knows, Nokobee then might get picked up by the State of Alabama or a conservation organization like The Nature Conservancy."
"Oh, yeah. Actually, I've thought about that a lot. It could happen." Raff broke a crayfish in two and sucked out the meat, then followed it with a slug of beer. "But that could also allow some pirate group to grab it and do God knows what to it. Maybe turn it into a pig farm."
"I think that's way too pessimistic," Robbins returned. "Too much money involved. Anyway, I do think that we might have more time. I've been wanting to tell you, it looks like the Jepsons are set to keep arguing over what to do for a while yet."
"That's news to me. How do you know that?"
"I've got a couple of friends at the Atlanta Constitution with an ear on the door whenever the Jepson Trust members meet. The trust has a lot more property tied up, around here and over in Georgia. They've been arguing a lot lately over sales and development, and one of the properties they're seriously hung up over is Nokobee."
Raff asked, "Why is that, do you suppose? Some of the Jepsons want to develop it themselves? Or they want to raise the opening bid?"
"No, no. Not either. Nothing like that. It's simply that a couple of the Jepsons want to cash out now, while the others want to milk the best deal out of the tract by picking the optimum time and payout schedule. Fussing around like that could tie up the whole thing for a long time, maybe a couple more years."
"Well, damn it and be gone!" Raff reached over to another plate, lifted out a hushpuppy, chopped at it with a spoon, and mixed the pieces with cheese grits. "I ask you, why didn't God," he said, chewing, "make me the son of a billionaire so I could just buy the whole thing with pocket change and be done with it?"
"Bottom line," Bill Robbins said, brushing oyster cracker crumbs off his lap, "we just wait."
34
WAIT WAS ALL they could do. Finally, two years, four months, and a day after that conversation at the Rebel Cafe and Deli, the news finally came from Atlanta. The Nokobee tract, all of it except for the land around Dead Owl Cove already owned by Sunderland Associates, had been put on the market.
The time leading up to this moment had not been wasted for Raff. In balance, the years spent at Sunderland had been good ones for him. He had expanded his circle of friends dramatically. The grind of Harvard Law School was well behind him, and the more painful part of it mercifully forgotten. He sometimes thought about JoLane Simpson and wondered where she was--but not keenly enough to call the Harvard Alumni Office to find out. His work continued to prove mostly routine, and he began to squeeze out longer stretches of leisure time.
At twenty-eight years, Raphael Semmes Cody had adapted to a very different world from that of his boyhood. Clayville was culturally farther from Mobile than Mobile was from Cleveland or Albany. And unlike his existence at Harvard, Raff now ate regularly at the best restaurants and attended first-run movies and both classical and rock concerts. To these he added Gulf and river fishing. He joined other naturalists in the area on field trips. He dated regularly, but never with serious intent. He dodged relationships with younger women that might, he feared, lead to marriage before he wished. He never dated Sarah Beth, despite the lilt he perceived in her laugh whenever he said anything even remotely funny, or anyone else in the Sunderland offices. Within a year, in any case, his secretary married a divorced bank manager in nearby Lucedale, Mississippi, and the giggles became slightly less pronounced. She still commuted in to Sunderland, however, and continued to fill Raff's office with nonstop sunshine chatter.
Within a year of his arrival at Mobile, Raff had become a respected figure in the local conservation community. He attended meetings of several organizations regularly and continued to give pro bono legal advice in those large majority of cases that had no possible connection with his obligation to Sunderland Associates. A few of his environmentalist associates wondered if his employment at Sunderland represented a conflict of interest, but his advice was consistently good and true, and no public mention was ever made of a possible inconsistency.
Raff no longer attended church, but as a secular substitute he accepted