Kat’s chaise was angled toward the pool. Martin and Dial Sinnat sat at a table to her left. Eloise sat on the edge of the pool beyond her feet, with Claire afloat just beyond Eloise. The pool lights had been turned off to lower the bug count. Three flares burned atop tall metal stakes, the orange flames guttering and smoking when the night breeze stirred them, emitting a fragrance of aromatic repellent. The flames made patterns on the dark water of the pool, and on the naked glossy back of Eloise, tapered, smoothly muscled, with an ample breadth across the shoulders to carry the richness of the invisible breasts.
They had been talking, the four of them, carrying on two simultaneous conversations, and Kat had not been listening until Di said, “You keep side-stepping, Martin. By God, I’m going to nail you down.”
The two conversations became one as Claire said, “I didn’t marry a very subtle fellow, Martin.”
“Let me try the question a new way,” Di said. “Two years ago, Martin, you didn’t get down in the mud and help us slug it out, but you were sympathetic when we were fighting that Lauderdale group. That big broad beautiful bay gives this town class. It’s distinctive. For long-run business reasons, it’s a good thing to have, particularly with the other west coast communities filling their own bays up as fast as they can so they all look alike. Now we find out you’re going along with this new group, this Palmland Development outfit. I think we’ve known each other long enough for you to stop hedging and give me some reasons.”
Martin said, vaguely, “I can’t really give you a simple answer.”
“So give me a complicated answer then. If I can’t understand it I’ll stop you.”
“Well... my responsibilities as executor of my mother’s estate come ahead of any personal feelings I might have, Dial. I’m accountable to the probate court. I’d have a certain amount of difficulty explaining why I turned down the best offer ever made for that land. Almost seven hundred feet of bay frontage at three hundred dollars a foot. It comes to more than two hundred thousand dollars. The estate retains the land to the south of that piece, and it will become much more valuable when the development is completed.”
“Is the estate hurting for cash? Are there unpaid obligations?”
“Oh, no! If that was the case, that land would have been sold off long ago. Actually, I’ve been in the position of waiting for a good offer.”
“So you could wait longer?”
“It isn’t that simple. I’d have to justify waiting, on some kind of financial basis.”
“But you have to exercise demonstrable bad judgment before the probate court gets agitated, don’t you?”
Eloise spoke then. “But Martin has other responsibilities too, Di. Responsibilities to the community, as president of the bank.”
“How did you get into this?” Di asked, astonished.
“Don’t be rude, dear,” Claire said.
“Eloise has been taking an interest in this,” Martin said proudly. “She really has had some very sound thoughts about it. Tell Di what you told me, dear.”
Eloise had turned toward the two men. “I told Martin a banker has to do more than just loan money and so forth. He ought to help get things started where a lot of people make money, like a farmer planting things. I mean it’s sort of a responsibility to the community for Martin to do something to help such a big project get started, even though we all might rather have it stay the way it is. It would be different if he was in your position, Di. But a banker has to think of the economic health of the community.”
“I didn’t know you cared,” Di said to her.
“Do you think it’s wrong for me to take an interest in Martin’s work?” she asked.
“No, Eloise,” Di said. “It’s very refreshing.”
“In any case,” Martin said, “the upland is optioned now.”
“And you’re certain you’ve done the right thing?” Di asked.
“I’m doing the reasonable thing, Dial.”
“An option and a nice fat line of credit.”
“That will be up to the Loan Committee.”
“My God, don’t give me that occupational sidestep, Martin!”
“What are you getting angry about? These are local men of good reputation, Dial. They have an option on access. They have their initial capital. Once they have the right to buy the submerged land from the IIF, they can present a very attractive operating picture. I’ve been assured the development will be in... good taste.”
“Martin,” Eloise said, “can we tell them about Turk’s Island?”
“But we aren’t ready to make any public...”
“Please keep it a secret,” Eloise said eagerly. “It’s being done through the Eleanor Marrinar Cable Foundation. The deeds and surveys and ownership of the land on Turk’s Island were in a terrible mess, and the lawyers have been working on it for over three years, buying it through dummies, or however you say it. Pretty soon the foundation will have the last tract, and then the whole island is going to be presented to the State of Florida as a wildlife refuge, along with all the bay bottom between the island and the channel.”
After a long silence Dial Sinnat said bitterly, “Very very neat, folks. It’s too low and too far offshore to be developed. A sop to the bird-watchers, at a very strategic time. We fight for Grassy Bay too, and we look greedy. I suppose you got it set up so that if the state tries anything cute, title reverts to the foundation?”
“Of course,” Martin Cable said. “There are some squatters on the island. They’ll have the right to stay during their lifetime. The foundation will retain a one-hundred-acre piece of high land fronting on the bay for eventual use as a marine biology laboratory site.”
“And this might just happen to be announced at the Public Hearing on the Grassy Bay development?”
“If it seems opportune.”
“Martin, will you answer just one small silly question?”
“I’ll try, Dial.”
“You’re chairman of the Board of Directors of that foundation. Eloise says you started quietly assembling the Turk’s Island property three years ago. Was this the plan you had in mind in the beginning?”
“N-not exactly.”
“When did you decide to do this with it?”
“I’d have to look at the minutes of the meetings. Perhaps six months ago.”
“Martin, was that before or after you heard of the Palmland Development Company plans?”
Martin Cable chuckled softly. “My word, Dial, I’m not that devious, really.”
“Somebody is, dammit!”
“I hardly think so. Dial, I think you’re trying to make a perfectly innocent coincidence appear to be a plot of some sort. As a matter of fact, Eloise and I had that inspiration one afternoon when we were out on the boat off Turk’s Island last autumn.”
“It was really your idea, darling,” Eloise said.
“Maybe I’m turning paranoid,” Di said. “I keep imagining some masterful hand behind this whole damnable deal. But when I think of the primary personnel involved, Burt Lesser, Bill Gormin, Shannard, Felix Aigan and that Flake animal, there just doesn’t seem to be anybody that damn special. I hear there are others in it, but those are the big five. Leroy Shannard is probably the shrewdest of the lot, but he’s never seemed to have the hunger to go with it. The way this whole thing is being shaped up so carefully, it has the mark of a bold and hungry man. It’s as if we had a visiting eagle in our midst. Martin, is there any chance those five guys are fronting for some tough visiting talent? Is the Lauderdale group trying the devious approach, maybe?”