Both Jenny and Cage tried to mask their surprise. “She never told you?” Cage asked. Linc shook his head and shoveled in another bite of eggs.
“She came to us,” Jenny said. “After going through the ordeal of her father’s trial, she—”
Linc’s fork clattered to his plate. “Whoa, whoa, what trial? What father?”
Cage and Jenny exchanged a glance. “Wooten Bishop,” Cage said, as though that explained everything. And it very nearly did.
Slowly Linc pushed his plate aside and folded his arms on the table in front of him. “Wooten Bishop? The Wooten Bishop is Kerry’s father?”
His hosts nodded simultaneously. Linc expelled his breath on a long gust. “Sonofagun.” He shook his head in disbelief. “I never would have put their names together. I remember now that he had a daughter. I guess I never paid much attention to how old she was or what she looked like. I was in Africa when that story broke.”
“He tried to shield her from the scandal as much as possible. Of course she was greatly affected by it anyway.”
“Obviously,” Linc muttered, staring into his coffee cup.
The Wooten Bishop family had been subjected to public scrutiny and ridicule only a couple of years earlier. After a long and illustrious career in the diplomatic corps, Bishop had been called home from Monterico when it was alleged that he had personally profited from that country’s political strife. He had used information made available to him as a diplomat in money-making scams.
When he was found out, all his shady dealings were aired over network television. There had followed a nasty, albeit enlightening, Senate hearing and a subsequent criminal trial. Only one month after his sentencing, he had died of heart failure in a federal prison.
“I asked Kerry about her childhood,” Linc said hoarsely. “She said that it had been charmed.”
“It was,” Jenny said sadly, “before the tragedy. Kerry once told me that something inside Ambassador Bishop snapped after the death of her mother. He was never quite the same.”
“Did she know about his corruption?”
Cage shook his head. “No. She suspected, but couldn’t believe it. She was shattered to learn that her father had ruthlessly exploited a people who had had so little to begin with. She told Jenny and me that she went through a period of hating him. Then all she could feel for him was pity. It’s little wonder that she made such a personal sacrifice to go to Monterico and try to make up for her father’s wrongdoings.”
“She had no business going there. She could have gotten herself killed!” Linc exclaimed, banging the table with his fist.
“You’re right, Linc.” Jenny laid a gentle hand over his. “She came to us, volunteering to go there and teach. We told her that there was plenty she could do here to support the cause without putting herself in danger. But she wouldn’t have it any other way.
“I don’t think any of us can really appreciate the sacrifices she made,” Jenny went on. “Until the scandal broke, she and her family had traveled all over the world. They were highly respected, often guests of royalty and heads of state.”
“She’s well educated I guess,” Linc remarked glumly.
“The Sorbonne.”
A muscle in his cheek twitched.
Cage swirled coffee around in his cup. “It was rumored several years ago that there was a romance budding between her and a young man in Britain’s royal family. But when I teased her about it, she said that’s all it was. A frivolous rumor.”
Jenny was reflective. “She hardly looked frivolous yesterday when she got off that airplane. I don’t think she’s ever been taken seriously. Maybe that’s what she had to prove. She went to Monterico to announce to the world that there was more to her than what was evident on the surface.”
“I still don’t get it,” Linc said, frowning. “It doesn’t make any sense.”
“What, Linc?”
“Why would a beautiful, charming, intelligent young woman like Kerry, who has everything going for her, give it all up to become a nun? I mean, isn’t that going a bit overboard just to make a point? Sure her ol’ man got caught with his hand in the till. There was a big scandal. But no... What’s the matter?”
“A nun?”
Chapter 10
They chorused their incredulity.
Of the three of them, Cage was the first to overcome his astonishment. “Where did you get that idea?”
“She isn’t a nun?” Linc croaked.