Chapter 1

"Mr. Stone? This is Mary Barker. From Creighton's? The employment agency?"

"Yes. This is Arliss Stone."

"Mr. Stone, I'm calling about a candidate for the housekeeper and nanny position you've advertised with us. I understand you've turned down all of the five women we've sent out earlier for interviews —- is that correct?"

"They weren't suitable. I'm sorry, but this position involves the care of two small children. My children. I'm going to keep on being picky."

"That's certainly your prerogative, Mr. Stone. We want you to be entirely satisfied, and Creighton's will keep screening applicants until we've found you the right person for the job. But that's why I'm calling, sir. We have a young woman who's very interested in the job but who doesn't fit precisely your specifications."

"So why are you calling, then?" Arlie couldn't disguise the weariness in his tone. He desperately wanted to get this important task accomplished, and time was running very short.

"It's just that this young woman was so insistent, sir. She's quite well-qualified in most respects, but you specified that you wanted someone between the ages of thirty-five and sixty, and this young woman is only twenty-four."

"Listen, Ms ... Barker, is it? I'm a widower with two children under twelve. I travel. In my work, I travel -- a lot. I need a live-in, motherly type female to help me with my children. I need somebody who's mature, responsible, and knows something about raising kids. A twenty-four year old isn't likely to be suitable."

"Yes, sir. I understand. But this young woman was extraordinarily insistent. She says the job is perfect for her, and that she's perfect for the job. She begged me to at least call and ask you to see her. She wants a chance to convince you not to hold her relative youth against her."

"No."

"All right, sir. I'm sorry to have bothered you. I just wanted to respond to the young woman's request. Forgive me, but she was ... quite insistent, and she's a charming young thing. I just allowed myself to..."

"It's all right, Ms. Barker. But please just stick to the script and send me some mature women to interview. And make sure they understand about the job's difficult schedule. The last two people you sent for interviews just didn't get it. The idea that they couldn't take days off while I was out of town just struck them as unreasonable. Hell, maybe it is unreasonable, but it's a requirement of the job, and I've been trying to make that clear from the outset, and by being willing to pay well above-scale for the person's inconvenience."

"Well, it's hard, Mr. Stone. I mean, the salary you're offering is unusually generous —- but most people, you know, they've got families or other personal responsibilities that make the schedule you've laid out just beyond their capabilities."

"Keep trying. I've got to leave for Spring Training in Florida two weeks from today. I need someone who can step in and be here for my kids, and I need to find that person quickly. I can't just hire a stranger and not even be around here for a couple of weeks to see for myself who they are. And I damned well need someone with top-drawer references!"

"Well, that's just it, Mr. Stone. This young woman, she's just —- she would be just perfect for you except for the age thing. She has impeccable references, and she has experience with children —- she's the eldest of four children in her own family, and she's demonstrated to us that she helped to raise her younger siblings."

"Do you have any other prospects lined up for me to interview?"

"Not yet, sir, no. I'm afraid our pre-interview screening has disqualified most of the applicants who've responded to the advertisement to date."

"Well, hell. Go ahead and send this kid over, then. I'll talk to her. We're getting down to the short strokes here, damn it! My kids are in school, and I can't take them with me to Florida for seven weeks."

"I don't think you'll regret it, sir. I mean, perhaps after you've met Susan, you'll still want someone older, but I think you're wise to at least interview her."

"What's her full name?"

"Susan Munger, Mr. Stone. She's a recent University of Pennsylvania graduate. I understand that she grew up in California."

"University of Pennsylvania? That's a first-rate school. And she wants to be a full-time housekeeper and nanny?"

"She has her reasons, sir. I'll let her tell you. When she told me her story, I thought it made sense. She's a very well-grounded young lady, Mr. Stone."

"All right. Can she come over here tomorrow morning?"

"I'm certain she can. How about ten o'clock? I'll call you back to confirm after I've called her, but I'm near-certain she'll say she'll be there any time you specify."

Arlie Stone had been the Baltimore Orioles' pitching coach for six years and had been a coach in their minor league system before that.

Eleven years ago, when he had been thirty-six, Arlie had been a journeyman starting pitcher for the Kansas City Royals. Before the Royals, he'd come up through the Oakland Athletics' system. He hadn't been a world-beater, and he'd only pitched in the majors for a little over five years. His fast ball wasn't quite fast enough, and as a result he never rose above the level of number three starter on a losing ball club.

