This piece appeared in Afternoon TV in 1982.

AN ATV NOVELETTE
THE LEGEND OF LUKE AND LAURA--THE FINAL CHAPTER
by Marilyn Henry

In the big, homey Whittaker kitchen, Luke and Laura began their honeymoon by sitting at the old fashioned table and reading the list of farm chores they would have to take on while the Whittakers were gone. "Just what I wanted to do every morning at 6 AM on my honeymoon--milk Bessy," Luke kidded, but he said it with a fond look at Laura that told her he was as happy to be honeymooning on the farm as she was. Actually, Laura's chore assignments sounded even worse: canning pumpkins and churning butter

Chores were not on either of their minds, however. The wedding had been glorious (discounting Scott Baldwin's nasty intrusion which Luke had dealt with swiftly and effectively), and now, at last, bride and groom were alone. Really alone. Being alone was a luxury they had seldom had a chance to enjoy the past year and it seemed marvelous, so new, that both were slightly nervous about it.

It didn't last. A rap at the door introduced the Whittaker's hired man, Buford Hunnicut, who dropped by to say he would be available to help out with chores when they needed him and did they need him for anything that night? Luke shook his head, a wisp of a smile on his lips. "Nope, I think I can handle tonight myself," he said, trying to show Buford the door. When Buford offered to go over the list of chores with them, Luke's strained hospitality snapped. "Look, my wife and I are on our honeymoon and we're kind of anxious to get to bed," he blurted, for which Laura poked him with her elbow, causing him to add, "To sleep."

Sleep wasn't exactly on their minds, either. Standing in the doorway of the cozy country bedroom, Luke gazed with awe at his shapely young bride who was looking at him so tenderly, so trustfully. After all the months of having to control their passion, the barriers were finally down and they were together and breathlessly aware of each other. The Whittakers had left gifts of a wispy, lace-trimmed gown and peignoir set for Laura and a flannel nightshirt and cap for Luke, and though Laura could make a joke about him being overdressed in the outfit, Luke realized she was feeling shy, vulnerable. He moved gently, lifting the peignoir from her shoulders and drawing her into a warm embrace. The kiss fired them both and they tumbled into the bed, pulling the homemade quilt over them. Close, so close, Laura confided how she had dreamed of being there with him, how frustrating it had been when circumstances prevented their love making, but now, lying beside him, she was glad they had waited. "I know," he whispered, "I feel that way, too. After all the waiting, waiting, waiting, it's just all the more exciting." He turned out the light and wrapped his arms around her. Suddenly a terrible clatter started up outside the window and the lovers pulled apart with alarm.

"Luke! What is it!?"

"I think I know--I was warned about this. It's an old country custom, a Charivari [sic]," Luke groaned. "That's where a lot of people celebrate the marriage by yelling and beating on old pots and pans."

"What do they want?" Laura asked, bewildered.

"They want the groom to buy them a drink."

"Now? Luke, you mean they're all going to just come in here?"

"Over my dead body! I prepared for this, honey. You think you married a dummy?"

He gave her a quick kiss, rose, went to the window and threw up the sash to lean far out. "SHUT UP! Thank you, nice to see you, too! I have something for you--six jugs of the hard stuff, down by the barn! Now, goodnight, go away, and give us a break!" and he pulled back inside, shutting the window while Laura collapsed with laughter.

"You did that real good," she told him, "Are they gone?"

"Gone," he confirmed, climbing back under the covers with her.

"Come here--I have other things to show you..." and his mouth whispered, "I love you..." before covering hers with a kiss that told her the waiting was over.

Luke tried to forget Scott Baldwin while he lost himself in the joy of having Laura for his own, but on some level of his brain, Scott was there, again intruding. He remembered the fight he and Scott had had on the Smith yacht nearly two years before when Laura had been Scott's wife and Luke had been unable to give up his dream of her, had pursued her, right or wrong, through a summer of trying to bring down the dangerous Smith mob and free himself from his slum past and his connections with organized crime. At the moment he had achieved his dream, when she was legally his, Scott had appeared once more to interfere with that dream. The Mexican divorce was shaky, could be contested at any time--and if that happened, Laura would not be Luke's wife; she would be guilty of bigamy. And Scott had looked very much as if he had vengeance in his bitter heart.

Before the honeymoon was over, Luke was called back to town by Helena Cassadine, widow of madman Mikkos who had tried to bring the world to its knees by freezing Pt. Charles that summer. Helena was curious about the man who had overcome her powerful husband, but Luke sensed more than curiosity in her strange eyes Eerie, the way their eyes connected. Frightening.

Scott started immediately to play his cruel games. On Thanksgiving, when Luke and Laura were scheduled to return and have dinner with the Webbers, Scott sent a note to Luke's Aunt Ruby to steer her to a waterfront warehouse while he called the Webbers to tell them Ruby had been hit by a truck. When a tired and frightened Ruby showed up later at the Webbers and they realized it was a hoax, Luke knew instinctively that it was Scott's handiwork.

