Chapter Three: Aztec Treasure

Up to now, Alan's colorful family had been good for a few new faces and some much needed Luke and Laura support. The family had been on our screens for enough years that we cared when new members were introduced and historical points about which we had no idea were brought out in to the light of day. The scope of the family was about to widened much to the fans delight.

1983 roared into Port Charles along with motorcycle riding hot-bod Jimmie Lee Holt, straight from Indiana with the shocking news that he was Edward Quartermaines illegitimate son. Edward tried to deny it but Jimmie Lee proved that Edward’s affair with his mother Beatrice LeSeur had resulted in his existence. True to form, the Quartermaines thought that Jimmie Lee’s motive was their money. The new Q denied that he wanted their wealth and proclaimed that what he wanted was a relationship with his family. Edward even tried to pay him off to leave town but it seemed that Jimmie really didn’t want the family fortune. He legitimately seemed to want to be a part of the family, especially after he met distant cousin Celia!

Celia was an artist who came to live with her cousins and was immediately drawn to shockingly handsome Jimmie Lee. Celia played it cool, reminding her new heart throb that she was engaged to all-American and super cool surgeon grant Putnam. That didn’t discourage Jimmie, and as Grant worked long hours Celia used any excuse to be with Jimmie, even renting a room above Kelly’s, where Jimmie Lee lived, as an art studio. As Grant became suspicious of Celia we began to see that he was not exactly who and what we thought he was either. We heard him on the phone, assuring an anonymous source that his marriage to sweet Celia was all set, even as Jimmie and Celia gave into to their passion enough for their first—extremely hot kiss.

Grant threatened to cancel the wedding if Celia didn’t control her interest in the other man, and she tried, imploringly telling the other man how much she loved her fiancé even as we saw Grant meeting in secret with the physical therapist who had been working with an injured Luke Spencer to get him back on his feet. It became clear that Natalie Dearborn and Grant Putnam were spies! Natalie a.k.a Natasha and Grant were DVX agents sent with their supervisor Gregory Malko to infiltrate the top secret laboratory at General Hospital where Dr. Jerrold was developing a high-tech energy source called The Prometheus Disc.

On Celia and Grant’s wedding day Jimmie Lee lured her to a secluded cabin and tried to coerce her into admitting she loved him. When she refused he stole her clothes and left her locked in the cabin, but she escaped naked and dirty, wrapped in a blanket and hitch hiked a ride to the church in a chicken truck where she ran into Jimmie Lee. She hit him in the mouth and knocked him out. Grant at first cancelled the wedding but reconsidered when ordered to go through with the marriage by Natalie.

Grant was having problems. Celia suspected he had had plastic surgery and became suspicious of why her husband was spending so much time in Dr. Jerrold’s lab. Natalie and Gregory threatened Grant that they would kill Celia and Grant realized that he had lost his objectivity by falling in love with his wife for real. Grant froze when ordered to kill Dr. Jerrold who was shot dead by Gregory and died in grant’s arms begging him to keep the disc safe from the DVX. Robert, Luke and the WSB became entangled in the tale and after Luke, Holly and Celia were abducted and held hostage Robert found out that Grant was on their side when WSB director Ballantine betrayed them. Grant was arrested and turned the dime on the DVX but was not accepted back at General Hospital when he won his release by helping our government. Celia stayed by his side.

Gleefully, Susan summoned the entire Quartermaine family to her home and announced to them that none of them were the legitimate issue of a legal marriage and as such could not inherit the family’s vast fortune. This set the stage for Susan’s murder. She blackmailed Edward and Lila for 2 million dollars in exchange for the unsigned divorce papers and marriage certificate to Tolliver and secretly arranged for a reporter to be witness to the exchange in order to make public the shocking news and keep the money, but on that night she was shot dead.

Robert and Holly Scorpio investigated the murder and found that Alan, Monica, Scott, Tolliver, Heather and her mother Alice had all been in the house that night. All had motive and opportunity. They suspected Tolliver and set up a sting to catch him by letting him “find out” that Heather had witnessed the murder and then setting a trap to catch him trying to kill her. It worked. Crane was shot, but escaped and slipped the marriage and divorce papers to a stunned and hither-to-fore uninvolved Jimmie Lee Holt who realized the importance of what he had in his possession. Jimmie Lee held the papers that could secure him a piece of the Quartermaine fortune. The problem was Jimmie Lee had never wanted any money; he had wanted a family. Jimmie kept the secret. Lila and Edward married.