But Arlie Stone knew how to pitch, and, more importantly, how to teach young men to be better pitchers than they were before Arlie met them. After his arm died on him, Arlie got picked up by the then-brand-new manager of the Bowie Baysox in the Eastern League as a minor-league pitching coach. He had been hired for that job by Paul Warren in Warren's first year at Bowie.

Two seasons later, Paul Warren had become manager of the Baltimore Orioles, and Arlie Stone was back in the big leagues as the big club's pitching coach.

It had been a wonderful eight years with the Orioles' organization, and he and Paul Warren had eventually enjoyed great success together. The Orioles —- every bit as hopeless an organization eight years earlier as Arlie Stone's Royals had been -- were now all the way back to their long-ago glory days: perennial contenders in the tough American League Eastern Division.

Wonderful days. At least they had been until right around the Thanksgiving Holiday fourteen months ago, when Sylvia, Arlie's wife of fifteen years, died of breast cancer. She had spent two years in a courageous but futile struggle against the disease.

Last season, Arlie's sister-in-law from Philadelphia had taken the children while Arlie, less than three months after Sylvia's death, had resumed work. The kids had been uprooted from their school, their home, and both parents, and had finished their school year in suburban Philadelphia.

During the ensuing summer, Arlie had brought his children back home to Baltimore and, with the help of friends and relatives, they'd reestablished their household. For a time, his motherless children were in the care of a fiftyish widowed cousin who had consented to becoming their live-in substitute mother.

That arrangement had worked well for a brief period, but Cousin Minerva had found love while in Baltimore. After only seven months with the family, she announced to Arlie that she was marrying a man she'd met via the Internet, and she'd be moving to Wilmington, Delaware to be with him.

At that point, available human resources within Arlie's extended family had been expended. Arlie knew he was going to have to rely on the kindness of strangers. He was going to have to hire a live-in nanny.

Cousin Minerva hadn't given him a whole lot of advance warning. Now, only a year after he'd been casting about for childcare solutions after his wife died, he was in the same fix all over again. He needed someone reliable and trustworthy, and he needed someone fast.

The employment agency he'd hired was reputed to be first-rate, but no one they'd sent to be interviewed so far had been willing to take on the job. In essence, Arlie was trying to hire a substitute mom. A substitute who would be his children's only available adult presence for long stretches of time while Arlie was in Florida for seven weeks of Spring Training.

Even when he returned home, the Orioles would be on the road for very nearly half the time between early April and the end of September. That schedule would stretch into late October if things went well for the Orioles.

Most women who sought work as nannies or housekeepers were expecting the same things that other people looking for employment wanted: time to themselves to leave the job and spend their down time elsewhere. If they'd wanted to be a single parent of two children, they'd have probably chosen to give birth to their own.

Arlie realized this and had hoped to find an older woman whose family was grown and gone. An empty-nester —- perhaps a widow —- who might welcome a roof over her head and her own bedroom, complete with cable TV. The search had proven more difficult than he'd anticipated. In fact, panic was beginning to set in.

So maybe, Arlie thought, he was being too fussy, specifying that he wanted a woman thirty-five or older to care for his kids. Maybe he'd have to give this young girl who was coming by in the morning a fair shot at the job. God knows it was getting late. He was due in Ft. Lauderdale thirteen days from tomorrow. If he didn't find somebody suitable to care for the kids, they'd have to go back to Philadelphia again and live with their aunt. They'd have to change schools (again). Arlie would be breaking up his family (again), and he'd scarcely ever get to see his kids the entire season long.

Or, perhaps Arlie should just take an emergency leave of absence, or even resign his job altogether and stay home and raise his children properly.

Maybe that's what he ought to be considering, instead of interviewing strangers for the impossible job he was offering. He could afford to quit working. He had put away money over the years. Baseball, as the cliché went, had been "berry berry good" to Arlie Stone. Quitting, Arlie knew, might be the most responsible thing he could do.

But, oh, God, he didn't want to quit! He loved his kids and wanted the best for them both. But he loved his job, too! Arlie loved the Orioles. Sure, the long, long season was a grind, even for coaches. But it had been his life, as player and coach, for the past quarter-century. At forty-seven, baseball and his children were the only things he had left. He wanted desperately to hang onto both.

The agency representative had called back to confirm that Susan Munger would be there for her interview at the precise time specified, and she was as good as her word.