“Noble,” she said. “I would not have expected it, knowing what I did about you, through Lillian, before … this.”

“Told tales on me, did she?” He took a straight from the basket on the end table and a match from the tin beside it.

“You certainly didn’t make your family’s life very easy. And it seems you continued the trend well into adulthood, affecting rather more people.”

He was glad of the straight; midway through lighting it, he could feign intense focus on the flame. If it had already been burning, he might have ripped it from his mouth to tear her up and down. As it was, he only inhaled sharply, making the tip of his cigarette flare.

“If you’re here to school me about my flaws,” he said, once the ember had caught, “let me assure you: I already have them memorized.”

“Good,” she said, and shuffled a clipped sheaf of papers to the bottom of her stack. “Less coaching.”

“Ms. Higata,” he said. “I’m not sure you understand—”

“That you’d rather hang? I think I’ve caught on by now. Lillian said you refused her offer to send you abroad. You could easily have gone. You could still easily go, though time is running out.”

“Frye hasn’t even been elected yet.”

“And you think Saeger will let this kitty sit on the table? There will be a reckoning no matter who takes the Cliff House. And here you sit on your sad, self-pitying rear, waiting to walk up the gallows stairs.”

He said nothing. Just drew on the straight.

“Dying will not fix what you did,” she told him.

Guilt crawled through him like black mold. “That isn’t the point.”

“What is?”

He looked at her, finally: a long, hard stare.

“Would you be satisfied,” she asked, “with life in prison?”

“What?”

“I said, would you be—”

“I heard you the first time.”

She put the folder on her knee, and placed her hands on it in a deliberate stack. “I told your sister I think I can keep your neck out of the noose.”

“You’re assuming I won’t plead guilty.”

“I’m not entirely sure they’ll let you. This is going to be a show trial; no plea bargains, no going quietly.”

“I wasn’t aiming for a plea bargain,” said Cyril. “I shot an innocent man in the back of the head.”

“And poisoned two others before that, yes. The Telegraph has the stories on microfiche. Anyway, those are criminal charges. You’ll have to deal with them sometime, but I doubt they’ll come up in this particular court. The point is you were hemmed into a corner. The last of many.”

“That doesn’t make it right.” Sacred arches, this woman was getting under his skin like splinters.