“Hire your own publicist and beat her to the punch.”

“Well, Susannah has a publicist, of course—all the Hollywood folks do. I could talk to him.”

“Ann is here. She knows the executive producer of 60 Minutes, and she’s willing to call him on your behalf. Tell your publicist that. You need to work out a plan with your guy both to punch and counterpunch. You’ve got to have an argument ready for every point she makes. And speaking as an attorney, you’d better be ready for a slander suit once she hears what you’re doing. She can outspend you.”

“Well, then, I’m going to have to let her throw the first punch,” Ed said. “After that, I’ll just be defending myself.”

“That won’t be enough, Ed, you’re going to have to destroy her, burn her to the ground.”

Ed was silent for a moment. “I can’t say I relish that thought,” he said.

“If you don’t do it to her, she’s going to do it to you. She’ll ruin your practice. And, while she’s at it, ruin your life.”

“She’s certainly capable of that.”

“She’s crazy, Ed, and you’re going to have to be the sane, sensible one while she’s making the wild allegations. You’ve got one important thing going for you: there’s a record of the things she’s done—her prison sentence as an accessory to murder, her theft of your money and escape to Mexico, the conviction down there of killing a policeman, her escape from a Mexican prison, and then the shooting at the Bel-Air. You’re going to have to turn her acquittal into a miscarriage of justice.”

“That’s exactly what it was,” Ed said. “I was astonished when she walked. I’ve also got the knife attack on me and the time I spent in the hospital on my side. Nobody has ever hurt Barbara.”

“It’s time to call Susannah’s publicist, and you’d better get some cash together, because hiring a publicist and conducting this kind of campaign is going to cost as much as it would cost to hire you to defend somebody.”

“I’d better get on it, then.”

“Keep me posted?”

“Sure.”

“I’ll be back in New York tomorrow night.” Stone hung up.

“I expect that call scared the shit out of Ed,” Ann said. “It certainly would me.”

“He’s taking it seriously. Luckily, Susannah already has a publicist.”

“Let me know when you want me to call 60 Minutes,” Ann said.

—

PAM HALE SAT in her cubicle at WSFO in San Francisco and read the transcript of Barbara Eagle’s murder trial in Los Angeles. Her friend Sherry, the meteorologist, stopped by. “You’ve been intense all morning,” she said. “What’s up?”

“I’m just reading about this woman, Barbara Eagle—or rather, Grosvenor.”