reading them. If you have a good idea for a book, write it yourself, but I will not be able to advise you on how to get it published. Buy a copy of Writer's Market Writer's Market at any bookstore; that will tell you how. at any bookstore; that will tell you how.

Anyone with a request concerning events or appearances may e-mail it to me or send it to: The Publicity Department, G. P. Putnam's Sons, 375 Hudson Street, New York, NY 10014.

Those ambitious fold who wish to buy film, dramatic, or television rights to my books should contact Matthew Snyder, Creative Artists Agency, 9830 Wilshire Boulevard, Beverly Hills, CA 90212-1825.

Those who wish to conduct business of a more literary nature should contact Anne Sibbald, Janklow & Nesbit, 445 Park Avenue, New York, NY 10022.

If you want to know if I will be signing books in your city, please visit my Web site, www.stuartwoods.com, where the tour schedule will be published a month or so in advance. If you wish me to do a book signing in your locality, ask your favorite bookseller to contact his Putnam representative or the G. P. Putnam's Sons Publicity Department with the request.

If you find typographical or editorial errors in my book and feel an irresistible urge to tell someone, please write to Putnam, address above. Do not e-mail your discoveries to me, as I will already have learned about them from others.

All my novels are still in print in paperback and can be found at or ordered from any bookstore. If you wish to obtain hardcover copies of earlier novels or of the two nonfiction books, a good used-book store or one of the online bookstores can help you find them. Otherwise, you will have to go to a great many garage sales.

Please turn the page for a preview of Stuart Woods'sORCHID BLUESavailable now from Signet.

HE WAITED UNTIL THE LAST OF THE LINE HAD EN tered the cinema for the eight o'clock movie.

"All right, let's take a tour," he said to the boy at the wheel.

The boy drove slowly around the parking lot.

"Here," he said.

The boy stopped the car.

The man looked at the parked vehicle. It was an older Ford commercial van, well cared for and clean. "Wait a minute," he said. He got out of the car and grabbed his tool bag. "Drive over to the edge of the parking lot and wait. When you see the van's headlights go on, follow me home. I'll be making a lot of turns."

"Yessir," the boy said.

He slipped on a pair of rubber gloves, then walked over to the van and tried the door. Unlocked. It took him less than a minute to punch the steering lock and start the van. He switched on the lights and checked the odometer: 48,000 miles; not bad. He backed out of the parking s.p.a.ce and drove out of the lot, onto the highway.

In the rearview mirror he watched the boy fall in behind him, well back. He drove for a couple of minutes, constantly making turns, checking the mirror, then he turned down a dirt road, drove a hundred yards, and stopped. The boy stopped behind him. He sat in the van and watched the traffic pa.s.s on the highway for five minutes, then he made a U-turn and went back to the highway and headed west. He had two hours before the van's owner would come out of the movies and discover his loss, and he needed only half an hour.

Twenty-five minutes later, he drove into the little town, and five minutes after that, he pulled the van into the large steel shed behind his business. Half a dozen men, who had been sitting around a poker table, stood up and walked over.

"Looks good," one of them said.

"It'll do. Only 48K on the clock, and it runs like a sewing machine. Let's do it."

Everybody went to work. First, they donned rubber gloves, then they washed the van thoroughly and cleaned the interior, fixing two rough wooden benches to the floor. Two men unrolled a large decal and fixed it to the side of the van. ENVIRONMENTAL SERVICES, INC., it read, and in smaller letters, CLEANING UP AFTER THE WORLD. There was a phone number, too. If anyone rang it, they'd get a pizzeria on U.S. One. They fixed an identical decal to the opposite side of the van, then changed the license plates, tossing the old ones into the van.

Somebody looked under the hood, fiddled with a couple of things, then closed it. "Good shape," he said. "The man knows how to take care of a vehicle." He checked a sticker on the windshield. "Had it serviced last week; nice of him."

"I hope his insurance is paid up," someone else said.

"All right," their leader said, "let's go over it again." The poker chips and cards were removed from the big, round table, and a large floor plan was spread out. "Number two," the leader said, "take us through it."

"We all know it by heart," somebody said.

"You will when I'm finished," the leader said. "Then you can all get a good night's sleep."

