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Back The Outside Man Save as PDF
Chapters (42)
  1. Cover Page
  2. EARLY BIRD BOOKS
  3. Praise for the Writing of Richard North Patterson
  4. Title Page
  5. Dedication
  6. Epigraph
  7. One
  8. Two
  9. Three
  10. Four
  11. Five
  12. Six
  13. Seven
  14. Eight
  15. Nine
  16. Ten
  17. Eleven
  18. Twelve
  19. Thirteen
  20. Fourteen
  21. Fifteen
  22. Sixteen
  23. Seventeen
  24. Eighteen
  25. Nineteen
  26. Twenty
  27. Twenty-one
  28. Twenty-two
  29. Twenty-three
  30. Twenty-four
  31. Twenty-five
  32. Twenty-six
  33. Twenty-seven
  34. Twenty-eight
  35. Twenty-nine
  36. Thirty
  37. Thirty-one
  38. Thirty-two
  39. Thirty-three
  40. Thirty-four
  41. Thirty-five
  42. About the Author

“You’re forgetting that I know Otis Lee may be innocent. And you or your wife, guilty.”

“It wasn’t rape, Shaw. That means in theory it could be anyone: me, Jason, Joanne, this man Lee—or Henry Cantwell.” He pronounced the name bitterly.

“No one will believe your wife.”

His look was keen. “Think about what she told you. She didn’t see Cantwell, although that makes the best story. She saw his car. The police say there was no break-in. After Cantwell called Lydia no one saw him until the next morning. Except Joanne. Her testimony could send Henry Cantwell to the electric chair. And that’s why you’ll leave us out of it and the black man in jail. Because it’s practical.”

“That’s already been done,” I shot back. “To Lee’s father. You’re a bloodless prick and your wife’s story is horseshit. If it weren’t, you’d be tripping over me to nail Henry Cantwell for killing the woman you were supposed to love.”

“Don’t judge me, Shaw.” Mooring’s eyes turned bright and angry. “I hate Henry Cantwell more than you can dream. But Lydia’s gone now. I have other obligations—things that don’t concern you. There’s no one, ever, who can truly judge another person’s life, and I won’t have you judge mine. All you need to know is that your friend’s a murderer. You see,” he finished softly, “we are at the country club. You’ve come here, and we’ve just made a deal.”

A golfer laughed in the hallway. Mooring’s stare was utterly composed. I stood without speaking, and left.

Twenty-two

TWENTY-TWO

I left the parking lot driving too fast until I forced myself to slow down and think. But it was almost by instinct that I stopped at a telephone booth and called Jason Cantwell’s.

No one answered. Cradling the still-ringing phone, I checked my watch and read one-thirty. I had less than three hours to decide what I could tell Rayfield. Nora Culhane would have to wait. I drove to Jason’s and parked a half-block away.

An hour passed in the heat of the car before the woman appeared, striding loose-limbed with a grocery bag slung on her hip, hair bouncing as she walked. I waited until she was inside the building, then took the stairs up and knocked.

When the door unlatched, her wide, turquoise eyes peered frightenedly through a three-inch crack with a chain across. “I need to talk to you,” I said.

She shrank back. “Jason might come home.”

“I won’t take long. Please, you might save someone from being hurt. Maybe you.”