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corporation on the other end of the line.
    “We have a message for Ms. Hudson.”
    “I’ll take it.”
    “Ms. Hudson?”
    Regina wondered when Western Union had gotten so picky. “I’m Ms. Hudson,” she said truthfully. Her mother was going to be in no mood to chase down messages after she got home.
    “Deepest condolences for your loss,” the voice began.
    “What?” It took a split second for Regina to realize this was the beginning of the message, rather than some kind of gentle insult, but it was still bewildering. Petra Hudson hadn’t suffered any loss her daughter knew about.
    “Deepest condolences on your loss,” the voice said again. “It is well known how you feel about your family. Tragedy can strike at any time, but strength and wisdom can see us through. Best personal regards.”
    There was a silence. Regina doubted it was a pause for effect, since the whole thing had been read in the mechanical singsong of a court stenographer.
    “Is that it?” she asked.
    “There is a signature.”
    “Okay,” Regina said. “Whose?”
    “It’s signed, Cronus.”
    There’d been some expression in the voice that time, and there could be no doubt that the pause had been intentional. Regina was losing her patience.
    “Cronus,” she said.
    “You heard me correctly,” the voice said. It was less Western Union-like all the time.
    “And who the hell,” she said, “is Cronus?”
    But even if she’d been expecting an answer, she wasn’t going to get one. The owner of the voice had hung up before she’d even gotten to “hell.”

Chapter Two
    T HE PEOPLE MAY HAVE come to the child’s funeral to mourn, but they stayed to gossip. Petra Hudson had good ears, better ears than the gossipers thought she did. They kept choking off their sentences or lowering their voices a split second too late. Petra heard the fragments of insult and insinuation all the way from the gravesite to the car.
    “... her ‘driver.’ Too democratic to say ‘chauffeur’ ...” This with a finger pointed through the crook of an elbow at Wes Charles, who held his cap in one gloved hand and his employer’s elbow in the other, helping her over the muddy spots.
    “... sleeping with him?” another voice said.
    “... never needed a driver before this year. Drove herself. Said she liked it that ...” Petra recognized that last voice, one of the photo editors on Worldwatch. She was ready to whirl on the man and fire him on the spot, but that would have been madness. A child had just been laid to rest here, an infant. A young mother was facing the greatest grief imaginable. This was no time to make a scene.
    And, she decided, there never would be a good time to fire the man. Not for gossiping about her, at least. It was, she reminded herself, a free country, and this was part of the price you paid for being the boss.
    They reached the car. Charles let go of her elbow and attended to the door. Petra Hudson sat on soft white leather and let her breath go with an undignified whoosh. She unpinned the hat and shook her hair loose, thick black hair that halfway through her fifties needed no touch-ups. Which was something else they gossiped about.
    When journalists wrote about Petra Hudson (and they frequently did, the only thing journalists like to write about more than crooked politicians being other journalists), two words never failed to appear— statuesque and handsome. She had no complaints, even when they managed to work in the information that the late James Hudson, Sr., had been a mere five feet five inches tall. As if there were something perverted about a small man marrying a large woman.
    To hell with them. James might have been attracted to her because she was big. She had, in fact, counted on that before she ever met him. But anyone who thought that was what their marriage was based on was pathetically wrong.
    James Hudson had a small body, a moderate amount of capital, and a genius for the communications business. He took joy in