I watched him climb as the shape of his future came to me. The quiet he had cherished here would build until it screamed. Gawkers would nose their cars up the drive, and people who didn’t would claim to know him—or Lydia or Jason—and to remember some telling incident. And if the killer weren’t found, someone, to liven up a party, would mention Henry: “He was always so quiet, so much to himself.…” He reached the top of the stairs, and disappeared.

“You can have him at four,” Cade was saying. “Assuming it won’t be a media event.”

Rayfield’s lips were an angry line. “We’ll do what’s proper.”

“Good.” Cade was once again crisp. “I take it you’re through here.”

The almost insulting slowness of Rayfield’s look at Cade lent the lingering sense of some deeper, more obscure conflict than that between police and lawyer. “We’re through,” he finally answered. Leaving, he snapped, “Check the neighbors,” to someone at the door, and slammed it behind him.

Cade and I stood alone. “Henry’s in no shape to be questioned,” I said.

He gave me a gelid stare. “Do you think I like this? But it won’t help him to wait and suffer. This way the police will grant us some consideration.”

“Not Rayfield. There’s something wrong about him.”

“Yes. He’s a policeman.”

I ignored that. “A couple of times I wondered if he knew Henry somehow, or you.”

“Why would he?” Cade said disdainfully. “Henry’s not a criminal, and I’m not a criminal lawyer.”

“That’s a second thing that bothers me. We should bring in the Danelaw firm, someone who does this kind of work.”

“Henry wants us, not some knit-suited showoff.” I sensed Cade trying to regain initiative lost in the matter of the will. “You needn’t participate if you think that’s such a mistake. I haven’t asked you to.”

We faced each other. Unspoken were the last four years of tacit avoidance, the finding of work with other projects and partners, other clients than Cade’s. “Henry’s my friend, Roland.”

Cade shrugged dismissingly. “Meet me, then. Just don’t upset Kris Ann.”

There was nothing more—no instructions, confidences, or requests for help. Cade began pacing the sitting room. I said goodbye, got in the car, and drove, past the black Mercedes and away from Cade, the pines, the silent house, the chemical smell of death.

Four

FOUR

I reached the street of oaks and sloping lawns and white-trimmed Georgian homes before I knew what I wanted.

Kris Ann’s Audi—a gift from Cade to match his own—sat in the rear garage. I parked beside it, walking through the backyard and between the house and the overgrown lot next door until I reached the front porch.