"Rhiannon. She went back east to see her father." He changed the subject. "Speaking of fathers, how is yours?" "Rolling along," she said. "We're going to get together at my sister's over the holidays." "I'm planning to visit Kate," Joe said. "Maybe we should get together at the Caffe Ladro . . . " Mo smiled noncommittally, and they parted on a friendly note. She hadn't said anything about Rob Wilcox and he hadn't asked. He and Mo were going to connect with work and art, it seemed. The personal, or the intimate, would stay in the background. Nothing wrong with that, Joe said to himself as he walked home. Several days later the phone rang. Joe picked it up on the second ring. "Hi, Joe." "Max! Hey, how are you?" "Good. The reason I'm calling is: I got a call last week from a woman asking if she could come see Stone Man." "Rhiannon," Joe said. "Yeah, Rhiannon. She said that she saw the picture of Stone Man at your place." "So, what happened?" Joe asked. "She showed up. She was great. She made a drawing of Stone Man and hung out for awhile." Joe heard familiar music in the background. "What's the music?" "Chesapeake Bay sea chanteys--the cassette was in your truck." "Ha, ha. That's what I thought. The banjo player is an old friend of mine. I listened to that tape all across the country. There's a song on there about how you're counted a lucky drudger if you ever get your pay." He sang the words. "Right," Max said. "So, did you like her? Rhiannon?" "Yeah. She said she'd come back in two weeks and cook me a decent meal if I wanted. She was critical of the kitchen--like a little countess or something." Joe laughed. "Her father's a chef, I guess. You lucky drudger! You remember my maxim about what to do when you're really attracted to a woman?" "Tell her," Max said, and added, "where's my quarter?" "I'll invest it for you. She's the real thing, Max." Joe paused. "When you see her, tell her Sumoko and Batman are spending a lot of time together." "Cool," Max said. "Who's Sumoko?" "She'll explain." Good old Max. Maybe he and Rhiannon would get together. Impossible to predict, Joe thought, but he could keep his fingers crossed. 20 A month after Maxie's call, two years after he had left Portland, Joe made coffee and read the beginning of his novel. He squared the pages and leaned back. It was the best he could do--given what he knew about the story so far. When he finished the first draft, he would start over and add things to better frame the questions that the story answered, and he would take things out that didn't matter. The phone rang. "Joe?" The voice was husky, like Isabelle's, but it turned up at the corners and had Texas in it. "Daisy?" "Yes. I'm in San Francisco . . . Wes died in July." "I know," Joe said. "I'm sorry. I just heard. I was going to write." "I'll be in Honolulu tomorrow. I wondered . . . " "When will you be here?"