"These folks are real nice. I wish I'd had a mother like Bernice."

Edward nodded. "Are we going, to stay here," he asked, "and keep imposing, or are we going back to Texas?"

"We're going to have to face the music eventually," Minelli said philosophically. "The press awaits. I watched television a little last night. The whole country's gone nuts. Quietly, mind you, but nuts all the same."

"I don't blame them."

The phone rang.

"What time is it?" Minelli asked. Edward glanced at his watch.

"Seven-thirty."

On the second ring, the phone was silent.

They stared at it apprehensively. "Bernice must have answered it in the back bedroom," Minelli said.

A few minutes later, Stella came out, followed by her mother, both unselfconsciously attired in flannel pajamas and flower-print robes. Bernice smiled at them. "Breakfast, gentlemen? It's going to be a long day."

"That was CBS," Stella said. "They keep sniffing."

"We can only fool them so long," Bernice said.

Edward looked across the quiet, frosty field. A pickup truck parked just off the highway held two men in brown coats and cowboy hats—locals sworn to keep "snoops" from setting up cameras and interfering with the Morgan family's privacy. Even at a hundred yards' distance, they looked formidable.

Stella shook her head. "I don't know what to say. We didn't do anything important. I didn't, anyway. You found the rock."

Edward shrugged. "What's to say about that?"

Reslaw, dressed in jeans and a blue-and-white-striped long-sleeved shirt, walked out of the hallway, past the entrance alcove and the baby grand piano in an adjacent corner. "Somebody ask about breakfast?"

"Coming up," Mrs. Morgan said.

"You know," Edward said, "it was probably a bad idea to come here. For you two. We all need our rest, but your mother has been through a lot."

Bernice Morgan walked stiffly into the kitchen. "It was exhilarating, really," she said. "I haven't had a fight like that in years."

"Besides, she got to talk to the President," Stella said, grinning.

"Makes me ashamed to be a Democrat," she said. "Mike and the boys are keeping a watch. I just have to make sure they don't get too zealous. You stay as long as you want."

"Please stay," Stella said, looking at Edward. "I have to talk. To all of you. I'm still confused. We should help each other out."

"What about the fireworks?" Minelli asked. "Maybe there's something on the news now."

He stretched and swung his legs off the lounger, then stood and walked across the linoleum floor and wide Navajo rugs to the living room, a few steps from the marble-top pedestal table in the open dining area. He sat in front of the television. Slowly, as if it might be hot, he turned it on, then backed up, licking his lips. Edward watched him with concern.