The yacht Titan, a gift to Luke from an anonymous donor, seemed only an expensive nuisance until Robert and Tiffany suggested Luke and Robert pool their resources and open the yacht as a floating nightclub. Luke liked the idea. Laura hated the idea. From the moment she stepped aboard, she felt uneasy. The Cassadine aura was still there. Luke had to do some tall cajoling to get her to agree they should remodel and open a club.

And just as he finished winning his lady over with kisses and sweet argument, he discovered Scott Baldwin on board, uninvited. Luke stood like a fierce terrier between Scott and the stateroom door that hid his Laura, baring his bottom teeth in a snarling demand to know what Scott was doing there. None of it, neither the guarding of that door nor the bristling distrust, was lost on Scott. Luke Spencer was a ripe target for the kind of revenge Scott hoped to enjoy. Looking ingenuous and sly at the same time, Scott told Luke he only wanted to apologize and to promise he would give them the copy of the valid divorce decree as soon as it arrived.

Laura's parents, brought together by their mutual concern for Laura over her summer adventure, decided to remarry and Laura was delighted. When Laura accompanied actress Tiffany Hill to New York to meet her agent, Laura was astonished to be offered a screen test for a cosmetic commercial, a chance to become "Miss Star Eyes." Things seemed to be rosy--until she told Luke about the screen test. Instead of being happy for her, he turned hostile and chauvinistic, telling her she had all the job she needed--handling him. Not as skilled in the seductive techniques as Luke, Laura tried to persuade him with hard-headed reason and failed. He was hurt, feeling she had rejected him for something frivolous that would take her away from him half the time.

Was the yacht haunted? There seemed to be some strange things happening--Cassadine roses appearing out of nowhere, sudden chilling drops in temperature, mirrors that fell, a valve mysteriously opened, a railing that came loose, nearly sending Laura over the side. Luke half suspected Scott was responsible for some of it, but he could not account for all of it. Meantime, Scott had seemed to change his spots, had been acting the fair-haired innocent again, apologizing to everyone about his bad behavior. Luke did not buy the act for a second and he did not believe Scott's alibi that a rain storm enroute damaged the original divorce decree that was in Scott's luggage from Mexico. "Baby Baldwin", as Luke called him, was up to something for sure.

The strange happenings on board decided Luke to rename the yacht "The Haunted Star" and feature a magic show. When Slick Jones introduced the Amazing Bajour, a magician/mind reader, into the salon's company, the magician told Luke he was sure Luke had psychic powers. Luke scoffed, but was shaken when the room's temperature suddenly dropped again.

For her birthday, Luke gave Laura a lovely little star necklace, but Scott came close to spoiling the occasion by sending around the old star ornament he and Laura had used on their first Christmas tree. Luke likened Scott to an annoying insect, buzzing around just out of reach.

When Laura went off to New York for her screen test, she noticed a man staring at her in a restaurant, and later the same man was leaning over her when she awoke on the plane. She tried to tell Luke about the man, about his strange eyes, but felt foolish when she realized there was so little to tell. Nevertheless, she was disturbed.

Laura's contract for the Miss Star Eyes job arrived just before Lesley and Rick's small, private wedding. Seeing her parents pledge their love, brought Luke and Laura close again after the outburst the lengthy contract had triggered. Laura wanted that contract badly, but she also wanted to make Luke happy--a quandry [sic] she hoped to solve by having Joe Kelly find a way to limit the contract. Joe told her it couldn't be done; it was all or nothing.

Over Christmas Laura continued to worry about her decision--plus a nervous suspicion she was definitely being followed by a tall man with piercing eyes, the same man who had been on the plane. Again she tried to tell Luke, but finished with, "It's probably just my imagination."

Meanwhile Luke had run into some trouble with liquor supplies for the club. A menacing type representing a certain "organization" had come to the boat to sell Luke and Robert on the idea that if they didn't buy all their booze from his "company", they would be very sorry. The price was no bargain; neither was the protection, and Luke and Robert dumped the man over the side, refusing to be intimidated. Luke and Robert discovered the man worked for a boss called "The Mouse" and they decided the way to get booze and teach the Mouse a lesson at the same time, was to heist a few cases out of the Mouse's illegal warehouse. A plan was set in motion and the heist was carried out during the time Laura was away modeling in New York. When the Mouse showed up at the yacht to threaten Robert and search the ship, Robert found an unexpected ally in Kurt Maxwell, a stranger who appeared with a gun to drive the Mouse and his hoodlums away and who explained to Robert he was a friend of O'Riley, Robert's dear friend from the days when they were agents of the World Security Bureau. Kurt told Robert he was in trouble and asked if he could hide on the boat.

