It could, Annie realized, have happened exactly like that. Or it could have been some other memory entirely that reformed Amanda's picture of that day. Perhaps on the anniversary of the Judge's death, she remembered the click of a cane in the hall or perhaps she remembered the glimpse of a long, old-fashioned dress. . .
"You think Mother went from that to accusing someone of the Judge's murder?" Milam frowned fiercely. "That wouldn't be like her. She would have come to me or to Whitney."
"Or perhaps to Julia?" Annie asked quietly.
"Maybe." The suggestion apparently didn't bother Milam. "Or even to Charlotte, though I never thought Mother liked her overmuch."
Miss Dora was nodding, her shaggy white hair flying. "Of course. Don't you see? She did tell someone. But it was the wrong person."
"Murder piled upon murder?" Milam's lips curved down in ugly amusement. "You've been reading too much family history, Aunt Dora."
Max lost patience. "You seem to think all of this is amusing. But you weren't laughing the day your father died. You were upset."
Milam let the pad slip into his lap and folded his hands behind his head. He looked insolently up at Max. "Sorry if I let the Family down, showing emotion and all that. But it's quite a shock, to have your little brother blow away your old man. At least, that's what I thought at the time. Believe me, it was a hell of an afternoon. I suppose I—"
"You were upset before your father died," Annie interrupted irritably. "We have it on good authority." Was it stretching the truth to consider Enid Friendley a good authority?
Milam's arms dropped. His expression smoothed out as if all thought and emotion had been wiped away with a sponge. "Do you now?" he asked silkily. "And who would that be?"
No one answered.
A sour smile stretched his lips. "Enid, probably. Well,
that's fine. Maybe so. It was a long time ago. If Enid told you that, ask her what else she knows."
"We will," Max replied. "Look, Milam, you were upset
that morning. Long before someone shot the Judge. Why?" Milam looked down at the sketch pad in his lap. So did Annie.
It was just the merest hint of a sketch. A child's face. A wispy ponytail. That's all it was.
Milam traced the outline of a delicately drawn cheek. "I don't remember. It's been too damn long ago."
When they walked—the three of them—into the downstairs laundry room, Enid Friendley watched them approach, her arms folded across her abdomen, a curious expression on her face.
"We appreciate your coming," Max said briskly.
Her unfriendly eyes remained wary. They moved from Max to Annie to Miss Dora. It was to the latter that Enid spoke. "Hello, Miss Dora."
"Enid, we need your help." Miss Dora's glance was compelling. "What happened that last day? Who did the Judge talk to? What did you see?"
The caterer hesitated.
"Come now." Miss Dora was impatient. "Max and Annie told me what you said about Amanda and Julia. I can't say I believe you were right, but we'll leave that for now. Tell us what you actually saw or heard."
"I know what I know," Enid said mulishly. "If it isn't true, then why were Amanda and Julia scared to death that day, quaking in their shoes? And Amanda—well, she came out of her room that morning and there was a bright-red mark on her cheek where he'd slapped her. And I can't say I blame him. Two women—" Her face wrinkled in disgust. "And later, Julia came running down the stairs and out into the garden and she looked like the hounds of hell were after her. And maybe they were! And rightly so. But they weren't the only ones upset. Milam came downstairs a little after that and hehad an ugly look on his face when he went into the study. I was still in the hall when he came out. He stopped in the door and threatened his father. He said, cold and clear, 'I won't stand for it. You don't run the world." He walked by me like I wasn't there. He left the door open and in a minute the Judge came and pulled it shut and his face was hard as the stones in the cemetery."
Milam's story.
Enid's story.
"What happened next?" Max asked.
Enid shrugged. "I was out in the kitchen to help with lunch." A look of surprise touched her face. "Funny. I hadn't thought about it for years. But he was the only one who came to lunch."
"He?" Annie asked.
"The Judge. Ate all by himself, and he was mad as a wet hen. Later, after he died, I thought he'd given his heart a beating that day sure enough. Quarreling with first one, then another. It was after lunch—oh, more than an hour—that Ross came home. From school. He wasn't expected. I was surprised when I heard his voice—and he was upset, upset as he could be. I didn't understand all of it, but he was standing in the door of the study—just like Milam—and he was saying that he wouldn't go, that it was all wrong. It wasn't till later that I knew what he was talking about." Her eyes filled with anguish. "My cousin Eddie died over there. Just three weeks before it was all over." Unquenched anger burst out. "That's when I knew the government lied to us. They said we had to be there, that if we didn't stay, didn't fight, that all those countries over there would go Communist and we couldn't let that happen, that it would be bad trouble for us. But when the war ended, nothing happened! And finally I saw it for what it was—a big lie. All those soldiers died for nothing. That's when I stopped believing the government—ever." Tears glistened in her blazing eyes. "They put Eddie's name on a wall. Like that helped."
To Annie, that long-ago war was the stuff of history. And here was raw pain and unhealed bitterness flowing from that
history. For the first time, Annie understood on a personal level something of the misery and anger of those days. The shootings at Kent State crystallized the emotions of many Americans, including Ross Tarrant, who made a fateful decision.
"So Ross said he wouldn't go—he wouldn't die for nothing. Then he died anyway. And he was the Tarrant everybody loved. I can tell you, the tears in this house were for him. Not the Judge." Her voice was harsh.
"Do you think everybody knew about Ross's argument with his father?" Max asked thoughtfully.
"Oh, yes. You could have heard them from here to Bathsheba. The Judge's voice was terrible, like a winter wind." Enid didn't even try to mask her dislike.
"It must have broken Augustus's heart." Miss Dora's face softened with pity. "Ross was his favorite—because Ross always did everything right. To have Ross refuse to serve his country—I can imagine how Augustus felt."
But Annie wasn't focused on Augustus Tarrant and whatever disappointment he had felt over his son's decision. She was studying the bitter twist to Enid's mouth, the fury in her eyes. "Enid, when did the Judge offer to send you to college?"
Enid stood still and straight, her face suddenly empty of expression.
Annie attacked. "Was it before you found the key to that special box—or after?"
Annie would have sworn there was a flash of satisfaction in Enid's eyes, but it came and went so quickly she couldn't be certain.
"I came here to help," Enid snapped, "not to take the blame." She grabbed up her purse from a table crowded with wash powders and bleach and brushed past them.
Miss Dora called after her, "Wait now, Enid. We need you."
The only answer was the slam of the front door as it closed behind Enid.
"She blackmailed him!" Annie said urgently.
"It could be," Max said grimly. "It very well could be."Whitney, his brows drawn in a tight frown, stood stiffly by a post in the garage, irritation in every line of his body.