Miss Sybil bided her time until the bell rang and then called him to her desk. He stood before her, one thumb tucked in the front pocket of his jeans, his expression determinedly bored. She examined the card for his name, checked his age-nearly sixteen-and informed him of her classroom rules: "I do not tolerate tardiness, gum chewing, or slackers. You will write a short essay for me introducing yourself and have it on my desk tomorrow morning."

He studied her for a moment and then withdrew his thumb from the pocket of his jeans. "Go fuck yourself, lady."

This statement quite naturally caught her attention, but before she could respond, he had swaggered from the room. As she stared at the empty doorway, a great flood of excitement rose inside her. She had seen

a blaze of intelligence shining in those sullen blue eyes. Astonishing! She immediately realized that more than insolence was eating away at this young man. He was another rebel, just like herself!

At precisely seven-thirty that evening, she rapped on the door of a run-down duplex and introduced herself to the man who had been listed on the registration card as the boy's guardian, a sinister-looking character who couldn't have been thirty himself. She explained her difficulty and the man shook his head dejectedly. "Dallie's starting to go bad," he told her. "The first few months we were together, he was all right, but the kid needs a house and a family. That's why I told him we were gonna settle here in Wynette for a while. I thought getting him into school regular might calm him down, but he got hisself suspended the first day for hitting the gym teacher."

Miss Sybil sniffed. "A most obnoxious man. Dallas made an excellent choice." She heard a soft shuffling noise behind her and hastily amended, "Not that I approve of violence, of course, although I should imagine it's sometimes quite satisfying." Then she turned and told the lanky, too-handsome boy slouched in the doorway that she had come to supervise his homework assignment.

"And what if I tell you I'm not doing it?" he sneered.

"I should imagine your guardian would object." She regarded Skeet. "Tell me, Mr. Cooper, what is your position regarding physical violence?"

"Don't bother me none," Skeet replied.

"Do you think you might be capable of physically restraining Dallas if he doesn't do as I ask?"

"Hard to say. I've got him on weight, but he's got me on height. And if he's hurt too much, he won't be able to hustle the boys at the country club this weekend. All in all, I'd say no."

She didn't give up hope. "All right, then, Dallas, I'm asking you to do your assignment voluntarily. For

the sake of your immortal soul."

He shook his head and stuck a toothpick in his mouth.

She was quite disappointed, but she hid her feelings by rummaging in the tie-dyed tote bag she'd brought with her and pulling out a paperback book. "Very well, then. I observed your visual exchanges with the young ladies in the class today and came to the conclusion that anyone as obviously interested in sexual activity as you should read about it from one of the world's great writers. I'll expect an intelligent report from you in two days." With that, she thrust a copy of Lady Chatterley's Lover into his hand and left the house.

For nearly a month she relentlessly dogged the small apartment, thrusting banned books at her rebellious student and badgering Skeet to put tighter reins on the boy. "You don't understand," Skeet finally complained in frustration. "Regardless of the fact that no one wants him back, he's a runaway and I'm

not even his legal guardian. I'm an ex-con he picked up in a gas station rest room, and he's been pretty much taking care of me, instead of the other way around."

"Nevertheless," she said, "you're an adult and he is still a minor."

Gradually Dallie's intelligence won out over his sullen-ness, although later he would insist she had just worn him down with all her dirty books. She talked him back into school, moved him into her college-bound class, and tutored him whenever he wasn't playing golf. Thanks to her efforts, he

graduated with honors at age eighteen and was accepted at four different colleges.

After he left for Texas A &M, she missed him dreadfully, although he and Skeet continued to make Wynette their home base and he came to see her during vacations when he wasn't playing golf. Gradually, however, his responsibilities took him farther away for longer stretches of time. Once they didn't see each other for nearly a year. In her dazed state, she had barely recognized him the night he found her sitting in the thunderstorm on the curb at Main and Elwood wearing her nightgown.

Francesca had somehow imagined Dallie living in a modem apartment built next to a golf course instead

of an old Victorian house with a central turret and pastel-painted gingerbread trim. She gazed at the windows of the house in disbelief as the Riviera turned the comer and slipped into a narrow gravel driveway. "Are those rabbits?"

"Two hundred fifty-six of them," Skeet said. "Fifty-seven if you count the one on the front door. Look, Dallie, that rainbow on the garage is new."

"She's going to break her fool neck one of these days climbing those ladders," Dallie grumbled. Then he turned to Francesca. "You mind your manners, now. I mean it, Francie. None of your fancy stuff."

He was talking to her as if she were a child instead of his lover, but before she could retaliate, the back door flew open and an incredible-looking old lady appeared. With her long gray ponytail flying behind her and a pair of reading glasses bobbing on the gold neck chain that hung over her daffodil yellow sweat suit, she rushed toward them, crying out, "Dallas! Oh, my, my! Skeet! My goodness!"

Dallie climbed out of the car and enveloped her small, thin body in a bear hug. Then Skeet grabbed her away to the accompaniment of another chorus of my-my's.

Francesca emerged from the back seat and looked on curiously. Dallie had said his mother was dead, so who was this? A grandmother? As far as she knew, he had no relatives except the woman named Holly Grace. Was this Holly Grace? Somehow Francesca doubted it. She'd gotten the impression Holly Grace was Dallie's sister. Besides, she couldn't envision this eccentric-looking old lady showing up at a motel with a Chevy dealer from Tulsa. The cat slipped from the back seat, looked around disdainfully with his one good eye, and disappeared under the back steps.

"And who is this, Dallas?" the woman inquired, turning to Francesca. "Please introduce me to your friend."

