"Ross," she cried brokenly. "You know how it happened, you old bitch. It shouldn't have happened, but it did. An accident. Ross and I . . ." She looked about with glazed, uncomprehending eyes. "That's when everything went wrong, and it never came right again. Never. I still don't know why he went out to the lodge. He was supposed to meet me at the bottom of the drive. I was there," she said forlornly, years of grief weighting the words. "I waited and waited—and then Daddy found me and . . ." She broke off. Sybil's bejeweled hands clenched. There was more than grief, there was anger that could never be answered, the fury at fate that had robbed her of the man she loved. Annie thought she'd never seen Sybil look more lovely . . . or more dangerous.
"I saw you and Ross in the garden that afternoon," Miss Dora said gently.
For an instant, the years fell away and Sybil looked like a girl again, young and in love and breathtakingly beautiful. "One last kiss—it was so light, just the barest touch. We thought there would be time for all the kisses in the world." The brief illusion of youth fled, replaced by the sorrow-ravaged yet still gorgeous face. Sybil's bitter eyes raked the room. "Why couldn't it have been one of you? Why couldn't it have been Milam? Or Whitney? They aren't a quarter the man Ross was. Ross was—" She swallowed convulsively. "Oh, God, he was wonderful. Young and strong. And a man. He knew how to live—and none of you has ever lived, not the way Ross did. He could laugh and make love and ride a horse and be brave and gentle and kind and rough. Oh, dear God, what irony, what sick and puking irony that he should die and any one of you live." Years of anger corroded her husky voice.
Annie reached out and took Max's hand and held it hard. Max watched Sybil, his dark-blue eyes somber.
"How dare you talk like that!" Charlotte, her voice high with anger, her plain face livid, turned to Miss Dora. "You make her hush up right this minute. We don't have to sit here and be insulted. Why, Whitney and I—"
"You and Whitney will do as I say," Miss Dora snapped.
Charlotte looked as though she'd been slapped. Her head jerked up, her mouth opened, but no words came. Then, her shoulders slumped and her eyes fell before Miss Dora's unbending gaze.
"Of course we will, Miss Dora." Whitney's voice was placating. "But the past is past. Dad and Ross—that's been over and done with for more than twenty years. There's nothing to be gained by discussing it."
Charlotte lifted her chin. "A tragic day," she said loudly. But there was no sympathy in her voice. Annie heard instead the oily complacency of a chorus in a Greek tragedy. "A double loss for poor Amanda."
Julia buried her face in her hands for a long moment, then struggled up from her chair and moved heavily toward the sideboard, one hand outstretched for the cut-glass decanter.
Milam bowed toward his great-aunt. "What an exquisite sense of drama you possess," he drawled. His green eyes glittered with malice; his plump face was once again amused. "But the difficulty is, you face a dead end. No one will ever know more about that day because the principals are all beyond this earthly vale of tears."
"I will know more." The old woman spoke with utter confidence.
Again, taut silence stretched.
"You see," the whispery voice continued, "no one has ever questioned the official version, Ross dead of an accidental gunshot wound; Augustus dead from a heart attack upon hearing the shocking news." She smiled grimly, her ancient face an icy mask of contempt. "All of you—except dear Sybil, of course—were in Tarrant House that day. Whitney, how did you learn of Ross's `accident'?" Her voice lingered deliberately on the final word.
Whitney stood with his hands clasped behind him, rockingback and forth. He had the wary look of a man suddenly confronted with a minefield and ordered to cross it. He cleared his throat. "Grandfather told me."
Annie's mind went back to her painstakingly inked family trees. That would be Harmon Brevard, Amanda's father. "What time was that?" Miss Dora's question was rapier‑
quick.
Whitney looked confused.
"It's disrespectful to the dead." Nervously, Charlotte pleated her white chiffon skirt. "Miss Dora, this is dreadful, like pulling and picking at bones."
But Miss Dora ignored Charlotte's shrill protest. The old
lady's imperious gaze never left her great-nephew's face. Whitney moved restively. "God, it's been twenty—" "Whitney," Miss Dora said sharply.
Whitney moved restively, then glanced uncertainly toward his brother.
Annie squeezed Max's hand. How revealing! Whitney, the member of the bar, the substantial brother, still deferred to his older brother, whom Annie had supposed to be the weaker personality of the two. Or was that just society's prejudice taking over, the assumption that a lawyer of substance in a community would, of course, dominate an older, unconventional sibling.
Milam sniggered, breaking the silence. "May as well give up, brother dear." He fluffed the thick blond hair over his collar. "Aunt Dora always did have your number. Oh, well, I don't suppose it matters after all these years. Why not let the truth come out—"
"Milam, no!" Charlotte importuned. Panic shrilled her voice.
"Truth!" Sybil said harshly. "What truth?" In the light from the glittering chandelier, her eyes glowed a hot, deep black.
"Your sweetie pie shot himself all right." Milam's light, high voice held a sickening note of satisfaction. "Suicide in the first degree, my dear Sybil. That's why dear Papa dropped
dead—he and Ross had enjoyed a hell of a nasty little scene and—"
Hands raised, Sybil launched herself with a deep cry. Her fingernails raked Milam's face, scoring crimson slashes on both cheeks.
Milam stumbled backwards, swearing and awkwardly struggling to push away Sybil's slender, green-gowned body.
But it was Julia's drunken voice that cut through the sound and fury and brought a terrible quiet to the drawing room.
Julia stood at the sideboard, pouring brandy sloppily into a cut-glass tumbler. She plunked down the decanter and picked up the glass in her trembling hand. " 's true, Sybil. Because it was the same gun, you know. Ross took the gun that killed the Judge and used it on himself."
Sybil tore free of Milam's grip and whirled to face her distant cousin's wife. "The gun that killed the Judge? Jesus Christ, Julia, what are you saying?"
10:15 A.M., SATURDAY, MAY 9, 1970
Whitney lifted his hand to knock at the door of the study, then let it fall. He felt, at the same time, hot and uncomfortable and cold and sick. He hadn't hurt the firm. Not really. To he thrown out, to have nowhere to go—once again he could hear his father's icy, contemptuous voice, "A lawyer's conduct must always be above reproach." Christ, hadn't he ever wanted a woman like Jessica? Whitney pictured his father's thin, merciless, ascetic face. His shoulders slumped. He turned. Blindly, he walked away from the study door.