“Maybe that’s what the botched morphine injection was about. A failed attempt.”

Doris shakes her head stubbornly. “I’ve seen the medical reports. Viola was in bad shape, but not so bad that she couldn’t have injected the deep vein in her thigh. She knew how to do that.”

“Okay, then. What are you telling me?”

Doris takes a long drag on her cigarette, like a diver taking a deep breath before plunging off a cliff. “When I was nineteen years old, I got involved with a married man. One of my college professors. I was crazy in love. He made me promises, and I believed them. Maybe he meant them when he said the words . . . I don’t know. But anyway, one night I told a girlfriend about him. Lord, her eyes lit up like I’d told her the secret of eternal youth. I knew right then that I’d made a mistake. She was going to tell somebody the first chance she got. But I’d been drinking too much, and so had she. When I first told her, I may have halfway hoped she would tell. But later that night, I panicked. I realized how terrible the consequences would be for his family if she told anyone. For me, too. If my father and mother ever learned what I’d done, it would break their hearts. They’d never let me come home. Well . . . my friend had passed out by that time. She was lying on the floor, so drunk she couldn’t have woken up if the fire alarm went off.”

Doris is clearly reliving the moment as though she were there. “And?”

“For a few minutes . . . Penn, I thought about holding a pillow over her face until she stopped breathing.”

A chill rushes over my skin. “What?”

She nods slowly, almost defiantly. “Smothering the life out of her.”

“Bullshit.”

“I swear to God. In those few moments, I couldn’t bear the idea that the world would know what I’d done. My mother and father . . . my lover’s wife and children.”

“What stopped you?”

“Fear. That’s all. And maybe my upbringing. But that pillow was in my hands, boy. You hear me?”

I shake my head in denial, but Doris reaches out and squeezes my arm hard enough to hurt. “Listen to me. Any human being is capable of killing to keep their darkest secret from coming to light. Don’t lie to yourself about that.”

“So, you believe Dad could be guilty.”

“Of course. But Quentin’s job isn’t to find out whether or not Tom’s guilty. It’s to make sure he doesn’t go to jail. The rest is up to God.”

“You mean the jury.”

Doris shrugs like that’s the same thing.