“Tell Bill I can’t make it today, but I’ll call him later,” Stone said. “Oh, and call Dino and tell him to pick me up in five minutes and to bring his friends. I’ve got some stuff I want to give to the Salvation Army.”

“Okay,” Alma said, then left.

“Stone,” Manning said, “I really came to see you to find out if you would represent me as my attorney.”

“No, I won’t.”

“Why not?”

“Because you’re looking for attorney-client confidentiality, aren’t you?”

“In part.”

“Well, you won’t get it from me, pal.”

“Stone, I don’t understand…”

“Sure you do, Paul. By the way, I got a check for your yacht this morning. It brought a million eight after the broker’s fee.”

His face flushed. “I should have thought it was worth a good deal more.”

“Oh, I know you paid more, but what with the market and all…”

Paul Manning looked at his nails again. “When did you figure it out?”

“Oh, I was very slow. It didn’t all come together for me until I was sailing the boat from St. Marks to Fort Lauderdale. No, a little earlier, I guess, when I saw the repair you’d made to the headsail reefing swivel.”

“What else do you think you’ve figured out?”

“The dinghy was never stolen in Las Palmas.”

“Wasn’t it?”

“You just made some noise about it, replaced it, then sailed the old one back to the Canaries after Expansive was over the horizon.”

“If you say so.”

“What did you do about clothes and papers? You couldn’t use your own passport.”

Manning looked at Stone for a long moment, then apparently decided it didn’t matter anymore. “All right, I left a car on the south coast of Gran Canaria with some clothes.”

“How long did it take you to lose the weight?”

“I started dieting the minute we left the States,” Manning said. “Losing weight has never been easy for me, but I had some time; I lost a pound or two a week. By the time we got to Las Palmas, I was as slim as I am now.”

“Careful you don’t gain it back, Paul; somebody might recognize you.”

“Not where I’m going.”

“And where would that be?”

“You figure it out.”

“It’s going to be tough without the money, isn’t it?”

“Damn Allison!” Manning said suddenly, and with some venom.

“Wasn’t the money in the Cayman Islands account? Didn’t you have access to it?”

“The money was moved to a different account the day before Allison’s trial.”

“I thought it might have been.”

“I’d like to get my hands on her.”

“I’ll bet you would, but it’s going to be a little difficult, isn’t it?”

“She’s not dead, is she?”