“It was, but it’s all right now. At least, I finally know what my mother was going through. And the funny thing is, I think I understand.” She reached for my hand and held it across the table. She said to Carter, “You know that I love this man, don’t you?”

Carter shrugged. “Of course I do. I’ve always known it. I know it better than the two of you do.”

“I think that may be true,” Amy said. “He and I have today, and tonight, and then we may have nothing, ever again. In twenty-four hours, he’ll be gone. I don’t know if I will ever see him again, but I do know I will forever keep these past three days in my life, and I know that nothing will, or can, take them from me, or make them cheap in any way, or make me regret them.”

“Regret?” Carter argued. “My God, I don’t want to hear the word.”

“You wanted me to call him before he married,” Amy said. “Do you remember?”

Carter bobbed his head. He glanced at me, then back to Amy.

“Maybe if I had called or written, our lives would be different. Maybe we would have been together all those years. I don’t know.” Her hand rubbed my hand. She leaned toward Carter. “But, Carter, those are all maybes. And we can’t make our lives out of maybes. Living needs more than that, just as it needs more than boredom or routine. I don’t know how it’s supposed to be done in order to be perfect, but I do know that anything that’s truly grand, wonderfully grand—even if it’s only a few hours—is worth a lot of pain.

“I think that’s what my mother discovered,” she added in a whisper. “And that’s why it’s all right—her life, I mean.”

Carter’s voice cracked when he spoke: “Goddamn it, I love the two of you.” He stood at the table and opened his arms and motioned us to him, and we stood and let him swoop us into an embrace. “Damn, I love you,” he said again.

CHAPTER

25
 

I WALKED CARTER TO HIS CAR AFTER OUR BREAKFAST. HE HAD a meeting with Joe and Anne Fergis, he explained. “The right nudge and old Joe will reach for his checkbook and it’ll be done. No more Jean Archer for any of us.”

“Are you sure it’s a sell?” I asked.

“The wife loves the place,” Carter replied confidently. “Especially loves the fact that somebody famous owned it.” He smiled. “People,” he added, clucking his tongue. “They do fall for the sizzle, don’t they?”

I thought of Carter with Anne Fergis in front of the ice cream shop. “I guess they do.”

Carter glanced at his watch. “Gotta go. Joe was supposed to get back this morning.”

“Who?” I asked.