Monica saved her ex-lover, Rick Webber’s life by removing a tumor from his heart. At home, the otherwise happy couple fought over Alan’s son Jason. Alan beseeched Monica to open her heart to the delightful child and Monica resisted vehemently. Jimmie Lee, heartbroken by Celia, fell under Heather’s spell and they teamed up to gain custody of Jason and his hefty trust fund, he thought he could control the Quartermaines by using the Crane Toliver papers but was shocked to find that they had been destroyed in a fire.

When Jason’s guardian, Alice Grant, died her last request was that Alan give Jason to Heather. Alan was miserable and cried to Monica that Heather could not raise Jason. Monica finally agreed. In the months that followed, she came to love Jason as much as she did AJ. The family was embroiled in a blackmail and murder investigation concerning Monica’s distant cousin and Jimmie Lee’s mother but again, the Scorpios managed to prove them innocent.

Celia Quartermaines story was far from over. In England a mental patient regained his memory as the real Grant Putnam who had been replaced years earlier by the DVX agent claiming to be him. The DVX had raised children in “American Villages” where they were trained from infancy to take on the lives of selected real Americans; to be put in key positions of authority that could benefit the DVX in undermining and ultimately over throwing the American government. The real Grant convinced the doctors that he was sane and was released. He moved to Port Charles to assume the life that faux-Grant had usurped from him. He met Celia and promised that he held no ill will and only wanted to live his life in peace. Celia and her Grant changed their last name to Andrews. Stripped of his medical license, Grant Andrews was forced to take a construction job, working for Jimmie Lee Holt!

The real Putnam began a campaign to ruin Andrews and started with his marriage. Andrews began an innocent friendship with immigrant Tania Roskov with whom he had much in common. Putnam planted evidence that Andrews and Tania were lovers and at the same time convinced Andrews that Celia was having an affair with him. Celia’s marriage hit the skids. Putnam convinced Celia that Andrews tried to kill them and Andrews was arrested. Celia; with Jimmie Lee by her side testified against Andrews and the faux-grant was sentenced to 15 years in prison for attempted murder.

Even though Celia took comfort in hunky Jimmie Lee’s bed she began to investigate to try to prove that Andrews was innocent and with Robert Scorpio they finally uncovered the truth. The real Grant Putnam was caught. Andrews got his medical license and his wife back, while a heartbroken Jimmie Lee lurked in the background. Tania, who had fallen in love with Andrews; was also broken hearted and turned to singer Frisco Jones for comfort.

Things got more complicated when Monica’s Cousin Lorena Sharpe moved into the mansion and convinced the Q’s to invest in her Avalon health spas and Jimmie Lee’s scandalous mother came to town. Beatrice took advantage of Jimmie lee’s heartache to convince him to blackmail the Quartermaines for money after all. Beatrice was blackmailing Amanda Barrington and other socialite Sylvia Whitby, too, but she wasn’t the only one doing so. Leo Russell, a masseur at the Avalon spa was also blackmailing them with video of them succumbing to his seduction.

When Beatrice was murdered Edward went to jail after confessing, but Edward was protecting Lila who he thought had drugged Beatrice at the charity ball. Robert discovered that “knock out drugs” had been dropped in Beatrice’s drink by Alan, Monica, Lila, Holly, Amanda, Sylvia and Leo. In a dramatic recreation Robert proved that Beatrice had accidentally take Lila’s heart medication thinking it was aspirin and that that coupled with the knock out drops added to her drink by others had caused her death. It was death by misadventure.

Eventually Celia and Jimmie Lee planned to wed in a Gay-1890’s style wedding on a train unknowingly being used to smuggle a stolen Aztec treasure through Port Charles by Celia’s ex, Grant, WSB agent Sean Donely and young Aztec Princess Felicia Cummings ex fiancé Prescott. This was the end to the Aztec treasure story and the beginning of a Asian Quarter Mystery. 

Sweeping epic adventures were the forte of the day and a family as rich in texture and as eccentric as the Q's were a great way to anchor new characters to the canvas. As the Quartermaines moved into their second decade on General Hospital they were no longer the new family on the block but had become one of the accepted staples of General Hospital, a foundation upon which to build for another generation.