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was a far cry from being able to detect lies, he assured himself. It was certainly not the kind of personality flaw that should keep a woman from marrying him.
    Hobart peered at him. “More people than you would believe have an aversion to the notion of marriage to a strat-talent. They are afraid there might be some truth in the old shibboleths. But even those outmoded misconceptions, difficult as they are to correct, are not our only serious challenges, Mr. Stonebraker.”
    Rafe folded his arms and propped one shoulder against the end of the bookcase. “You mean I’ve got other defects?”
    â€œWell—”
    â€œTell me, Batt, have I got anything at all going for me in the marriage market?”
    â€œYes and no.”
    â€œWhat in five hells is that supposed to mean?”
    â€œOne of our most difficult challenges is not the nature of your talent. It is the fact that you are a Stonebraker.”
    Hell. He had been counting on his family name to overcome some of the complications posed by his talent. “I would have thought that was one of my few pluses.”
    â€œIt is and it isn’t.”
    â€œDamn it, Batt—”
    â€œWhat I mean is, of course your family name speaks for itself. Everyone in the tri-city-states is aware ofStonebraker Shipping. The Stonebraker name commands enormous respect in the highest social circles as well as in the business sphere. Your family has made great contributions to New Seattle.”
    â€œGet to the point, Batt.”
    â€œThe point,” Hobart said carefully, “is that you have chosen not to involve yourself with Stonebraker Shipping. You have not followed in your grandfather’s footsteps. You did not even pursue a career in academia as your parents did. Instead, you have completely disassociated yourself from the source of the family fortune.”
    â€œAh.” Rafe closed his eyes in brief resignation. “I think I see the problem.”
    Hobart’s mouth tightened with disapproval. “Matters would be greatly simplified if you had taken your place in the Stonebraker empire.”
    Hobart was right, Rafe thought. As challenges went, this one was probably among the more difficult for a professional matchmaker. Any woman who could be persuaded to overcome her aversion to marrying a strat-talent who happened to be a Stonebraker would naturally expect to move in the same elite social circles as the rest of the clan. He had turned his back on those circles and the family fortune at the age of nineteen.
    Rafe considered the problem from a hunter’s viewpoint. In a sense he was a victim of his own strategy.
    As Hobart had just said, virtually everyone, at least everyone who had even the smallest connection to the business community, had heard of Stonebraker Shipping. Fortunately, Rafe thought, almost no one was aware of the current, highly precarious condition of the shipping dynasty his great-grandfather had founded.
    There was still time to save the company and the livelihoods of the two thousand people, including the many members of his extended clan, who depended upon the firm. Rafe had been working night and day on the problem for weeks. He had only three more months to get all of the necessary duck-puffins in a row.
    One of the most crucial duck-puffins was a wife. He needed one to present to the board of directors of Stonebraker Shipping at the annual board meeting when he made his bid to grab the C.E.O. position.
    A wife was not merely a matter of window dressing in his case. Corporate tradition as well as the usual St. Helens social bias in favor of marriage dictated that only a married or seriously engaged person would be elected president and C.E.O. of Stonebraker Shipping.
    His chief competition for the job was his ambitious cousin, Selby Culverthorpe, who had been respectably married for six years and had two kids to show for it. Selby’s status as a family man as well as his long-term loyalty to the