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years, and she had thus been completing her education in August-she had not known what to expect-but she had certainly never anticipated that the conference involved an offer of employment from a millionaire!
        “I've taken the liberty,” Dr. Toomey explained, once he had given her the general outline of the job and her potential employers, “of sending Mr. Dougherty your records from the university. He has seen them, given his final approval. If you want the job, it's yours.”
        “But he's never even met me!” she'd said, incredulous.
        “Mr. Dougherty's a very busy man,” Toomey had explained. “He doesn't have time to interview potential employees. And he trusts my judgment, for we've been friends for a good many years now.”
        “But with all the people you could have chosen, why choose me?” Sonya asked, beginning to be excited, but still wary.
        “Come, Miss Carter,” Dean Toomey said, smiling gently, “you're being far too modest.”
        “No, really, I-”
        “For one thing, you've got the highest grade average in your field, in your graduating class. For another, during your three years here, you've been constantly involved in extra-curricular activities: drama club, the campus peace movement, the yearbook staff, the newspaper… You're known as a doer, someone who accomplishes things, and you're also known as an optimistic, immensely pleasant young woman.”
        Sonya was flushed bright red, and she did not make any comments.
        “Furthermore,” Toomey said, “You've got a degree in nursing, an excellent spare talent for a governness and tutor who will be spending much time with active young children.”
        She had seen the logic of that, but still she worried about meeting her employers. She needn't have worried, for they were quite personable people, the Doughertys.
        Now, on Distingue, the roast had been served, complete with six different vegetables, all rather exotic, and Joe Dougherty was questioning her about her trip from Boston, punctuating her remarks with amusing anecdotes about his own experiences with airlines-lost baggage, a martini that was accidentally made completely with vermouth and no gin.
        Helen Dougherty was more quiet than her husband, though she was in no way aloof or snobbish. She was an exceptionally lovely woman, with high, aristocratic cheekbones, a pert nose, thin but somehow friendly lips, a rich fall of auburn hair framing her delicate face. She was a slim woman, one clearly born to position; she moved with a fluid grace, whether walking to the table or merely salting her potatoes, that must have come, in part at least, from having been raised in the very best private schools where a third of the classroom hours were spent in the establishment of good manners and habits of gracious elegance.
        The children-nine-year-old Alex and seven-year-old Tina-sat side-by-side near their mother's end of the table, on cushion-raised chairs, both dark-haired, dark-eyed and beautiful. They were dressed pretty much alike in simple, serviceable jeans and lightweight tee-shirts, clean but certainly not formal. Occasionally giggling, offering their own observations, but mostly quiet, they complemented the air of casual formality-if there could be such a thing, a mixture of easiness and distance. Perhaps the distance, the lingering note of formality was all in Sonya's own mind; after all, she had never been this close to a millionaire and his family, and she could not bring herself to think of them as just average folks.
        “I hope Bill didn't scare you too badly on the way over from Pointe-a-Pitre,” Joe Dougherty said. “Sometimes, he thinks the Lady Jane is a racing boat, and he puts her through her paces.”
        “It keeps the engines in good condition to open her up now and again,” Bill said. “You're just too land-bound to appreciate a good fast cabin cruiser.”
        Joe Dougherty grinned, winked at Sonya.