When the van was ready they went home and left him alone in the shed. He went to an elongated safe in a corner, tapped the combination into the keypad, and opened it. He removed six Remington riot guns-twelve-gauge pump shotguns with 18-inch barrels, normally used for police work-and took them to the van, laying them on the floor. He went to a locker and removed six blue jumpsuits-all the same size-took them to the van, and distributed them to the various seats. Back to the locker to find six yellow construction hard hats, six dust masks, and six pairs of tinted safety goggles, which he laid neatly on top of the jumpsuits. He then laid a shotgun on each seat, placed a box of double-ought sh.e.l.ls beside it, and placed a pair of latex surgical gloves on each seat. Finally, he went back to the gun safe, removed six nine-mm semiautomatic handguns and boxes of ammunition and distributed them inside the van. The weapons had been bought, one at a time, at gun shows or from unlicensed dealers, then stripped, inspected and, if necessary, repaired. Before rea.s.sembly, each part of each weapon had been washed with denatured alcohol and oiled. There would be no fingerprints or DNA samples on them.

When he was done, he sat down at the table, stripped off his gloves, and poured himself a drink from a bottle of bourbon. He looked at the newspaper clipping again. Eleven o'clock at the courthouse. "Happy occasion," he said aloud to himself. "And oh, so convenient."

Holly Barker opened her eyes and felt for Jackson. His side of the bed was empty, and she could hear the shower running. She moved her hand to the warm place on her stomach and found Daisy's head. She scratched behind an ear and was answered with a small sigh. Daisy was a Doberman Pincer, and she liked to sleep with her head on Holly's belly.

Holly heard the shower turn off and, a moment later, Jackson's bare feet padding across the bedroom carpet. She raised her head, tucked a pillow under it, and eyed him-naked, wet hair, in a hurry. She liked him naked.

"So," she said, "where am I going on my honeymoon?"

"Same place as I," Jackson replied, stepping into his boxer shorts and selecting a white shirt from a cubicle.

"I'm relieved to hear it," she said. "And where is that?"

"Some place you'll probably like," he said.

"Probably like? You're not even like? You're not even sure sure I'm going to like it?" I'm going to like it?"

"I think think you will," he said, "but, in the immortal words of Fats Waller, 'One never knows, do one?' " you will," he said, "but, in the immortal words of Fats Waller, 'One never knows, do one?' "

"This is how you treat your wife?"

"I don't have a wife."

"You will by high noon, or my daddy will shoot you."

"Ham wouldn't shoot me; he's too nice a guy."

"He would, if he knew you wouldn't tell me where I'm going on my honeymoon."

"He knows, and that's enough for Ham." knows, and that's enough for Ham."

"Wait a minute," she said. "My father father knows where I'm going on my honeymoon, and your wife doesn't?" knows where I'm going on my honeymoon, and your wife doesn't?"

"I told you, I don't have a wife."

She sat up on one elbow, and the sheet fell away from her b.r.e.a.s.t.s. "How will I know what to pack?"

"You packed yesterday," he said, "and I told you what to pack, remember?"

"Men never know what to pack; what if you screw up?"

"I'll just have to take that chance." He pulled on his trousers, found a necktie, and started to tie it.

"You're driving me crazy," she said, falling back onto the pillow.

"If you don't pull that sheet over your b.r.e.a.s.t.s, you're going to drive me crazy," he replied, looking at her in the mirror.

She kicked the sheet completely off, disturbing Daisy's sleep. "Take that that," she said.

"I intend to," he said, "when we arrive in . . . whatchacallit."

"Why are you rushing off?" she asked seductively.

"Don't point that thing at me," Jackson said. "I've got a closing in half an hour, then I have to do some dictating before I leave the office, and then, on the way to the courthouse, I have to pick up the tickets at the travel agent's and stop at the bank for some travelers' checks."

"Why didn't you have the tickets sent here?" she asked.

"Because you would have ripped them open to find out where you're going on your honeymoon."

He had her there. She fumed.

He slipped into his suit jacket, adjusted his tie, came to the bed, and bent over her.

"Why didn't you dry your hair?"

"I'll put the top down." He kissed her on one nipple, then the other.