Chapter 23: The Danner Cheque

The criminal courthouse on Centre Street had forty-one steps, and by ten the next morning the press stood on every one.

Joan Danner stood on the top step, in the grey cardigan with the pearl buttons.

I stood beside her.

Eli was one step below us, with a leather folder, and he was looking at the street so I wouldn't see his face.

The cheque was in my hand.

It was the same one I had put on her kitchen table, folded once.

I had signed the line again that morning at my father's desk.

Thirty-one million dollars.

"Are you sure?" I asked her.

"No," Joan said. "Come on."

A van pulled up at the curb.

Two officers opened the back door, and Bryce stepped out between them in a borrowed suit that didn't fit.

His wrists were chained in front of him.

He had not shaved.

He lifted his head and saw the cameras, and then the top of the steps.

He saw us.

Every camera on the steps swung toward him.

"Mr. Danner! Mr. Danner, over here!"

The officers walked him up toward the doors.

He climbed slowly, staring at his mother.

Joan raised her hand.

"Stop," she said, not loudly.

Everything stopped.

The officer at Bryce's elbow looked at me, then at the detective in the grey raincoat, standing at the top of the steps.

The detective nodded once.

"One minute," he said.

Joan stepped down two stairs until she faced her son.

"Bryce," she said. "Look at me."

He looked.

"I want you to hear this," she said. "Because you spent twelve years believing nobody would ever say it."

She turned to me.

I walked down the last two steps to stand beside her.

I had written a speech.

I put it in my coat pocket.

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