to move on before she returns. He goes to L.A.; after a couple of weeks, he starts hanging around the marketplace where Nick and Cora buy most of their produce, hoping to see her. He runs into Nick, who has been looking for him; Nick insists that Frank returns to Twin Oaks with him, saying, "something important's gonna happen tonight, and you're in on it." Upon Frank's return, Cora behaves coolly toward him; the three of them have dinner together, and Nick announces that he will be selling Twin Oaks and that Cora and he will be moving in with his infirm sister in northern Canada. That night, Cora is desperate; Frank finds her in the kitchen with a knife she says she will use on herself. Frank agrees to kill Nick. The next day, the three of them are to drive to Santa Barbara to finalize the sale of Twin Oaks. Frank and Cora intend to stage a drunk driving accident. Sackett stops by to air his tire, and Frank and Cora stage an argument where she insists on driving due to the men's inebriation. On a deserted stretch of road, Frank kills Nick with a blow to the head and then sends the car off a cliff. However, Frank is also caught in the car and injured. Sackett, who followed them, arrives to find Cora crying for help. The District Attorney files murder charges against only Cora, hoping to divide her and Frank. Although this ploy works temporarily, a clever measure by Cora's lawyer, Arthur Keats, prevents Cora's full confession from coming into the hands of the prosecutor. Cora secures a plea bargain in which she pleads guilty to manslaughter and receives probation. Publicity from the murder makes Twin Oaks very successful, but things remain tense between Frank and Cora. They marry to protect themselves from being forced to testify against each other. When Cora leaves to care for her sick mother, Frank has a brief fling with a woman. After Cora returns, a man named Kennedy, who had worked as an investigator for her attorney, shows up and attempts to blackmail her with the confession. Frank beats up Kennedy and his partner and takes the signed confession from them. Cora tells Frank that she knows about his affair. The two argue but reconcile, and Cora announces that she is pregnant. She speculates that the new life they