Phần I
Ellie hid the box in the one place nobody in the Ashby family would ever touch: inside the hard black case of her stenograph machine, under the tripod and the spare paper.
Then she got back into bed beside Julian and lay there until the windows went gray.
At breakfast on the big porch at Heron Hall, everything was so ordinary it felt staged. Vivian sat at the head of the table with a seating chart and a red pencil, moving guests like chess pieces. Tessa was still asleep. Julian kissed the top of Ellie's head on his way to the coffee pot and stole a piece of her toast.
Judge Ashby read the Post and Courier in his shirtsleeves. He looked up when she sat down and smiled the warm, crinkled smile that half of Charleston would have voted for.
"Five days, Eleanor," he said. "Nervous?"
"Terrified," Ellie said, and everyone laughed, because it was the right answer.
Under the table she looked at his feet. White bucks. Red soles. Clean.
She called her father from the car on the Ravenel Bridge, the river wide and silver below her.
"Daddy. I've got one question, and I need a straight answer."
"Morning to you too."
"Where were you the night of the fire?"
The silence went on long enough that she checked the screen to see if the call had dropped.
"You know where I was," he said finally. "Offshore. Crewing on the Miss Patsy with Ray Dupree. My boat was in the shop."
"Okay."
"Ellie. Why are you asking me this?"
"No reason. I love you. I have to go."
She hung up before he could hear anything in her voice. Her fingers were already moving on the steering wheel. Offshore. Crewing on the Miss Patsy with Ray Dupree. My boat was in the shop.
She had the photograph. She could have told him so.
But she had sat through enough trials to know the first rule of cross-examination. You never show a witness the exhibit until he has locked himself into his story.
Now he had.