"This is Francie… Francesca," Dallie amended. "Old F. Scott would have loved her, Miss Sybil, so if

she gives you any trouble, let me know." Francesca darted him an angry glare, but he ignored her and continued his introduction. "Miss Sybil Chandler… Francesca Day."

Small brown eyes gazed at her, and Francesca suddenly felt as if her soul was being examined. "How

do you do?" she replied, barely able to keep herself from squirming. "It's a pleasure to meet you."

Miss Sybil beamed at the sound of her accent, then extended her hand for a hearty shake. "Francesca, you're British! What a delightful surprise. Pay no attention to Dallas. He can charm the dead, of course, but he's a complete scoundrel. Do you read Fitzgerald?"

Francesca had seen the movie of The Great Gatsby, but she suspected that wouldn't count. "I'm afraid not," she said. "I don't read much."

Miss Sybil gave a disapproving cluck. "Well, we'll soon fix that, won't we? Bring the suitcases inside, boys. Dallas, are you chewing gum?"

"Yes, ma'am."

"Please remove it along with your hat before you come inside."

Francesca giggled as the old woman disappeared through the back door.

Dallie flicked his gum into a hydrangea bush. "Just you wait," he said to Francesca ominously.

Skeet chuckled. "Looks like ol' Francie's gonna take some of the heat off us for a change."

Dallie smiled back. "You can almost see Miss Sybil rubbing her hands together just waiting to get at her." He looked at Francesca. "Did you mean it when you said you haven't read Fitzgerald?"

Francesca was beginning to feel as if she'd confessed to a series of mass murders. "It's not a crime, Dallie."

"It is around here." He chuckled maliciously. "Boy, are you ever in for it."

The house on Cherry Street had high ceilings, heavy walnut moldings, and light-flooded rooms. The old wooden floors were scarred in places, a few cracks marred the plaster walls, and the interior decoration lacked even a modest sense of coordination, but the house still managed to project a haphazard charm. Striped wallpaper coexisted alongside floral, and the odd mix of furniture was enlivened by needlework pillows and afghans crocheted in multicolored yarns. Plants set in handmade ceramic pots filled dark corners, cross-stitch samplers decorated the walls, and golf trophies popped up everywhere-as doorstops, bookends, weighing down a stack of newspapers, or simply catching the light on a sunny windowsill.

Three days after her arrival in Wynette, Francesca slipped out of the bedroom Miss Sybil had assigned to her and crept across the hallway. Beneath a T-shirt of Dallie's that fell to the middle of her thighs, she wore a rather astonishing pair of silky black bikini underpants that had miraculously appeared in the small stack of clothing Miss Sybil had lent her to supplement her wardrobe. She had slipped into them half an hour earlier when she'd heard Dallie come up the stairs and go into his bedroom.

Since their arrival, she'd barely seen him. He left for the driving range early in the morning, from there went to the golf course and then God knew where, leaving her with no one but Miss Sybil for company. Francesca hadn't been in the house for a day before she'd found a copy of Tender Is the Night pressed into her hands along with a gentle admonition to refrain from pouting when things didn't go her way. Dallie's abandonment upset her. He acted as if nothing had happened between them, as if they hadn't spent a night making love. At first she had tried to ignore it, but now she had decided that she had to start fighting for what she wanted, and what she wanted was more lovemaking.

She tapped the tip of one unpainted fingernail softly on the door opposite her own, afraid Miss Sybil would awaken and hear her. She shuddered at the thought of what the disagreeable old woman would do if she knew Francesca had wandered across the hall to Dallie's bedroom for illicit sex. She would probably chase her from the house screaming "Harlot!" at the top of her lungs. When Francesca heard no response from the other side of the door, she tapped a bit harder.

Without warning, Dallie's voice boomed out from the other side, sounding like a cannon in the still of the night. "If that's you, Francie, come on in and stop making so damned much noise."

She darted inside the bedroom, hissing like a tire losing its air. "Shh! She'll hear you, Dallie. She'll know I'm in your room."

He stood fully dressed, hitting golf balls with his putter across the carpet toward an empty beer bottle. "Miss Sybil's eccentric," he said, eyeing the line of his putt, "but she's not even close to being a prude. I think she was disappointed when I told her we wouldn't be sharing a room."

Francesca had been disappointed, too, but she wasn't going to make an issue of it now, when her pride had already been stung. "I've barely seen you at all since we got here. I thought maybe you were still angry with me about Beast."

"Beast?"

"That bloody cat." A trace of annoyance crept into her voice. "He bit me again yesterday."

Dallie smiled, then sobered. "Actually, Francie, I thought it might be better if we kept our hands to ourselves for a while."

Something inside her gave a small lurch. "Why? What do you mean?"

The bail pinged against the glass as his putt found its mark. "I mean that I don't think you can handle a whole lot more trouble in your life right now, and you should know that I'm pretty much unreliable where women are concerned." He used the head of the putter to reach out for another ball and draw it close. "Not that I'm proud of it, you understand, but that's the way things are. So if you've got any ideas about rose-covered bungalows or His and Her bath towels, you might want to get rid of them."

Enough of the old proud Francesca still lingered that she managed to slip a condescending laugh past the lump in her throat. "Rose-covered bungalows? Really, Dallie, what on earth can you be thinking of? I'm going to marry Nicky, remember? This is my last fling before I'm permanently shackled." Except she wasn't going to marry Nicky. She'd placed another call last night, hoping that he would have returned by now and she could talk him into advancing her a small loan so she wouldn't be so dependent on Dallie for money. Her call woke the houseboy, who said Mr. Gwynwyck was away on his honeymoon. Francesca had stood with the receiver in her hand for some time before she'd hung up the phone.