Now she was not. She no longer thought of him like her father, a natural writer and self-disciplined enough to work on his own. The more she plunged purposefully into her graduate studies, the more his genius seemed wispy and thin as his hair.

Duke went with her to the airport, and though Tina was telling him they’d keep in touch while she was gone, she already felt estranged and as if the departure were for good. Maybe he felt it, too. He pulled a small object from his pocket and said, “This is for you.”

“Shall I open it now?”

“You’d better,” he said, and she wondered if he knew, or sensed, that it could be the last chance for her to open it with him present. She opened a box and took out a gold ring set with turquoise, her birthstone.

“Oh, Duke, you knew I wanted it. It’s beautiful. And I don’t have anything for you.”

“Just come back from Rome; that’s enough.”

“Duke, you know what I told you yesterday. I want to be with my father now.”

“That’s right, Tina—but you’ve got to get back to finish your studies. I’ll be here when you do.”

“I want to be with my father for as long as he wants me. I keep wondering if he ever guessed about Bontelli; they were sort of friends in Rome. I have to be with him now.”

“I need you, too, Tina.”

“I can’t bear it! You know what I’ve been saying for a while now, even before this happened—what future do we have together? None.”

“Tina, girl, you’re upset now. Don’t try to make plans or think things out. Just remember I want you to come back. I’ll be waiting—and if you don’t come back in a decent time, why, I might even have to stir myself enough to get over there and get you back.” He smiled his slow, mouth-stretching, lazy smile, the smile that had once given Tina such feelings of tenderness toward him. But what did she see now? A guy with a soupy smile and strawlike hair, the hair of which her mother had said, “So thin . . . it looks sort of dead.” Maybe it was just from the moment those words were spoken that Tina had known she and Duke wouldn’t make it.