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Eleanor had finally refused all offers, however, and had slipped off one night for parts unknown, taking the eight-month-old Kenneth with her. Later, word had come that she had retreated to the old family plantation, long since abandoned as uneconomic, where with just a few natives, mainly blacks, for company, she intended to raise Kenneth, secure from the hypocrisy of the Porter family. Nothing more had been heard from her until word of her death finally reached New Providence.

Kate Porter's first thoughts had been about the boy, her nephew. As she remembered him, he had been a quiet, but very mature boy for his age, usually appearing to be under strict self-control. He had possessed the white, silky-blonde hair and black eyes of his mother, a very handsome little boy. Kate could remember little else, yet she had always thought of him as a lonely, unhappy little boy. It was upon her insistence that Jim Porter had finally agreed that they owed some kind of a debt to young Kenneth-the money from hs mother's un- collected income was quite insubstantial in comparison to the wealth of the rest of the family. So, they had come to Porter's Bay not only to pay their last respects to Eleanor but also to find Kenneth and to help him arrange his future.

Jim Porter's white shirt and shorts were not exactly mourning dress, but, with the temperature in the nineties, neatly pressed clothes were more than any of them were used to. The black armbands were picked up in a seafront store, and black veils, tied about the brims of Cathy's and Kate's wide, straw hats, were somber reminders of the purpose of their visit.

The track wound in and around mammoth trees, but the path itself was fairly clear and obviously well used. The plantation house jutted out from the side of a cliff. It was a grey stone house, its original fa- cade of white paint evident only on the upper third story. From the path, the Porter family could see into quite a wide valley, fringed by forest with the sea in the distance. Close to the old house, the ground had been cleared and was under cultivation. Away from the house, however, the forest had begun to encroach across the untilled sugar fields. Directly before them, and in front of the house, was a freshly dug mound of earth. It was surrounded by an unpainted wicket fence. A large wooden cross had been inserted into the ground at the far end. It bore the simple inscription, "In Memoriam," and then the name, "Eleanor Porter," with the years of her birth and death.

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