“Are you going to kiss me good-night?” Amy teased.

“Are you crazy? Your folks can see us.”

“I don’t mind.”

“You may not, but I do,” I said.

She smiled softly. “What should we do? Shake hands?”

“Not even that.”

She stepped toward me, her face lifted.

“Don’t, Amy—”

“What if I sneaked into The Cave tonight?” she whispered.

“My God, Amy.”

She smiled again. She reached with her hand and drew her fingertip down my forearm, tracing the muscle.

“I love you, Bobo Murphy,” she said quietly.

“I love you,” I told her.

“Thank you for tonight, Bobo.”

CHAPTER

15
 

LILA WAS WAITING FOR ME IN THE INN, PRETENDING TO WORK behind the registration desk. She handed me a glass of wine and then lifted her own glass and tipped it to mine in a bell-ring of crystal.

“To good findings,” she said.

“To good friends,” I replied.

“So, that’s your Amy,” she sighed. She leaned over the desk and gazed at me. “I don’t blame you for looking for her all those years, Bobo. She’s so damn beautiful, it makes me wish I were gay,” She sipped from her wine. “I hope you know I’m jealous.”

“No reason to be,” I told her. “You’re still my favorite fantasy. By the way, thanks for lunch. It was good of you and Sammy.”

“We enjoyed it,” Lila said. “Anyway, I think Sammy’s inspired again. You’ll probably see something that’s supposed to be Amy’s face—or a mutilation of it—in a piece of rock before the week’s over.”

I laughed. Lila was right. If Sammy was inspired, and I was sure he must be, he would hammer away at a stone until he was exhausted. But Sammy would not understand that stone was too rough for Amy Lourie Meyers’s face. Her face begged for the delicate touch of a brush from an artist of extraordinary talent, someone like Jean Archer.

“Tell me something, Bobo.”

“Ask.”

“Did you ever make love to her?”

“No, Lila, I didn’t.”

“Why not?”

“We were very young. It was different then, a different time.”

“Did you want to?”

“I think so. Yes, I think so. I just remember being confused.”

“Do you want to now?”

“Lila,” I said with warning.

“All right, I won’t ask,” she said. “I think I know the answer, anyway. Oh, Carter called a few minutes ago. I told him the two of you were in your room and had the Do Not Disturb sign on the door. He wants you to call him when you’re finished.”

“You don’t stop, do you?” I said.

She sipped seductively from her wine. “Never.”

There was a schoolboy eagerness in Carter’s voice. He demanded to know what had happened with Amy.

“Nothing happened. We took a walk and then sat on Avrum’s bench for a few minutes and talked, and then she left.”