Once again, while in the photographer's studio in New York, Laura sensed the tall man with piercing eyes was watching her, mesmerizing her with the help of a brilliant star sapphire ring.

Over the New Year holiday, while Laura was home in Pt. Charles, she seemed nervous and Luke and Lesley were concerned for her, but concluded she was simply overwrought by too much excitement, too much traveling. So much had happened to her in a short time; she had been interviewed for Advertising News, spent days posing for photographer Mel Wilson's lense [sic], had luncheoned with agents--it was a bit overwhelming for a small town girl. Luke tried to be understanding, but it depressed him, having to see her off to New York so often. Still, when she returned, they found a hot afternoon in bed usually cured their discontent. The marriage might not be thriving exactly, but it was scarcely in trouble. A passionate mutual love kept it afloat.

Luke was suspicious of Kurt Maxwell, Robert's guest who was hiding below decks. He couldn't say why; it was just a feeling. On an afternoon when Laura was off in New York for a photo session, Scott walked on board the Titan to deliver the club's liquor license and found there was no one around. He wandered into Luke and Laura's state room, saw the rumbled bed where the lovers had slept and in impulsive anger, ripped apart Laura's delicate nightgown which had been lying on the bed. As he stepped out on deck, he came across Kurt Maxwell mumbling some sort of curse over a miniature model of the Titan, "The Cassadine curse on you, Laura Spencer," recited Max, and he dropped the little boat over the side, into the water. Scott spoke, startling Kurt, and assured him he was on Kurt's side; he, too, wanted to get even with Luke and Laura.

That same day, Scott flew to New York to trick Laura into having dinner with him by calling the photo studio and saying her husband would meet her at a certain restaurant. Assuming it was Luke and eager to see him, Laura wound up her photo session with Mel and hurried away. As she left the studio, she passed a young woman with an uncanny resemblance to herself and they stared at each other a moment before Laura went out the door.

Meanwhile Luke found the torn nightgown and learned Scott was out of town. Still furious, Luke returned to the boat and came up on Kurt Maxwell at the rail, holding a model of the Titan and mumbling some sort of curse. Luke grabbed the boat from Kurt and as it broke, his own stickpin fell out of it. Kurt bolted and Luke ran after him, tracking him across the waterfront. The trail led to Scott's hotel room. Luke found a sterling rose on the fire escape, but Kurt got away. Turning to Scott, Luke grabbed him to ask some very pointed questions. Scott's guileful blue eyes were amused; he knew something Luke did not: that Laura had had dinner with him in New York, had finally, if hesitantly, accepted his wide-eyed apologies and had flown back on the same plane with him to Pt. Charles. They had parted at the airport, Laura declining his invitation to share a cab.

Laura had been expected on the late flight and had instead taken the earlier one in a rush to get back to Luke. Only when she arrived at the yacht, Luke was not there. No one was there, not even Robert. She checked the state rooms and the salon, feeling very uneasy in the silence that was broken only by the wash of water against the side of the ship and the lonely cry of foghorns off shore. She unpacked, tried again to use the phone, which seemed to be out of order. Then, feeling shivery and lonely, she decided to go ashore and use the public phone on the dock.

Meanwhile Luke had gone to the airport and discovered Laura had been booked on the earlier flight. He returned to town, went to the diner, then to the Webbers. They hadn't heard from Laura, but then, their phone had been tied up all evening. Luke was getting concerned--something was wrong. He could feel it. A search of the boat with Robert did not turn up Laura. His sense of foreboding and anxiety increased. It was late, the fog was closing in and Laura had not been seen anywhere.

Laura's many phone calls had been useless; her parent's number was always busy and no one answered at Tiffany's. The dark fog was thick, frightening her as she left the booth and almost ran into a man passing by. He offered to help, but she shook her head, not trusting him. After he went a way she began walking toward the diner, feeling she would be safe there with Rose. They were faint, but she was sure she heard footsteps behind her. Terrified, she turned and there, looming at her out of the heavy fog was the tall man with the odd eyes and he was holding his hand with the sapphire ring up to his head. Laura screamed in terror and ran, vanishing into the wall of fog.

Luke was more than uneasy; he was nearly frantic because he had a premonition of disaster and couldn't explain it. He returned to Rose's diner to check if anyone had heard anything from Laura, but there was no word at all. Unable to think of anything else to do, he headed back toward the boat. As the fog curled around him on the dock and the foghorns sounded their doom, Luke's sense of dread overwhelmed him. And then suddenly, there on the dock, was a girl calling for help, a young girl with long blonde hair. He cried out to her, "Laura, baby it's me!" but the girl swung around and ran, the fog swallowing her as if she had never been there. It had not been Laura. Luke knew that, and he sank to his knees and gave a sobbing cry of distress: "Laura.....!"

Sidebar: An ATV Viewpoint