Chapter 6: The Bolt on the Outside

The Keane compound in Miami had a wall, a gate and a guard at the gate who did not look at my face.

Desmond walked me through the front hall himself.

Two men carried Rory up the stairs on a chair.

He lay back in it with his eyes shut and one hand dangling, and he did not look at me once.

"Your rooms are in the east wing," Desmond said. "Quieter. You'll like the garden."

He opened the door of a long, pretty suite with white curtains.

I stepped in and looked at the door behind me.

The lock was on the outside.

There was a brass bolt at the height of my shoulder, and the screws were newer than the door.

"A convenience," Desmond said, following my eyes. "For wives who wander."

"And who wanders?"

"Nobody," he said. "Not since I put it in."

He smiled and left it open.

I stood at the window after he was gone.

A garden ran under it, with a gravel path and a fountain.

At the far end, a second window looked back at me from the same wing.

An old woman stood in it, in a faded blue cardigan, with both hands flat on the glass.

She was very thin and her hair was white.

She lifted one hand and pressed it closer, and I understood that she had been watching the gate.

That was Rory's mother.

The widow Desmond had kept in the east wing for fifteen years.

I raised my hand back, and she nodded.

At four o'clock Desmond brought the tea himself.

He set the tray down on Rory's bedside table in the master suite, with the silver pot and the same two cups.

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