Still, when he arrived the next morning, he was unexpectedly pleasant, even charming—until Roy walked in. If Roy Beach was the personification of the classic concept of the male manner. Chess Baurio was the twenty-first century's. Compact, lean, healthily attractive, alert, he was the antithesis of Roy's studied indolence. Roy was the aloof, detached, arrogant observer;

Chess was the involved, enthusiastic, vital participator.

As Roy strode up to the terrace where she and Chess were discussing the location of the kitchen room, the air became charged with electric hostility.

Claire looked at Chess, saw that his eyes were snapping with anger, that the smile on his face was set, that his movements as he leaned forward slightly to shake Roy's hand were jerky. His manner became stilted, false. She glanced at Roy, who was his usual urbane self.

"Chess Baurio? You designed the new theater complex at Northwest 4," Roy said by way of greeting. "Now, why did you use polyfoam instead of Mutual's acoustical shielding?"

"Ever heard the wows in the Fine Arts Theater at Washington South?"

"Can't say that I've been in that theater, but wasn't it John Bracker, Claire, who was so vehement in his objections to playing in that hall?"

"He did mention he'd rather play under Niagara Falls," she said lightly, hoping to ease the tension.

"And polyfoam corrects wow?" Roy demanded of Chess.

"In that size building, or in amphitheater form." Baurio's voice had a bitten quality.

"I've been advised to use it in our music room," Roy went on, blandly, dialing out three coffees and passing them round as if Chess would naturally take his black as they did. "What's your opinion on its use in a small room?"

"As a consultant?"

The rudeness in Chess' tone surprised Claire. People were rarely rude to Roy. He simply didn't elicit that kind of response. She held her breath. Roy did not appear to notice.

"The kitchen room comes before the music room, but we always combine efforts. I believe that Ellyot… Ellyot Harding," and that was the first time Claire ever heard Roy qualify any acquaintance so pointedly, "is the third member of the house… has a preference for natural woods as acoustical materials, rather than manmade products."

Hostility fairly bristled from Baurio now.

"We have not really discussed the music room. I imagine, however. Designer Baurio, that if the kitchen room is successful, we'll get busy on the other," Claire said, trying to sound relaxed and gracious. Why was anything Roy said so offensive to this Baurio?

"I'm not at all sure," Baurio said icily, putting down his untouched cup of coffee, "if anything I designed would be successful in this… this kind of manage."

Not even Roy could ignore that, and he slowly turned toward Baurio, his eyes glittering.

"You object to polyandry?"

"I object… I object to such a monopoly, to the sheer waste of…" He broke off, glaring savagely from Claire to Roy before he spun around and strode out of the house.

"What on earth possessed you to come out with statements like that, Roy?" Claire asked. "He was… to design a kitchen room… What happened?"

Roy smiled down at her. "He'll be back. And you must make him stay."

After the most tempestuous three months in her entire life, she did, but only when their marriage contract had been registered in the City. And that came about only because Roy and Ellyot cornered Chess privately at the end of a particularly bitter quarrel.

The end of the mad abduction and the cessation of a particularly painful contraction—her muscles were beginning to hurt despite training and control—were simultaneous. Claire opened her eyes to a leafy vista, the tops of trees below the heli's landing gear. Startled, she peered down. The heli was perched on the edge of a sudden, sharp drop, the bottom of which was hidden by foliage. Wildly she turned to Roy. His eyes wouldn't focus on her, his breath was uneven. "Can you move?" he asked.

"Where?" She couldn't control the quaver in her voice.

He threw up the hatch and jumped out, ignoring the gasp she made as she had a flash of him disappearing over the precipice, leaving her alone and at the mercy of her body's birth-drive in the cramped nose of the heli.

"Put your hands on my shoulders," he ordered, and she found herself obeying.

She moved as quickly as she could, knowing that a spasm was seconds away. It seized her as she reached out to him and sent her reeling into his arms. He had seen the look of pain on her face, and deftly caught her to him, holding her firmly despite the awkward position for them both.

It seemed an age until the contraction passed. She submitted weakly as he swung her up and strode off. She buried her face against his shoulder.

Does he intend for me to have the child in the woods, like an animal? she wondered.

"You'll have to open the door," he said in her ear.

She looked down and fumbled for the crude latch, surprised that there should be a door, for she had only the fleeting impression of the facade of the retreat, its rustic logs, the heli's floatons apparently resting on the surface which camouflaged the retreat. Vaguely, she hoped the roof was firmly supported against the heli's weight.

As Roy angled her through the doorway, she caught a glimpse of the superb view of the valley below them, the mountains beyond. When had he acquired such a retreat? Or who had lent it to him? Stupefied, Claire wondered if Ellyot had suspected this and kept silent.

A contraction. She couldn't suppress the groan, which deafened her to a statement Roy muttered under his breath. But, seemingly a century later, he laid her on a bed and was arranging her body in the best position to ease the strain.

"A hard one, huh?" he said as she lay, panting. She didn't resist as his hands turned her gently and stripped off her maternity sack, or as they felt her writhing abdomen.

How can he bear to touch me? He has scarcely looked at me for five months.

The next moment she became aware of other preparations for the coming birth and she began to struggle fastidiously.

"Don't resist. This has to be done. For the child's sake."

Hearing the anger and distaste in his voice for what he had to do, she forced herself to relax and endure his ministrations.

Her waters broke while she was on the toilet and she began to whimper, more from embarrassment and tension than pain.

"What is it?" His voice was clinical. "The waters broke."

He got her back to the bed, on her back, and examined her with the deftness of her obstetrician.

"The head is in the birth canal," he said just as she experienced the first of the second-stage contractions. "That's right. Push down!"

She fought the hand that pressed down on the upper part of her belly.

"No, no Roy. Leave me alone. Get a doctor. Please, Roy!"

His face loomed suddenly above her so that she was forced to open her eyes wide and look at him.

"I know what to do, Claire. The child is mine!"

"But you could have assisted at the hospital, Roy," she cried, slowly perceiving through her pain and anxiety what motivated him.

"With Chess listed as your legal spouse? We haven't that right yet. No, Claire, this is my child."

"It's mine, too," she screamed.

"Is the pain unbearable? I'll fix the mask for you."

"Mask?"

"I have assembled everything that might be needed," he told her in that odd flat voice. "Do you need the mask now?"

"No, no. No!" She couldn't succumb to the desire for relief from the pain, though it was fierce now, fierce and inexorable, convulsing her body, seizing her with a steadily increasing rhythm, permitting her not so much as a moment to relax straining muscles.

"Good. Press harder. Press downward." She heard his voice through a mist of sweat and tears and pain.